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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?

Read Debates, a new Web-only feature culled from Readers' Opinions, published every Thursday.

lchic - 04:17pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1713 of 1731)
"Washington's values are not my values .." Karen HUGHES (Mine Neither!)

Palestine is the world-wide headline ... only the NYT is opting for 'The Sudan' - where conditions reported have existed seemingly forever unsolved by either political or religious strategy.

lchic - 04:30pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1714 of 1731)
"Washington's values are not my values .." Karen HUGHES (Mine Neither!)

Alex - goods bought at low cost and later sold in another country at a higher price will include costs in relation to : buying, transporting, port exit/entry, warehousing, overheads re retail - rent/rate/power/staff/turnoverTime/advertising / returns/exchanges/ IT infrastructure/ etc..

If a country can supply goods at a base price cost effectively - direct marketing is possible via the internet - but - people have to have confidence in both the integrity and security of the systems used. A quality assurance and return system needs also to be in place.

lchic - 04:32pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1715 of 1731)
"Washington's values are not my values .." Karen HUGHES (Mine Neither!)

France : http://www.guardian.co.uk/cartoons/0,7371,337484,00.html

Were the current voting system to be challenged as 'undemocratic' say as against the Australian Preferential-flow Voting System - Federal Senate Canberra, and reformed, then France might enjoy the ability to express annoyance with main parties while ultimately voting for them - at the ONE election.

lchic - 04:44pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1716 of 1731)
"Washington's values are not my values .." Karen HUGHES (Mine Neither!)

Kissenger : http://news.independent.co.uk/world/americas/story.jsp?story=287973

.... individuals have a past – and that of Kissinger is coming back to haunt him with a vengeance. Not the glorious chapters, when he managed the Cold War and played off China against the Soviet Union, but the dirty little history of the Nixon/Kissinger administration's dealings in Latin America. Measured against nuclear arms reductions and the balance of global power, it was nothing, a grubby little pile of fetid laundry in America's backyard. But a quarter of a century on, the unrequited demands for justice threaten to destroy a vain old man's most precious asset: his reputation ...

lchic - 04:53pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1717 of 1731)
"Washington's values are not my values .." Karen HUGHES (Mine Neither!)

.... In America, the 37th president still languishes in posthumous limbo. Not Henry the K. Network anchors continue to interview him as if his views were carved on tablets brought down from Sinai ...

The News Hour unfortunately still flatters this alleged war-criminal - WHY?!

almarst-2001 - 06:06pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1718 of 1731)

Swiss Paper Revealed How Kosovo Verification Mission Was Used for NATO Spying - http://www.icdsm.org/more/liberte.htm

almarst-2001 - 06:32pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1719 of 1731)

Lunarchic,

All is possible. If you have enough capital directed to this end. Including the human capital.

Most poor countries have very little of both. They are at mercy of the landers who dictate the investment with highest return in shortest time as a goal. Not what those nations need.

The globalization today resembles to me the industrial revolution. When millions of peasants left the land to become the dispensible interchangible pieces of a machinery. Totaly dependent on employement and employer. At least in a field they could provide for some food for their families. Not in a city.

The development countries should set self-sufficiency and independent development as a primary goal. Their interests should be the masses of their citizens in need of education, health care, food and clean water. The public infrustructure. The law and order.

Just look at an example of a new NATO members eager to become a "true" Europeans. The first thing they are asked to do is to throw away their old wearponery to buy a new from the West. Whoes interests are served when so much needed capital will drain from where it need the most. How much of the Western "help" is in a form of an Arms sales?

I don't believe the West (as a predominant politico-economical power) give a dime about the life of the undeveloped nations and their people.

That why it is so hypocritical to see the articles ctiticizing the poor countries societies. Just trying to survive. While the same or worst evils florish in so called "civilized" West.

rshow55 - 08:06pm Apr 23, 2002 EST (#1720 of 1731)

almarst-2001 4/23/02 6:32pm . . . For all the horrors, if you look at economic history carefully, the industrial revolution produced an increase in the welfare of most of the people involved -- including the workers.

Ugly as it was, the life of peasants in feudal environments was usually a good deal worse.

The indignation and anger of Karl Marx has some evidence behind it -- but was an unbalanced view of capitalism, even at its worst.

Not that we have to agree on that.

. . . . .

In societies where per capita income is only a few hundred dollars -- the technical knowledge that is already well known in more advanced societes can often be used, and used effectively, for very little money. It is human organizational problems, more than anything else, that keep the really poor countries poor.

It is not hypocritical to be critical of the societies of poor countries. Kristoff's piece was a good example of a totally justified criticism of a poor country.

You say: "While the same or worst evils florish in so called "civilized" West."

Well, sometimes. And they should be fixed.

But there are plenty of real horrors all over the world - and the less advanced countries have MORE than their share.

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