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.

lchic - 01:53pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#819 of 835)

special Sunday

manjumicha2001 - 02:23pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#820 of 835)

How appropriate pattern to this day.....a pyscho devising the US strategic plans toward the world at large....it starts to make sense......hahaha !!!

applez101 - 02:36pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#821 of 835)

On nuclear preparedness, few have the pulse of the nation like the incomparable Onion:

http://www.theonion.com/onion3810/wdyt_3810.html

:)

rshow55 - 02:58pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#822 of 835)

Some of the key assumptions of US strategy -- especially the ones that are recipes for endless fighting and deception -- are being taken apart - losing credibility -- all over the world.

MD804 lchic 3/24/02 8:00am quotes Robert Fuller:

"... The people of the earth are in a most dangerous passage. We have only the barest knowledge of each other, after centuries of relative isolation. And a little learning is a dangerous thing. We must move rapidly to reduce the danger, so greatly enhanced by nuclear weapons technology, by learning enough more about each other to overcome the fright of first encounter. Paradoxically, it is technology that makes this awkward passage both necessary and possible."

The world has made a lot of progress along that passage. ... Some kinds of patterns, that sustain wars, are less powerful and less stable than they used to be.

From a "game" point of view, some major thrusts of the United States are acting to "set up" wars with N. Korea, Iraq, Iran, and, perhaps, the whole Arab world. But that isn't everything, as far as US actions go - - and there are other actors in the world who are taking a hand.

Militaries, by the logic of their function, work to set up wars - and the only termination of a war that they ever see as acceptable is "total victory" -- by which they mean the extermination or total overpowering of the other side. That's built into the logic of military function, just as the need to restrict information flow is built in -- just as the need to lie is built in.

There are other logics, too. And other institutions. One can't ask militaries to change certain basic things. Moreover, there are times when societies have no choice but to fight. But the US has become dangerously dominated by military interests and patterns, that need to be subordinated - and resisted intelligently and effectively by other nations in the world.

It seems to be happening. Maybe we don't have to get to the point of slaughter with Iraq, N. Korea, Iran, and the whole Arab world. Maybe something else might be worked out . . . .

People and institutions are more sophisticated than they used to be, and I've got some hope.

. . . . . . . . . . .

If the US and Russia have their arsenals under decent control - so they don't "go off like a string of firecrackers" - - then the world is facing less risk of slaughter than it was in 1914 - - or in 1938 - - which isn't all the comfort you could wish for - but it is something. Maybe we're getting smarter. Hope so. And hope we're industious and lucky enough, this time . . . .

manjumicha2001 - 05:06pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#823 of 835)

China successfully launched its third unmanned space ship, Shenjou 3, this morning. This follows a successful robot-arm experiment conducted a few months ago. Aside from the civilian applications which include their long-term lunar base plan, these systems will provide the foundations for their own space-based warfare system in conjunction wiht their own GPS systems being launched since a few years ago. I doubt you will see much reports on these in the US media, including NYT......:-)

Anyway, to pop the typical paradigm (bovine excrement, that is) that defines the US public discussion of NMD against NK, it is likely that NK and China have started coooperating in the the areas of common NMD countermeasure and space-based weapons system capabilities........it will be interesting to see how Bush and hsi big-mouth foreign policy team will speed up such process even further.

almarst-2001 - 06:16pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#824 of 835)

" I doubt you will see much reports on these in the US media, including NYT......:-) "

The NYT seems rather inclined to let the public to chew the candies out of Mr. Friedman's mouth..;)

It is quite possible the US's MD will force China and Russia to join into common deterrance aliance and military/space technology development. If they have a slightest believe the MD may work to some degree.

I haven't seen this to be discussed either - the notion that MD may be seen as a danger to Russia and particularely, the China's national security and their possible response.

lchic - 08:16pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#825 of 835)

China's national security may relate to it's social treatment of labour as new economic process is introduced. How to move from a labour rich to a process economy that sets out to improve it's own standards and become more competitive internationally will be a bigger transition than any rocket-firing propaganda status ploy.

Cheap Labour : http://www.ifc.org/economics/speeches/jlspeech/jlspeech.htm

almarst-2001 - 08:31pm Mar 25, 2002 EST (#826 of 835)

"The people have been left out of the China planner strategy"

Any proof?

It seems the improving the living standard has being a China's priority for the past couple of decades.

Do you suggest they should try the "russian experiment"?

China was trying before to leap from an agrarian underdeveloped poor country into the modern society. Remember the "Big Jump"?

Unfortunatly, it may be forced to spend a lot of needed resorces on defence.

(9 following messages)

New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense