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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 - 02:31pm Feb 2, 2003 EST (# 8495 of 8497)
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.

An Improvised March to War http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/opinion/02SUN2.html

Throughout the Iraq crisis there has been an unsettling sense of improvisation to the Bush administration's explanations of its concerns, goals and postwar plans.

Who Has the Hot Rods? By MAUREEN DOWD http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/opinion/02DOWD.html

The Bush administration has made fuzzy evidence against Iraq sound scarier than it is, and scary evidence against North Korea sound fuzzier than it is.

Ah, Those Principled Europeans By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/02/opinion/02FRIE.html

I don't take seriously all the Euro-whining about the Bush policies toward Iraq for one very simple reason: It strikes me as unserious.

America Mourns, Again http://www.nytimes.com/2003/02/01/opinion/01CND-COLE.html

Iraq Says It's Ready to Resolve Pending Arms Issues 12:07 p.m. ET http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-iraq-amin.html

It has been a big time for news - and for looking at contrasts. I had an interesting trip to Chicago, and meeting with WRCooper - that mattered a good deal to me. I wanted to wait a little while, and talk to my wife after she'd thought a little while, before responding. I appreciate much of what Cooper says in 8466-8467 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@93.BfMEa4c82HI.463096@.f28e622/9992 - - and wish the meeting could have occurred in August, when I first asked for it. The meeting represented progress - though it didn't settle everything. It did clarify some things.

I left unsure about how much of an apology I owed George Johnson, for instance. Cooper conveyed the clear impression that he was close to Johnson, yet wasn't. I'd said that I thought Cooper was Johnson, or near enough to being Johnson to make no difference for the purposes of this board. I've reread the correspondence, and the assumptions are reasonable unless one assumes that one is bound to believe the things that people post on this board, merely because they post them - something that I do not believe. Was I wrong that Cooper was close enough to Johnson to be working with him - close enough to Johnson to make no difference for the purposes of the board? I left the meeting certain that the point hadn't been established in the ways that I thought ought to matter. I may owe George Johnson a big apology -but as of now - I'm not sure I owe him any apology at all. I'd be glad to know enough apologize properly to Johnson - in a way that fits the facts, equities, and decencies of the situation. I think Johnson may owe me a substantial apology for some things, and I may owe him an apology on some other things - perhaps big things -but maybe very small things. .

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense