Report of the Panel on Reducing Risk in Ballistic Missile Defense Flight Test Programs

摘要

This study was initiated by the sponsors to address risk in the flight test programs of BMDO's hit-to-kill (HTK) ballistic missile defense (B MD) systems. The four systems are the Theater High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) ; the Patriot-3 System with its Patriot Advanced Capability.3 (PAC-3) missile; the AEGIS LEAP Interceptor (ALI) Program, which is a risk-reduction program within the Navy Theater Wide (NTW) Defense System; and BMDO's NMD program. This study was motivated by a series of flight test failures in some of these programs failures which indicated a high level of risk. These failures have significantly delayed the planned fielding of BMD systems. The study group members examined current theater missile defense (TMD) programs to address the issues. However, the task was not to evaluate these programs. Rather, the task was to take lessons from these programs that could and should be applied to the NMD program.