A recent report by the U.S. General Accounting Office to Congress suggests that the Kaua`i launches of Strategic Target System (STARS) missiles may face dramatic reductions from what had been planned for the program.<\/p>\n
The first launch of a STARS missile was made in February 1993, initiating what the U.S. Army planned to be a series of at least 40 such launches. In August 1993, the second launch occurred. A third took place in July 1994.<\/p>\n
Shortly after the first launch, the Secretary of Defense initiated a “bottom-up review” of the nation’s defense needs. As the GAO report states, “Since July 1993, the planned level of test launches has decreased. One firm STARS launch is scheduled to support [National Missile Defense] in fiscal year 1995. [The Ballistic Missile Defense Organization] has identified another 11 potential launches through fiscal year 2000. Ten of these 11 launches would support [Theater Missile Defense] and are dependent on the successful resolution of ABM Treaty issues. The remaining launch would support NMD.”<\/p>\n
(NMD, as explained by the GAO, “refers to defending the United States from limited ballistic missile attacks whether deliberate, accidental, or unauthorized.” Theater Missile Defense, or TMD, “refers to defending U.S. forces deployed overseas and allies and friends from theater ballistic missile attacks.” The ABM Treaty, or Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, generally prohibits the testing or deployment of weapons intended to defend against first-strike ballistic missiles.)<\/p>\n
That one planned STARS launch has been moved to the 1996 fiscal year, according to a report in the Honolulu Advertiser.<\/i><\/p>\n
Under Review<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n
The GAO report, “Ballistic Missile Defense: Current Status of Strategic Target System” (GAO\/NSIAD-95-78), points out that as a result of the “bottom-up review,” the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization asked the Army’s Space and Strategic Defense Command, which supervises the STARS program, to develop a long-range plan for STARS. The resulting draft long-range plan included three management options for STARS: (1) continuing it; (2) placing it in a “dormant status,” while retaining the capability to reactivate it; and (3) terminating it. According to the GAO, a final decision should be reached by the year’s end, “based on factors such as the cost to maintain STARS and ABM Treaty issues associated with testing TMD systems.”<\/p>\n
Even if STARS is continued, the program will be far less ambitious than what was originally planned. As early as July 1993, the planned STARS launches from Kaua`i had been cut to just 12 from the original schedule of four a year for 10 years. “Now,” the GAO report states, “no more than two launches a year are anticipated or even considered possible without increasing the number of Sandia personnel supporting the STARS program.” Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico is a facility of the Department of Energy; Sandia runs the STARS program for the Army.<\/p>\n
Merely to keep the launch capability intact costs the government more than $15 million a year — this after initial start-up costs of the program totaling more than $200 million. Launches cost from $5 million to $7 million apiece over and above that fixed cost.<\/p>\n
The GAO notes that of the $15.1 million, roughly one-sixth — or $2.5 million — goes to support the Kaua`i Test Facility. The remainder goes to the Sandia labs at Albuquerque ($8.36 million), to the booster refurbishment and mission support contracts ($3.47 million), to storage costs ($110,000), to contracts for specialized assistance (a total of $520,000), and, finally, for Army staff travel ($130,000).<\/p>\n
(For further background on the controversy surrounding the STARS launches, scroll down to the [url=\/members_archives\/archives1993.php]March 1993[\/url] edition of Environment Hawai`i.<\/i><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/b><\/p>\n For years, several state agencies have been working with private parties to develop a plan to install day-use moorings in heavily used coastal waters where anchorings were causing damage to coral cover. In the spring of 1994, the state Department of Land and Natural Resources’ Division of Boating and Ocean Recreation released a draft environmental assessment for installation of 281 moorings. (Originally, 287 had been proposed, but six scheduled for installation around Kaho`olawe were dropped from the final EA).<\/p>\n In June 1995, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers issued is permit for the moorings — which now number 277 (three mooring sites have been eliminated for Maui, while West Hawai`i lost one site). The Corps’ permit, however, allows for additional day-use moorings to be installed, subject to notification and approval of the Corps, the National Marine Fisheries Service, and “other appropriate divisions of the” DLNR, including the Historic Sites Division and the Division of Aquatic Resources.<\/p>\n The Corps attached several “special conditions” to the permit. Among other things, the moorings are to be installed “in accordance with a proposed schedule agreed to, or as developed by a mooring committee.” Members of that committee are to include representatives of the private group TORCH (The Ocean Recreation Council of Hawai`i); the state Departments of Land and Natural Resources and Business, Economic Development, and Tourism; the Sea Grant program of the University of Hawai`i; the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service; and the National Marine Fisheries Service.<\/p>\n — Patricia Tummons<\/p>\n Volume 6, Number 1 July 1995<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A recent report by the U.S. General Accounting Office to Congress suggests that the Kaua`i launches of Strategic Target System (STARS) missiles may face dramatic reductions from what had been planned for the program. The first launch of a STARS … Continued<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[243],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3623","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-july-1995"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3623","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3623"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3623\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3623"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3623"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/environment-hawaii.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3623"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nCorps of Engineers Issues Moorings Permit<\/div>\n