Obama administration now learning to love missile defense

Indeed, whether or not the administration will acknowledge it, missile defense has proven an effective system based on dozens of successful tests. Sure, the technology is still evolving, but it's already shown it can “hit a bullet with a bullet” in space: Now we're even able to hit a particular spot on that “bullet.”

Deploying missile defense in the face of continuing Korean hectoring also helps the administration counter the perceptions (domestic and international) that it's weak on national security. Indeed, this allows the Pentagon to act militarily, but in a way that's relatively unlikely to provoke escalation by the other side.

It's certainly more subtle than stationing a carrier strike group off the Korean coast.

The good news is the Bush administration kept its promise to develop and deploy missile defense to protect us against an expanding nuke and missile threat. Otherwise, we'd now be completely vulnerable to North Korean missiles.

The bad news is the new team hit the brakes on developing the Pacific missile-defense system further, halted the development of a European system to protect us against the unfolding Iranian threat and cut the missile-defense budget by 15 percent.

Maybe North Korean menacing will finally convince the administration and Congress that being able to protect yourself with missile defense is really a good thing. It certainly beats the alternative — “Duck and Cover.”

Peter Brookes is a Heritage Foundation senior fellow and a former deputy assistant secretary of defense. peterbrookes@heritage.org

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