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Army Extends THAAD Deadlines, Signs Agreement to Possibly Rescind Lockheed-Martin Fines
The Pentagon
has announced an extension of the THAAD intercept deadlines
in its agreement with Lockheed-Martin from July 16, 1999 until
"late July, early August," said Jennifer Canaff,
public affairs officer for the Pentagon's Ballistic Missile
Defense Organization in a recent interview with Taxpayers
for Common Sense.
Canaff
cited "programatic" reasons and then clarified "for
reasons that deal with the program. It was done internally."
On May
13, 1998, after the THAAD missile defense system failed to
hit its target five consecutive times, the Department of Defense
(DOD) entered a "cure agreement" with Lockheed-Martin.
The agreement created punitive fines if the weapon system
continued to fail intercept tests by specified dates.
On March
29, 1999, Lockheed-Martin was fined $15 million following
THAAD’s sixth failure. However the latest agreement by
Ballistic Missile Defense Organization with Lockheed-Martin
will return that punitive fine if THAAD achieves three successful
intercepts by December 31, 1999.
Lockheed-Martin
was to be fined $20 million unless it could produce two successful
intercepts by June 30, 1999. But the deadline was extended
to July 16, 1999 following problems with the target missile
(HERA) during a test on May 25, 1999.
Canaff
explained the first extension: "The technical reason
was the HERA" target missile’s malfunction. As for
the newest extension, she said that DOD would not state a
specific deadline date "right now."
The next
THAAD test is slated for July 26, 1999. The first - and only
- successful intercept took place on June 10, 1999 during
THAAD's 7th test flight. |
