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Missile Defense

Russian military leaders have expressed concern about US plans for a national missile defense system. Will defense technology be limited by possibilities for a strategic imbalance? Is this just SDI all over again?

rshowalter - 05:50am Apr 14, 2001 EST (#2230 of 2234)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

almarst_2001 I think you've just made a very constructive response.

I thought Friedman's piece was beautiful in terms of his assumptions -- assumptions that I wish corresponded better to US behavior. Assumptions that sometimes do correspond to US behavior. Assume Friedman's assumptions. So far, so credible for Friedman's piece of yesterday. So far, so beautiful.

But at the same time, the "One Nation, Three Lessons" piece does have significant mismatches. It significantly misleads, in terms of some current and past US behavior. You point some of the disparities. And insofar as the piece does not match important facts, it is ugly. Beautiful in terms of its own assumptions, but ugly matched against some facts, and some true stories about what the US has done, and is doing now.

I've been arguing very hard for the necessity of checking. and you're response is a fine example of a checking process that can find clear ugliness. Showing, in detail, what is ugly reduces the danger of the errors that cause the ugliness. And where the ugliness is, there new clarity, and new beauty may be sought for, and found.

The most fundamental kind of checking is matching. If something clear is said, about either fact or ideals, then facts can be matched clearly beside what was said --- and they match as well as they do. And people can see.

rshowalter - 05:51am Apr 14, 2001 EST (#2231 of 2234)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I think that you, (if you could set aside the gratuitous insult to Russia that Friedman makes, or even learn from if) might agree that much of what Friedman says would be nice, and beautiful if it were true. Perhaps I'm wrong about that.

You might also agree, looking at the American political process as it is, that in the American context Friedman's piece might have been constructive, in important ways, on your terms.

But at the same time, I think you'd be clear that Friedman describes, in significant ways, a world that doesn't match the real one.

And to the extent that Friedman advocates a rough "golden rule" for nations, he doesn't acknowledge essential, vital was in which his own country falls short of that "golden rule."

If the points that Friendman makes in his piece were set out clearly, and matched, both for the ways that they do fit US intentions and facts that can be checked, and for the ways that they do not, in enough detail so that few reasonable people could doubt the facts involved, and the matches and mismatches involved, something beautiful might happen. There might be an island of "common ground" that would bear logical weight, from which people might work of peace in Asia, between Russia and the West, and elsewhere, as well.

I'm going to be studying your 2227-2229 some more. The statements and acknowledgements that you make about admitting mistakes are especially profound, important, and welcome to me.

in 2227 you cite Friedman's

" Authoritarian regimes, having little legitimacy, can almost never admit a mistake."

and respond very constructively

" May be true. But how many Democratic goverments you know who admitted their mistakes?"

You acknowledge a key fact, and balance it with a profound question, well supported by arguments by you -- and if that question was well discussed, and well adressed, the whole world might be happier, more prosperous, and more peaceful than it is.

Lies are unbelievably damaging and expensive in our world, the inability to apologize is a central human problem, and we need to be able, all of us, to find ways to deal with the truth. Because when we become bound up by lies, we can make terrible decisions, and the damage done by such terrible decisions can be seen all over the world.

Let me post this, and then let me respond, in a very matchable way, to your 2229 above, which I feel is both very important and very hopeful.

rshowalter - 06:22am Apr 14, 2001 EST (#2232 of 2234)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I'm commenting on almarst-2001 4/13/01 11:47pm

almarst_2001 "Authoritarian regimes, having little legitimacy, can almost never admit a mistake."

" But if they could find ways to do so, to face their past, that would be good. If they could proceed reasonably into the future, not denying their past, but proceeding from where they actually were, with the people they actually have to make sensible, humanly practical adjustments, step-by-step, based on reliable feedback patterns, in the interest of their own people, in ways they could explain to each other and to outsiders, that would be good. Then these regimes would have achieved legitimacy, and could serve themselves, and their people, in ways that everyone could be proud of. Their core problems could be resolved, in redemptive, practical ways, that fit their actual circumstances. Fighting would be unnecessary, or very much minimized. It seems to me that both Russia and China are, within the human limits, and with many missteps, trying to do something like this. At least some of the time, with respect to some things. If they could do it better, and explain themselves more clearly, they would have more legitimacy on the public stage. That would be both comfortable and profitable for them, and for those who deal honorably with them.

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