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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 - 08:48am May 24, 2002 EST (#2377 of 2381)

Sailors Sprayed With Nerve Gas in Cold War Test, Pentagon Says by THOM SHANKER with WILLIAM J. BROAD http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/politics/24NERV.html

"The Defense Department sprayed live nerve and biological agents on ships and sailors during cold war-era experiments to test the Navy's vulnerability to toxic warfare." (And hid it from the human guinea pigs involved for more than 30 years.)

Agent Complaints Lead F.B.I. Director to Ask for Inquiry by JAMES RISEN and DAVID JOHNSTON http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/national/24INQU.html

"The F.B.I. director is ordering an internal inquiry into complaints that agents were held back from investigating Zacarias Moussaoui in the days before Sept. 11."

America the Scofflaw By PAUL KRUGMAN http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/opinion/24KRUG.html

In sheer economic terms, the steel tariff is not that big a deal. But it demonstrates an unprecedented contempt for international rules.

Connecting Deadly Dots By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/opinion/24KRIS.html

search Enron - on these threads, and in the NYT

The "missile defense" boondoggle would be a fine place to ask key questions - which would connect to a lot, because the web of deceptions, less-than-half-truths, and evasions is so dense.

MD1075 rshow55 4/4/02 1:17pm ... MD1076 rshow55 4/4/02 1:20pm

rshow55 - 09:24am May 24, 2002 EST (#2378 of 2381)

And the key questions involved in missile defense all connect to simple questions in clear ways. The questions, for the systems involved, under realistic conditions, are:

Can it see the target?

Can it hit the target?

Can it hurt the target?

These questions can be dealt with, in the open literature, directly and fairly easily, according to the logic set out on this thread and elsewhere, and somewhat reviewed by lchic and I last night rshow55 5/24/02 12:04am

MD1585 rshow55 4/20/02 11:37pm

MD1666-1672 rshow55 4/22/02 4:22pm

MD1857 rshow55 4/28/02 7:59pm

MD1895-1898 rshow55 4/30/02 10:09am

MD1907-1909 rshow55 4/30/02 4:02pm

MD2257-2235 rshow55 5/17/02 7:41am

There are a lot of "dots" that have been collected (and more can be collected) that can be connected -- to find answers much safer and better than some of the ones the Bush administration is pursuing now.

I've had a problem with title to my own knowledge - but that is, I believe, going to be resolved.

There are questions that should be asked, and answered, in the national interest, in the interest of decency, and in the practical interest of people all over the world.

rshow55 - 10:46am May 24, 2002 EST (#2379 of 2381)

U.S. and Russia Sign Nuclear Weapons Reduction Treaty By MICHAEL WINES http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/24/international/24CND-RUSS.html

There's much to hope for, if we remember that we are human beings, and deal with others, intelligently and carefully, on the same basis. MD1001 rshow55 3/31/02 4:45pm

Lies and evasions are unstable - terribly unstable when they are checked, or tested by events. We need to do better than that. We can.

The military-industrial complex, in my view, is a precious national resource. But it should be deployed doing possible things -- that can yeild security and other benefits for the nation, and human culture in general.

MD1318 rshow55 4/12/02 6:59pm

Don't want to be too sentimental, but I believe that these poems express some key points - well known, in practice, to some deal-making businessmen and lawyers (active Republicans) of my acquaintance. We need solutions that are true, and work for all concerned. Based on ideas that can "propagate" through the culture - rather than fizzle from too many "Chain Breakers."

We need solutions that are, in a technical sense I try to explain in two poems "redemptive and detonative."

Secular Redemption http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee79f4e/619

Chain Breakers http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee79f4e/618

- -

Mushy idealism? I think not. I think that a lot of good redemptive and detonative solutions happen in the United States of America, and all over the world, every day. They are the solutions, I think, that work best.

We are living in a dangerous but hopeful time - - and things are so complicated that anything but the truth, and balanced right answers, are prohibitively expensive and dangerous. We should face the thruth.

When the United States avoids the truth, I believe other nations ought to ask questions. I believe that a great deal would happen, in the service of the common interest, if they did.

lchic - 11:38am May 24, 2002 EST (#2380 of 2381)

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