March 1, 2004 :: Honolulu Advertiser :: News
The Theatre High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) missile defense program has apparently been renamed, but its acronym will remain the same. The “T” in THAAD will now stand for now “Terminal,” referring to the last phase in a ballistic missile’s flight in which the interceptor destroys it. The Honolulu Advertiser cites a February 26 MDA release that the change better reflects its role in the nation’s Ballistic Missile Defense System.
A more complete explanation, however, may indicate that the change is more than bureaucratic: specifically, a belated updating of new policy language indicated by the December 16, 2002 National Security Policy Directive 23 of President Bush, which repudiated the artificial distinction between “theatre” and “national” missile defense. The reason THAAD was renamed, in other words, is because the term “theatre missile defense” is obsolete, made so by the 2002 withdrawal from the ABM Treaty.
The terms “theatre” and “national” which came into use due to constraints imposed by the ABM Treaty of 1972, and became important when accords were signed in the 1990s which permitted the development of “theatre” systems capable of intercepting short-range missiles, and “national” defenses capable of intercepting long-range ICBMs. By only permitting theatre defenses, the sacrosanct doctrine of mutually assured destruction (MAD) with the former Soviet Union was left intact.
Although the distinction between theatre (short-range) and national (long range) missile defenses is obsolete, this does not mean that reliance upon a policy of mutually assured destruction (MAD) has similarly gone by the wayside. The revised deployment will have its own revised vocabulary designed to articulate the application of MAD to changed circumstances. The “limited” ground based missile defense system to be deployed this year in Alaska is designed to intercept long range missiles, but it will have too few interceptors to intercept more than a handful. For the immediate future, the dangerous policy of MAD will apparently remain intact vis a vis those countries—currently, Russia and China—capable of producing enough ICBMs to overwhelm such “limited” defenses.
Update: The March 3 edition of Inside Missile Defense notes that the tests this year will be the first in four years, and represent a substantially improved system. This, then, could be another impetus for a name change.
An excerpt from NSPD-23:
The Administration has also eliminated the artificial distinction between “national” and “theater” missile defenses.
The defenses we will develop and deploy must be capable of not only defending the United States and our deployed forces, but also friends and allies;
The distinction between theater and national defenses was largely a product of the ABM Treaty and is outmoded. For example, some of the systems we are pursuing, such as boost-phase defenses, are intended to be capable of intercepting missiles of all ranges, blurring the distinction between theater and national defenses; and
The terms “theater” and “national” are interchangeable depending on the circumstances, and thus are not a meaningful means of categorizing missile defenses. For example, some of the systems being pursued by the United States to protect deployed forces are capable of defending the entire national territory of some friends and allies, thereby meeting the definition of a “national” missile defense system.
(Article)» Text of NSPD 23
» Dec. 17 White House Fact Sheet similar to NSPD-23
» Feb. 26 Memo from MDA THAAD office
» More stories on: Land-Based Systems, Policy, Testing - American
» Missile system details for: Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD)
