FRIDAY FOTO (April 12, 2019)

The Fire Next Time.

(Defense Department photo by Lisa Simunaci)

God gave Noah the rainbow sign. No more water, fire next time.

                                                                                                 — James Baldwin

A target intercontinental ballistic missile launches from the Ronald Reagan Ballistic Missile Defense Test Site in the Marshall Islands on March 25, 2019. It was successfully intercepted by two long-range, ground-based interceptors launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

 

FRIDAY FOTO (January 18, 2019)

Sending a “Stinging” Message.

(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Corporal Rachel K. Young)

Here we have “before and after” photos of a Stinger anti-aircraft missile launch. In the first, we see Marine Corps Provate First Class Scout Mohrman testing  Stinger during a training exercise at the Marine Corps Air Ground Combat Center in Twentynine Palms, California on January 14, 2019.

In the photo below, we see the same weapon, same day, same place — same photographer — but a different Marine, Private First Class Joshua English. as the Stinger leaves the launch tube.

(U.S. Marine Corps photo by Lance Corporal Rachel K. Young)

The Stinger, a Cold War weapon that is making a come-back with the U.S. military, is part of a group of anti-aircraft weapons known as Man Portable Air Defense Systems, or  MANPADS.  After the Soviet Union invadede Afghanistan, the United States supplied anti-Soviet Afghan insurgents with Stingers.  Between 1986 and 1989, Afghan forces used the missiles to down an estimated 269 aircraft and helicopters. (See video clip  from the 2007 motion picture Charlie Wilson’s War) Many Stingers, however, remained unaccounted for after the conflict despite U.S. efforts to have unused missiles returned to U.S. control. Some of the missiles made it into the international black market and the hands of terrorists.

After the 9/11 attacks, the proliferation of Stingers and other shoulder-fired anti-aircraft weapons was by the U.S. State Department as a “serious potential threat to global civilian aviation,” 4GWAR reported numerous times. Those concerns sparked both efforts to collect and destroy unsecured stockpiles of portable anti-aircraft missiles as well as industry efforts to equip commercial aircraft with counter MANPADS technologies.

With the rise of unmanned aircraft technology, security concerns have shifted to inadvertent or malicious drone interference with civil aviation.

Missile Defense: Latest North Korean Missile Launch Increases Threat.

Raising the Stakes.

After more than 20 years spent focusing on global terrorism and counterinsurgency, the United States and its allies are confronting the Cold War threat of nuclear missile attack again.

North Korea launched another intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) test this week (July 4) and it’s getting a lot of attention, analysts say, because the missile was powerful enough to reach Alaska.

The United States detected the ICBM and tracked it for 37 minutes, the longest time of flight for any ballistic missile North Korea has launched to date, a Pentagon spokesman said.

The ICBM launched from North Korea’s Banghyon Airfield, which is about 62 miles from Pyongyang, said the spokesman, Navy Captain Jeff Davis. The North Korean missile landed in the Sea of Japan.

An M270 Multiple Launch Rocket System from U.S. Army’s 18th Field Artillery Regiment, 210th Field Artillery Brigade, fires an MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile into the Sea of Japan on July 5, 2017. In the foreground, two mobile carriers prepare to launch South Korean Hyunmoo II missiles.  (Army photo)

The U.S. and South Korean military launched their own missile tests Wednesday (July 5). The exercise utilized the Eighth U.S. Army’s Tactical Missile System and South Korean Hyunmoo II missiles. U.S. and South Korean personnel fired missiles into territorial waters along South Korea’s east coast.

Officials said the missile launches demonstrated the combined deep strike capabilities which allow the South Korean-U.S. alliance to neutralize hostile threats and aggression against South Korea, the United States and other allies.

In Poland on Thursday (July 6), President Donald Trump said the time has arrived to confront North Korea.  “I don’t like to talk about what I have planned, but I have some pretty severe things that we’re thinking about,” Trump said, the Associated Press reported. “That doesn’t mean we’re going to do them,” Trump added.

Meanwhile, Defense Secretary James Mattis told reporters in Washington Thursday July 6 that the U.S. military stands ready to provide Trump with options, but that diplomatic and economic efforts remain the tools of choice to convince North Korea to stop its nuclear and missile programs, according to DoD News.

“The president’s been very clear, and secretary of state’s been very clear that we are leading with diplomatic and economic efforts,” Mattis said during an impromptu news conference in the Pentagon. “The military remains ready in accordance with our alliance with Japan, with Korea,” he added. The North Korean launch of an intercontinental ballistic missile on July 4 is a very serious escalation and provocation, Mattis said, and also an affront to the United Nations Security Council resolutions.

Just last month, Mattis told the Senate Armed services committee that the “most urgent and dangerous threat” to peace and security is “North Korea’s continued pursuit of nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them.”

Your 4GWAR editor addressed North Korea’s belligerence and other threats for an upcoming integrated air and missile defense conference. To read more about missile threats facing the United States and its allies, click here.