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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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bluestar23 - 01:49pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15106 of 15116)

"George Bush is an avowed Christian fundamentalist?"

Sure, but where is the evidence that Christianity afflicts the Missile Defense effort..?

wrcooper - 02:00pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15107 of 15116)

I never said it did. You just assumed I connected the two.

wrcooper - 02:23pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15108 of 15116)

bluestar23

You didn't respond whether you'd read any of the material I linked for you. You inquired about the "fundamental facts" I mentioned. As just a sampler, consider the following:

______________________________________ Physics and other fundamental facts stand in the way [of implementing a successful NMD system]:

The technology has always been the limiting factor, and there are several fundamental facts that make this unlikely to change.   Defending against missiles is inherently much more demanding than launching missiles. The defense must respond to an attack whose key features are unpredictable. It must make decisions and take actions based on its sensor measurements, and do so in a matter of minutes. In contrast, the offense can be passive: it simply has to carry out a set of pre-programmed actions independent of what the defense does.

Missile defense is sometimes compared to the once-impossible tasks of flying or landing on the moon. This comparison is specious. Nature does not change to foil human endeavors, whereas an attacker will shape its attack in response to the defense, whose key features will be known to the attacker.

The laws of physics give the attacker the advantage against any missile defense system that seeks to intercept warheads in their midcourse outside of the atmosphere—such as the system Bush plans to deploy by September 2004. In the vacuum of space, lightweight objects—like mylar balloons—will travel on the same trajectory as heavy objects—like a warhead. This means that an attacker could deploy tens of lightweight decoys to confuse and overwhelm the defense. Any country that could build a nuclear-armed long-range missile could also implement comparatively simple countermeasures to foil the defense. The countermeasure problem remains unsolved despite decades of work.

But perhaps the most relevant fact of physics is that even one nuclear weapon could cause tremendous devastation and hundreds of thousands of deaths. For a defense against nuclear weapons, the requirements for success are much higher than for any other military system.

FROM http://www.ucsusa.org/global_security/missile_defense/page.cfm?pageID=1140 ________________________________________________

I urge you to read more of the material at UCS and the other sites I linked.

Cheers

bluestar23 - 02:45pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15109 of 15116)

Test

bluestar23 - 02:51pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15110 of 15116)

Can't post...a whole sentence so far...

bluestar23 - 02:54pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15111 of 15116)

third suitcase nuke post disappeared, that's it for now..

bluestar23 - 03:03pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15112 of 15116)

Check one two

bluestar23 - 03:05pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15113 of 15116)

WTF...?

lchic - 05:06pm Oct 15, 2003 EST (# 15114 of 15116)
TRUTH outs ultimately : TRUTH has to be morally forcing : build on TRUTH it's a strong foundation

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preference ignore

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