US Navy close to getting interceptors that could stop ICBMs

WASHINGTON • The Pentagon's No. 2 official has ordered 11 missile interceptors for possible deployment on US Navy ships after a test in November indicated they could stop an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM).

In the test, the USS John Finn intercepted a mock ICBM intended to simulate one that could be launched at Hawaii by North Korea. The destroyer, operating near Hawaii, fired off one of the Standard Missile-3 model Block IIA interceptors built by Raytheon Technologies at the target launched from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands.

Deputy Defence Secretary Kathleen Hicks informed Congress of her rationale for transferring the interceptors for possible deployment on Navy ships in the Pacific or European regions, but did not disclose it publicly.

"The missiles have conducted successful intercept tests and their deployment is in the important interest of our national security," Ms Hicks' spokesman Jamal Brown said in an e-mail this month. The transfer to the Navy would mark the first major missile defence initiative of the Biden administration.

Although the Navy's Aegis combat system, which launched the missile, and the interceptor "were not designed to defeat an ICBM-class target, this test demonstrated some potential limited capability", Vice-Admiral Jon Hill, director of the Missile Defence Agency, said in testimony to Congress last week.

The Block IIA is the latest model in the Standard Missile family of weapons. Earlier versions are now the Navy's primary surface-to-air defensive system against short-, medium-and intermediate-range ballistic missiles threats. The IIA has increased range, more sensitive seeker technology, and an advanced "kill vehicle" or warhead, to intercept medium-and intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

Congressional supporters mandated the November test to determine the missile's capabilities to intercept an ICBM.

A month before Ms Hicks' directive, the Government Accountability Office cautioned that integrating the missile into a "layered" homeland defence against ICBMs "could introduce considerable cost, schedule and performance uncertainty to a programme that just entered initial production". ICBM interceptions are "more challenging" than the interception of intermediate-range missiles for which the Block IIA was designed, the watchdog said in its annual assessment.

The new missile is being developed jointly with Japan. Congress in 2019 cleared the sale to Japan of as many as 73 of the new version in a potential US$3.2 billion (S$4.3 billion) sale.

BLOOMBERG