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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

applez101 - 08:20pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3621 of 3639)

On the demise of dictators:

Let's see what history has to offer up for the last century's pile of dictators:

a) America's guy in Panama ends up in a resort prison. :)

b) Chile's strongman is lost in a legal struggle & alzheimers.

c) Cambodia's murderer dies under questionable circumstances

d) Burma's Nei Win is sitting pretty, letting his Lieutenants take the int'l public heat. His retirement plan seems to be working.

e) Hitler took on one country too many and ends up committing suicide in his bunker amid the rubble of his nation.

f) Saddam has positioned himself as 'the better' option amongst his generals, so keeps his power & office. He'll probably die of old age.

g) Stalin, by all balanced accounts, is the most successful modern dictator, and he dies of old age.

All in all, not a bad career opportunity if you can handle it to the end. :)

rshowalter - 08:28pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3622 of 3639)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

gisterme you have to count bodies -- sanctions kill maybe half a million kids and do not take out Saddam. A questions of effectiveness here -- might something else (even something else involving negotiation) have been done -- or things rearranged so we could have killed the guy.

For my part, I think once we undertook military action against Iraq, we should have taken Saddam's regime out -- the idea that he'd "fall apart of his own weight" didn't work well - did it.

rshowalter - 08:30pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3623 of 3639)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Sanctions have been gut-wrenchingly expensive.

Ever counted to half a million? Maybe you ought to try it, between drinks of water.

We're talking about dead kids here.

You say "just Saddam's fault?"

Is it that simple - don't you worry about human consequences at all --- and if you don't -- why should you think of yourself, or expect others to think of you, as "the good guy?"

artemis130 - 08:30pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3624 of 3639)
caveat venditor

almarst-2001 - 06:22pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3614 of 3621)

paulistano 5/9/01 5:59pm

Surely, any nation has a right for self-defense. However, the current state of US military budget and posture is extremely offensive.

Are you suggesting that the fact the U.S. outspends the Russians and Chinese combined on the military by 15 to 1 is offensive to the rest of the free world?

I suspect they may consider it more obscene than offensive.

artemis130 - 08:42pm May 9, 2001 EST (#3625 of 3639)
caveat venditor

What's Rumsfeld's problem with MAD anyway? It's an egalitarian principle, allowing no one party to gain an upper hand - that's why it's worked for so long. It worked with the big powers and it works with the small. The lone rogue madman, reaching for a launch button, if his madness forces him to suicide under MAD, can be dealt with by early warning policies/contingencies (the protocols I spoke of) and a limited BMD.

This is going to end up being a trojan horse AND a pandora's box. Sounds like pretty risky stuff to me.

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