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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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rshow55 - 11:31am Dec 16, 2002 EST (# 6751 of 6755)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

lunarchick 12/16/02 11:21am

And a very important one. And operationally, fairly easy to do!

Pentagon Debates Propaganda Push in Allied Nations By THOM SHANKER and ERIC SCHMITT http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/16/international/16MILI.html includes this:

" These allied nations would absolutely object to having the American military attempt to secretly affect communications to their populations," said one State Department official with a long career in overseas public affairs.

and ends with this:

"One effort to reshape the nation's ability to get its message out was a proposal by Representative Henry J. Hyde, an Illinois Republican who is chairman of the House International Relations Committee. Mr. Hyde is pushing for $255 million to bolster the State Department's public diplomacy effort and reorganize international broadcasting activities.

"If we are to be successful in our broader foreign policy goals," Mr. Hyde said in a statement, "America's effort to engage the peoples of the world must assume a more prominent place in the planning and execution of our foreign policy."

What would our case be like if we faced the truth ourselves - - and tried to see that, when it mattered to us for reasons we could explain - other individuals and nation states did the same. Suppose we said that facing facts was morally forcing when stakes mattered enough - lived by that ourselves - and expected the same.

It would be a big change.

But I believe that most of the problems of the world would be solved - fairly rapidly - by the people involved - if we could effectively do this.

almarst2002 - 11:33am Dec 16, 2002 EST (# 6752 of 6755)

lunarchick 12/16/02 11:25am - "The morally corrupt enslave children to do their killing ..."

Just compare his testimony with the assertion of still living crew member of US bomber which droped the bomb on Hirosima. Or the "sweet memories" of this F105 pilot flighing over Hanoi.

Just who is ultimatly moraly corrupt here?

rshow55 - 11:42am Dec 16, 2002 EST (# 6753 of 6755)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

almarst2002 12/16/02 11:33am

How do we do better than we're doing? And, as a practical matter, what can we expect?

(Not "what would we like to expect" - - but "what can we expect." )

Records from Russia, China, and all over the world tell us enough so that we can't be too casually moralistic here.

People, even at their best, are only as moral and as responsible as they are.

We have to do the best we can knowing that.

rshow55 - 11:43am Dec 16, 2002 EST (# 6754 of 6755)
Can we do a better job of finding truth? YES. Click "rshow55" for some things Lchic and I have done and worked for on this thread.

almarst2002 12/16/02 11:30am . . makes vital points - and they are being discussed - with a lot of power at play - not anything like all of it in the hands of the United States.

I think we can come up with better answers than we have now - from my personal point of view - and I think from almarst's , and from the point of view of US national interest as understood by "the typical reader of The New York Times " - - - and think progress is being made.

The US is not acting as if it had complete and totally irresponsible power - and that isn't just a matter of "good faith."

We live in an interdependent world. And here is a point still under-appreciated - but getting to be more appreciated. Connecting the dots may be "philosophically flawed" in some Humian sense - but very often, if you keep at the process, check facts, and are prepared to abandon viewpoints that don't fit facts -- connecting the dots works well.

If we rule out the impossible - there may be so few alternatives that we can deal with them.

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New York Times on the Web Forums Science Missile Defense