In the 1990s, the THAAD originally stood for Theater High Altitude Area Defense, but it has changed. Lockheed Martin: “…Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) interceptor to the Missile Defense Agency (MDA). THAAD is a highly effective, combat-proven defense capability against short, medium and intermediate-range ballistic missile threats, and is the only U.S. system designed to intercept targets outside and inside the atmosphere.”
Possibly in exchange for Israel’s Benjamin Netanyahu promising not to attack nuclear operations in Iran, on 13OCT2024 U.S. President Joseph Robinette Biden Junior confirmed he deployed the THAAD system to Israel.
Bravo Battery-62nd Air Defense Artillery Regiment, Fort Cavazos (aka Fort Hood), July 2024. U.S. Army photo by Private First Class Josefina Garcia.
Estimated cost (as of 2017): $1.25-Billion per battery (48 missiles, six truck-mounted launchers, a radar, a command-and-control platform, 95 soldiers), $12.6-Million per missile.
THAAD command & control vehicles, Dededo, Guam, 12MAR2024. U.S. Army photo by Major Trevor Wild.
Difference between a rocket and a missile: A ‘missile’ is a guided rocket, a ‘rocket’ has no guidance system.
THAAD launcher somewhere in The Middle East, November 2023. USA photo by Duy Nguyen.
In March 2019, the U.S. Army deployed (supposedly for the first time) a THAAD battery to Israel for a U.S.-Israeli wargame.
Somewhere in the Negev Desert, U.S. Air Force photo by Staff Sergeant Cory D. Payne.
THAAD radar units of the U.S. Army’s Bravo Battery-Second Air Defense Artillery Regiment-11th Air Defense Artillery Brigade, Israel, 04MAR2019.
Somewhere in the Negev Desert, USAF photo by Staff Sergeant Cory D. Payne, 05MAR2019.
Fort Bliss, Texas, 23FEB2019. USAF photo by Staff Sergeant Cory D. Payne.
THAAD load-up on C-17 for deployment from Fort Bliss, Texas, 23FEB2019.
Official U.S. Department of Defense music video of 2019 deployment to Israel:
Anderson Air Force Base, Guam. USA photo by Captain Adan Cazarez.
THAAD deployed to Guam, 05FEB2019.
AN/TPY-2 radar on Kwajalein Atoll, 11AUG2012. Photo via U.S. Missile Defense Agency.
The THAAD also uses the Army/Navy TPY-2 radar.
GREAT RENEGER:
TRUMP DEPLOYS THAAD TO ISRAEL
VEHICLE I-D: USAF C-21 LEARJET, YEAR OF THE LEAR