Chairman of a Congressional Committee: Expansion of Missile Defense Shield Against Iran and North Korea is Necessary

The Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee in the United States stated that to counter the missile "threats" from Iran and North Korea, the U.S. government needs to increase spending and expand its missile defense shield. Mac Thornberry, the committee's chairman, said on February 6 that "if you look at the events happening around the world, I mean Iran and North Korea, the importance of expanding the missile defense shield increases." According to this senior U.S. congressman, "global actors are building missiles that are harder to counter." Just days before Thornberry's remarks, Iran conducted a missile test that faced anger and criticism from officials in the Donald Trump administration, leading to new sanctions against individuals and entities from Iran to China. Both Iran and China have protested these sanctions. Iranian officials have threatened Israel with missile attacks on various occasions. Iran is also accused of providing its missiles to several of its supported militia groups, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon or the Houthis in Yemen. Currently, Israel possesses an advanced missile defense system, and officials in the Obama administration emphasized that there was no reason to halt the missile defense shield program in the Gulf region following the nuclear agreement with Iran. Robert Scher, the former Deputy Secretary of Defense, stated in September 2015 during a session of a subcommittee of the House Armed Services Committee that "since the nuclear agreement with Iran does not cover Iran's ballistic missile program, the Pentagon will continue efforts to establish such a defensive system in the Gulf." According to this former official, "there is no doubt that Iran's ballistic missile activities will continue to pose a threat to the U.S. and its allies in Europe, Israel, and the Gulf." Iranian officials claim their missile program is "defensive" and they have no intention of halting its development. Meanwhile, the leader of North Korea also promised during a televised speech in January that his country would test an intercontinental ballistic missile; if successful, this would mean that this nuclear-armed country could reach parts of U.S. territory. Before the Trump administration took office, during the Obama administration, the U.S. began negotiations with South Korea to establish the THAAD missile defense system in that country. James Mattis, Trump's Secretary of Defense, recently continued these negotiations in Seoul. China strongly opposes the establishment of this system, considering its radar a threat to information security and the system itself a danger to the balance of power in the region. Washington and Seoul have rejected these claims, stating that the establishment of this system is for defensive purposes.