AL.com:
The enemy threat has been thwarted. Missiles bearing lethal warheads have been intercepted.
The world is safe.
You’re welcome.
For a tense 25-minute exercise, I assume the Walter Mitty experience of saving the planet, or at least key targets on a tiny Pacific island.
The Space & Missile Defense Symposium is a grand annual Huntsville exhibition for those who work in and support the defense industry. Even for the laymen among us who don’t speak Acronym, there are enough big-boy toys, or least exhibits from those who manufacture them, to make it fascinating.
In a small room at the rear of the North Hall of the Von Braun Center is one of the coolest of the big-boy toys.
The Missile Defense Agency is hosting an Interactive Wargame for symposium attendees, a 25-station command center in which participants are assigned roles to defend good-guy territory against the evil, heavily armed island nation of Zolon. (OK, so on the map it looks like Maui is attacking Molokai, but who’s to quibble?)
There are two sessions remaining for participants, at 0945 and 1055 – military time there – on Thursday.
The MDA’s task, we are told, is to “develop, test and field an integrated missile defense system” and what we’ll use is “close to a real-world system.”
We are assigned a call name — I am Shark – and a cubicle controlling our specific weapons system or task. Shark is a conceptual weapon soaring in a figure-8 path at 35,000 feet above the earth.
We each have mentors to lead us through the exercise. If one is going to kick some Zolon butt, being wingman to a former combat pilot like MDA consultant Paul Henry is a great ride.
We sit in front of two monitors. On the left one is a map that displays the targets, our location and the approximate location of enemy launch sites. Ominous red arcs arise from the “threat country,” headed toward targets on our territory. White arcs stream from defense positions, trying to intercept the enemy missiles.
The right screen provides all the data – shots fired, approximate time of intercept, status of fellow defenders. And, with one little mouse-click on the button reading “Shark,” the ability to fire the weapon to destroy the incoming missiles.
Amazing what can be done behind a computer keyboard.
Amazing how one can become all swallowed up in the make-believe drama.
Amazing how nervous are these endless seconds of wait-and-see, to learn if the Shark’s weapon indeed does its job as signaled by a little white diamond indicating a kill…
