Iran to stage major drill in November: report

The Iranian Army and Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) will stage a joint major military drill in November to display the country’s modern defensive capabilities, the local satellite Press TV reported on Thursday.

The drill will be held across the country in four phases and Iran’s armed forces will take part in the air, ground and sea exercise and various defensive equipment including tanks, personnel carriers, ballistic missiles and vessels will be put on display, the report said.

Meanwhile, different kinds of radar systems, modern anti-aircraft missile systems, anti-cruise missile cannon, anti-armor and electronic warfare systems, fighter bombers as well as destroyers will also be showcased in the drill, according to the report.

South Korea favors short-range missiles

South Korea said it favors a joint U.S-Korean missile defense system rather than the United States-led plan involving the purchase of longer range missiles.

South Korea’s anti-missile system, under the Korea Air Missile Defense program, is designed to protect the south from short-range missiles fired by North Korea while the U.S. system uses missiles to protect against medium- and long-range ballistic missile threats.

“South Korea and the U.S. will discuss intelligence sharing and operation of means regarding the missile defense system so as to protect the Korean Peninsula from the threats of North Korean nuclear weapons and its weapons of mass destruction at the Extended Deterrence Policy Committee,” the ministry said in a statement.

U.S. reviewing missile program with Germany, Italy

A prime multibillion-dollar example of U.S.-German-Italian cooperation for the battlefield of the future is facing an uncertain future.

Armament directors from the three countries were to discuss the status of the Medium Extended Air Defense System, or MEADS, in Brussels this week among other things, even as overarching missile-defense issues loom larger on NATO’s agenda.

“We have to look at our portfolio for air defense and see where there’s overlap, where there’s duplication,” Malcolm O’Neill, the U.S. Army’s top arms buyer, said in an interview on Wednesday.

U.S. Laser Fails to Switch On

Riki Ellison, Founder and Chairman of the Missile Defense Advocacy Alliance (MDAA), www.missiledefenseadvocacy.org, has commented on the results of the recent airborne laser test bed missile test out at Point Mugu, California last week where the laser failed to switch on.  Ellison is one of the foremost lay experts in the field of missile defense in the world. His comments include the following:

“Last week, in the skies off Point Mugu, California, a 747 equipped with solid state lasers successfully tracked and targeted at the speed of light a short-range ballistic missile target launched from a sea-based barge; however it failed to switch on and engage its megawatt class lethal chemical laser to destroy the boosting missile.

Obama Set to Offer Stricter Nuclear Deal to Iran

The Obama administration and its European allies are preparing a new offer for negotiations with Iran on its nuclear program, senior administration officials say, but the conditions on Tehran would be even more onerous than a deal that the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, rejected last year.Iran’s reaction, officials say, will be the first test of whether a new and surprisingly broad set of economic sanctions is changing Iran’s nuclear calculus.

As recently as last summer, senior officials, ranging from the C.I.A. director, Leon E. Panetta, to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. Mike Mullen, predicted that while the sanctions would hurt Iran, it was unlikely they would prove sufficient to force it to give up the major elements of its nuclear program.