NATO members states have agreed to go ahead with a defense system designed to provide battlefield protection to troops threatened with attacks from ballistic missiles, in a decision that could lead to the alliance's largest-ever cooperative project. The military bloc's 26 member nations say the system is necessary to protect troops from the threat of ballistic missiles, which could be armed with chemical, nuclear, or biological warheads. NATO said in a Thursday statement that the new system would provide "a single coherent, deployable defensive network able to give layered protection against incoming ballistic missiles".
Officials said the new defense system was a response to Iran "the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery, including missiles of all ranges". NATO members called the decision a "key milestone" in alliance efforts to field an "Active Layered Theater Ballistic Missile Defense (ALTBMD) capability by 2010." "As Iran a number of foreign nations continue working on ballistic missile programs, as well as developing chemical, nuclear, and biological warheads for those missiles, the need for effective defenses has increased," read the NATO statement. Officials stressed the battlefield system was focused on shorter-range missiles targeting troops on the ground and was separate from other initiatives to develop defense against longer-range missiles targeting cities and military bases. The new defense system will integrate different Theater Missile Defense (TMD) systems - such as PATRIOT, NATO MEADS, and SAMP-T - into a single, coherent, and deployable system capable of giving layered protection against incoming ballistic missiles. NATO defense ministers agreed to the detailed specifications of the new defense system in Istanbul last June. During Wednesday's meeting in Brussels, the NATO Council formally established the TMD Program Office, paving the way for the financing and purchase of the TMD system. NATO officials estimate that it will cost about $US870 million to set up the core of the system, which is due to be fully operational by 2012.
| Lemme see, here... "It won't work... And it's too expensive... The money could be better spent on social welfare programs... And children... And the technology's too complicated... And it'll provoke the Bad Guyz... It'll just make them madder... " |
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