Wednesday, April 30, 2014

Congress Directs Pentagon to Evaluate Railgun for Missile Defense

The strategic forces subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee requested on 29 April that the US Department of Defense outline a plan for determining if the Electro-Magnetic (EM) Railgun could be an affordable alternative for missile defence.

The language, approved during the subcommittee's markup of the US House of Representative's version of the fiscal year 2015 (FY 2015) defence authorisation bill, requested both the US Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and Strategic Capabilities Office (SCO) provide a report by November 2015 that includes: an agreed series of test events to determine the suitability of the EM Railgun technology for transfer to MDA for further development activity; necessary funding in FY 2016 and future years to conduct testing; opportunities to use existing MDA test events and assets to evaluate features of a railgun system; and opportunities to leverage other military service development and test activities to ensure the most cost-effective commitment of funds.

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