I'm pretty sure that's been explained already. Apparently it's against Navy regs to launch shit in rough seas during peacetime. Overly cautious safety regs I guess.
Rough seas complicate things. Especially if the sea is really rough. Every second of a rockets fuel is precious and if the rocket has to realign itself towards the target because the ship rolled heavily to one side as it was fired might mean the missile runs out of fuel and misses the target. Plus you could have situations where the ship is being battered by waves as the missile fires and a wave fucks the missile up.
I fail to see how delaying for the most adventageous shot is an admission of anything short of common sense considering the thirty million plus price tag to bring this defective piece of hardware down. If your argument is that they didn't do it in high seas so therefore it can't be done in high seas then your argument is preposterous. Keep trying to make it out as a failure guys, your arguments fall like a wad on the floor of a quarter movie room.
I'm still wondering what the hell a multi-vector warhead is. When I google it all I get is Star Trek links and links to multi-vector diplomacy articles.
I know em as "agile" warheads. They've got the capability of maneuvering somewhat within their flight path.
The only argument I see here seems to go "doing this in good weather and in calm seas proves it can be done in bad weather and in high sea." And yes, that is utterly preposterous. For the third time: This is a success. But turning it into a test of the MDS would turn it into a failure. And at least for this thread, that's what this rhetoric seems to have done; I couldn't stop it.
Not to pick nits, but there's no such thing as a "decaying but stable orbit." If the orbit is stable, it's not decaying, and if it's decaying, it's not stable. I think you meant "decaying but known orbit".
