'Son of Star Wars' missile test fails

[rooboy]

The first test in nearly two years of a planned multi-billion dollar United States anti-missile shield has failed, with the interceptor missile shutting down on its launch pad in the central Pacific before it was launched, the Pentagon said.

About 16 minutes earlier, a target missile carrying a mock warhead had been successfully launched from Kodiak Island, Alaska, the Pentagon's Missile Defence Agency said in a statement.

The aborted mission appeared likely to set back plans for activation of the rudimentary bulwark, known as "Son of Star Wars", against ballistic missiles that could be fired by countries like North Korea.

The system is a scaled-down version of a ballistic missile shield first outlined in March 1983 by President Ronald Reagan and derided by critics as "Star Wars".

In 2002, President George W. Bush pledged to have initial elements of the program up and running by the end of this year, although critics say that tests like the one on Wednesday failed to demonstrate any real-world capabilities.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200412/s1266063.htm

[UL_Approved]

1. They can never get this to work

At some point, one must make one of several observations:

1. This program needs a lot more development.
2. This program will never work.
3. This program is just the ultimate pork barrel scam.

After about 3 tries now, I choose #3.

[tx_dem41]

20. I choose 2 and 3 n/t

[pinniped]

35. Sounds just like Iraq except all three apply and add #4, people get killed

.

[MichaelHarris]

2. So did its daddy

Star Wars defense 1. It had a horrible sucess rate, in fact I'm not sure it ever worked. Scientists told them over and over it would never work.

[Selteri]

3. I thought the most positive quote they had was

When this system works missiles will have already become obsolete as weapons of war.

[The_Casual_Observer]

4. Yet there are stupid asses who continue to pretend

that this is do-able. However, they are either misinformed, or the are the ones earning a living from these programs. One must first suspend all logic and common sense in order to believe that a missile interceptor
system could reliably shoot down even a single missile. The whole thing basically proves that the military/wh/defense contractors can't be trusted about anything they say about anything, if they are willing to lie about something a obvious as this.

[eridani]

5. How much Humvee armor could these stupid shits buy with this money? n/t

[Florida_Geek]

7. A lot of men/women arms and legs could have been saved by

the $$$$$ in just this one missle test.

[KDLarsen]

27. My thoughts exactly..

.. if any of the Democrats had any gonads, they would be all over the evening news, asking how much armor this could have bought the troops & how many homes for the homeless this could have bought. Don't single out either issue or the Rethug spin machine would turn right back at us.

[truthisfreedom]

6. bushco sucks.

and everything they touch breaks.

[ze_dscherman]

8. Good in some way

Money squandered on this will not be available for the next invasion.
Bad thing is, they'll have their invasion, nevertheless.

[driver8]

36. They don't care if money is available...

They just pile on more debt! They don't care -- they won't be paying for it.

[depakid]

9. Even if it could work

the system could be defeated by cheap countermeasures such multiple decoys. This has been quite posibly the stupidest idea the pentagon has come up with since nuclear powered aircraft.

[fryguy]

13. will never work

the factors that need to occur to even give the chance that it works include:

- the person/nation launching a missile at the US need to notify the defense system weeks in advance

- the notice needs to include date, time, location, trajectory, and speed of missile to be launched

- it must be done in good weather.....

doesn't really make me sleep well at night thinking about how the system would "work"....meanwhile billions go into the project that could be going to improving LIFE in the country

[ixion]

18. even with that info it wouldn't necessarily work

They have never had a successful test with this system, not one. Their 'successes' have been against drone aircraft, not missiles. The problem is that it is trying to hit a bullet with a bullet, which is next to impossible to do outside the vacuum of a lab environment.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

26. Yep. The launching nation would have to add one more thing:

A homing beacon.

[leveymg]

31. >50% Would Still Miss Or Wouldn't Launch

The system was never intended to really work.

But, it makes me proud that we've taken such good care of the stockholders of Raytheon-Boeing-Lockheed-Martin, et. al.

Why not put the money into protecting the troops? There's less margin for cost-overruns in Humvee armour contracts. Maybe if they can build in some electronics that might fail and require more R&D $$$s . . .

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

33. Alternately, they could strap a

demolition charge on the warhead.

[geomon666]

28. Not true

I think you have like a 1 in a billion chance of doing that so if a country launches a billion missles, you're bound to hit one of them! The system works! Woohoo!

I was dreamin' when I wrote this
Forgive me if it goes astray
But when I woke up this mornin'
Coulda sworn it was judgment day
The sky was all purple
There were people runnin' everywhere
Tryin' 2 run from the destruction
U know I didn't even care
'Cuz they say two thousand zero zero party over
Oops out of time
So tonight I'm gonna party like it's 1999

:party:

[Historic NY]

10. meanwhile in Iraq, cheap explosives and unguarded weapons .....are

killing more men every day. We keep building Hummers that are death traps because only one contractor can make armor for them. For the life of me I can't understand that one, they leave the factory only to go to another factory.

[Hekate]

11. Box cutters are cheap, too

There is something deeply, deeply sick about the Military Industrial Complex. They love power, and they love death. They suck our hard-earned money down a bottomless hole, and they suck our kids down after it.

SDI/Star Wars is a science fiction fantasy that has never worked and will never work, except as a cash cow for the Military Industrial Complex.

In the meanwhile, the people who attacked us on 9-11 did so with only a few, rather inexpensive, ingredients, plus our own fully-fueled jet airplanes. They used their brains, they took flight lessons, and their weapons were another sort of improvised exploding device.

If only there were more brains and wisdom and less blind arrogance and greed in our halls of power.

Hekate

[fryguy]

12. why in the world are we spending money on this?

hadn't the events of 9/11 and the on-going "war on terrorism" demonstrated that the threats faced by the country aren't those that we had in the cold war? even if the system worked - which i doubt it ever will - it doesn't protect from a nuclear bomb entering the country by shipping container or truck....shouldn't we be more worried about that?

[driver8]

37. because one of shrub's buddies needed a govt. contract n/t

[rooboy]

14. Soon to be renamed the George W Bush Missile Defense System...

because it's milked billions of dollars, has never worked and never will.

[BiggJawn]

15. TRUE "Junk Science"

This thing may work SOME day, but it's criminal, the way BUSHCO is promoting this pork project as "Ready to roll out"...

[Massachusetts]

16. Surprise....Surprise......

bring it into the Geerage Andy and Goober and I will fix it up Reeeeeeel nice.:silly:

[NNN0LHI]

17. And think, this dinosaur is not even designed to intercept cruise missiles

[mbperrin]

19. And Star Wars I is what Ronnie Ray-Gun spent

$2 TRILLION dollars from the Social Security surplus on. He put back IOUs. Now they're using the presence of the IOUs to claim that SS is broke, and so they need $2 TRILLION MORE in IOUs so that their bankers and stockbrokers can get their paws on TRILLIONS MORE in the form of ALL SS revenues forever.

Isn't living in a kleptocracy nice? (It would be if we were the ones doing the stealing!)

[Beetwasher]

21. And These Tests Are Now RIGGED and They STILL Can't Pass!

Amazing...

[Zynx]

22. Oddly, real "Star Wars" would work better

By that I mean solid state lasers with very high energy yields. Point, click, no missile.

So we're actually going in the wrong direction, as well as wasting money.

[bobthedrummer]

23. Oops...

:argh:

[maddezmom]

24. kick

[LibDemAlways]

25. Just another way for defense

contractors to waste taxpayer dollars. These make-work projects are the bread and butter of the aerospace industry, yet the vast majority of this shit ends up getting cancelled - but not before billions are thrown away.

[Triana]

29. It didn't work in the 80s either...I talked to the engineers...

...I worked there. That project was so damned far behind schedule and over budget it was sickening. The engineers said this crap will never work. It never did. It never will. Even if they started all over from scratch and redesigned or designed a new system. IT WON'T WORK. The tests all failed in the 80s. They'll all fail now. Same crap, different decade.

This is nothing but a money pit for defense contractors - AND THAT'S ALL it is. It's a way for a Republican regime to funnel money to defense contractors FOR NOTHING. It's a ruse.

Period.

[donkeyotay]

30. Pork. Porkers. We work for them. They're supposed to work for us.

Emad posted a link to a BBC article which contained additional info:

The Pentagon is spending $10bn a year on the missile system, which was meant to be in operation by the end of 2004.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4097267.stm

[dweller]

32. listening to NPR in the car tonite...

NPR covered this and spoke with Coyle on tonite's edition
of All Things Considered. I wish i had been listening closer, but did catch the drift that Coyle was NOT pleased with bushie's rush to test the system now. It seemed he was crediting the *moron with the 'setback' to the system . . .

no text yet of the program, but you can listen here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4229961


dp

[radar]

34. MeanWhile...

...On the East Coast - crack, professional, baggage screeeners lose a fake bomb during a test of airport security.

Newark Airport Screeners Lose Fake Bomb By WAYNE PARRY, Associated Press Writer
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&e=2&u=/ap/fake_bomb_lost

NEWARK, N.J. - Baggage screeners at Newark Liberty International Airport spotted — and then lost — a fake bomb planted in luggage by a supervisor during a training exercise.

Despite an hours-long search Tuesday night, the bag, containing a fake bomb complete with wires, a detonator and a clock, made it onto an Amsterdam-bound flight. It was recovered by airport security officials in Amsterdam when the flight landed.

"This really underscores the importance of the TSA's ongoing training exercises," said Ann Davis, a spokeswoman for the Transportation Security Administration, the agency responsible for screening passengers and baggage for weapons and explosives. "At no time did the bag pose a threat and at no time was anyone in danger."


* Sarcasm Alert *
Conservatives really know how to distribute taxpayer money to get the best value for a buck...yeah - right.

[VegasWolf]

38. Never works after they turn off that "test" GPS transponder on the

attacking missle saying "Here I am", "Come left two degrees".
I hope the Koreans help us by incorporating these
transponders in their missles too.

[struggle4progress]

39. kick for expensive boondoggles

:kick:

[durablend]

40. Nothing to see here...

Just another excuse to give the rich a tax cut, pillage SS and Medicare permanently, and make everyone else (poor/middle class) pay for it.