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WASHINGTON - THE US military on Friday successfully intercepted a long-range missile target in a 'very realistic' simulated attack to test the proposed US missile defence system, the Defence Department said.
'We had a successful intercept' at 3.29 pm (4.29 am Singapore time), Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said of the test, which is seen as a crucial step towards a controversial anti-missile shield Washington plans to base in Eastern Europe.
The Bush administration wants to install a radar facility in the Czech Republic and 10 interceptor missiles in neighboring Poland by 2014.
Friday's effort was the eighth successful intercept out of the 13 tests conducted since 1999, with the last successful test taking place in September 2007.
The successful test of the project, which so far has cost the Defense Department some 100 billion dollars (S$152 billion), comes at a critical time before president-elect Barack Obama moves into the White House on January 20.
Mr Obama has so far not committed to the missile defence shield.
One of his senior foreign policy advisors during the campaign, Denis McDonough, has indicated however that Mr Obama would support the programme if the technology proves viable.
Moscow has repeatedly voiced strong objections to the shield plan, which Washington insists is not directed against Russia but at 'rogue states' such as Iran and North Korea.
In late November, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin urged Mr Obama to drop the planned shield in Eastern Europe.
'This project is aimed against the strategic potential of Russia. And we can only give it an adequate response,' he said.
Earlier last month, Moscow raised alarm in Western capitals by warning it could place missiles in the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, close to Poland, in response to the plan.
On Friday, the interceptor missile was launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, as the target - a fake warhead mimicking long-range ballistic missiles from nations like North Korea - was set off from the Alaskan island of Kodiak.
The effectiveness of the defense shield has been questioned by some scientists who claim the programme would be unable to distinguish between a missile and a decoy.
But Mr Whitman assured before Friday's effort that it would 'be a very realistic test'.
The target would include 'countermeasures of the type that we would expect to see from countries that are developing these types of threatening ballistic missile capabilities', such as Iran and North Korea, he said.
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