Lexington Institute:
The United States, its friends and allies face a serious and growing threat from adversaries armed with a spectrum of rockets, missiles and drones. Most recently we have seen the dangers posed by shorter range rockets and missiles such as short range, homemade Qassam rockets and longer-range Iranian supplied Fateh and SCUD derivatives in the hands of Hamas. But today, the Free World also is having to contend with the proliferation of sophisticated long-range missiles, including intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). While the major arsenals of these weapons are in the hands of competitors such as Russia and China, new actors are poised to enter this club. North Korea and Iran are working assiduously on their arsenals of theater-range ballistic missiles and towards the creation of indigenous ICBMs.
The key to countering this threat is, first, the availability of sensors, primarily radar to detect and track them. The more rapidly and farther away the rocket, missile or drone can be detected the greater the likelihood of being able to defeat it. For example, when the threat is a Qassam rocket (or a mortar shell) launched from the Gaza Strip, detection and track is a matter of a few seconds. When it comes to long-range missiles, even ICBMs, early detection and track can maximize the engagement range available to the defender, permitting multiple shots or a refined shoot-look-shoot doctrine. Today, there are many missile defense systems whose effective defense envelope against long-range threats is limited not by the interceptor’s performance but by the availability of early tracking information. This is why the U.S. and its allies have sought to deploy radars forward in places like Turkey and Japan, where they can establish early tracks of North Korean and Iranian ballistic missiles launched against Europe or the United States…
