Washington, Oct 27 (AFP) The US military successfully shot down a medium-range ballistic missile Friday in a test of a new interceptor system, which is being co-developed with Japan and has been dogged by previous failures.

Sailors aboard the USS John Finn successfully detected, tracked and targeted the rocket with an SM-3 Block IIA missile during a test off the west coast of Hawaii, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) said in a statement.

The successful operation comes after two failed intercept tests, in June 2017 and January 2018.

A test firing in February 2017 had been successful.

"This was a superb accomplishment and key milestone for the SM-3 Block IIA return to flight," MDA Director Lieutenant General Sam Greaves said.

The MDA in January said America had so far spent about USD 2.2 billion on the system and Japan about USD 1 billion.

The MDA could not immediately confirm if those numbers had grown.

The SM-3 Block IIA missile is part of the AEGIS Ballistic Missile Defense system and is made by arms giant Raytheon. (AFP) CK

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