U.S. plans to test ICBM interceptor

Goal is to simulate North Korea missile aimed at the U.S.

WASHINGTON — Preparing for North Korea’s growing threat, the Pentagon will try to shoot down an intercontinental-range missile for the fifirst time in a test next week. The goal is to simulate a North Korean ICBM aimed at the U.S. homeland, offifficials said Friday

The American interceptor has a spotty track record, s ucc e e di ng i n ni ne of 17 attempts against missiles of less-then-intercontinental range since 1999. The most recent test, in June 2014, was a success, but followed three straight failures.

The system has evolved from the multibillion-dollar effffffffffffort triggered by President Ronald Reagan’s 1983 push for a “Star Wars” solution to ballistic missile threats during the Cold War, when the Soviet Union was the major worry.

North Korea is now the focus of U.S. efffffffffffforts because i t s l e a d e r, Ki m Jo n g Un, has vowed to fifield a nuclear-armed missile capable of reaching American territory. He has yet to test an intercontinental ballistic missile, or ICBM, but Pentagon offifficials believe he is speeding in that direction.

M a r i n e L t . G e n . V i n - cent Stewart , direc tor of the Defense I nte l l i gence Agency, said this week that “left unchecked,” Kim will eventually succeed.

The Pentagon has a variety of missile defense systems, but the one designed with a potential North Korean ICBM in mind is perhaps the most technologically challenging. Critics say it also is the least reliable.

The basic idea is to fifire a rocket into space upon warning of a hostile missile launch. The rocket releases a 5-footlong device called a “kill vehicle” that uses internal guidance systems to steer into the path of the oncoming missile’s warhead, destroying it by force of impact. Offifficially known as the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system, the Pentagon likens it to hitting a bullet with a bullet.

The Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency, which is responsible for developing and testing the system, has scheduled the intercept test for Tuesday.

An interceptor i s to be launched from an underground silo at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California and soar toward the target, which will be fifired from a test range on Kwajalein Atoll in the Pacifific. If all goes as planned, the “kill vehicle” will slam into the ICBM-like target’s mock warhead high over the Pacifific Ocean.

The target will be a custom-made missile meant to simulate an ICBM, meaning it will flfly faster than missiles used in previous intercept tests, according to Christopher Johnson, spokesman for the Missile Defense Agency.

“We conduct increasingly complex test scenarios as the program matures and advances,” Johnson said Friday. “Testing against an ICBM-type threat is the next step in that process.”

The interceptor system has been i n pl a c e s i nce 2004, but it has never been us e d i n c ombat or f ul ly tested. There currently are 32 interceptors in silos at Fort Greely in Alaska and four at Vandenberg, north of Los Angeles. The Pentagon says it will have eight more, for a total of 44, by the end of this year.