Missile Interceptor Installed in Alaska

A ground-based missile interceptor was installed Thursday in Alaska’s interior -- the first component of a national defense system designed to shoot down enemy missiles.

Crews at Ft. Greely lowered the 55-foot-long, three-stage interceptor into one of six silos built behind a double-perimeter reinforced fence.

“We’re coming to the end of an era where we have not been able to defend our country against long-range ballistic missile attacks,” said Maj. Gen. John Holly, who heads the ground-based missile defense program for the Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency.

Five more interceptors will be installed at the complex 80 miles southeast of Fairbanks -- and four at Vandenberg Air Force Base in Santa Barbara County -- by the end of the year. Ten more will be installed at Ft. Greely by late 2005.

Missile defense is an essential part of President Bush’s national security policy. It hasn’t been as politically divisive as President Reagan’s more elaborate Star Wars program, but Democrats complain that the administration is spending billions of dollars to deploy interceptors without knowing if they will work.

The interceptors have not proved their reliability, hitting targets only five times in eight tests, said Philip Coyle, former assistant secretary of operational test and evaluation at the Pentagon. He said they failed even with information “an enemy would never give us,” including launch time.