A friend sends this link from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, suggesting that despite the US refusal to consider shooting down a North Korean rocket, the Japanese may do it anyway.
Japan has begun moving Patriot guided missiles to the country’s north-east to possibly shoot down a North Korean rocket. … Tokyo is threatening to shoot the North Korean rocket down if it threatens Japanese territory. Meanwhile the US Defence Secretary Robert Gates says the US has no plans to shoot down the missile if the test goes ahead.
But given the nature of the missile system referred to here — Patriot, whose interception envelope occurs when the incoming projectile is in its terminal phase — this will probably only happen as a last resort, if the North Korean is seen headed for Japan. The US refusal to engage the North Korean missile, which may have left Japan with no option but to consider a unilateral response, is an intriguing development. The conceptual lid on Japanese rearmament has always been the tacit assurance that Big Brother USA would take care of Nippon. And although the Japanese government would probably prefer to see the North Korean missile, if it went awry, engaged on an alliance basis, no responsible government in Tokyo would be without an insurance plan in the event the Dear Leader’s missile accidentally, or accidentally on purpose, veered towards the home islands.
The PAC-3 upgrade carried with it a new missile design, nominally known as MIM-104F and called PAC-3 by the Army. The PAC-3 missile dedicated almost entirely to the anti-ballistic missile mission. Miniaturization has made the PAC-3 missile much smaller than the previous Patriot missiles; a single “can” (canister) now holds four missiles where one was once held. The PAC-3 missile is also much more maneuverable than previous variants, thanks to dozens of tiny rocket motors mounted in the forebody of the missile (called ACMs, or Attitude Control Motors). However, the most significant upgrade to the PAC-3 missile is the addition of a Ka band active radar seeker. This allows the missile to drop its uplink to the system and acquire its target itself in the terminal phase of its intercept, which improves the reaction time of the missile against a fast-moving ballistic missile target; the PAC-3 missile is accurate enough to select, target, and home in on the warhead portion of an inbound ballistic missile. The active radar also gives the warhead a “hit-to-kill” capability that completely removes the need for a traditional proximity-fused warhead. This greatly increases the lethality against ballistic missiles of all types.
The PAC-3 upgrade has effectively quintupled the “footprint” that a Patriot unit can defend against ballistic missiles of all types, and has considerably increased the system’s lethality and effectiveness against ballistic missiles. It has also increased the scope of ballistic missiles that Patriot can engage, which now includes several intermediate range. However, despite its increases in ballistic missile defence capabilities, the PAC-3 missile is a less capable interceptor of atmospheric aircraft and air-to-surface missiles. It is slower, has a shorter range, and has a smaller explosive warhead compared to older Patriot missiles (although it generally relies on its kinetic “hit to kill” warhead).
At this rate we will see at least 4 new nuclear powers by the end of Obama’s administration.
Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Japan.
Derek
Those traits make PAC-3 really a whole new missile disguised as an evolution of the art.
H’s gambits will almost certainly trigger an arms breakout in Japan, Taiwan, Korea and even Vietnam.
I’d expect that the first three will get the bomb soon if they don’t have it already.
H has fecklessly upended decades of non-proliferation effort.
His theme tune: Go Your Own Way (You’re on your own)
wretchard,
Being one who loves physics and mathematics, but who has no expertise in this particular field, I am truly impressed by the progress that has been made in the past two decades.
But I remain puzzled by the left’s dismissal of, and opposition to, this wonderful and promising technology.
Is it just residual hatred of Reagan and his Star Wars ambitions?
Jamie Irons
Jamie – If the USA isn’t totally defenseless, totally supine, why, there’s always the chance some deranged right-winger might stand up and oppose our overlords….successfully.
These folks are so full of loathing for their country and themselves that they dare not leave any stone unturned to secure our submission. I doubt even the mullahs hate us as much.
The Left views themselves as the Eloi.
Everyone else is either a serf or a Morlock.
Rush = Morlock
illegal immigrant = serf
Google executive = Eloi
The Eloi are simply beyond the need to do, to perform, to research, to think. They have their bible — it’s loose leaf can comes every sunday on the porch: NYT.
No longer believing in God they are free to believe anything.
It’s a wonderful, superior world to dream in. Why leave it now?
Dr. Irons,
My suspicion (I did not stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night, either), is that the intellectual Left always thought (in the 1980′s) that BMD against a massive Soviet Threat was foolhardy because of the complexity of intercepts and battle management that was required. Some years later (the early 90′s, I think) the Los Alamos National Lab unveiled an incredibly powerful (for its time) parallel processing computer that could be part of the battle management system that was guffawed by the Smart People.
