U.S. schedules new National Missile Defense test

WASHINGTON — The Bush administration has decided to resume tests of the National Missile Defense system.

Officials said the next test of the NMD will take place in the second quarter of this year. They did not announce a date.

NMD testing was suspended after two failures last year during the term of then-President Bill Clinton. Clinton suspended a decision on NMD deployment and relayed the issue for the next administration.

President George Bush has advocated deployment of the NMD and officials said the Defense Department has resumed tests of the system. Test No. 6, which failed in July, will take place in the early to mid-summer.

The booster will be that of the Minuteman missile rather than the three-stage booster being developed by Boeing. The Boeing booster failed in the July test when the kill vehicle failed to separate from the booster.

"The one we've been using for the integrated flight test so far is a Minuteman booster basically," Pentagon spokesman Craig Quigley said. "It's a two-stage booster. It launches the systems you need to test in outer space."

The Boeing booster will be used in Test No. 7. This will take place later this year, Quigley said. Each test costs about $100 million.

Until the first test, officials said, the Pentagon will examine all components of the NMD interceptor without actually launching the system.