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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 - 12:32am Oct 11, 2002 EST (# 4791 of 4800)
~~~~ It got understood and exposed ~~~~

Now let's get this right:

If Mazza is Johnson, and Johnson is Gunk and Gunk hangs out at Wood's Hole Boston ... then .... Noam and Mazza have taken tea ... it's all as simple as ABC!

Isn't that right Mr Cooper ... errr ... Johnson of Hack dis-information repute .... does the cash come in brown paper bags for each moniker of just a straight cheque from Walker?

lchic - 12:37am Oct 11, 2002 EST (# 4792 of 4800)
~~~~ It got understood and exposed ~~~~

If Kurgman and Kristof have got it 'right' ... then what went wrong at the Senate last night?

Why put all the power in the hands of a homeland-mo b/n ster?

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/11/opinion/11KRUG.html

lchic - 12:43am Oct 11, 2002 EST (# 4793 of 4800)
~~~~ It got understood and exposed ~~~~

Afghanistan - back to normal - amputations, religious law, the 'thought police' are back in power.

Bin Laden - if his remains are with USA - his relatives aren't coming forward with samples for DNA testing.
There was a theory that Bin hadn't to die until after the Nov4 Election.

lchic - 12:48am Oct 11, 2002 EST (# 4794 of 4800)
~~~~ It got understood and exposed ~~~~

Iraq oil Saddam Economist Oct10

SADDAM HUSSEIN is on a charm offensive. Desperate to save his skin from the coalition that President Bush is seeking to build, he is busily trying to boost his own international support by doling out Iraqi oil to anybody he thinks will rally to his cause. Needless to say, the firms left out of this bonanza seem to be the American oil giants. If there were ever any truth in the talk outside America that Mr Bush's secret motive for an invasion was black gold, Mr Hussein is raising the stakes.

The deals now being done with Iraq may prove significant in shaping any post-invasion politics, since its oil is among the industry's most coveted. The country sits atop over 110 billion barrels of proven reserves (and possibly more), the second-largest in the world after Saudi Arabia's. And if reports of a flurry of deal-making by Mr Hussein turn out to be accurate, says Robert Mabro, the head of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, “then there's not much left in Iraq for the Americans!”

Mr Hussein has been using oil as a political weapon for years. At unexpected times, he has suddenly cut off exports to rattle the markets, to complicate OPEC's market manipulations or to protest against America's support for Israel. Now, with an invasion looming, he is doing the reverse: in the past few weeks, he has more than doubled exports of oil.

This is, admittedly, from depressed levels. The United Nations, which supervises sales of Iraqi oil, had cracked down on illicit surcharges that Mr Hussein had been tacking on to his exports. That measure, as well as the UN's new policy of setting the price that purchasers must pay for Iraqi oil some weeks after they have bought it, had driven away all but the shadiest of customers. To win back the big boys, Mr Hussein has now dropped the surcharges. Rumours suggest that he has secretly offered to compensate oil companies if they lose because of the UN's new pricing policy.

Axis of evil? Such manoeuvres seem to have paid off. In the past few weeks, leading firms such as TotalFinaElf (of France), Eni (Italy) and Repsol YPF (Spain) have signed bilateral deals to bring Iraq's oil to market. These European countries now have a greater incentive (should they need it) to think twice before supporting any invasion. Boosting exports also adds to the impact that disrupting the supply of Iraqi oil would have on global prices—a factor that might influence politicians even in America, given the fragility of the world's economy.

Mr Hussein is also dangling drilling and service contracts. A few months ago, a Turkish firm cut a deal to drill in the north of Iraq. More recently, a team from Tatneft, an oil contractor from the Russian republic of Tatarstan, arrived to drill the first of what may be over 70 wells. That deal, believed to be the biggest for several years, is part of a much broader relationship that Mr Hussein has cultivated with Russian firms. Some industry insiders reckon that Zarubezhneft, the Russian firm for which Tatneft is working, may have secured oil concessions worth up to $90 billion.

The big prize is control of the country's oil reserves. UN sanctions forbid foreigners from investing in the oilfields. But that has not stopped firms rushing to sign contracts in the hope of exploiting fields when sanctions are lifted. Mr Hussein has long been handing out concessions to big firms from politically important countries. France's Total, for example, holds rights to potentially huge reserves in the country. The national oil companies of China and India (not hitherto regarded as oil powerhouses) have also been given slices of the pie. Even Royal Dutch/Shell has signed a deal with Mr Hussein.

As well as Zarubezhneft, a number of smaller Russian firms are doing a brisk trade with Iraq, in everything from oil supplies to drilling to spare parts. Lukoil, a Russian giant, has a majority stake in West Qurna, an enormous field hold

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