Don’t be too shocked by the news that a U.S. ballistic missile interceptor test has failed.
First reported by CNN, the Hawaii based test was conducted by the personnel assigned to the Aegis ashore missile defense system. But while the test is obviously a disappointment, the U.S. remains years away from having a missile defense program that can, with high confidence, launch and destroy nuclear warhead armed ballistic missiles.
“High confidence” are the key words here.
U.S. ballistic missile defense capabilities are actually pretty competent nowadays. While they might struggle with advanced countermeasure-equipped ballistic missiles from China or Russia, North Korean missiles would be vulnerable to U.S. attack across the three stages of flight: boost, midcourse and terminal.
The problem is that when you’re dealing with nuclear weapons, competency is a poor substitute for “high confidence.”
After all, American presidents present and future are unlikely to gamble with a North Korean showdown if they only have 95 percent confidence that the ballistic missile defense system will work. Put simply, the 5 percent margin is small, but it carries with it the prospective cost of a destroyed city and hundreds of thousands of dead Americans.
Kim Jong Un knows this. The North Korean leader’s determined push for a nuclear ICBM capability shows that he believes his prospective ability to destroy a U.S. city is all he needs to maximize the political effect of that capability.
All of this speaks to the final issue.
As the months click down to a confident North Korean ICBM+nuclear warhead program, Trump has few good choices remaining. Ultimately, the only real outstanding issue for North Korea’s missile scientists is how to construct a re-entry survivable and target-accurate warhead vehicle, and much of that work can be done in the lab.
This threat illustrates why I believe Trump’s brinkmanship is necessary if we’re going to resolve this situation peacefully. Absent the perception by China and North Korea that Trump will use force to stop Kim Jong Un’s ballistic missile program, neither nation is likely to introduce the pressure or concessions necessary to provide for a diplomatic solution.
Regardless, time is running out, and banking on missile defense is a poor idea.