There are numerous more examples of this sort of thing.
The bottom line, in my way of thinking, is that it CAN be done, but it also requires the WILL to be done. If there is no will to accomplish this sort of thing, it will always remain out of reach.
If you are philosphically opposed to such a system or set of systems, you can find plenty of niggling arguments to demean the intent and purpose. The final purpose, in fact, is deterence. If the existence of ballistic missile defence creates so much doubt in the eyes of the adversary, then they may never launch their ballistic missiles, because we could shrug off the attack and inflict retalliation at our leisure, if ever (or in measured amounts).
I’ve read literally the Party Line (from ex-Soviet Russians) that of course, American ballistic missile defense can’t work, but the real purpose is to foster even stronger offensive weapons. Huh? How does developing the PAC-3 or SM-3 or THAD improve offensive threats. Totally different technology.
But this is the mindset of those that oppose the use of BMD, on moral grounds, of course. Because it’s for the children. Or something.
Let’s hope Oahu doesn’t get incinerated next week. Or Wasilla, Alaska. Maybe the whole thing will be a dud.
Chances are that the North Korean missile will be a puny affair, but given that extortion is Pyongyang’s national industry, it is important to their future cashflow as nothing else is. Perhaps the North Koreans should not have been told anything one way or the other about US intent, leaving them to take their chances of losing the missile if they went ahead and fired it. That would still have left open the option of engaging the missile if it threatened to hit a populated area.
As it is, they know that the US won’t engage it. That means they can be that little extra bit provocative. Why? Remember that extortion is their national industry and the more menacing they can be without actually going to war the better for their little business.
What I can’t quite get my mind around is the exact link-up between (1) left-wing pacifism and at bottom moral will-less cowardice, and (2) dhimmitude. I intuit that psychologically there is a connection, which may be at least partially a relation between “base” (dhimmitude) and “super-structure” (rationalized cowardice).
I keep thinking back to the Muslim conquests during the middle ages, all of which were done by strictly terroristic methods: “We kill everyone without mercy who opposes us, and to conquer us you must be willing to die because we will never yield in our purpose, which is to force all peoples into submission to us (read: “Allah”) and we are willing to die to do this.” Confronted with armies that took no prisoners, the Hungarians at Vienna and the Franks under Charles Martel opted for decimation: kill them all was the only solution.
Now: just think about these kinds of thoughts percolating through the brains of people like Clinton, Biden, Obama, and their ilk. They cannot, will not, will not ever be able to think these thoughts. My friends, I give you the enemy.
We need to nix the extortions-R-us franchise the KFR has established.
Completely fumbling the football might accidentally work.
If South Korea develops its own nuclear armory then Kim’s game is through. Certainly his conventional arsenal of howitzers across the DMZ will no longer confer any clout. Neutron warheads and short flight missiles would shut off any bombardment in very short order indeed.
Once the nuclear threshold was crossed the South would march north nuking at will. Within no time the KFR would be extinguished and the Chinese would be faced with their own Dirty Harry moment. Do they feel lucky about intervening into the new, nuclear Korean civil war? Well, would they?
Sabotage on the launch pad is technically not an intercept but I dont think that is what “smart power” Hillary has in mind. Didnt we discuss burning a hole in the booster with a laser during or after the last launch?
blert @2:
“H has fecklessly upended decades of non-proliferation effort.”
Yup, and he seems to be dedicated to the active destruction of the USA. That is the only way I can read his feckless actions since 1/20/09.
In an odd way the left is profoundly reactionary. Missile defense, if it works at all, is a game changing technology. The russians saw it as such, and their reaction to it was one of the series of events that led to their downfall. The comfortable world where the US was constrained by an equal is gone, and missile defense would prevent a reoccurance of the stalemate. The Democratic party’s best years were the social liberal and Scoop Jackson defense stance. Even the ‘realist’ type moves we are seeing right now, Syria, talks with Russia and Iran about Afghanistan, etc. are an attempt to reconstruct the rolodex diplomacy of the glory days.
It didn’t work, and is profoundly dangerous, but it’s the game they play well.
Derek
And today Petraeus says Iran is two years away from a nuclear weapon. I really have to figure out how to get an updatable crisis world up going. All the Cold War territories are getting extremely provocative lately.
Kamikaze Zionist Drone
Obama Economics is making it financially impossible for the US to extend its power to the Indian Ocean. Thus, the Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese, etc. are – I am sure – already gearing up for the coming brawl with China. And India.
This was going to happen anyway, as the Boomers retire and their pension plans, public and private, collapse under that tsunami. Obama and his crew, however, are weakening America at warp speed.
