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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?

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rshow55 - 08:11am Oct 3, 2003 EST (# 14249 of 14250)
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 done a great deal of work on this thread, with lchic , since Sept 25, 2000 - some summarize from 9003-9 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@13.hHtQbPKfKLw.145048@.f28e622/10529

The part of this thread prior to March 1, 2002 is archived - and available at http://www.mrshowalter.net/ by number or date http://www.mrshowalter.net/calendar1.htm

I think readers may be interested in http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md8000s/md8298.htm , which summarizes practical problems as they appeared ten days before 9/11 , and begins as follows:

rshowalter - 02:14pm Sep 1, 2001 EST (#8298

With the ingenuity the Bush administration is now devoting to making its case for missile defense (and you have to credit them with ingenuity and initiative on this) they could probably figure out how to achieve real peace, solve the global warming problem, and assure the whole world an adequate and safe energy supply, forever.

They'd get a lot more credit for that than they're getting for what they're now doing.

- -

rshowalter - 03:52pm Sep 1, 2001 EST (#8300 of 8302)

We need to know what is hopeless -- so we can have a chance of finding practical hope.

Too many "constraints" mean "no solution as posed."

Lots of math problems, as posed, clearly have "no solution." That's true of lots of engineering problems, as well. In these (very common) cases, satisfying some of the conditions rules out the possibility of satsifying others.

For human survival, we need solutions ithat people can "live with." .... ("Live with" in every sense of the phrase.)

Consider the limitations, the constraints, and the human concerns and responsibilities clearly connected to the following.

" Even with the end of the Cold War, U.S. missile silos are poised to launch" ... CNN's Special Report, " Rehearsing Doomsday ," http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2000/democracy/nuclear/stories/nukes/index.html

. THREATS TO USE NUCLEAR WEAPONS: The Sixteen Known Nuclear Crises of the Cold War, 1946-1985 by David R. Morgan , National President, Veterans Against Nuclear Arms Vancouver, Canada March 6, 1996 http://scienceforpeace.sa.utoronto.ca/WorkingGroupsPage/NucWeaponsPage/Documents/ThreatsNucWea.html . . ( now off the web, but available )

MD7356 rshowalter 7/23/01 11:01pm http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md7000s/md7653.htm

" Now, the world could easily end, all sorts of people, including people in rich, mostly Republican churches know it, and yet nobody seems to know what to do about it. When the foundations are shaking" http://www.mrshowalter.net/sermon.html

It is a strictly bipartisan mess ... the Bush administration faces the situation it does ... and the Russians do, too. ... MD6932 rshowalter 7/11/01 4:24pm http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md6000s/md6932.htm

Our technical infrastructure, and the accountability arrangements, technical and financial, associated with it, are in disarray.

The Coyle Report http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/program/nmdcoylerep.pdf

rshowalter - 03:54pm Sep 1, 2001 EST (#8301

The hopes of Ted Turner and others for elimination of nuclear weapons are clear, and backed by great, generous committment.

. Press Statement by Ted Turner Announcing the Nuclear Threat Initiative (now off the net)

But these hopes exist in a context where the Cold War has shaped all of society, and the experience of the established experts. Patterns are in place that are the exact opposite of openness - - designed to frustrate predictability, and make rational trust ridiculous.

. NUNN-WOLFOWITZ TASK FORCE REPORT: INDUSTRY "BEST PRACTICES" REGARDING EXPORT COMPLIANCE PROGRAMS http://164.109.59.52/library/pdf/nunnwolfowitz.pdf July 25, 2000

rshowalt

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