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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?

ktaucer01 - 03:32pm May 2, 2001 EST (#3018 of 3022)

rshowalter: Thanks for your insight into to the history of America's involvement in the Cold War and the use of the nuclear threat to achieve global objectives. It is refreshing to see someone on this forum use research to construct an argument instead of rhetoric, insinuation and insults. Iam sure you are right about there being plants on the forums used to attempt to sidetrack reasoned argument. The nation was treated to just such a phenomena during the last presidential election when cadres of young Republican operatives where seen creating disruptions during street rallies by Democrats and most notoriously during attempts to count undercounted ballots. Why wouldn't these same tactics be used on public forums conducted by the most influential newspaper organizaton in the country?

wrcooper - 03:34pm May 2, 2001 EST (#3019 of 3022)
The whole is a riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery. Doubt [and] uncertainty...appear the only result of our most accurate scrutiny....But such is the frailty of human reason. --David Hume

gisterme 5/2/01 3:20pm

Getting rid of some arrows and adding a sheild seems like a reasonable step.

I agree that disarmament is reasonable. I don't agree that Bush's BMD proposal is reasonable. First of all, as so many people in the aerospace and information processing fields have said, it's unworkable at present. The tests that were done in the last year of the Clinton administration were outright failures. The problem lies in distinguishing decoys from warheads. The challenges are enormous, and even if they could be overcome, what would we have really gained? As I said in an earlier post, a terrorist with a small nuke in a knapsack would pose a far more serious risk to U.S. security. Our borders are highly permeable; it wouldn't take much to smuggle a bomb or a potent toxin into the country and detonate it in (or release it into the water supply of) a major city. Bush's idea is a blatant give-away to the military industrial complex. It makes no sense technically and less strategically.

gisterme - 03:42pm May 2, 2001 EST (#3020 of 3022)

rshowalter wrote: "...Could corruption be the problem? ..."

Sure it could Robert. Go ahead and give some specific examples of that corruption. Let's get all this dirty laundry out in the open. Admittedly, there haven't been any sex scandals, money for access scandals, pardon scandals, missing furniture or instances of the president being caught lying under oath, but surely you can come up with something specific.

deniseny - 03:51pm May 2, 2001 EST (#3021 of 3022)

I read the article regarding Dubya's "Missle Defense" plan. I wouldn't say I'm shocked. 'Discusted' is more the word. It made me think back to Bush Sr's administration. It was not long after the ending of the Persian-Gulf War when someone posted a sign somewhere that made the headlines which read:

BUSH GOES TO WAR!!! COUNTRY TO BE ANNOUNCED LATER

Sadly, the apple hasn't fallen too far from the tree. This man has been in office 3 1/2 months and he's already getting a reputation of being a "Bumbling Bully". Just WHO is he protecting us from anyway??? In the last couple months, this idiot has managed to alienate us not only from our adversaries but also from our allies! I guess that's the real plan isn't it? To place our country into a position of where we must be prepared to defend ourselves.

The fact that Bush intends to reduce our nuclear arsenal does not give me an all "warm and fuzzy" feeling either. He's simply reducing one grouping of weapons so he can build others. I don't so anything positive there.

I agree with many of the posters here who feel that a real threat against us would be more likely to come from terrorist attacks. I see nothing in Bush's plan to defend against such an event.

If you ask me, this is just a useless expenditure of billions (maybe more?) of our hard earned tax dollars for the real purpose of paying back Bush's [deep pocket] campaign supporters! How many more industries does Bush into to please over the next 3 2/3 years? I say he's just getting "warmed up"...

That, interestingly, makes me wonder just how Bush intends to follow through with his trillion dollar tax cut (now that it's been approved by Congress) and still spend all this money without putting us severely back into debt... I'm no accountant, but this just isn't adding up.

rshowalter - 03:59pm May 2, 2001 EST (#3022 of 3022)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I'll take things in order, thank you.

gisterme 5/2/01 3:20pm includes this question:

" Why should one acknowledge what the whole world already knows?"

Let me tell you why I think it is essential. On September 25, 2000, I made a proposal md 266-269.

From rshowalt 9/25/00 7:36am
"Human actions work best according to the following pattern:

" Get scared .... take a good look ..... get organized ..... fix it .... recount so all concerned are "reading from the same page ...... go on to other things."