OREANDA-NEWS. Boeing today issued the following statement regarding recently announced changes to the U.S. missile defense capability and the Ground-based Midcourse Defense (GMD) program:

"Boeing is proud to partner with the U.S. Missile Defense Agency in making operational, long-range ballistic missile defense a reality. As world events continue to show that ballistic missile threats are real, GMD offers U.S. warfighters a robust and reliable capability to defend the United States against these threats. Given the system's three-for-three track record of successful intercepts with the operationally deployed system and a successful flight test of the next-generation Ground-Based Interceptor earlier this year, we remain confident in the system's ability to defeat adversaries both now and in the future.

"Boeing stands ready to support the outlined changes and expanded capability for GMD as we have for the past decade. Boeing will continue to support the requirements that the Missile Defense Agency and U.S. policy makers determine for effective missile defense."