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Huntsville Times January 10, 2010 Global missile threat growing By Kenneth Kesner Lockheed outlines various programs under way for 2010 As the number of countries with missile programs grows, developing and fielding tools to protect U.S. troops and allies around the world is increasingly important, said retired Army Lt. Gen. John Holly, vice president of Lockheed Martin Missile Defense Systems in Huntsville. "It used to be that many people viewed missile defense as a luxury," he said. "It's no longer a luxury. It's a necessity in terms of protecting U.S. as well as allied interests and forces and people in their homelands." Holly outlined the growing global threat as he and other Lockheed missile defense leaders gave an overview of the company's programs for 2010 in a teleconference last week. China and Russia are continuing active technology and weapons programs, he said. And proliferation continues: More than two dozen countries have active ballistic missile programs, "and many of those countries, frankly, are not friendly to the U.S. interests," Holly said. In 2009, North Korea and Iran continued development and demonstration of their missile programs, he said. And, excluding the U.S., NATO countries, Russia and China, there are now more than 6,000 missiles in the short- and intermediate-range inventory. "This is not a very safe world," Holly said. "It is incumbent upon us to provide the kind of capabilities in industry to support our government in terms of preserving and protecting our national interests across the board." Missile-defense-related programs throughout the company accounted for about 10 percent of Lockheed's 2009 sales, he said. Among those are the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense, Aegis Weapon System, Patriot Advanced Capability-3, Ground-based Midcourse Defense, Medium Extended Air Defense System and the C2BMC - Command, Control, Battle Management and Communications - programs. Lockheed has provided ballistic missiles as sophisticated targets to the Missile Defense Agency since 1996, Holly said, with 33 of 34 mission successes, including three in 2009. The Targets and Countermeasures division will continue working with the MDA test program in 2010 and will soon see the maiden flight of the intermediate-range LV2 missile target, he said. =========================== Stop NATO http://groups.yahoo.com/group/stopnato Blog site: http://rickrozoff.wordpress.com/ To subscribe, send an e-mail to: [email protected] or [email protected] Daily digest option available. ============================== --------------------------- ANTI-NATO INFORMATION LIST --^---------------------------------------------------------------- This email was sent to: [email protected] EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.bNM5nn.YXJjaGl2 Or send an email to: [email protected] For Topica's complete suite of email marketing solutions visit: http://www.topica.com/?p=TEXFOOTER --^----------------------------------------------------------------
