A Standard Missile-3 Block IIA is launched by the Aegis Guam System, December 2024 Credit: DVIDS
THE TELEGRAPH | Published January 11, 2025
The US island territory of Guam, in the middle of the Pacific Ocean 1,700 miles from Taiwan, might be the most important real estate in the region for US and allied forces intervening in any future Chinese invasion of Taiwan.
Far enough from the likely locus of the fighting to be relatively safe from the most intensive Chinese attacks but close enough to function as a staging base for US and allied air, sea and ground forces, Guam could be the fulcrum for US leverage in a war over Taiwan.
But the island’s 200 square miles of beaches and mountains, and the constellation of ports, airfields and bases they shelter, aren’t invulnerable to attack. The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) possesses hundreds of ballistic missiles, including road-mobile DF-26s, with the range to hit Guam from launch sites in China.
Chinese People’s Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF) bombers and People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) submarines could also get close enough to the island to launch cruise missiles at it, adding a low-flying threat to the main ballistic threat.
It’s for that reason the Pentagon is spending billions of dollars to transform Guam into one of the most heavily-defended islands in the world. A new ground-based version of the US Navy’s Mark 41 vertical launch system, housed in a massive hinged structure, is central to the ongoing fortification.
In December, the US Missile Defense Agency conducted a critical test of the “Defense of Guam” system. A cargo plane took off from Andersen Air Force Base, the anchor of Guam’s base network, and far away and high up released a target simulating an incoming ballistic missile from its rear ramp.
Back on Guam, a powerful AN/TPY-6 radar tracked the missile target. The hinging launcher fired a rocket-boosted Raytheon SM-3 missile, which can hit ballistic missiles as far away as 750 miles with an infrared-guided, non-explosive “kinetic kill vehicle.”
The SM-3 knocked down the target, confirming that at least part of the Defense of Guam system works. “Collectively, we will use this to build upon and validate joint tracking architecture and integrated air and missile defence capabilities for Guam,” MDA director Lieutenant General Heath Collins stated.
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SOURCE: www.telegraph.co.uk
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