The U.S. Missile Defense Agency (MDA) conducted a missile defense system test on the island of Guam on Tuesday, December 10, successfully intercepting a target that simulated a medium-range ballistic missile.
The test was named Flight Experiment Mission-02 (FEM-02), utilizing the SM-3 Block IIA interceptor missile. The execution of such tests represents a significant step towards establishing 360-degree missile defense for the strategically important U.S. outpost in the Pacific. This was reported by the portal The War Zone.
It was noted that during these tests, the medium-range ballistic missile simulator was intercepted at a distance of over 200 nautical miles (or up to 400 kilometers) from Guam.
The launch itself employed the Aegis Ashore ground-based missile defense system, which is largely similar to that deployed in the Polish city of Redzikowo, and we have detailed its features in a separate publication.
However, as shown in the photographs from the tests provided by the MDA, this time a non-standard vertical launch system based on the Mark 41 VLS (the standard launch system for U.S. Navy ships) was used for launching the SM-3 Block IIA interceptor missile. This system can tilt at a certain angle to the west, which simplifies maintenance and seemingly increases the missile's range (which can already reach 1300 kilometers in the case of the SM-3).
Typically, Aegis Ashore uses vertical launch silos (also based on Mark 41 VLS), which are essentially buried in the ground, and there is no technical possibility to change the launch angle, which remains consistently at 90 degrees.
Americans believe that this "upgrade," meaning the replacement of vertical launch silos with a launch system capable of tilting at a certain angle, will significantly enhance the missile defense capabilities of Guam, which would immediately come "under fire" from various types of missiles, including MRBMs, in the event of a major conflict with China in the Pacific region.
Furthermore, from Defense Express, we emphasize that the aforementioned points not only highlight an interesting U.S. experiment in missile defense but also remind us of the necessity for Ukraine to acquire the same SM-3 interceptor missiles to defend against medium-range ballistic missiles currently posed by Russia.
Moreover, such missiles can be utilized not only from stationary Aegis Ashore systems located in Poland and Romania, but also from mobile launch systems like the 8-cell Mk 41 VLS, which are available to the U.S. Navy (The Military Balance 2024 states that there are three such systems as of the beginning of this year).