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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.

commondata - 11:53am Nov 26, 2002 EST (# 6307 of 6364)

Was it just altruism Mazza? I've been labouring under the illusion that it had something to do with the Japanese bombing Pearl Harbour. And in the 50 years following the defeat of Hitler you went on to bomb 19 different countries.

lunarchick 11/7/02 5:08am

data - knowledge - IDEAS

should be (?)

IDEAS - knowledge - data

Invert your hierarchy with a paper on Knowledge Management and Organizational Memory.

mazza9 - 12:32pm Nov 26, 2002 EST (# 6308 of 6364)
"Quae cum ita sunt" Caesar's Gallic Commentaries

Commondata:

Col Ploetz was fighting the Japanese in China in 1940!

There was a strong isolationist movement in the US prior to WWII in the US. Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh were its famous spokesman for peace and non-involvement in European and Pacific Wars! You're right. Pearl Harbor changed their minds and Ford would quickly convert his industrial strength to war manufacture.

Lindbergh would accept a commission and train Army Air Force pilots. I met one of the officers who went on the Yamamoto mission. This flight of P-38s was able to cross a great distance of Pacific Ocean and intercept/interdict Yamamoto over Bouganville. It was Lindbergh's training for conserving fuel and minimizing unnecessary flight maneuvers which extended the range of the US P-38s that contributed to the success of this mission.

Yes, I believe that the US' efforts have always been molded by that quaint phrase, "Truth Justice and the American Way!" We even invented the superhero that fights for justice and freedom!

commondata - 12:48pm Nov 26, 2002 EST (# 6309 of 6364)

Churchill complained about debt as well; he asked why Britain should be "the only debtor country in the world, while those she had rescued and those she had conquered went into the future without having to drag a terrible chain of debts behind them."

mazza9 11/26/02 12:32pm Yes, I believe that the US' efforts have always been molded by that quaint phrase, "Truth Justice and the American Way!".

We're all for truth and justice, Mazza; you should think about joining the International Criminal Court and fighting for the democratisation of the United Nations. Could that be an American Way?

wrcooper - 12:51pm Nov 26, 2002 EST (# 6310 of 6364)

Two items: Yesterday's data-gathering test-firing of a Scud missile and an interesting report suggesting that the DoD may be getting involved in defending the earth against meteorites.

U.S. Launches Second Scud for Anti-Missile Research

VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, California (AP) -- The U.S. military launched a Scud missile Monday to obtain data for use in developing missile defense systems.

The missile lifted off from a mobile launcher, reached an altitude of 281,000 feet (84,300 meters) and traveled 186 miles (300 kilometers) before it fell into the Pacific Ocean, Missile Defense Agency spokesman Chris Taylor said. The test was conducted to obtain flight data, and did not involve an intercept attempt, he said.

It was the military's second launch this month of a Scud, a ballistic missile that was developed by the Soviet Union in the 1960s and is now in the arsenals of at least 25 nations, including Iraq.

The launch was part of a $13 million program to help develop an advanced version of the Patriot anti-missile system and other defense technologies, officials said.

The Patriot was put to the test during the 1991 Gulf War, when Iraq fired about 90 Scuds. Forty-three landed in Saudi Arabia and 39 in Israel. One hit a U.S. barracks in Saudi Arabia, killing 28 soldiers. A congressional report found that Patriots downed only four Scuds.

The Scud is difficult to hit because it wobbles wildly in flight.

A Call for Planetary Defense

The final report of the Commission on the Future of the U.S. Aerospace Industry, released last week, calls for the Department of Defense (DoD) to take on the role of planetary defense.

The Commission noted that the U.S. Air Force is looking into use of satellites for detecting and tracking human-made satellites in Earth orbit. That effort should be broadened, the study group advised, to include detection of asteroids.

Given Air Force study and other military space reviews underway, "planetary defense should be assigned to the DoD in cooperation with NASA," the report states.

"The day will arrive when an asteroid is discovered on a collision course with Earth. The more we know about their orbit and structure, the more effective we can be in attempting to deflect it from harm's way," the Commission report concludes.

-- Leonard David

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