Obama's Dangerous Missile Omission

In the wake of the announced extension of the deadline for the Iranian nuclear negotiations, French foreign minister Laurent Fabius explained, “As long as everything is not solved, nothing is solved.”  This is true enough, as far as it goes.  Unfortunately, it appears that the talks are leading toward a “comprehensive” deal that completely omits a crucial element: Iran’s ballistic missile program.  It is past time for the Obama Administration to take this threat seriously, and any resolution of the Iranian nuclear talks must address it as part of a broader strategy.

The idea that ballistic missile development is unrelated to Iran’s nuclear program is both wrong and dangerous.  If Iran builds a nuclear weapon, its preferred delivery system would be a ballistic missile. Negotiations limiting the country’s nuclear program should not ignore its weapons delivery systems.  Iran continues to build longer-range and more sophisticated missiles, having demonstrated significant progress in stage-separation technologies.  A country developing highly sophisticated and expensive weaponry wants to see a maximum return on its investment – one does not typically see conventional ordinance atop an intercontinental ballistic missile.            

At the same time the U. S. should take other steps to neutralize the Iranian missile threat.  This requires investing in a credible ballistic missile shield for the U.S. homeland and our troops and allies abroad.  Unfortunately, the Obama Administration has been less than fully committed to BMD systems, cutting the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense (GMD) system’s budget by half between 2008 and 2012; cancelling plans for ground-based interceptors (GBIs) in Eastern Europe in 2009; attempting to scale back the planned GBIs in the U.S.; and insufficiently funding flight testing leading to reliability issues.

Despite these challenges, U.S. missile defense capabilities continue to improve and are becoming more credible.  Further action is needed is needed in the short-term not only to ensure the ability to counter evolving threats in the future, but also to signal that we are taking these threats from Iran and other hostile nations seriously today.  Moving ahead next year with the European Phased Adaptive Approach, a system utilizing the Aegis BMD system and including two land-based interceptor sites in Poland and Romania, is essential.  The sites are to be equipped with 24 variants of the SM-3 interceptors (Blocks IA, IB, and eventually IIA), which have proven highly effective (the IB having just again successfully intercepted a target during a Nov. 6 flight test).  The Aegis Ashore program will directly counter Iran’s ability to threaten European targets with medium and intermediate range ballistic missiles.      

In terms of neutralizing a potential threat to the U.S. homeland from an ICBM attack, the administration should stick to current GMD plans to deploy 44 GBIs by 2017 as well as moving forward with a new East Coast interceptor site.  Additionally, improving the performance and reliability of the kill vehicles is critical.  Eventually, the U.S. should move to an interchangeable "common kill vehicle" for its various U.S. missile defense systems, but in the near term, a redesign of the current EKV is needed.  Starting from scratch on an interim system would be costly and time-consuming and might create unforeseen capability issues.  Instead, it would be more realistic to use current, improving GMD hardware (that achieved its first successful intercept in five years in April) and further improve it, possibly using technology developed for the highly successful SM-3.   

The U.S. should demonstrate real commitment to its missile defense systems, thereby complicating Tehran’s ongoing calculus regarding its nuclear and missile programs.  Even if—or especially if—as Bret Stephens recently noted in the Wall Street Journal, “[Iran] will cheat on any undertakings it signs” and continues to pursue a nuclear weapons capability, improving the missile shield will make the U.S. and its allies more secure.