Special Missile Defense Conference Issue: Tauscher Says European Missile Defense To Wait Until After Ground-based Midcourse Defense Tests

Levin, Tauscher, Warn Of Cuts Coming In Total Missile Defense Authorizations

Tauscher Flails Airborne Laser As Behind Schedule And $4 Billion Over Budget; But She Praises Aegis, THAAD Programs

Any move to deploy the European Missile Defense (EMD) system is dead for years, because it will have to wait until after extensive testing is performed on its parent program, the Ground-based Missile Defense (GMD) system.

That was the message today from Rep. Ellen O. Tauscher (D-Calif.), who chairs the House Armed Services Committee strategic forces subcommittee.

The Boeing Co. [BA] leads both EMD and GMD programs.

Tauscher and Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), the Senate Armed Services Committee chairman, both warned separately that significant fiscal cuts are coming in some missile defense programs.

In a recent Webinar, Rep. Trent Franks (R-Ariz.), a member of the strategic forces subcommittee, said the total $9.6 billion yearly allowance for missile defense programs may be slashed by $3 billion overall, with some missile defense systems seeing half their financial support disappear.(Please see Space & Missile Defense Report, Monday, Feb. 23, 2009.)

President Obama recently chose Tauscher to fill a key State Department nonproliferation post, but it may be some time before she leaves Capitol Hill to head to Foggy Bottom. At this point, she said, she is speaking as a member of Congress, not an administration official.

While Tauscher and Levin both spoke warmly of the sea-based Aegis weapon control system which uses the Standard Missile interceptor, she ripped the Airborne Laser missile defense system for being eight years behind schedule and $4 billion over budget. The ABL program, too, is led by Boeing. (Please see transcript of her remarks in this issue.)

Levin and Tauscher also pushed the possibility of U.S. cooperation with Russia in devising a common response to a rising Iranian missile threat.

They spoke separately before a Missile Defense Agency (MDA) symposium presented by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics at the Reagan Building in Washington, D.C.

“At the start of a new administration, we have an opportunity to explore the possibility of cooperating with Russia on missile defense capabilities, to provide protection against Iran’s ballistic missile systems,” Levin said. Russia can’t remain indifferent to Iran moving to create a nuclear weapons program, because that would threaten Russia, too, not just the United States, Levin said.

He also asserted that Iran is “a state supporter of terrorism, and a threat to much of the Middle East, including the Arab world.” Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has said Israel should be wiped from the map, and that Israel soon shall cease to exist. Ahmadinejad also said he envisions the world without the United States.

Tauscher made several critical points:

• Iran hasn’t yet developed intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), so the United States has time meanwhile to focus on countering Iranian short- and medium-range missiles, she indicated. Later, the European Missile Defense system designed to kill long-range Iranian missiles could be “bolted on” to NATO missile defenses. However, some analysts note that Iran just launched a satellite, which involves the same basic technologies as an ICBM. Iran also is producing nuclear materials in thousands of centrifuges, which Tehran claims is for peaceful electrical generation, but which Westerners fear will be used to build atomic bombs.
• While Tauscher on the one hand deplored what she sees as a major lack of testing of the GMD system installed in Alaska and California, she said if and when Iran develops ICBMs, the EMD site wouldn’t be required to protect America, because the GMD system would be capable to handle the kill. She said that the GMD system has “great science and great opportunity. … We all want it to succeed,” and she said that by no means does she want to see the GMD program killed.
• She would, however, wish to see its funding used for testing against target missiles, rather than having the money used for expanding GMD.
• While Tauscher opposes any immediate move to build the GMD ground silos in Poland, she said the GMD radar proposed for siting in the Czech Republic “would be part of a NATO- ized” missile defense system.
• Meanwhile, Iran already has a large arsenal of short- and medium-range missiles, and the United States should defend against those threats with already-developed missile defense systems, she said.
• Tauscher praised the sea-based Aegis weapon control system, and lamented the fact that only 22 Navy cruisers and destroyers are to be upgraded to the Aegis ballistic missile defense capability. Most of the 22 already have been. “We must seriously consider adding additional Aegis cruisers and destroyers” to that total, she said, without specifying how much higher the 22 number should go. There are more than 60 Arleigh Burke Class destroyers, and more than 20 Ticonderoga Class cruisers, with a possibility of more of the 1980s- design destroyers being built. New ones presumably would have the missile defense upgrade built into the Aegis system as original equipment.
• Tauscher termed the Aegis/Standard Missile system “fabulous,” a label she also placed on the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense system, or THAAD. Both the Aegis weapon control system and THAAD are produced by Lockheed Martin Corp. [LMT].
• In other words, with the missile defense financial picture shaping up as it is on Capitol Hill, it’s far better to be Lockheed than Boeing.
• Separately, Lockheed announced it will take on Boeing over the GMD program, vying to win an MDA contract for operations and sustainment of the missile defense system. (Please see separate story in this issue.)
• Tauscher characterized defense against short- and medium-range missiles as NATO-ized. But NATO has endorsed the EMD system for taking down long-range threats, while NATO itself fields a system for shorter-range enemy weapons.
• She also praised the Patriot Advanced Capability-3, or PAC-3, made by Raytheon Co. [RTN].
• Army Lt. Gen. Patrick O’Reilly, MDA director, received high praise from Tauscher, who said he is doing well in leading the agency.

For his part, Levin made several points:

• U.S. and Russian missile defense experts may someday work together on a European missile defensive system.
• Levin and Sen. John McCain of Arizona, ranking Republican on Levin’s committee, have proposed sweeping reforms of Department of Defense acquisition procedures, and those reforms should extend to the MDA as well, Levin said.
• Tauscher, too, wishes to see regular budget processes imposed on MDA, in place of streamlined budgeting rules that it was permitted to follow to speed development of missile defense systems.
• Those rules permitted acquisition of GMD interceptors that quickly had to be refurbished at a price yet to be determined, Levin recalled.
• The Multiple Kill Vehicle is another example, where none of the 16 technologies it employs are mature, he noted.
• With the Airborne Laser, the Government Accountability Office couldn’t assess its design stability, Levin observed. And the ABL cost has risen by about 500 percent over the last dozen years, from $724 million in 1997 to $3.6 billion today.
• President Obama wishes to bring budget discipline to MDA, he said.

The GMD system must be subjected to extensive testing, including multiple interceptors being launched to take down a single target missile, multiple interceptors taking out multiple targets simultaneously, and more, Levin said.