[hash872]

Out of curiosity (this is totally not my field)- aren't anti-aircraft and anti-missile systems a thing, especially for a technologically advanced country like Japan? If Ukraine can shoot down half or more of the missiles that Russia lobs at them, why can't Japan use a similar system like the Patriot or Iron Dome?

Related question- what's the status of shooting down missiles in flight with lasers? Is that still a generation or two away?

[Merad]

Japan has Patriot systems and several Aegis equipped ships, and both of those have ABM capability. Ballistic missiles are just much harder to shoot down than normal surface to surface or air launched missiles, especially when you’re using SAM’s like Patriot that are relatively short range. I think there just isn’t a very high confidence level in ABM systems. Even the US’ dedicated ABM system, which consists of long range missiles based in CA and AK, is expected to need four shots to achieve a 97% probability of kill (the system only has 44 missiles).

The US had a test platform [0] that showed that the concept of an airborne laser ABM system was viable. However they concluded that we need an order of magnitude increase in the power of airborne lasers in order for it to have enough range to actually be useful.

0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_YAL-1

[HideousKojima]

For starters, never believe any side's claims about how many of the other side's materiel/soldiers they've destroyed/killed/whatever. Russia is definitely telling bigger lies about this stuff, but the Ukrainians and their allies are certainly exaggerating their numbers too. In war, truth is the first casualty.

The reality is that we don't really have any hard numbers for how effective various missile defense systems are. Any test results from them are classified because you don't want your opponent knowing ahead of time how effective your defenses actually are. Even for automated turrets like CIWS don't have any hard numbers on their shootdown rate.

[dirtyid]

Japan as AEGIS + SM3 with dedicated ballistic missile defense ships in the plan. Issue is BMD are really not well tested, intercept tests are very choreographed events that is not... reflective of reality, and still experiences occasional failures. I think JP conducts there tests with USN around Hawaii, away from prying eyes. Apart from just being sensitive tech where you don't want capabilities revealed (which it will if intercepting in sea of Japan), the political optics of FAILING to intercept is catastrophic. IMO worse than a F35 getting shot down. Imagine interceptor (missile) misses / fails to self destruct and lands in SKR (if lucky), or if unlucky, in nuclear states like PRC, RU, NKR where an incoming missile defense interceptor is not distinguishable from an actual missile. Basically, current BMD politics is better to pretend/hope you're capable (via controlled demostrations) than fail once while doing it live and remove all doubt.

[MichaelZuo]

They're not worth it to actually use unless you have unlimited amounts of money or you know there's a nuke on the missile.

It would take in the ballpark of $10 billion worth of anti-missile systems to shoot down $100 million worth of unarmed ballistic missiles if both sides know what their doing.

[perihelions]

These missiles are in outer space, at the altitude of the ISS or higher.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_North_Korean_missile_t... (*old* ICBM tests, not today's one)

- There's no extant technology to shoot them down;

- They're not in Japanese airspace or territory (does not extend to orbital altitude);

- If they were to crash in Japan by mistake, there's no benefit in shooting at them, because they'd be untargeted debris with no warheads. An anti-missile missile is just additional debris with extra steps.

[deepsun]

> half or more

Here is the answer. Every system has some percentage of misses, especially during mass attacks.

Iron Dome is not really relevant, I think, it's designed against small, short-range, mortar-like projectiles. For ballistic rockets or cruise missiles you need systems like Patriot, right.

[ethbr0]

You'd use the SM-3 (USN) launched from Aegis platforms. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIM-161_Standard_Missile_3

Threats like this are why Japan and South Korea are the only countries outside the US to field it.

Alternates would be THAAD and the GBI, but believe those are more specific to the US Army and Missile Defense Agency's needs. The latter is also still under serious development.

[anarchymatt]

"technologically advanced country like Japan?"

is unfortunately a misconception