"Fireball, Fireball, Fireball!"

So blared the intercoms (audio) aboard the USS Lake Erie, alerting the crew to a ballistic missile launch in their patrol area near Hawaii yesterday. Scrambling to their battlestations, the veterans of February's toxic satellite shootdown locked on to the screaming SCUD as it arced through the atmosphere, and quickly launched a salvo of two SM-2 missiles from the Aegis cruiser's forward bays:

"Mark India!" (mark intercept)

Unlike the modified SM-3 hit-to-kill kinetic interceptor launched against the failing spy satellite, this time the Lake Erie fired already-deployed SM-2 interceptors, the Navy's standard air defense missile. It uses an explosive fragmentation warhead to destroy its targets --- which explains the two explosions in the video, the first is the intercept and the other is the second SM-2 self-destructing (range safety!).

The purpose of this test was to demonstrate the Navy's capability to engage ballistic missiles in their terminal phase with off-the-shelf munitions. Think of it as a floating Patriot PAC-3 battery --- our very last chance to splash an incoming missile before it reaches its target city, base or troops in the field:

Over the next 20 months, the military plans to install terminal-phase missile interception capability on all 18 Navy ships equipped with Aegis ballistic missile defenses, Hicks said.

He said the technology would give commanders more options to defend against missiles, particularly if the Patriot missile defense system — a land-based technology designed to shoot down missiles in their final phase of flight — was unavailable.

"If I don't have a Patriot nearby on a shore station to do a short-range threat, near the defended area, I have nothing," Hicks said. "The flexibility of having a ship to complement the Patriot, or to be there when it can't be, is very high on a warfighter priority."

This now-proven Aegis capability complements the short-range Patriots and the longer range THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) batteries, the first of which was just activated (Alpha Battery, 4th Air Defense Artillery Regiment, 11th Air Defense Brigade, 32nd Army Air & Missile Defense Command).

And where did that target SCUD come from? Well, Steven Segal fans, from a decommissioned amphibious assault ship, of course:

The ballistic missile had been fired from the decommissioned helicopter carrier USS Tripoli about 250 miles northwest of Kauai....The Tripoli, which was decommissioned in 1996, also was used as a mobile launch platform last year.

Here's the Tripoli in fighting trim, during three tours of Vietnam and the lead Marine assault ship during peacekeeping operations in Somalia:

And here she is being towed out of San Francisco in her new role as floating launchpad. Note the upright radar dishes and the big tent aft --- that's where the target missile resides:

It's nice to know that the Bauer-esque scenario of a rusty freighter anchored off Chesapeake Bay lobbing first-generation ballistic missiles into the heart of DC has just been tested as well. Well done!

While these successful tests are starting to get old for us missile defense guys, others are certain that these "unproven missile defense systems" should be scrapped ASAP:

UPDATE: Thanks, Ace, Jawas, STACLU, and Doubleplusundead.

UPDATE: To clarify the SM-2's being "off-the-shelf," I meant that the Navy has about 100 SM-2 Block IV missiles in inventory, ready to go. These SAM's were not originally designed for ballistic defense duty, but have been modified for that role. The distinction I was making was between this new stockpile and the heavily modified, one-of-a-kind SM-3 that took down the spy satellite.

UPDATE: Thanks, Free Constitution --- check out his kickass Obama/missile defense remix. Also, Redstate and the bot(?) at the NY Times' Blogrunner.

Comments

[EC]

Cuffy, should I be buying stock in your company right now?

I've got mouths to feed at home, and striking it rich could help!

[Cuffy Meigs]

I'd wait til after the election, EC. I'll be a resident of Ace's Hobo Safari if Obama wins...

[EC]

Goddammit, Cuffy! You're not very reassuring.

What's the first stop on the safari? Detroit?

[Cuffy Meigs]

After Obama swings the axe there will be about 10,000 missile defense engineers cum vagrants working on new systems to evade Ace's advanced pool-cue cranial assault technology.

[geoff]

Congratulations, Cuffy.

And yes, if Obama is elected I'll probably be hurting, too. The funny part is that his foreign policy will create a huge need for the military that he slashes.

[DrFooMod2]

If this islamo-fascist gets elected, I'm moving to Vancouver.