{"id":10328,"date":"2007-03-27T11:20:32","date_gmt":"2007-03-27T15:20:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/10328.html"},"modified":"2007-03-27T11:20:32","modified_gmt":"2007-03-27T15:20:32","slug":"lets-hope-north-korea-attacks-on-a-sunny-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/lets-hope-north-korea-attacks-on-a-sunny-day\/","title":{"rendered":"Let’s hope North Korea attacks on a sunny day"},"content":{"rendered":"

In July, the Washington Examiner ran an item<\/a> that said the U.S. has a system in place that “is poised to shoot down anything launched from [tag]North Korea[\/tag] that threatens the American homeland or the critical interests of our regional allies like Japan and Australia.” This development, the piece argued, has led long-time skeptics to become “noticeably absent,” as if our defenses have finally reached a point that proves the merit behind the missile-defense idea.<\/p>\n

Around the same time, I saw one far-right blog argue<\/a> that the Pentagon’s decision to turn on the [tag]missile defense[\/tag] system is proof that “liberals were on the wrong side of history.” The post went on to say, “If not for Ronald Reagan, and his vision and leadership, we would now be at the mercy of that lunatic in North Korea.”<\/p>\n

As it turns out, while the lunatic was poised to start testing his missiles, our miraculous, life-saving defense system was having some trouble. Apparently, it was raining<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Torrential rains wiped out a quarter of the U.S.’ intercontinental ballistic missile interceptors in Ft. Greely, Alaska last summer — right when North Korea was preparing to carry out an advanced missile launch, according to documents obtained by the Project On Government Oversight.<\/p>\n

“The flooding occurred during a three-week period between the end of June and early July 2006,” POGO notes, in a statement. “The flooding damaged 25% of the U.S. interceptor missiles’ launch capability. These silos house the interceptor missiles that would be used to attempt to intercept a missile aimed at the United States. No interceptors were in the flooded silos.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Noah Shachtman asked<\/a>, “What exactly are we getting, for the $9 billion a year we’re paying for missile defense? And why can’t it take a little<\/strike> (ok, a whole bunch of) rain?”
\n
\nConservative bravado about already being prepared to “shoot down anything launched from [tag]North Korea[\/tag]” has always been misplaced. <\/p>\n

Indeed, as recently as August, as Kim Jung Il was poised to show off his missiles, U.S. officials were still testing whether the defense system was capable of spotting<\/i> a target, not hitting<\/i> it.<\/p>\n

This, coupled by the story about the rain, is a reminder of just how little this program has actually produced<\/a>.<\/p>\n

* The Pentagon’s Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system hasn’t successfully intercepted a missile<\/a> since October of 2002…. And the last two times it tried to hit an oncoming missile, the interceptor didn’t even leave the ground<\/strong>. Things have gotten so bad that the Missile Defense Agency’s independent review team concluded last year that more tests may only undermine the GMD’s value as a deterrent.”<\/p>\n

* A recent Pentagon Inspector General report<\/a> found that security vulnerabilities are so serious<\/strong> “that the agency and its contractor, Boeing, may not be able to prevent misuse of the system<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

* “A little-noticed study by the Government Accountability Office issued in March found that program officials were so concerned with potential flaws<\/a> in the first nine interceptors now in operation that they considered taking them out of their silos and returning them to their manufacturer for ‘disassembly and remanufacture.'”<\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Just to be clear, I’d be thrilled if we had an effective defense system that could shoot down threatening missiles. But we don’t, and the one we’re working on may never offer a realistic defense. That doesn’t mean critics of the system are “on the wrong side of history”; it just means we’re the ones paying attention to whether the darn thing actually works.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In July, the Washington Examiner ran an item that said the U.S. has a system in place that “is poised to shoot down anything launched from [tag]North Korea[\/tag] that threatens the American homeland or the critical interests of our regional allies like Japan and Australia.” This development, the piece argued, has led long-time skeptics to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10328\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}