The United States Army Space and Missile Defense Command (SMDC) is a specialized major command within the United States Army. The command was established in 1997. The SMDC is an organization composed of several components:
- SMDC Headquarters and the Force Development Integration Center in Redstone Arsenal, Alabama
- 1st Space Brigade, Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado – consists of 1st Space Battalion, 117th Space Battalion (Colorado Army National Guard) and 53rd Signal Battalion (SATCOM)
- 100th Missile Defense Brigade (GMD), Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado
- 49th Missile Defense Battalion, Alaska Army National Guard, Fort Greely, Alaska
- U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Command / U.S. Army Strategic Command (Forward) located in Peterson AFB, Colorado Springs, Colorado
- Space and Missile Defense Technical Center (SMDTC)
- Space and Missile Defense Battle Lab (SMDBL)
- Space and Missile Defense Acquisition Center (SMDAC) based in Huntsville, Alabama; the SMDAC comprises:
- High Energy Laser Systems Test Facility (HELSTF), at White Sands Missile Range, New Mexico.
- U.S. Army Kwajalein Atoll/Reagan Test Site (USAKA/RTS), in the Republic of the Marshall Islands
- Army Space Program Office (ASPO) in Alexandria, Virginia
- Joint Land Attack Cruise Missile Defense Elevated Netted Sensors Project Office (JLENS) based in Huntsville, Alabama
- Ballistic Missile Targets Joint Project Office (BMTJPO) based in Huntsville, Alabama
The current commander is Lieutenant General Richard P. Formica., with Senior Enlisted Advisor Command Sergeant Major Larry S. Turner.
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states, army, space, missile, defense and/or command:
“In the larger view the major forces of the depression now lie outside of the United States, and our recuperation has been retarded by the unwarranted degree of fear and apprehension created by these outside forces.”
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964)
“Before abstraction everything is one, but one like chaos; after abstraction everything is united again, but this union is a free binding of autonomous, self-determined beings. Out of a mob a society has developed, chaos has been transformed into a manifold world.”
—Novalis [Friedrich Von Hardenberg] (1772–1801)
“I make this direct statement to the American people that there is far less chance of the United States getting into war, if we do all we can now to support the nations defending themselves against attack by the Axis than if we acquiesce in their defeat, submit tamely to an Axis victory, and wait our turn to be the object of attack in another war later on.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)
“Ladies and gentlemen, I have a grave announcement to make. Incredible as it may seem, strange beings who landed in New Jersey tonight are the vanguard of an invading army from Mars.”
—Orson Welles (1915–1984)
“A set of ideas, a point of view, a frame of reference is in space only an intersection, the state of affairs at some given moment in the consciousness of one man or many men, but in time it has evolving form, virtually organic extension. In time ideas can be thought of as sprouting, growing, maturing, bringing forth seed and dying like plants.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)
“... the truth is the hardest missile one can be pelted with.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“... most Southerners of my parents’ era were raised to feel that it wasn’t respectable to be rich. We felt that all patriotic Southerners had lost everything in defense of the South, and sufficient time hadn’t elapsed for respectable rebuilding of financial security in a war- impoverished region.”
—Sarah Patton Boyle, U.S. civil rights activist and author. The Desegregated Heart, part 1, ch. 1 (1962)
“Under bare Ben Bulben’s head
In Drumcliff churchyard Yeats is laid.
An ancestor was rector there
Long years ago, a church stands near,
By the road an ancient cross.
No marble, no conventional phrase;
On limestone quarried near the spot
By his command these words are cut:
Cast a cold eye
On life, on death.
Horseman pass by!”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)