Missile Defense

The Missile Defense Agency aims to issue a final request for proposals for the Next-Generation Interceptor project next month, according to a top Defense Department official, as MDA is swiftly moving past the failure of the Redesigned Kill Vehicle program.

The Navy plans to use rapid prototyping authorities to develop its submarine-launched hypersonic strike weapon through the Conventional Prompt Strike program, a Senate panel revealed last week.

The Senate Appropriations Committee has proposed rescinding $4.7 billion in Defense Department funding allocated in previous years, with the steepest cuts hitting the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, missile defense programs and an aid fund used to train and equip Afghan and Iraqi forces fighting insurgents.

The Air Force is developing its own variant of a hypersonic glide body that pairs an aeroshell common to Army and Navy hypersonic programs with an Air Force-unique substructure needed to withstand conditions when dropped mid-air from a fast-moving aircraft, according to the service

Senate Appropriations Committee Democrats today voted against the fiscal year 2020 defense spending bill after failing to add measures that would block the Pentagon from spending funds on President Trump’s southern border wall.

The Missile Defense Agency has secured a de facto authorization from a key Senate panel for an eleventh-hour launch of the Next-Generation Interceptor, winning $222 million in fiscal year 2020 for a major new-start program to follow the recently terminated Redesigned Kill Vehicle program.

A Senate panel today marked up its version of the fiscal year 2020 defense spending bill in accordance with a bipartisan budget deal, appropriating $622 billion in base spending, $70.7 billion in Overseas Contingency Operations and $1.7 billion in emergency funding.

The White House Office of Management and Budget is asking Senate lawmakers to reconsider legislation that would transfer procurement funding for the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense program from the Missile Defense Agency to the Army, a move lawmakers have long sought and which the Pentagon has resisted.

The Defense Department plans to divert $8 million to help finance President Trump's controversial border wall from a Missile Defense Agency project deemed urgent for homeland defense. The MDA plan would add two additional ground-based interceptor silos at Ft. Greely, AK, to ensure the entire interceptor fleet remains poised to respond to a North Korean attack.