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On Sun, 29 Aug 2004 20:18:28 GMT, Orval Fairbairn
wrote: I have been following this thread recently. As a retired Lockheed engineer who did performance studies on THAAD, I can clear up a few things. 1. THAAD is not currently an anti-ICBM system. It does not have the performance (except on a lucky shot) to shoot down ICBMs consistently. They travel too fast for THAAD's performance envelope. Specific numbers would be classified. So is it's residual ABM capability something like Hawk did - before they made the modifications? The impression I'd gotten with Hawk is they went "hey let's try it against a missile" and it worked. After that they made some changes to the system to make it a little better in the ATBM role. 2. THAAD had some development problems. They did not have even the second team working on the original design. It appeared that a lot of the design was made by people who had not taken "Missile Design 101." A lot of the problems were simply stupid design and manufacturing errors. We can only hope that those problems have been cleared up. That would explain why AW&ST said the configuration of THAAD is quite a bit different now than those test vehicles. 3. THAAD should be an effective TBM defense. That is what it is designed for, and simulations show that it can hit a variety of targets. 4. An anti-ICBM missile would be a completely new, much larger design, which would probably use only the basic interceptor technology, not the same hardware. I don't think the idea has ever been to have THAAD as a dedicated ABM. It's more like a bonus. ATBM as you said is the role it was designed for. All I've ever seen written suggested that they just not let that residual capability go to waste. |
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