U.S. Interceptor Destroys Missile

In a boost for President Bush's hopes to build a defense against ballistic missile attack, the Defense Department scored a hit Saturday with an interceptor that soared into space from a tiny Pacific isle and destroyed its target, a mock nuclear warhead.

It was the first test of the "hit-to-kill" technology the administration hopes will become a key element of a missile defense network. Of three previous tests in 1999 and 2000, two failed and one succeeded.

"The early indication we have is that everything worked," Air Force Lt. Gen. Ronald Kadish, director of the Pentagon's missile defense programs, told a news conference less than an hour after the intercept.

Reuters

President Bush's reaction to the test.

Asked upon his return from Camp David Sunday by a reporter what he thought about the missile test, President Bush flashed two thumbs up.

Kadish said the next test, scheduled for October, might include some additional complexities such as adding more decoys, which in an actual attack would be used to attempt to fool the missile interceptor.

At 11:09 p.m. EDT, exactly the scheduled moment of collision between the interceptor and the warhead, an enormous white flash appeared at the planned impact point 144 miles above the earth's surface.

Military officials said minutes later that their tracking data showed a direct hit.

Reuters

The launch of the Minuteman

The interceptor missile was launched from Kwajalein 21 minutes after its target, a modified Minuteman II intercontinental-range missile equipped with a mock warhead, roared toward the heavens from a launch pad 4,800 miles aay at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.

Navigating by the stars and by information transmitted from a ground station on Kwajalein, the interceptor's weapon, known as a "kill vehicle," rammed the mock warhead. The force of impact obliterated the warhead, thus the term "hit-to-kill," as distinct from other approaches such as detonating an explosive in the flight path of the target.

The "kill vehicle," a 120-pound device with its own propulsion, communications, infrared seeker and guidance and control systems, separated from the rocket booster as planned and reached the planned impact point in space about eight minutes after the launch from Kwajalein.

The Coast Guard and Air Force arrested four Greenpeace environmental activists after they swam to shore from an inflatable raft moored off the central California coast, said Air Force Sgt. Rebecca Bonilla. The arrests delayed the launch by two minutes, she said.

The swimmers were among a small Greenpeace group who tried unsuccessfully to stop the launch, said Carol Gregory, a spokeswoman for the group.

Critics among America's allies say the tests could trigger another arms race, reports CBS News Correspondent Sam Litzinger. Defense expert Chris Bellamy at Britain's Cranfield University doesn't buy the argument that the system is needed to defend against missile attacks from rogue states.

"The fact is that if somebody wanted to put a weapon of mass effect — nuclear, biological or chemical — in Washington, the best way to do it would be in a suitcase in a truck, and not to put it on the end of a missile," he said.

Russia on Sunday denounced the test and accused Washington of threatening to undermine global disarmament treaties.

"The Russians are extremely concerned that this will not only allow perhaps the United States to throw its weight around while being invulnerable to counter-attack, but also will mess up the whole balance of nuclear deterrence which has held for 30 years," said Cranfield University's Bellamy.

In South Korea, some 1,000 demonstrators clashed with police at a U.S. bombing range, calling for Seoul to reject any role in the planned system.

Washington has used the threat of "rogue states" such as North Korea to underscore the need for a missile shield, although some Asian nations fear the plan could spur China to expand its missile arsenal.

Chinese President Jiang Zemin, a fierce opponent of the plan, was visiting Moscow later on Sunday for talks with Russian leaders.

In China itself, the official Xinhua news agency gave a factual report on U.S. missile test, quoting a Pentagon statement on its success, and concluded:

"Arms control experts said that the U.S. missile defense plan, opposed by the international community, will not only spark a new arms race, but also threaten world peace and security, and stimulate nuclear proliferation."

Less was riding on the outcome of Saturday's test than a year ago, when a failed interept sealed President Clinton's decision to put off initial steps toward deploying a national missile defense.

Mr. Bush has made clear he would proceed with an accelerated testing program regardless of the outcome Saturday.

The successful intercept provides a political boost for a project that some congressional Democrats believe risks upsetting relations with Russia and China, and has the potential to create a new arms race.

Failure would not have derailed the effort. It was just the first in a series of tests the administration hopes will produce at least a rudimentary defense against long-range missiles by 2004.

"We expect successes and we expect failures in this high technology that we're using," Kadish said Friday.

Mr. Bush has asked Congress for $8.3 billion to finance missile defense research and testing in 2002, a $3 billion increase over this year. Saturday's test was to cost about $100 million, Kadish said.

The last such missile intercept test, on July 8, 2000, was a stunning failure. The interceptor launched from Kwajalein but the kill vehicle failed to separate from its rocket booster. As a result, the kill vehicle never saw the target.

An October 1999 effort succeeded while a January 2000 test failed.

Kadish said the Pentagon has mapped out a more frequent schedule of tests, including four to six over the next 18 months.

The expanded testing program, described in detail to Congress by Pentagon officials for the first time last week, drew strong criticism from missile defense skeptics at home and abroad.

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