Missile Shield Test Failure

Another costly failure. Still having the interceptor fail to launch, but at least they haven't lost the interceptor, just the target.

Of course, you are getting more comments like this:

"It's clear that the programme is being pushed ahead for political reasons regardless of its capability," says David Wright, co-director of the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) in Cambridge, Massachusetts, US. "This interceptor has never been tested in an intercept test. Yet the Pentagon has already put eight of them in silos and is building at least another dozen before even knowing if they work."

"This administration has bought a lemon and there is no way to make lemonade," adds Stephen Young, senior analyst at UCS. "Congress should not spend another dime of the public's money until it can show this system would have some capability against a real attack."

Regarding the political nature of this, it is very hard to take the UCS seriously. The comment comes from an obviously political group, that is against the program. I wouldn't take their opinion of the political nature of the timing of the test. Unless they know something they aren't mentioning, for all they know this could just be another regularly scheduled retest and not something forced by politics.

Young fails to mention that Bush inherited this system from previous administrations. Not like Bush initialized the program. Even if Bush has refunded and moved the process forward, they're still working with an inherited system.