NICE: Navy Destroys Ballistic Missile Target in Successful Interceptor Test.

U.S. sailors aboard the Arleigh Burke-class destroyer John Finn destroyed a target Friday with the latest version of the Standard Missile-3 interceptor during a flight test off the coast of Hawaii.

The ship launched the SM-3 Block IIA guided missile, which then successfully intercepted a medium-range ballistic missile target deployed from the Pacific Missile Range Facility at Kauai, Hawaii, according to a U.S. Missile Defense Agency press release.

Mark Wright, a spokesman for MDA, confirmed that the SM-3 Block IIA impacted with the target.

“It’s a kinetic kill vehicle, meaning it has to slam into the target, not just explode near it,” he told Military.com.

Built by Raytheon, the Block IIA can be deployed on land as well as at sea.

China’s neighbors and our easternmost NATO allies ought to be buying Aegis Ashore systems as quickly as we can build them.