I can see a much diminished America by 2012.. and very likely, Petraeus doing a Julius Caesar on the ex-republic. The US Military is the only cohesive organization capable of taking over after the coming shambles.
heathermc:
Slow Learner Noonan calls it “Postprosperity America”
(After endorsing a Marxist for President)
Wonkette indulges in a bit of sarcasm @ Pretty Petty Peggy’s expense.
There’s No Pill for This Kind of Depression – Peggy Noonan
Wonkette – Peggy Noonan Wanders Upper East Side, Discovers Economic Depression
Our new home is postprosperity America; the old one was the abundance; we miss it. But he also detected a political dimension to his patients’ anguish. He felt that many see our leaders as “selfish and dishonest,” that “our institutions have been revealed as incompetent and undependable.” People feel “unled, overwhelmed,” the situation “seemingly unsalvageable.” The net result? He thinks what he is seeing, within and without his practice, is a “psychological pandemic of fear” as to the future of things—of our country, and even of mankind.
This is a bit OT, but I see President Obama just fired the head of GM — so he can be decisive as well as divisive. It occurs to me that if Grover Cleveland had the foresight to fire Thomas Edison the world would not face extinction because of Global Warming. And if Taft had only fired Henry Ford, there would be no SUV.
It’s good to see we are finally getting things right (or is it up ended?). Perhaps we can have President Obama select the next 007. I don’t particularly care for the current one. I see no reason why such an important decision should be left to the producers and directors.
After that he can judge dancing with the stars.
Not to fear!
I am sure that the Obama Administration has swung smartly into action.
Very soon we will be hearing the following Public Service Announcements on radio and TV:
“Attention! This is a test of the Emergency Broadcast System. In the event of an actual emergency you would have been instructed to hold hands with your neighbors and sing ‘I’d like to buy the world a Coke…’
This has been an announcement from the Semi Adult Guidance Environment.”
Heathermc:
I’ve had something of the same speculation, though not with Petraeus as necessarily the leader. Part of the trouble is that the only military take-overs we are familiar with are those in countries where democracy has little to no foothold. Now any government that the U. S. military is going to move against is going to be one that’s elected–and that’s where the rub is likely to occur. A U. S. where a crucial part of the population no longer has any respect for the electoral process–because (e.g.) ACORN and its clones have succeeded to doing what they want to do, i.e., precisely discrediting the electoral process itself–might support a carefully-crafted ousting of a president whose election credentials are eroded by way of a phony election. Any candidates for such a president and such an election? I suggest time present. Obama is going to have to shed his leftist support, or he’s doomed. The interesting thing is, he just might do that if push came to shove. It would indeed be entertaining watching him maneuver into the leading position in a parade of the U. S. military down 5th avenue, as he tries to co-opt the takeover. I think he’d be perfectly capable to imagining such an action if the “opportunity” every arose.
Heathermc @15: *I can see a much diminished America by 2012.. and very likely, Petraeus doing a Julius Caesar on the ex-republic. The US Military is the only cohesive organization capable of taking over after the coming shambles.*
Yes, but he may be able to destroy the military by 2012, at the rate he’s going. International war crimes trials, including Petraeus, as well as drastic de-funding, may go along way toward that end by 2012. Meanwhile, the civilian defense force may be built up considerably by then, given how *unfair* it is how much money the military has gotten over many decades.
My guess is that we are not going to shoot it down because we know our enemies will be watching and looking to take the measure of our ballistic missile defense system. Best not to tip our hand, because you can bet that Chinese, Iranian, and Russian advisers are watching this test. I would be very surprised if that were not the case.
Gosh I’d hate to see that happen, heathermc. And the sooner the better.
If I was the Republican Governor of Hawaii I would react to Obama’s failure to respond to a ballistic missile targeted on my state by marching down to the Hall of Records and personally fishing his birth certificate out of the file. While the Governor of Hawaii has no meaningful relation with active duty forces that could help to defend against such a threat, other than invoking Article IV section 4 clause 2 of the Constitution, the Governor of Alaska does. A potential conflict between Sarah Palin and Barack Obama could happen if she directs active duty Guard forces to defend her state and Obama federalizes the troops to prevent them from doing so. Lyndon Johnson did that to force through desegregation and the Guard obeyed him.
Let’s be a little careful in our comments please. I think anything can be discussed as a hypothetical, but let’s not sail too close to the wind.
“Lyndon Johnson did that to force through desegregation and the Guard obeyed him.”
Don’t you mean Ike?
Voltimand/#8; maybe those three states-of-being are actually hierarchical, in which case this semiotics scale might help find the pattern. You’d need to figure out which is or isn’t dependent on one or the other.
