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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.

rshow55 - 10:32am Jul 23, 2003 EST (# 13110 of 13267)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

Whoever Gisterme is - he sure pushes hard to support Osprey - though he said a while back (13074) that he "didn't think the military need is so urgent."

He's now arguing for Osprey on basis that it will have spinoffs that justify its cost.

gisterme - 07:45pm Jul 22, 2003 EST (# 13104 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.Z9exbJU7wf8.2132203@.f28e622/14783 quotes my "...Gisterme, if you're arguing for Osprey on the basis that it has a reasonable chance to lead to a "fast, fuel effiecient VTOL aircraft" suitable for civilian transport - - you're really stretching..." and responds with some counterexamples. There are plenty of examples where progress is made. And the value predicted.

Gisterme: So far as "how fast, how safe (reliable) and how expensive" goes, well, those are all categories that have been shown historically to improve as technologies mature. Would you disagree?

Not always, in general . But it depends on details. But most things aren't worth doing. I take the same position on these things Edison took.

. . Edison . . was one of the great "quitters" of all time.

If he saw that something wasn't going to work -- or wasn't worth it - he quit doing it -- and devoted attention to something that he thought could work.

He argued for what was worth it in terms of details.

Gisterme said: I for one thind that things worth having are worth paying for.

They are worth what they are worth - at the price that they happen to have. How much would a private investor pay for the spin-offs from Osprey in a real arms-length transaction?

rshow55 - 10:35am Jul 23, 2003 EST (# 13111 of 13267)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

I've thought of Edison all my adult life. Here are some links referring to Edison that are no longer on this board:

2550 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md2000s/md2547.htm

6397 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6395.htm

7395 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md7000s/md7395.htm

10902 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md10000s/md10902.htm

10914 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md10000s/md10909.htm

11220 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md11000s/md11215.htm

11911 http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md11000s/md11911_15.htm

In 13104 Gisterme said: "I think you should try to be a little more forward-looking, Robert. It might make your world a little bigger and a lot brighter."

Sometimes I'm forward looking.

rshow55 - 09:25am Jul 21, 2003 EST (# 13064 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.Z9exbJU7wf8.2132203@.f28e622/14741

A major step would be energy independence from the Middle East - independence from Saudi Arabia. I have a plan for that - but it requires, not only ideas, but some power. For instance, in the ways that matter, I have to be "out of jail."

13039 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.Z9exbJU7wf8.2132203@.f28e622/14716

13040 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.Z9exbJU7wf8.2132203@.f28e622/14717

13041 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.Z9exbJU7wf8.2132203@.f28e622/14718

That plan falls a good deal short of KAEP in some ways - but it would work technically - could produce energy independence and stability for the whole world - and that would do more to improve the strategic security of the United States than anything else could.

I can't do it alone. I can't do it isolated - in effect, under house arrest.

- - - - -

. Many of the most miserable, muddled, gruesome messes and tragedies in the world are traceable to the fact that containment works as it does - and results in paralysis, and systems of deceptions and evasions that completely close off clear action - for any purpose - right or wrong.

I've been contained on this thread - and have accomplished less (and had to speak more publicly) than I had hoped or intended. But I have worked to keep my promises, and to serve the United States, and the cause of human decency, in ways that I promised to do (and got trapped into doing.)

Much in America, and in the rest of the world, has been contained - for reasons that make some sense - but should be subject to exception handling. Some patterns ought to be more contained (for example, the propensity to lie with impunity.) Deceptions (and misunderstanding, in every sense of the word) happen, for all sorts of reasons, some involving blame, some not.

mazza9 - 10:51am Jul 23, 2003 EST (# 13112 of 13267)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic Commentaries

I only reveal my secret once a quarter, (or is it a dime). To do so more often would be too much for Robert to stand, (or sit down).

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