Features

Paul Fetters

A

n old Scottish horseman gave Kathleen Koehler Paige '70 her first crack at leadership. At the age of 12, Paige spent nearly every weekend and school vacation at his stable, lingering long after her riding lessons to groom horses and clean stalls. By the time she was 14, she was teaching adults how to ride.

Because she didn't own a horse, Paige never knew which mount would be hers on any given day. She much preferred young and green to old and plodding. "It's almost like problem-solving," she says. "You get on a horse and you don't know what responses they have, what capabilities they have. It's your job, as the rider, to bring out the best in them."

Paige wasn't again afforded such a wide berth in which to test her talents until she was a young officer in the U.S. Navy. She'd entered officer candidate school after graduating from the University of New Hampshire, thinking that the work experience would improve her job prospects. Two years of service, she figured, and she'd be out. Much to her astonishment, however, she found that the military, much like the stable owner, was willing to give her as much authority and responsibility as she could handle.

Some 30 years later, Paige, 54, is a rear admiral, the second highest-ranking female naval officer. Having proved her mettle in the testosterone-steeped Missile Defense Agency, she now bears the weighty responsibility for carrying out President George W. Bush's pledge to have a national missile defense system in place by the seemingly implausible deadline of September 2004.

Relaxing in a wing chair in her Crystal City, Va., living room, Paige appears much softer at the edges than one might expect for a seasoned officer and the program director for Aegis missile defense. She is dressed for comfort: a fleece pullover and plain black pants. Her red hair is military-short but stylish nonetheless.

It's nearly 6:30 in the evening and Paige is entering the 13th hour of her workday, which is not at all unusual except that tonight she's conducting business at home instead of at the office, on an airplane or behind a podium. The U.S. invasion of Iraq is well underway, but Paige is removed from the war operations. Instead, her day-to-day focus is on the future defense of the country.

Having cut her teeth on building ships and combat systems, she is now a key figure in the effort to expand the country's ability to track and intercept enemy missiles. The notion that the military could shoot down such missiles is an idea that has been kicked around since the '60s. President Ronald Reagan raised the concept to new heights with his vision of a national missile "shield," employing both ground- and space-based defense systems as added protection against the perceived Soviet threat. Dubbed "Star Wars," the controversial proposal lost momentum after the breakup of the U.S.S.R.

Soon after his election, President George W. Bush revived the idea in earnest, pointing to the growing threat from terrorists and rogue nations such as North Korea as justification. Bush made it clear that deployment of a national missile defense program was a top priority and reason enough to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. Signed with the Soviet Union in 1972, the treaty prohibited the testing or deployment of such systems. Withdrawal from the treaty cleared the way for the development of just such a program.

Bush's plan calls for land-based missile interceptors (missiles designed to destroy enemy warheads) in Alaska and California, and additional interceptors stationed on three Aegis warships. The sophisticated Aegis radar systems will be used to relay missile-tracking information to interceptors, both on land and at sea, thereby greatly expanding the area covered by missile defense.

Missile defense technology has come a long way since the 1991 Persian Gulf War, when U.S. Patriot missiles, originally designed to bring down aircraft, were pressed into service to intercept Iraqi Scuds. The Patriots failed to intercept their targets much of the time. During the most recent attack on Iraq, however, initial reports indicated that the latest generation of Patriots, called PAC-3s, were more effective.

Still, the theory that a national missile defense system will make the country any safer still has plenty of critics. Among their complaints: the unproven technology, the sky-high price tag (as much as $200 billion over two decades) and the potential for touching off an arms race. Proponents argue that such a national missile defense is crucial in the face of a proliferating world population of ballistic missiles. Paige calls that population "awesome," and she does not use the term in its complimentary sense.

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