The FY 2009 Pentagon Spending Request – Ballistic Missile Defense

by Christopher Hellman and Travis Sharp

Ballistic missile defense continues to receive more funding than any other weapons system in the annual Pentagon budget.

Background: As part of its Fiscal Year 2002 budget request, the Defense Department announced a major restructuring of the Ballistic Missile Defense Office (BMDO). Funding for a range of programs within BMDO were absorbed and redistributed into five major areas of research. These are the Terminal, Midcourse, and Boost Segments, the Ballistic Missile Defense Segment, and Ballistic Missile Defense Sensors. As part of the FY’02 reorganization, some specific missile defense programs were absorbed into the general research areas and have, from a funding perspective, effectively disappeared.

Meanwhile, as specific systems and technologies mature, they are shifted out of the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) budget into one (or more) of the service budgets. The Space Based Infra-Red System-High (SBIRS-High) continues to be funded outside the MDA budget.

FY’09 Request – The Administration is requesting $8.9 billion for the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) in FY’09, up roughly $350 million from the current $8.6 billion. The request includes $720 million for the third missile defense site in Europe ($96 million for Development, $382.6 million for Fielding, and $241.2 million for Military Construction). The $8.9 billion total does not include $2.3 billion for the SBIRS-High satellite program and a further $1 billion for programs such as Patriot and MEADS that are being funded directly by the services. Including these non-MDA programs increases the total FY’09 request for ballistic missile defense to $12.2 billion.

Ballistic Missile Defense in Europe – The FY’09 request includes $720 million for the third missile defense site in Europe ($96 million for Development, $382.6 million for Fielding, and $241.2 million for Military Construction). In the Missile Defense Agency’s budget documentation, missile defense in Europe is known as “Block 4.0” and is meant to “Defend Allies & Deployed Forces in Europe from Limited Iranian Long-Range Threats.” Block 4.0 components include:

• Ten ground-based interceptors (GBIs) equipped with the two-stage Orbital Boost Vehicle (OBV) configuration rather than the three-stage OBV configuration used on the interceptors deployed at Fort Greely and Vandenberg Air Force Base (VAFB). These GBIs are scheduled for deployment at the European Interceptor Site (EIS) in Poland pending an agreement with the Polish government and fulfillment of certain test requirements.
• The European Mid-course Radar (EMR) currently located at the Kwajalein Atoll, modified and relocated to a site in the Czech Republic pending an agreement with the Czech government. It will provide critical midcourse tracking data for the European Interceptor Site.
• A forward-based AN/TPY-2 radar. The site for this radar has not been selected, but its placement should enable it to provide information early in the flight of a potential ballistic missile launch and help discriminate threat RVs from associated countermeasures.
• The C2BMC infrastructure and expanded network enabling capabilities required to support the EIS in Poland and provide sensor management of the EMR in the Czech Republic and the forward-based AN/TPY-2 radar.

TABLE 6. FY’09 REQUEST FOR BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSE
(Budget Authority in Millions of Dollars)

TABLE 7. FY’09 REQUEST FOR BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSE IN EUROPE
(Budget Authority in Millions of Dollars)