Author: AW1Ed

US Missile Defense Agency in conjunction with the Japan Ministry of Defense conducted a developmental test of a new Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA missile off the coast of Hawaii.

At approximately 7:20 p.m., Hawaii Standard Time, 21 June, a medium-range ballistic target missile was launched from the Pacific Missile Range Facility at Kauai, Hawaii. USS John Paul Jones (DDG 53) detected and tracked the target with its on-board AN/SPY-1 radar using the Aegis Baseline 9.C2 weapon system. Upon acquiring and tracking the target, the ship launched an SM-3 Block IIA guided missile. Unfortunately, the missile did not intercept the target as planned.

Program officials will conduct an extensive analysis of the test data. Until that review is complete, no additional details will be forthcoming.

This is the fourth live fire test of the system and the second intercept test. The first intercept test in February was successful.

The SM-3 Block IIA is being developed cooperatively by the U.S. and Japan to defeat medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missile threats. Currently in the developmental test phase, the SM-3 Block IIA is being designed to operate as part of the Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense system.

Disappointing, but this is why we test. A very wise old tester once told me that failure is always an option, as long as you learn from it.

Fox News is reporting on Hanna Böhman, a Canadian former model and motorcycle sales rep found a different calling, joining Kurdish women fighting ISIS in Syria.

She  joined the YPJ – the female brigade of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units – after sneaking into Syria in and receiving rudimentary instruction on the care and feeding of the AK-47 before being thrust onto the front lines.

“I just felt like I had to do something greater with my life,” Böhman told Fox News. “I spent my life not doing what I wanted to do, but what I was expected to do. I wanted something different.”

“It was inspiring to fight alongside other women,” she said.

She served in two positions with the YPJ, first as overwatch guarding against suicide bombers, and then as her unit’s sniper.

“My first gun — an AK-47 — was 40 years old,” said Böhman, who recounted a near-death gun battle with two ISIS snipers in the northern Syrian border town of Til Abyad.

“I’m so much taller than most of the Kurdish girls and I was always getting shot at by snipers,” said Böhman, who is 5 feet 8 inches tall. “On this one day, the bullet was so close I actually felt it part my hair.”

“We’re being the change we want to see in the world,” she said. “It sounds cliché, but it’s true.”

 

 

 

 

The Army Times (I know, a bit out of my swim lane) reports that a group of US combat vets has formed a non-profit that addresses both poaching and PTSD. A former Marine, Ray Tate, founded Veterans Empowered to Protect African Wildlife (Vetpaw) with the goal of protecting rhinos and other game in the bush around their base in South Africa.

The vets have had extensive training and are salty enough “to resist the temptation” of the use of lethal force, and use “textbook COIN” techniques, according to Kevin, a former Green Beret who did not wish to be identified further.

“The organization seeks to employ combat veterans and giving them a similar level of brotherhood, intensity and purpose they knew during deployments. That also may help offset the PTSD that Tate told The Guardian “everyone gets” after returning from war.

“There are all these veterans with billions of dollars of training and the government doesn’t use them. I saw a need in two places and just put them together,” Tate said. ”

I hope part of the price of admission is a valid DD-214. If so, good on them.

 

 

CBS News is reporting Reality Leigh Winner, the 25-year-old NSA contractor accused of leaking classified documents, has been denied bail by U.S. Magistrate Judge Brian Epps.  She had pleaded not guilty to charges that she illegally retained and transmitted national defense information. The federal crime carries a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison upon conviction.

Prosecutors argued Winner had used a thumb drive to download classified documents while she was in the Air Force, CBS News’ David Begnaud reports. The thumb drive has not been found, and Epps said he was concerned that drive’s location is unknown.

Epps was also concerned that Winner seemed be fascinated with the Middle East and Islamic terrorism, Begnaud reports. “Whether that’s a jest or not, it still concerns me,” Epps said.

“Prosecutor Jennifer Solari says investigators seized a notebook from Winner’s house in Augusta, Georgia, and in it, Winner made references about traveling to the Middle East. At one point she wrote, “I want to burn the White House down … find somewhere in Kurdistan to live. Haha.”‘

Solari cautioned that prosecutors were not trying to link Winner to terrorism.”

Maybe one day she’ll get her wish about moving to Kurdistan, inshallah.

Combined Joint Task Force-Inherent Resolve (CJTF-IR) reports a US aircraft shot down a Syrian armed Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) after it fired on Coalition forces in Southern Syria today. The UAV was similar to a US MQ-1 Predator, and it was downed after attacking personnel training and advising partner forces in the fight against ISIS.

This follows another successful attack where Coalition Forces destroyed two Syrian “Technical” vehicles, essentially trucks with heavy caliber crew served guns.

“The Coalition’s mission is to defeat ISIS in Iraq and Syria.  The Coalition does not seek to fight Syrian regime, Russian or pro-regime forces partnered with them. The demonstrated hostile intent and actions of pro-regime forces near Coalition and partner forces in southern Syria, however, continue to concern us and the Coalition will take appropriate measures to protect our forces.”

While not as satisfying as seeing SU-22 Fitter silhouettes painted on a F-14 Tomcat’s tail, this is the first air-to-air kill in about 20 years, and I’m sure the troops on the ground appreciated the effort.

 

Fox News is reporting the successful shoot-down of a mock nuclear warhead from a ground based missile interceptor. The event occurred over the Pacific Ocean, where a simulated ballistic missile was launched from the Marshall Islands and the interceptor was fired from Vandenberg AFB.

This is the first test of this type in nearly three years, and comes on the heels of a North Korean missile launch this past weekend, firing a Scud-like missile into Japanese waters.

“This system is vitally important to the defense of our homeland, and this test demonstrates that we have a capable, credible deterrent against a very real threat,” said Missile Defense Agency (MDA) Director Vice Admiral Jim Syring. “I am incredibly proud of the warfighters who executed this test and who operate this system every day.”

The US fields two other anti-missile systems, the Patriot Missile System and the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, or THAAD. Both are designed to counter short and medium range ballistic missiles. The system under test today has the long range capability, but has only about a 50% success rate thus far. But that’s why we test.

More here.