Pentagon eyeing West Coast missile defense sites: report

The Pentagon is reportedly evaluating locations on the West Coast for places to install new anti-missile defenses, amid the increasing threat of a nuclear North Korea.

Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) told Reuters on Saturday that the Missile Defense Agency was hoping to install extra defenses, including Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-ballistic missiles, on West Coast sites. 

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The possibility is being considered shortly after North Korea claimed it successfully launched a missile capable of reaching the entire United States mainland.

THAAD is designed to shoot down short-, medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles using radar to detect an incoming threat.

Funding for the system is not in the 2018 defense budget plan. Rep. Adam Smith (D-Wash.) told Reuters that the sites where the technology would be installed have yet to be determined.

North Korea claimed it carried out successful a missile test last week, two months after its most recent launch attempt.

It was the country’s third intercontinental ballistic missile test, but the first of what North Korea is calling its Hwasong-15 missile.

The missile is said to have flown nearly 2,800 miles high and for a distance of more than 600 miles. Flattened out to typical missile trajectory, experts said, that means the missile can travel a distance of more than 8,000 miles — far enough to strike anywhere in United States.

South Korea installed a THAAD system in September as a defense mechanism against possible North Korean missile launches.