U.S. Aegis Warship To Be Dispatched to East Sea

U.S. Aegis Warship To Be Dispatched to East Sea. April. 06, 2004 22:34. by Young-Sik Kim spear@donga.com.

The U.S. is reportedly planning to send a cutting-edge Aegis warship, famous for the pivotal role they plays in organizing the Missile Defense system of the U.S., to the East Sea of Korea this September.

This dispatch can be interpreted as a restraining effort against North Korea, which already owns missiles, and another step in the movement of the front line of a missile defense system for Japan.

Quoting the remarks of U.S. Admiral Gordon England on April 5, Defense News, a military magazine based in the U.S., has reported that “this warship will detect and trace the movement and flight of missiles in order to mutually exchange information about those missiles with the Army as part of a multi-layer defense system.” This warship weighs 9,000 tons and is equipped with a missile-tracing radar system and an interceptor missile system.

The U.S. government has disclosed that they will dispatch a missile interceptor system to Alaska this autumn in accordance with their idea of missile defense system organization, in order to take countermeasures against the intimidation of North Korea, together with the Aegis warship dispatched to the East Sea.

The dispatch of warship is regarded as the first level of preparation in a three-step maritime defense plan which was urged by U.S. President George W. Bush about two years ago.

The second step, the “prepatory intervention level,” will be to establish the “SM-3 Block 1 Missile” on the warship, which can intercept short and medium-range missiles, starting in 2005.

Starting in the spring of 2006, the third step will be to dispatch 15 destroyers and three cruisers to the East Sea in order to intercept missiles from anywhere in the world that are aimed at the Korean Peninsula, reported this magazine.

The U.S. Navy has shown examples of this system in Iraq War, when it utilized detectors on board a destroyer to trace the launch of short-range missiles and gave this information to Patriot anti-missile batteries on the ground.

“Using a destroyer to transfer emergency information earlier to the ground forces is similar to procedures used in the Iraq War, but, the intimidation of North Korea is more menacing because they possess longer ranged and multi-level missiles comparing to Iraq,” remarked a spokesperson of the U.S.’s Missile Defense Agency (MDA).

The United States possesses 39 Aegis warships, which are equipped with cutting-edge electronic defense systems such as high-performance radar.