Missile defense

Trump Unveils Ambitious Missile Defense Plans

President Trump unveiled a sweeping plan Thursday to defend the U.S. and its allies from missile attack.

The plan is the first update to the nation's missile defense strategy in nearly a decade, but in many ways it is reminiscent of President Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, a pie-in-the-sky program that was later dubbed "Star Wars."

The report outlines a battery of new technologies — including lasers and space-based systems — that the Pentagon wants to combat what it deems to be a growing missile threat. It also calls for adding 20 interceptor missiles to an existing system of 44 interceptors based in Fort Greely, Alaska.

"Our goal is simple," Trump said at a Pentagon briefing on Thursday. "To ensure that we can detect and destroy any missile launched against the United States anywhere, anytime, anyplace."

Critics were quick to point out that meeting this goal would cost many billions of dollars.

"It would be incredibly costly," says Laura Grego, a physicist at the Union of Concerned Scientists who tracks missile defense programs. Grego says that Trump's comments hark back to the days of Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative. That program cost billions, and in the end, its vision of a space-based blanket defense against nuclear attack proved to be too technically challenging.