Boeing 747 Laser

Any one know where the laser toting 747 is now? If the plan is to
shoot the North Korean missile down, would we do it with a laser? If we
miss the missile with the ABM interceptors it would be an embarrassment, but
if we miss it with the Boeing (Deathstar) 747 know one would ever know we
tried.

I assume that the North Koreans are not stupid enough to throw it in
our direction, so I don't know how the ABMs are supposed to intercept it
anyway. Is there a chance, assuming our ABM system actually works, of
intercepting the NK missile in a trajectory not aimed at the US westcoast,
or is this a fantasy of the Newsmedia?

EricT wrote:

Any one know where the laser toting 747 is now? If the plan is to
shoot the North Korean missile down, would we do it with a laser? If we
miss the missile with the ABM interceptors it would be an embarrassment, but
if we miss it with the Boeing (Deathstar) 747 know one would ever know we
tried.

I assume that the North Koreans are not stupid enough to throw it in
our direction, so I don't know how the ABMs are supposed to intercept it
anyway. Is there a chance, assuming our ABM system actually works, of
intercepting the NK missile in a trajectory not aimed at the US westcoast,
or is this a fantasy of the Newsmedia?


I think the most likely mode of interception is a boost-phase intercept
by the Navy missile cruiser that is presently sailing off of the North
Korean coast using its upgraded Standard Missile-3 system.
The Navy has recently done successful ABM tests of this system against
target missiles:
http://www.defensetech.org/archives/001409.html
Unless North Korea fired the missile at the United States itself (which
would be insane, but these aren't the most rational people in the world)
I doubt that the missile would ever come in range of our land-based ABMs.
As for the 747 ABL system, the little I've heard of it recently seems to
suggest that it is moving forward at a snail's pace, and may be a target
for cancellation.

Pat

"EricT" wrote in message
...
Any one know where the laser toting 747 is now? If the plan is to
shoot the North Korean missile down, would we do it with a laser?


The correct name for the "laser toting 747" is Airborne Laser or ABL.

ABL has been under development for many years and is still under
development. I think the plane has been built, but I don't know if they
have finished putting the laser inside of it yet. Once upon a time the Air
Force dreamed of a Fleet of these aircraft roaming the skies ready to shoot
down missiles at any minute. But lately I have heard Air Force officials
say that it will never become an operational weapon system. It will just be
more of an ongoing R&D project that may result in something called a
demonstration test in the year 2009 or something like that, but no plans
beyond that. It is a complete waste of the taxpayers money.

To answer your question: No, they will not use the ABL to shoot down the NK
missile. They will have to find some other means to stop it.


JD

Joe Delphi wrote:

ABL has been under development for many years and is still under
development. I think the plane has been built, but I don't know if they
have finished putting the laser inside of it yet.

IIRC It's in place and they've fired it in a low power mode, but I
don't think they have done it while airborne yet.

Once upon a time the Air
Force dreamed of a Fleet of these aircraft roaming the skies ready to shoot
down missiles at any minute. But lately I have heard Air Force officials
say that it will never become an operational weapon system. It will just be
more of an ongoing R&D project that may result in something called a
demonstration test in the year 2009 or something like that, but no plans
beyond that. It is a complete waste of the taxpayers money.

To answer your question: No, they will not use the ABL to shoot down the NK
missile. They will have to find some other means to stop it.



It's thought that the North Koreans (who as of now seem to want to
discuss the test with us before launching) will claim that it is a
satellite launch attempt and not a missile test.
These leaves us in a quandary; if we shoot it down, how can we prove it
wasn't a satellite launch attempt?
Intercepting a missile test is one thing; shooting down a satellite
carrying rocket is quite another.
The North Koreans may have the means to do a direct ascent attack on our
Shuttle when it orbits over North Korea using one of their No-Dong
missiles with either a fragmentation, nuclear, or "sandblast" (a large
cloud of small particles released into a oncoming spacecraft's orbital
trajectory which it would then impact at 18,000 mph) warhead.
They could claim this is tit-for-tat for shooting down their rocket.
If not the Shuttle, other LEO satellites such as HST could be targeted.
Something like this could escalate out of control very quickly.

