US Missile Defense
Unproven, unaccountable, and unhelpful for reducing the nuclear threat.
Six hours north of Anchorage, Alaska, lies a sprawling, snow-covered military base called Fort Greeley. Three thousand miles to its south, outside Lompoc, California, is another major installation—Vandenberg Air Force Base.
The two bases are linked by a unique security objective: to destroy nuclear-tipped missiles bound for the United States, should they ever be launched from North Korea or another hostile state.
Unfortunately, the system creates far more problems than it solves, and it likely wouldn’t work in the event of an actual attack—a practical reality that money and research won’t fix.