August 18, 2004 :: Department of Defense :: News
Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld spoke to the seventh annual Space and Missile Defense Conference, held in Huntsville, Alabama, where he spoke of the importance of missile defense and the plans for deployment in the coming months.
Among other things, Rumsfeld noted that “History has taught us that weakness is provocative,” and warned that some two dozen countries currently have ballistic missiles and other WMD programs, including North Korea, Pakistan, and Iran.
Rumsfeld noted that the United States would have a limited defense by the end of the year, but stressed the importance that it continue to evolve to match the growing capabilities of those countries, terrorists, and other extremists who threaten America.
Perhaps most importantly, however, is that Rumsfeld apparently repeated his previous observations about the threat from a ship-launched ballistic missile. Gertz and Scarborough in the August 27 edition of Inside the Ring report the following from Rumsfeld:
Mr. Rumsfeld also was asked about the danger of terrorists or rogue states attacking the United States by putting a short-range Scud-type missile on a freighter and firing it close to U.S. shores.
He said one Middle East nation already has “launched a ballistic missile from a cargo vessel.”
“They had taken a short-range, probably Scud missile, put it on a transporter-erector launcher, lowered it in, taken the vessel out into the water, peeled back the top, erected it, fired it, lowered it, covered it up. And the ship that they used was using a radar and electronic equipment that was no different than 50, 60, 100 other ships operating in the immediate area.”
Other U.S. officials have said the nation was Iran, which tested a freighter-launched missile in the Caspian Sea in the late 1990s.
“It is true that the big distinction we make between intercontinental, medium-range and shorter-range ballistic missiles doesn’t make a lot of sense if you’re going to move the missile closer to the target,” he said.
These comments repeat almost verbatim his previous report, one month after 9-11, that such a thing had occured, as well as that by Asst. Sec. of Defense Paul Wolfowitz in 2002. (Article)
» Transcript of Rumsfeld remarks
» More stories on: Iran, North Korea, Policy, Ship-Launched Threat, Testing - Foreign
