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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?

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rshow55 - 12:19pm Feb 20, 2002 EST (#11658 of 11662)

An editorial and OpEd piece in the New York Times could harrdly be more serious.

Managing the News http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/20/opinion/_20WED2.html

The new Office of Strategic Influence's plans to plant false stories in the foreign press would undermine rather than reinforce the government's broader efforts to build international support for the war on terrorism.

The administration's "missile defense" program is essentially a fraud - - based on what seems to be an assumption of a "right to lie and evade" built into current American arrangements in the course of fighting the Cold War. If facts, repeatedly pointed out by people with credentials, were taken into account, the "missile defense" fraud, and all its foreign policy implications, would simply be impossible.

For practical reasons, important in America, and important elsewhere in the world, there have to be limits on the "right to lie" about subject matter that is of consequence.

People need to expect decent action. It cannot be taken for granted, and has been too often - - something well illustrated in a piece today:

An Enron Unit Chief Warned, and Was Rebuffed By JOHN SCHWARTZ http://www.nytimes.com/2002/02/20/business/20PIPE.html

http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/276
http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/277
http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/278

almarst-2001 - 02:22pm Feb 20, 2002 EST (#11659 of 11662)

UNITED NATIONS: NO PROOF SADDAM GASSED THE KURDS! - http://www.whatreallyhappened.com/helms.html

"This is serious stuff, because the U.N. tells us that 1.4 million Iraqi civilians have died as a result of the sanctions, which is 3,000 times more than the number of Kurds who supposedly died of gassing at the hands of Saddam. "

rshow55 - 02:45pm Feb 20, 2002 EST (#11660 of 11662)

Yes it is serious. And your point about proportion is serious.

Getting facts straight is serious - - - and almarst , I'm very grateful you're participating in this forum again. There are plenty of terrible problems in the world -- but very many that are insoluble when people don't know the facts, and agree to them ARE capable of better solutions when people do. And this thread is talking about big scale matters of life and death.

When Eisenhower lied about the U-2 flights over Russia, he did so reluctantly, and when he was found out, he was very embarrassed. Because the presumption of true statement is key to workable human cooperations.

We are in a dangerous but also strange situation -- where the United States is involved in a great deal of deception, and a great deal of self deception.

It has to be possible to find ways, when it matter enough, to force people to face consequential facts. We live in a far too ugly, far too dangerous world, because this is not now possible. It needs to be.

We now seem to live in a world where the most important facts, and most vital decencies, can simply be ignored and suppressed by means of the "political technologies" Ralph Reed explained to Enron so clearly in
MD11621 rshow55 2/19/02 7:52am ... MD11622 rshow55 2/19/02 7:54am

I spoke with some optimism in MD11623 rshow55 2/19/02 7:58am

It is vital that we find ways to get some fundamental facts established, and put in some reasonable proportion. MD8000 rshowalter 8/22/01 9:19am

Sometimes the conclusions that follow from a circumstance aren't pretty. But the uglier they are, the more important it can be to get them right. MD11638 rshow55 2/19/02 8:03pm

Almarst , there may be more hope now than there was before, because more people are paying attention, and more people are concerned.

almarst-2001 - 03:31pm Feb 20, 2002 EST (#11661 of 11662)

"more people are paying attention, and more people are concerned. "

I hope you are right, Robert.

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