If we really have an airborne laser capable of hitting this thing then now is the time to use it and claim we didn’t (if anyone asks).
Best case would be if it blew up on the pad.
A “potential conflict” between Sarah Palin and Obama?
I agree with Wretchard, such an hypothetical is a little too windward of leeward.
But back to the isle, perhaps there is magical thinking, that an errant telephone pole might six all the docs.
Gentlemen, gentlemen. George Washington himself forever (in my humble opinion) removed the threat of military coups in the US. The story of his shaming the officiers who were meeting to plan such a takeover is the stuff of legends, and one that the cemented the ideal of the US Military of being under civilian control. Add in too the spector of the Civil War and I think most of the rank and file, the junior officiers and the senior officials would fight tooth and nail against such an attempt. I think as civilians we too should oppose any such notion. The success of the United States is in large part because the military is slave of the civil authorities, not the other way around. I for one do not want an American Caesar.
James R,
My apologies I was thinking of the next point and made a fool of myself. Thank you for the correction.
My assumption is that our host was referring to other commentators speculating about an alteration to our government under the Turkish model, not to my consideration of the role of State Governors under Article IV.
Tarsman, Concur.
If anyone will confront Obama in a constitutional crisis it will be someone from the Democrats in Congress. Remember the Republicans in Congress told Nixon when it was time to go. It is unfortunate that in Pelosi and Reid we have two of the worst examples of ignorant political hackery that ever disgraced their two offices. While the office of the Vice President and President of the Senate has not been exactly distinguished in American History Biden represents a modern low from whom we can expect no leadership. Strangely enough the most likely source of a challenge to Obama might be the ancient President Protempore of the Senate and third in line to the Presidency, former Exalted Cyclops of the KKK, Robert Byrd. He is a bigot and a partisan and his pork barrel earmarks are legendary but he fancies himself an orator and a constitutional scholar on the order of Henry Clay or John Calhoun. The question is at the age of 92 is he up to the fight?
At 92 is he up to the fight?
You Decide
……irradiate the..wait that was another thread ….ok yeah ..irradiate the North Korean tribal areas.
Regarding the Palin-Obama scenario, it should be noted that 15 states have recently adopted “sovereignty” resolutions in their relationship with the Federal government. In New Hampshire, the state legislature voted on a resolution that included the right secession. It was defeated, but 120 legislators voted for it. In the coming crisis, I think the most likely scenario is the “Palin” one, not some general crossing the Rubicon. If confidence in the Federal government and Obama collapses under the weight of economic turmoil, then we may well see groups of states beginning to exercise what would amount to dual political power–and that would set the stage for a revolution.
Contrarian, i think that was what was being bandied about upthread –what brought the warning from w to stick to hypotheticals.
The unclarified question was really, what, hypthetically speaking, if a new president’s policies, beginning with something like the stimulus bill’s act of boldly arrogant political trickery and aggression, was actually trying to force just such a break as you describe?
These states (and i agree with you it’s a-build –our Gov Perry already seems to’ve made some sort of hard-to-describe rhetorical shift wherein DC seems almost the state’s foreign policy headache #1) then by making some sort of federalist break would be playing right into the hands of the directors of the ultimate Cloward-Piven, would they not?
The reason I put in the Kerry links: basically, this morning in a few hours, if the past is any guide to the future, we’ll be hearing the updated communist wish-list for the new admin’s Mexican-border policy initiatives.
If you read the Freeper and Discover the Network reports, you’ll see, based on the public record, that Kerry’s previous hands-on with Latin America had several pre-ordained goals. He fell flat on his face of course when Ortega went to Moscow almost on the heels of (kerry’s) report to congress that USSR was ‘no problemo’ in the isthmus –but he recovered quickly on two met goals: (1) his trip had given his sponsor the IPS (in turn itself a Kremlin proxy) plausibility to have Kerry execute a long-cherished (see 1967-established ‘Liberation Press’) smear of the CIA as being part of the LatAm narco biz, and (2) when Reagan went ahead and funded the contras anyway, but necessarily off-books, kerry & IPS’s set-up proved to’ve provided the Reagan II-damaging “Iran Contra Scandal” (his handlers even let the senator personally make the big scoop announcement).
But, point, then as now, the narco biz was involved, sen. kerry manipulating it hammer & tong, with the twin motives of helping the communists/Kremlin and wounding President of the United States of America Ronald Wilson Reagan and the American intelligence services.
Same people, similar situation now. So, i guess all i’m trying to say is, “BOHICA”.
i should’ve added, the Kerry links “in the ‘southern neighbor’ thread”.