Integrating Technologies to Protect the Home Front against Ballistic Threats and Cruise Missiles

This article discusses active protection in response to the rocket threat to Israel’s home front. The defense establishment anticipates that in an allout war, the home front would be attacked for about thirty days, and that every day there would be about one thousand rocket and missile hits that would cause thousands of casualties as well as damage to infrastructures and strategic sites. Israel has an active protection system with five layers of interceptor missiles, and in cooperation with the United States, it developed Nautilus, a chemical-laser-based defense system from which the Skyguard system is derived. In 2007, the Iron Dome system, whose missiles are more expensive, was chosen over it for reasons both economic and operational. Yet only an integrated response that includes anti-missile defense systems and chemical laser systems will offer a comprehensive solution for active protection against all threats, without causing any significant economic difficulties.