Shooting Down A Simulated Intercontinental Ballistic Missile

The anti-missile system Aegis onboard the USS Jon Finn got to “protect” Hawaii and shot down a simulated ICBM missile. This is a big success.

Image by WikiImages from Pixabay

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When it comes to nuclear weapons and threats it was somewhat simple during the Cold War. All the United States needed to do was get rid of the threats coming from the Soviets and that was it. But nowadays, the American military needs defensive systems that are practical, flexible, and can be easily coordinated to cover all the complex nuclear threats of the 21st century.

It was exactly such a system that the world got to see in action just a few days ago. On the 16th November 2020, the American Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and the US Navy did a breakthrough test of defense against Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBMs). And it was a success. The Arleigh Burke-class destroyer USS John Finn shot down a simulated ICMB rocket RIM-161 Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA on the edge of space. The missile was the newest variant of the Standard Missile-3 that are being used by the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense System.

The simulated ICBM launched from the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site in the Marshall Islands. It flew over the ocean north-east from the Hawaiian Islands. The test was labeled Flight Test Aegis Weapon System-44 and it was the sixth test of the SM-3 Block IIA rocket

In this particular test, the US Navy got to try out defending Hawaii. The simulated attacking rocket was first observed by the Command and Control Battle Management Communications (C2BMC) network that is part of the anti-missile defense system Ballistic Missile Defense System (BMDS). The main purpose of the test was to find out if a surface-to-air SM-3 missile that was designed to defend against short and mid-range ballistic missiles will also successfully defend against an intercontinental ballistic missile.

According to Jon Hill – the director of MDA – this test was an amazing success and a major breakthrough in developing the new missile SM-3 Block IIA. The long-term goal of the US anti-missile defense is to empower the somewhat problematic terrestrial defense system Ground-based Midcourse Defense by adding more sensors and weapon systems to it.

The end goal is to allow to anti-missile defense to react to any potential unexpected development in the area of nuclear threats. The successful test shows that the United States are capable of decently easily enhancing their defense against an intercontinental nuclear attack.

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