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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?

rshowalter - 03:37pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5212 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

A key thing, trying to make contact across a barrier, is to get a sense of the questions:

How is this beautiful to you?

and

How is this ugly to you?

The big point is not for people to convert each other -- though some mutual sympathy, at the emotional level, may be important.

The big point is for people to know enough so that they can satisfy each other's basic needs in negotiation - so that they can fashion complex cooperations that are durable.

rshowalter - 03:41pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5213 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

For instance, Russians and Americans are always going to look ugly to each other in some essential ways (by no means all, but some).

There's no changing that - nor reason to want to change it, particularly.

There's reason to understand it.

For example, a mathematical engineer has to talk to Russians and Americans differently -- or it used to be that way -- because the patterns of thought are really different.

For example, Americans are much more likely to talk of "degrees of freedom" -- Russians about "constraints."

(For a lot of problems, I happen to like the Russian way better.)

rshowalter - 03:43pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5214 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

And if you have to get compatible definitions -- both ways -- it can take some talking.

rshowalter - 03:47pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5215 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Have you ever looked at a full transcript of a jury trial? A LOT of words. When things are in doubt, people need that.

The internet helps. Once facts are agreed to in common, by a matching process -- then negotiation is possible.

But if the facts are agreed, and the objective relations are agreed -- that doesn't make a deal -- it only makes a deal possible.

Russians and Americans could be exactly agreed about all "the facts" and "the relations" -- but then they'd have to come to agreements by negotiation. The point is, with everybody "reading from the same page" workable, durable deals can be struck. People know what they're signing, and therefore have a good chance of living up to their agreements --and a good chance of being willing to.

rshowalter - 03:50pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5216 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

People of much lower rank --even no rank at all -- can do a lot of the focusing -- the pre-digesting -- so that definitions and objective relationships are clear. And the internet can help with these clarification and definition processes.

That's a staff function.

The dealmaking itself has to be done by people with the authority to do it. The internet will help very little, or very much less, there.

rshowalter - 03:52pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5217 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

But if "everybody's reading from the same page" redemptive solutions, that work for all concerned, and are fair on balance, really can be fashioned. Good dealmakers make them all the time -- or we'd all be a lot poorer than they are.

Russians and Americans have to learn to come to such solutions, where they have to interact.

rshowalter - 04:04pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5218 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

rshowalter 6/15/01 7:51am and posts immediately following seem like they might connect to the limited things that might be discussed tomorrow.

rshowalter - 04:16pm Jun 15, 2001 EST (#5219 of 5245)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

( gisterme also liked those posts, based on New York Times op ed pieces today.)

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