The United States’ European missile defense system is aimed toward defending European allies against shorter-range Iranian missile strikes and not long-range Russian ones, according to ranking officials.
Assistant Secretary of Defense for Global Strategic Affairs Madelyn Creedon said recently following a Russian Ministry of Defence missile defense conference in Moscow that the United States, with its European Phased Adaptive Approach (EPAA) is concerned about Iranian short- to medium-range missiles reaching North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nations in Europe and not advanced, long-range ballistic missiles coming out of Russia.
“We worry about the development of a longer range missile,” Creedon said. “But the system is designed to go after the Iranian missiles, not the sophisticated Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (ICBM) that have lots of capabilities, frankly, to evade any sort of missile defense system.”
Creedon said the proof is where the two interceptor sites will be located: Poland and Romania. She also said intercepts will not take place in Russian territory.
“These intercepts will only occur when we know that these hypothetical missiles are coming into one of the NATO-defended areas,” Creedon said.
Missile Defense Agency Deputy Director Navy Rear Adm. Randall Hendrickson added the intercepts won’t even take place within the Earth’s atmosphere.
“The intercepts occur in a common area of space,” Hendrickson said. “The (Standard Missile-3) only works in space and it is the hit-to-kill weapon. It is such that the system can be set up to have the intercept occur where we would like it to occur in space.”
U.S. representatives have urged Russian officials to participate in missile defense talks, but Russia has been hesitant to participate due to skepticism about America’s true intent with the EPAA.
The SM-3 missile is developed by Raytheon [RTN].