By Geoff Fein
The administration’s decision to shift its missile defense policy for Europe away from a land-based system has allowed for the Navy to examine using its ship-based ballistic missile interceptor, the Standard Missile (SM), in a different way, according to panelists at a National Defense University (NDU) Sea Based Missile Defense symposium.
The Navy is currently using Raytheon‘s [RTN] SM-3 Block 1A aboard all Aegis ballistic missile defense (BMD) capable ships. That missile provides large territorial coverage and has to be sea based, one panelist said Dec. 2. “We don’t have any other SM-3 capability right now.”
NDU did not allow the direct attribution of speakers for this event.
Lockheed Martin [LMT] builds the Aegis BMD system.
However, the panelist noted, the addition of a new capabilities to the SM-3 will lead to the introduction of a land-based variant. “This system doesn’t exist right now,” the panelist added.
“Missile defense is a geometric problem. If you can only put an interceptor in large bodies of water, you start to have geometric constraints,” the panelist said.
The land-based concept is being dubbed “Aegis Ashore,” the panelist noted. It will use the Aegis radar system and the SM-3.
“The Navy is making its case for why they should operate and maintain this system,” the panelist said. “It makes sense. It’s a Navy system.”
Plans call for installing the land-based system in southern Europe, although an exact location has yet to be worked out, the panelist added.
The panelist expected to see a decision in the next six months. “Once that is in place, [you] likely will begin to see those numbers in the budget.”
In the 2018 time frame, the panelist expects there will be a more capable interceptor introduced to the Navy’s fleet that will cover a larger area. That missile will likely be the SM-3 Block 2A being co-developed by the United States and Japan.
The panelist envisioned a land-based SM-3 Block 2A being deployed in northern Europe, giving the United States two European land-based sites. “Poland has agreed to host it.”
With the Block 2A being co-developed by the United States and Japan, the two countries are working on how that will work, the panelist said.
According to a Raytheon official, the land-based set-up would be the SM-3 Block 1B, followed by the SM-3 Block 2A in 2018 and then the SM-3 block 2B in 2020.
In the future years, expect a SM with some ICBM capability for defense of the homeland, the panelist remarked.
Currently, the Navy has 18 Aegis BMD ships in the fleet with two additional ships, the USS Monterey (CG-61) and the USS Vella Gulf (CG-72), undergoing upgrading to that capability on the East Coast. Those two ships will be delivered back to the Navy at the end of this year and into the spring, a speaker said.
The bulk of the Navy’s BMD capable fleet, however, is home ported in the Pacific, the speaker noted.
“[The Navy] is starting to build a footprint of [Aegis BMD capable] ships based in the East Coast,” the speaker said. “Both in Mayport, Fla., and Norfolk, Va., to get a little better balance between the two fleets.”
The USS Lake Erie (CG-70), based in the Pacific, is currently testing the second-generation BMD system–Aegis BMD, 4.0.1.
The Navy is working to get that system ready for eventual deployment, the speaker said. “[The] entire engineering focus is on that.
“Early tests on Lake Erie show the results are very encouraging,” the speaker said. “[The Navy is] out performing [the] specs.”
The Navy is still conducting tests with earlier Aegis baseline, and the speaker said there is still demand to do more tests to explore the margins of what can be done with it. One example is the use of the SM-3 to shoot down a wayward spy satellite in February 2008.
The Navy also has an inventory of approximately 52 SM-3 Block 1As, the speaker added, and close to 60 SM-2 Block 4s. Those missiles were modified to provide ” a Patriot-like capability within the atmosphere,” the speaker added. “That came online in 2008 after a two-year development and deployment program.”
The service will conduct the first flight of the SM-3 Block 1B in mid fiscal year ’11. The missile just passed its critical design review and is undergoing ground testing of major components, the speaker noted.
The Navy and Raytheon are concentrating their efforts on the kill vehicle on the SM-3 1B, the speaker added. Those efforts will make the missile smarter, provide it a better engine and give it better “eyes,” the speaker said.
Following the SM-3 Block 1B is the SM-3 Block 2A. With a 21-inch diameter and weighing roughly 4,600 pounds, it is the biggest missile that could be fitted into a vertical launch system, the speaker said.
“[It will have] greater reach and velocity than the SM-3 Block 1 that the Navy has today,” the speaker said. “It gives [the Navy] more range from a given ship to the point where the missile out flies the own ship’s radars performance.”