by TChris

The Missile Defense Agency has spent more than $80 billion since 1985 in its effort to develop a missle defense system. That's a lot of money for a system that doesn't work. The good news for defense contractors is that the administration plans to spend another $50 billion over the next five years.

In the latest test of a missile interceptor, conducted yesterday, the launching system shut down for unknown reasons. This follows a 2002 test in which the interceptor failed to separate from its booster rocket, causing it to miss its target by hundreds of miles.

A Democratic member of the Senate Armed Services Committee who has been critical of the program, Senator Jack Reed of Rhode Island, said the latest setback might make lawmakers wonder whether money for the Pentagon might be better spent elsewhere, particularly in light of the mounting costs of the campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan.

But Republican supporters won't let failure deter their desire to throw more tax dollars at their pals in the defense industry. And while President Bush pledged in December 2002 (after the last failure) that the system would be operational by September 2004, the latest failure will only motivate the administration to set another unrealistic target date for its scaled-down version of Star Wars.