Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday the United
States would deploy Aegis warships equipped with missile
interceptors to defend its forces and allies around Europe.
[]
Following is a report on these Aegis ships, first filed on
Sept 8 by Reuters correspondent Dan Williams, who went aboard
one of them, the destroyer USS Higgins, in the Mediterranean.
The text is unchanged.
* Aegis missile-killer a boon to U.S. allies fearing Iran
* Israelis see potential competitor to their Arrow system
By Dan Williams
ABOARD USS HIGGINS, Mediterranean Sea, Sept 8 (Reuters) - He
is trained to hunt submarines or pirates, launch Tomahawk cruise
missiles at coastal targets and shoot down attacking planes. He
can also enforce naval blockades and rescue vessels in distress.
Yet on his first Mediterranean tour Commander Carl Meuser
may have another mission in mind, the kind the U.S. Navy has
long performed off North Korea and Japan -- strategic air
defence.
Iran has girded its disputed nuclear project with long-range
missiles. Israel and Washington's Arab allies are nervous. The
Obama administration wants talks with Tehran, but is quietly
shoring up the diplomacy with means for military containment.
So Meuser cites no specific Middle Eastern adversaries when
showing a Reuters crew his destroyer, USS Higgins, one of 18
American ships deployed globally with Aegis interceptor systems
capable of blowing up ballistic missiles above the atmosphere.
"Regardless of the threat, regardless of the territory that
we are trying to defend, based on our national interest, we can
cover a large area," he said.
According to a regional map issued last month by the U.S.
Missile Defence Agency, a Mediterranean-based Aegis could cover
southern Turkey, Lebanon, Israel, the Palestinian territories
and north Egypt in the event of a missile war. Another ship,
deployed in the Gulf, would similarly protect local Arab states.
"Being ship-based, it also gives us more flexibility and
gives our leadership more flexibility in that we can go places a
lot more simply and folks at the embassies don't have to spend
as much time getting clearance," Meuser said.
"We just kind of show up 12 miles (19 km) off the coast and
we're in international waters."
CLOSE ASSET
For Israel, where Higgins docked this week, Aegis is an
especially close asset. Israel already hosts a U.S. strategic
radar, X-band, and its Arrow II missile interceptor, which is
partly underwritten by Washington, is inter-operable with Aegis.
Arrow designer Uzi Rubin said Aegis could be brought into
line with Israel's air defences "at the flick of a switch".
"I think it is very important that the United States make
Aegis ships available should there be an attack by Iran, with
their firepower joining our firepower," he said, echoing fears
that Iranian nuclear warheads could one day be used against the
Jewish state, although Tehran denies having hostile designs.
But some Israelis have voiced concern at the degree to which
their country may grow beholden to American military largesse.
Assumed to have the region's only atomic arsenal, Israel has
hinted it might strike Iran preemptively. Any such unilateral
action could be circumscribed by the presence of U.S. forces
whose ties to Israel would mark them out for Iranian reprisals.
Israel is also reluctant to rely too heavily on Aegis ships,
which are unlikely to carry more than two dozen of the costly
SM-3 interceptor missiles and could thus, in theory, be stumped
by a big salvo from Iran or its ally Syria.
Pointing to Higgins's 90 pre-loaded launch tubes, Meuser
said: "Even if you filled them up with the $10 million missiles
-- that's a lot of money -- then you're still going to have a
limited amount, so you would need to have more ships come in."
PROTRACTED FACE-OFF
Robert Hewson, a combat systems analyst with Jane's
Information Group, said such reinforcement would be unfeasible
for any protracted face-off between Israel and its arch-foes.
"I don't think the United States can afford to provide the
number of ships and assets required to provide 365-day coverage
for Israel," he said.
Thrift is one selling point behind the Israeli-U.S. plan to
develop an upgraded Arrow III by the middle of next decade, with
a projected price of $2.4 million for its interceptor missiles.
Yet the Pentagon has also shown interest in a land-based
version of SM-3, which could be offered to Israel either as a
stop-gap or an alternative to Arrow, with the added domestic
boon of diverting funds to its American manufacturer, Raytheon.
Despite the protectionist instincts on both sides, Rubin
said professional considerations would keep Arrow III on track.
"The question is what's easier: to take a foreign-designed
missile across the barriers of sovereignty and proprietary
rights and somehow integrate it into our system, or to do it
in-house? To do it in-house is cheaper and faster," he said.
Raytheon says the "ashore" SM-3, due out in 2013, may also
be considered by the Pentagon for Europe, where it could play a
role with or without a missile defence deployment that former
U.S. President George W. Bush had proposed in Poland and the
Czech Republic and which has been fiercely opposed by Russia.
"As Navy guys, we are going to have plenty of work to keep
us busy. So if the Army comes up with a better answer for how to
do this (missile defence), then that's fine. I can tell you that
Aegis is not the answer to everybody's problems," Meuser said.
"But right now we do have a good capability. We are mobile,
and we are on-scene ... so at least we can influence events."
(For a factbox on the U.S. missile shield please click on
[])
(Editing by Samia Nakhoul)