Pat

Matthew Ota wrote:

Actually, we have no ABM defense against incoming ICBM warheads. The
Sprint and Spartan systems were deactivated way back in the 70s,
leaving us with no defense against nukes. This is waht prompter Regan
to start the SDI program.

Granted we are off topic here but I wanted to clarify this. We have no
current land based defense against reentry vehicles.

Matthew Ota


No, we've got a few "operational" RV interceptors ready in Alaska and
California at the moment, but they have shown anything but acceptable
performance during tests: http://www.missilethreat.com/news/land.html
They are intended to destroy the incoming RV's before they reach the
atmosphere.

Pat

On Wed, 21 Jun 2006 02:34:42 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

These leaves us in a quandary; if we shoot it down, how can we prove it
wasn't a satellite launch attempt?

....Who ****ing cares? They've been rattling sabres for years now wtih
this particular threat. They launch, we knock it out of the sky and
tell them if they do it again, we'll just keep knocking it down. And
when they scream to the UN, we tell the NK *and* the UN "tough ****"
and stick to our guns.

Again, I say blow the damn thing out of the sky *before* it reaches
Max Q and they can claim it was a "launch malfunction"...

OM
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On Wed, 21 Jun 2006 02:34:42 -0500, Pat Flannery
wrote:

They could claim this is tit-for-tat for shooting down their rocket.

....At which time NK becomes a glassed-over parking lot with Cherenkov
lighting 24 hours a day.

OM
--
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] OMBlog - http://www.io.com/~o_m/omworld [
] Let's face it: Sometimes you *need* [
] an obnoxious opinion in your day! [
]=====================================[

OM wrote:



These leaves us in a quandary; if we shoot it down, how can we prove it
wasn't a satellite launch attempt?



...Who ****ing cares? They've been rattling sabres for years now wtih
this particular threat. They launch, we knock it out of the sky and
tell them if they do it again, we'll just keep knocking it down. And
when they scream to the UN, we tell the NK *and* the UN "tough ****"
and stick to our guns.


The UN is on our side in this particular instant.
North Korea seems to want direct talks with us, rather than with the
six-party group of its neighbors with us as a member of that group.
We say "no" to this, though what the big deal about direct talks is
evades me.
If we do shoot it down, we are counting on North Korea responding in a
rational manner rather than say, nuking South Korea or Japan.
Can we be sure they will react rationally based on past experience?
I wouldn't say so.
How do we know there isn't a North Korean SS-N-6 or two lurking off the
west coast in a old beat-up freighter ready to head for LA if we do
something about the missile/satellite launch?
I'm still trying to make heads or tails of reports that they have 40
tanks of propellant around the missile, but this isn't enough to finish
fueling it; what are they filling it by? Five gallon pails?
A few days back the media stated they would have to launch within 48
hours after finishing fueling it, now that seems to have changed to
around six months to a year.
The thing's range also seems wildly variable based on news reports; a
few days ago it could only reach Alaska; now it's shown able to reach
half of the U.S.:
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/Co...EA_MISSILE.gif
Getting straight info on this whole mess seems impossible.

Pat

OM wrote:.


...At which time NK becomes a glassed-over parking lot with Cherenkov
lighting 24 hours a day.



Don't forget that these guys are supposed to have somewhere between
three and six nukes as well as a very active chemical/biological warfare
program: http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/dprk/index.html
They also have a lot of crazy little zealots who would probably be quite
willing to get back at us with those weapons for anything we did to
North Korea.
This is a dangerous situation, and I think some diplomacy might be
useful here- we should get our heads together with China on this. They
can lean on North Korea due to its reliance on Chinese oil imports to
keep its what-passes-for-an-economy running.

Pat