US missile defense test fails: Pentagon
America's missile defense system failed on Friday in a test over the Pacific, with an interceptor failing to hit an incoming ballistic missile, the Pentagon said. The miss represented yet another setback for the costly ground-based interceptors, which have not had a successful test result since 2008. The test's objective was to have an interceptor, launched from Vandenberg air base in California, knock out a long-range ballistic missile fired from a US military test site at Kwajalein atoll in the Marshall Islands. But "an intercept was not achieved," US Missile Defense Agency spokesman Richard Lehner said in a brief statement. "Program officials will conduct an extensive review to determine the cause or causes of any anomalies which may have prevented a successful intercept," it said.
