On July 12, 2006, a Hizballah militia ambushed a small Israeli force across the Israeli-Lebanese border, killing three and kidnapping two wounded soldiers. Five more Israeli soldiers were killed when their unit entered Lebanon to rescue their comrades. The following morning, Hizballah fired a rocket from Lebanon into the Israeli resort town of Nahariya, killing one and injuring ten. From July 13 to August 13, Israeli police reported more than 4000 impact sites within Israel from rockets launched by Hizballah forces in Lebanon. More than 2000 civilians were wounded and 53 were killed; the barrage caused extensive damage to hundreds of homes, public utilities, and industrial plants. Nearly a million Israelis were forced to live in or near secure shelters, while a quarter of a million people from northern Israel were evacuated and relocated to other areas of the country. Economic activity in northern Israel was halted for at least a month.
In March 1996, the Chinese government announced its intention to conduct ballistic missile tests 20 miles off of the Taiwanese northeastern coast and 30 miles off the Taiwanese southwestern coast. The exercise interfered with access to the island's principal port of Kao-Hsiung, to Taipei's international airport, and to rich fishing areas. The Chinese action was, in effect, a partial and temporary blockade on Taiwan. The Chinese admitted later to attempting to influence the presidential elections in the small nation and to affect its foreign policy with the United States.
These are just two examples of many world events underscoring the seriousness of ballistic missile threats. The concern that ballistic missiles and weapons of mass destruction are proliferating has heightened the sense of urgency for the United States to develop a comprehensive ballistic missile defense system capable of defending the homeland, its deployed troops, and friends against weapons of mass destruction and ballistic platforms that deliver them.