logo

Does the Pentagon want to strengthen a key US missile defense system?

Friday, September 25, 2020
By William Boger
YES

In its budget request for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, the Missile Defense Agency has asked for $9.2 billion to "refocus" the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense System, a weapons program intended to protect the U.S. mainland.

The missiles have failed in 8 of 18 tests since 1999. Work to strengthen a key component of the $67 billion program was cancelled in 2019. Now the goal is to develop a "layered" approach working with other shorter-range missiles and detection efforts, Defense News reported.

The U.S. at first limited use of missile-defense systems under a treaty with Russia, but the Bush administration changed course following the 9/11 attacks. The U.S. says the GMD system is focused on threats from "rogue" states such as North Korea; 44 interceptors are currently deployed, mostly in Alaska.

This fact brief is responsive to conversations such as this one.
ABOUT THE CONTRIBUTOR
Between 2020 and 2022, under close editorial supervision, Gigafact contracted a group of freelance writers and editors to test the concepts for fact briefs and provide inputs to our software development process. We call this effort Gigafact Foundry. Over the course of these two years, Gigafact Foundry writers published over 1500 fact briefs in response to claims they found online. Their important work forms the basis of Gigafact formats and editorial guidelines, and is available to the public on Gigafact.org. Readers should be aware that while there is still a lot of relevant information to be found, not all fact briefs produced by Gigafact Foundry reflect Gigafact's current methods and standards for fact briefs. If you come across any that you feel are out of date and need to be looked at with fresh eyes, don't hesitate to contact us at support@gigafact.org.
FACT BRIEF BY
facebook
twitter
email
email