The Missile Defense Agency (MDA) is the section of the United States government's Department of Defense responsible for developing a layered defense against ballistic missiles. The agency has its origins in the Strategic Defense Initiative, which was established in 1983 and was headed by Lt. General James Alan Abrahamson with physicist and engineer James Ionson, Ph.D., as head of the Innovative Science and Technology Office. It was renamed as the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization in 1993, and then renamed as the Missile Defense Agency in 2002. See National Missile Defense for the history of DoD missile defense programs.
Read more about Missile Defense Agency: Mission Statement, International Mission, Potential Enemies of The United States, Categories, Boost Phase Defense, Ascent Phase Defense, Midcourse (ballistic) Phase Defense, Terminal Phase Defense
Famous quotes containing the words missile, defense and/or agency:
“... the truth is the hardest missile one can be pelted with.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“He said, truly, that the reason why such greatly superior numbers quailed before him was, as one of his prisoners confessed, because they lacked a cause,—a kind of armor which he and his party never lacked. When the time came, few men were found willing to lay down their lives in defense of what they knew to be wrong; they did not like that this should be their last act in this world.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“It is possible that the telephone has been responsible for more business inefficiency than any other agency except laudanum.... In the old days when you wanted to get in touch with a man you wrote a note, sprinkled it with sand, and gave it to a man on horseback. It probably was delivered within half an hour, depending on how big a lunch the horse had had. But in these busy days of rush-rush-rush, it is sometimes a week before you can catch your man on the telephone.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)