New York Times on the Web Forums Science

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.

rshow55 - 10:15am Mar 3, 2002 EST (#150 of 153)

One big story, and set of strange facts, involves proportion - and is well set out in OpEd today. How did we get into such strange circumstances?

The Uses of American Power http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/03/opinion/03SUN1.html

" If Congress cranks up the Pentagon's budget as much as President Bush would like, the United States will soon be spending more on defense than all the other countries of the world combined. That is just one measure of America's armed might — and a global imbalance of power the likes of which has probably not been seen since the height of the Roman empire. While the United States is used to regarding itself as a global power, and its status as the sole superpower has steadily grown since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the overwhelming disparity is still a big change . . ."

Wall of Ideas By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

"I 've spent the last six weeks traveling around the Arab-Muslim world, talking with people about Sept. 11 and U.S.-Muslim relations. So I didn't know whether to laugh or cry when I got home and read that the Pentagon was considering putting out false stories that might advance America's antiterrorism campaign. I didn't know whether to laugh or cry because if you spend five minutes in the Arab-Muslim world these days, you'll instantly discover that people there don't believe us when we tell the truth"

rshow55 - 10:18am Mar 3, 2002 EST (#151 of 153)

lchic 3/3/02 10:06am of course, there can be many stories based on the same "facts" - but as more facts get connected -- and the more connections get drawn, interpreted, and crosschecked -- the number of consistent stories shrinks. Usually shrinks enough that people who have to cooperate can agree on enough so that cooperation is possible -- whether they are fully agreed in their stories or not. They come to agree on what matters to their interaction together.

rshow55 - 10:56am Mar 3, 2002 EST (#152 of 153)

I think lchic - is profoundly right in her remarks about the need for dramatic presentation, for patterns that can be made to fit into people's head.

The 'truth' of the past half century might be a 'new-to-you' as yet unrevealed pattern. Truth patterns might play out and 'fit' into minds more easily than the 'pattern of lies' that has been put out as 'dis-information' over past years.

Of course CONGRESS could have a hearing into the matter .. or .. simply remove much funding from missile production and upkeep ... redeploying redundant minds towards more useful humanitarian work.

But for that to happen, voters would have to understand patterns where there has been much effort, over half a century, to conceal and muddle some fundamentals.

Movie - script - making it 'work' http://www.writersconference.com/crew/progmain.html

An illustrated script of Casablanca http://www.edict.com.hk/movies/casablanca/casablanca1.htm

Casablanca is common ground, something culturally literate Americans know -- and that people the whole world over understand, at the level of sympathy, and intellectually, too. I used the movie as a point of departure in PSYCHWAR, CASABLANCA, AND TERROR , which tells a key story about the Cold War, interesting to American, Russians, and others. http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/0 Especially the core story part, from posting 13 http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/12 to posting 23 http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/22 There is a comment in #26 that I feel some may find interesting, as well...

A fairly compact ongoing summary of this thread from September 25, 2000 to date, which is too large for easy reading, but not for sampling, is set out with many links in Psychwar, Casablanca, and Terror -- from #151 on... http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/159 It involves many links that no longer work, but a good deal of information on what has happened on this thread, as well.

PSYCHWAR, CASABLANCA, AND TERROR sets out basic mechanisms of how psychological injury happens. It deals with patterns of psychological warfare that are still ongoing -- where lies are weapons. A key point is how psychologically injurious, and devastating, the psychological injury associated with deception can be.

The lies of "missile defense" persist because they are part of a tradition of psychological warfare - - and in psychological warfare, mistakes aren't corrected so that mutual cooperation and good decisions can occur. Lies are defended, so that progress and good decisions can be prevented. In that defense, diversion, distraction, and avoidance of fundamentals are the watchwords.

(1 following message)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense