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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.

lchic - 11:44am Mar 6, 2002 EST (#238 of 239)

Their story of the moment asking how did history run, who did what, to who by whom :

Putin resigned as FSB chief to become prime minister shortly before the spate of bombings began in Buinaksk, Dagestan, on Sept. 4, 1999. That blast leveled an apartment building, claiming 62 lives. Two apartment buildings were subsequently destroyed by explosions in Moscow, killing 215. A fourth bomb was detonated outside an apartment building in Volgodonsk on Sept. 16, leaving 18 dead and 288 injured.

The government has blamed Chechen rebels for the attacks, though it has never produced evidence to back up this claim. The FSB announced last month that all of the bombers were known, and that some had been detained, though no details have since emerged. The only convictions to date concern the first bombing at Buinaksk. Two men were sentenced to life in prison by a Dagestani court last year and four others were given lighter sentences. http://www.moscowtimes.ru/stories/2002/03/06/003.html

rshow55 - 12:08pm Mar 6, 2002 EST (#239 of 239)

The Core of Muslim Rage by THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/06/opinion/06FRIE.html

This is a profound piece, and though it doesn't speak of missile defense, it does speak about how decisive patterns of emotion and ideas, including fictions, can be in matters of conflict.

To make peace, people have to understand how natural and powerful rage is, how natural it is for people to fight when they are threatened, how difficult, awkward, and "unnatural" it is to back out of fights - - and how easily escalatory sequences can careen toward escalation to the point of extermination.

We've seen case after case, and are seeing many cases now, where people are acting "irrationally" and "illogically."

We need, I think, to be clearer about some basic things about how human rationality and logic work.

When pressed, people fight -- and when in fights, they seldom run if they are decently motivated and led at all. "Logic", in times of conflict, often seems like a machine for moving people to violence. Moreover, suicidal bravery is absolutely natural human behavior, and something to be expected.

Ideas are key. And exits, that permit people to survive -- are essential, and take work and care to arrange.

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