07.28.17

Sullivan Statement on Latest North Korea ICBM Test

WASHINGTON, DC – U.S. Senator Dan Sullivan (R-AK), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, released the following statement after the Pentagon confirmed today that North Korea has conducted yet another ballistic missile test. 

“Today’s North Korean test shows that Kim Jong-un will not stop until he has an ICBM that can strike American cities like New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles with a nuclear weapon,” said Senator Sullivan. “While I am hopeful that a diplomatic solution will ultimately prevail, the United States cannot and will not allow an irrational dictator to have a capability that threatens millions of American lives. Period.

“This latest test further reinforces the need for a more robust and integrated ballistic missile defense system to protect not only Alaska and the rest of the nation, but also our deployed service members and our allies – which is what my provision in this year’s defense authorization bill begins to do.”

Senator Sullivan is an outspoken advocate for bolstering the nation’s missile defense. To counter the threat from North Korea, Senator Sullivan introduced the bipartisan S. 1196 Advancing America’s Missile Defense (AAMD) Act to advance the U.S. missile defense program. The legislation has 27 Senate cosponsors.

The bipartisan AAMD Act, much of which is included in the FY 2018 National Defense Authorization Act, would do the following:

  • Authorize the procurement of an additional 28 interceptors, and require our military to look at having up to 100 interceptors distributed across the U.S.
  • Authorize the more rapid development of new and better kill vehicles—the “bullets” that intercept warheads in space—and a layer of space-based radars to track missile threats from launch to intercept, a technological advancement that would improve all missile systems.
  • Push to better integrate our current and future ground-based radars that allow the U.S.—both independently and in concert with space-based capabilities—to “picture” an incoming missile with incredible detail and precisely target it for intercept. 
  • Increase the pace of missile defense testing to allow U.S. forces to learn from actual launches of our defenses and increase confidence in the effectiveness of the system.

 

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