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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 - 07:46am Feb 22, 2003 EST (# 9201 of 9203)
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.

My http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.e28Eanfi3qz.1944671@.f28e622/10708 ended with this - - - "It seems to me that, compared to historical precedents, the crises today seem likely to resolve very well - if people continue to work as well as they have. "

and then a few minutes later lchic made a vitally important point. - 08:09pm Feb 21, 2003 EST (# 9183 http://forums.nytimes.com/webin/WebX?8@28.e28Eanfi3qz.1944671@.f28e622/10709

"There seems to be confusion in the international-mind regarding separation of the concepts of

" weapons

" HUMAN RIGHTS

She's right. The point she makes is vitally important.

- - - -

Human beings (in nations, and internationally) need to live in orderly frameworks. Only when that occurs are human rights really stable, or possible at a high level. We have to do better than people have done in the past here - and we have a good chance to do so.

Any nation, if threatened enough, will sacrifice human rights - just as families and other groups will. Safety is primary. And so stability is vital. Stability on what terms? We need better answers to that than we've ever had - and it looks to me like they are coming into being.

Historically, at the level of international relations - life has been primative - Hobbesian - dangerous - "nasty, brutish and short."

American policy - which has been a realistic policy well grounded in history and experience - has been explicitly Hobbesian. That point was made by "becq" on the first day I was on this board - Sept 25, 2000:

After it was made clear how willing the US was, philosophically, to use nuclear weapons - and what the reservations were in http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md00100s/md280.htm the Hobbesian level of the logic (with connections to machiavelli, too) were explicitly made:

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md00100s/MD290.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md00100s/md310.htm

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md00100s/md318.htm

the Hobbesian connection was also discussed, with respect to President Bush's "faith based presidency" on Feb 25, 2001 - a couple of months before gisterme's first posting.

http://www.mrshowalter.net/a_md00100s/md781_785b.htm

We're making advances, and not so very slowly - from that level of "morality" - but we can't forget where we've been - and things we've done - and can't forget how brutal the world is - has been, and remains.

rshow55 - 07:50am Feb 22, 2003 EST (# 9202 of 9203)
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.

This is a very hopeful time. Can we do better than a "war of all against all" - or better than a "World scale leviathan" governed by the hegemony of one state?

Can we do better than surrender our hopes to ideas that we can somehow agree on basics -somehow become "one world" in a way that's never even been approached before?

If we're to get to a much more peaceful, much more prosperous, much more decent world - we have to do MUCH better. It looks to me like it may be happening. If we keep at it (and that includes gisterme ), things might get a lot better.

Things are going beautifully now, by the standards Adof Berle discussed in Power , Chapter III .

It is hard for me to look at the way things are happening - and not feel a lot of hope, mixed with some fear.

Human beings (in families, in all sorts of groups, in nations, and internationally) need to live in orderly frameworks. Orderly enough to meet safety needs, and other basic needs. Only when that occurs are human rights really stable, or possible at a high level.

It seems to me that we're making progress - - and to me it looks like historically important progress - with a chance of a real breakthrough to better, more practical, less muddled times.

- - -

I'll be trying to respond usefully to some important points gisterme has made about international relations.

If gisterme is speaking for Bush, he doesn't have the luxury of idealistic stances that can't work. But he does have the responsibility for good outcomes - in the world as it is. A very heavy burden - that he shares with other national leaders - who are responsible, too.

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