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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

dirac_10 - 10:20pm Jun 8, 2001 EST (#4637 of 4640)

Here's one.

Published on Thursday, May 11, 2000 in the Boston Globe

Missile Defense System Won't Work by David Wright and Theodore Postol

...The chief difficulty in trying to develop missile defenses is not getting vast systems of complex hardware to work as intended - although that is a daunting task.

That we solve on a regular basis. And it ain't that complex.

The key problem is that the defense has to work against an enemy who is trying to foil the system. what's worse, the attacker can do so with technology much simpler than the technology needed for the defense system.

It is assumed that the attacker will have inferior technology. It won't work against Russia for sure.

This inherent asymmetry means the attacker has the advantage despite the technological edge the United States has over a potential attacker such as North Korea.

Considering the vast US technological advantage, they will need a heck of a lot of "advantage".

We recently completed, along with nine other scientists, a yearlong study that examined in detail what countermeasures an emerging missile state could take to defeat the missile defense system the United States is planning.

Ok, now we are going to see the best that 9 scientists can come up with after a year of study. This outta' be good.

That study shows that effective countermeasures require technology much less sophisticated than is needed to build a long-range missile in the first place - technology that would be available to the potential attacker.

Yeah, yeah, spit it out. Enough talk.

This kind of analysis is possible since the United States has already selected the interceptor and sensor technologies its defense system would use.

Hardly. These 9 scientists spending a year on it didn't even consider lasers. Just for starters.

We assessed the full missile defense system the United States is planning - not just the first phase planned for 2005 - and assumed only that it is constrained by the laws of physics.

Seems these "scientists" are pretty short on physics too.

We examined three countermeasures in detail, each of which would defeat the planned US defense.

Spit it out.

A country that decided to deliver biological weapons by ballistic missile could divide the lethal agent into 100 or more small bombs, known as ''bomblets,'' as a way of dispersing the agent over the target. This would also overwhelm the defense, which couldn't shoot at so many warheads.

Except for the lasers that shoot dozens of times per second. Something that they are totally oblivious to. So much for the "physics" of that one.

The Rumsfeld panel, a high-level commission convened by Congress in 1998 to assess the ballistic missile threat to the United States, noted that potential attackers could build such bomblets. We show this in detail.

It is vastly cheaper to shoot laser blasts at them, than to launch them into orbit. And we have a lot more "disposable income".

Not to mention the rather serious drawbacks of biological weapons. Not to mention that all boost phase intercept methods would stop it dead in it's tracks.

An attacker launching missiles with nuclear weapons would have other options.

They would obviously need them. The bomblet idea is out to lunch.

It could disguise the warhead by enclosing it in an aluminum-coated Mylar balloon and releasing it with a large number of empty balloons.

Talk about a piece of cake for a laser. You couldn't design something more sui

dirac_10 - 10:22pm Jun 8, 2001 EST (#4638 of 4640)

continued...

Talk about a piece of cake for a laser. You couldn't design something more suited to demonstrate the usefulness of a laser. Pop, pop, pop. And of course the boost phase intercept that these clowns apparantly didn't even consider.

None of the missile defense sensors could tell which balloon held the warhead, and again the defense could not shoot at all of them.

Except for a laser that could do it in less than a second. But don't mind me.

Alternately, we showed that the warhead could be enclosed in a thin shroud cooled with liquid nitrogen - a common laboratory material - so it would be invisible to the heat-seeking interceptors the defense will use.

Too bad we don't know anything about radar. And I suppose I must again point out the total absence of a clue about boost phase intercept.

These are only three of many possible countermeasures.

That's it?!? Nine scientists workking for a year and that's it?

Pathetic.

And none of these ideas is new; most are as old as ballistic missiles themselves.

And none of them are as old as Kepler that made anything ballistic a sitting duck.

I guess this shows why everyone around these parts runs from actual physics/engineering reasons like scared rabbits.

rshowalter - 10:27pm Jun 8, 2001 EST (#4639 of 4640)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

rshowalter 6/8/01 5:16pm

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