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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

beckq - 06:03pm Sep 6, 2000 EST (#263 of 11863)

Vic,

Remember now vic remember what the intial remark that was made to you:

beckq - 11:09am Aug 10, 2000 EDT (#210 of 261)

". Think I'm wrong-consider why America signed that SALT I treaty and the protocols. It signed it to lower the chance that one side would attempt to consider ways to increase a survival rate. They knew-that if they did not maintain provisions that survival a 'no-no' then both would attempt to survive. "

beckq - 11:38am Sep 7, 2000 EST (#264 of 11863)

Interesting-

warwolf - 08:53pm Sep 10, 2000 EST (#265 of 11863)
"Distrust all in whom the impulse to punish is powerful." -- Nietzsche

What's the point of an NMD?? Any nation or group with the intention of deploying "rogue missiles" at the U.S. or any of our strategic interests will feel the taste of a what a $300 billion dollar military budget can cook up.

rshowalt - 07:32am Sep 25, 2000 EST (#266 of 11863)

Ridding the world of nuclear weapons, this year or next year. What would have to happen?

Given sufficient understanding (and hence motivation) among the main participants, primarily the U.S. and Russia, almost all nuclear weapons could be dismantled in about four weeks time, with rapid mop up and convergence to a nuclear weapon free world thereafter.

The massive arsenals of the U.S. and the former USSR could be dismanted by the military forces responsible for them, with the opposite side, in every case, observing and assured that the weapons could not be used as part of a first strike trick in the course of stand down. Trust or good will would not be necessary nor would they be assumed. Distrustful checking and deterrence would be used to provide the vital assurances the nation states would properly need.

Leaders would "live in a fishbowl" during the full nuclear stand down. Major leaders of each country would have to be "fully observed" by the other side during stand down, so that tricks large enough to constitute first strikes could not go undetected. Leaders would be wired for sound that the other side could monitor, and visual inputs also would have to be monitored by the other side.

Direct observation of nuclear weapon destruction by the enemies, U.S. and Russia, would be as open as it could be made to be, and still be fast.

Hostages from high status families in the two countries would be exchanged for the duration of the stand down, treated as honored guests who would nonetheless be killed if a first strike occurred.

These conditions, together, would rule out a first strike, and so make the nuclear weapon elimination possible. Conventional arsenals would remain intact.

rshowalt - 07:33am Sep 25, 2000 EST (#267 of 11863)

After full nuclear disarmament of the U.S. and Russia, the US and Russia, working together, and with their conventional military forces intact, would see to it, through ordinary negotiation and the coordinated use of force, that other nuclear weapon holding nations destroyed their nuclear weapons, in ways that could be clearly checked.

Rogue nuclear forces would be hunted down, with Russia, the US, and other forces acting in coordination to confiscate their nuclear weapons, and with rogues punished in memorable ways.

Full nuclear disarmament that leaves other military forces intact is technically easy, and could be done quickly.

rshowalt - 07:35am Sep 25, 2000 EST (#268 of 11863)

To motivate this nuclear disarmament, the following things would have to happen.

People would have to see how bad nuclear weapons are, and how first use of nuclear weapons is worse than anything that Hitler did. IT IS NOT ALL RIGHT TO USE NUCLEAR WEAPONS.

For effective elimination of nuclear weapons, and to establish conditions so that they stay eliminated, I believe that artists and other people must make it memorably clear how bad nuclear weapons are, so that no one wants to make them again. So that no one condones their use again. If people remember this, anyone trying to make a nuclear weapon is overwhelmingly likely to be caught and punished. It should be the tradition that the property rights and moral rights of anyone making nuclear weapons should be dismissed, and any and all force mobilized to prevent the building of nuclear weapons or their use.

The technical part of full world disarmament isn't especially difficult for the nation states that would have to do it. The motivation to eliminate nuclear weapons is the harder part.

rshowalt - 07:36am Sep 25, 2000 EST (#269 of 11863)

Human actions work best according to the following pattern:

"Get scared .... take a good look ..... get organized ..... fix it .... recount so all concerned are "reading from the same page ...... go on to other things."

I believe that elimination of nuclear weapons should proceed according to this pattern, with details well crafted enough so that the pattern worked for almost all people in the world. It would be a major challenge to disarm in a way that was aesthetically pleasing, and understood to be honorable, by all concerned. I believe that people are artistically perceptive enough to meet this challenge.

I believe that we could do it soon, and that we should do it soon.

beckq - 09:19am Sep 25, 2000 EST (#270 of 11863)

rshowalt - 07:36am Sep 25, 2000 EDT (#269 of 269)

name any technology in human history that has been developed and then 'eliminated'.

thanks

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