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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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mazza9 - 10:39am Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11501 of 11506)
Louis Mazza

RShow55:

The context is missile defense. I'm sure you'll agree that before we can establish umpires we must delineate the facts that are to challenged and verified using objective measurements. No Olympic Judges, Puhleese!

It's Fat Tuesday and I take it personaly!

LouMazza

rshow55 - 11:17am Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11502 of 11506)

I'm modifying your language slightly, with italics where words are added or changed.

We agree that the context is missile defense.

We agree that before we can establish umpires we must delineate the facts that are to be challenged and verified using objective measurements and calculations.

There do have to be calculations. And the calculations, often, will have to be for systems that are carefully defined -- well enough defined that there are words, pictures, and math together.

For missile defense, here are the key questions, for the particular weapons systems the administration is proposing.

For each weapons system:

Can it see the target?

Can it hit the target?

Can it hit the target hard enough to kill it?

These questions apply for "best possible test conditions" and also for tactical conditions, including conditions with the existence of particular, defined countermeasures.

Now, there's no quesition that the contractors may have made technical advances over the open literature state-of-the art. But it will be possible to ask

" How hard is it for the weapons system to do the things it has to to see, hit, and hurt the targets that count, judging from what can be done in the open literature?"

For individual weapons systems, there are a number of specific questions that can be asked about these things -- and they are worth asking if they have a definite bearing on the questions of seeing, hitting, and hurting.

lchic - 12:04pm Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11503 of 11506)

I'm watching this with interest

lchic - 12:04pm Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11504 of 11506)

"I'm watching this with interest" - says Maggie!

rshow55 - 12:18pm Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11505 of 11506)

We're not playing badmitton here -- and dealing with gisterme , who seems to be connected to high officers of state, I need to be careful. Out of respect for the national interest, and concern for the stakes involved -- very many bad decisions have been made, and are being made, on large scale matters of life and death. Under the circumstances, one is careful - - and not in a race.

I'm applying several tests. Some of the things I said in MD8500 rshowalter 9/5/01 3:04pm . . seem worth repeating now.

I'm having to consider priorities, and for me, the first one is one of community standards, broadly considered. I have to ask myself:

" What would this look like, and how would it be judged, if it was written up, in detail, in THE NEW YORK TIMES ? "

I don't want to do anything that is either dishonorable or ineffectual by that community standard. Nor do I wish to ask anyone else to do any dishonorable or ineffectual thing.

I'm asking another question. What would Bill Casey, who cared deeply about the United States, was not a sentimentalist, and knew what "careful" means -- want me to do?

It seems to me that I'm dealing with the reasonable questions raised by gisterme at a reasonable pace. Doing so on the assumption that this is happening in public, and that gisterme , if it ever really matters, will have a name, and the responsibilities that go with it, as I do.

I'm going up against some established patterns, sometimes in ways that make me feel isolated.

It seems to me that we're making progress.

rshow55 - 12:31pm Feb 12, 2002 EST (#11506 of 11506)

The questions that need to be answered, I believe, are questions where responsible conservatives, such as Margaret Thatcher, or Senator Lugar -- would want right answers as much as anyone.

On the selection of umpires -- I tend to lean toward Professional Engineering credentials -- they are not too high-flow, they are clear, and they provide for some professional discipline.

But I'd also favor impeccable conservative credentials on judging the facts in question.

Especially if the technical discussions are public.

Margaret Thatcher would be an excellent person to choose umpires -- and so would Senator Lugar.

No one has to dispute the idea that missile defense is important. I certainly don't, and I'd favor a missile defense that could work, and that made some reasonable sense in terms of alternatives.

But to favor large expenditures on systems that are not technically feasible -- or that are wild long-shots at best -- is not a conservative (or, in my view) patriotic position.

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