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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 - 01:07pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3758 of 3800)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Here are issues that I think are useful here:

. rshowalter 3/22/01 10:04am Part of "doing business" is knowing when the other side is telling the truth, and when it is lying, and shifting the discourse so that truth, that both sides can work with on an ongoing basis, emerges. .... In America, that happens "informally"

. rshowalter 3/22/01 10:05am If officers of the United States govenment, even the highest ones, are actually caught violating rules of decency, among "people who count" that can have serious consequences. ....A trick, sometimes, is getting to "count."

I think these exchanges fit here, too:
1300 almarst-2001 3/22/01 10:27am .... 1301: rshowalter 3/22/01 10:46am .... 1302: rshowalter 3/22/01 10:54am

We're only beginning to deal with each other as full human beings, in the ways that would make sense to do. And some of the decisions that have been made, or happened by default, between the US and Russia are insanely out of proportion, and better balances need to be found.

rshowalter - 01:08pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3759 of 3800)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I feel that people in Russia, and the US, and elsewhere, need to remember what a mess the last decade has been, for Russia and its realtions to the whole world. rshowalter 3/23/01 7:10pm ... there's sorting to do.

Messy as things are, I think this thread shows real progress, over the last three weeks, and over the last six weeks, and sometimes, from day to day.

rshowalter - 01:11pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3760 of 3800)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

almarst-2001 5/12/01 9:03am raises very important points, and I'll try to be back to it. Do others have comments on it, or does Almarst have more to say about it?

rshowalter - 01:41pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3761 of 3800)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

The Russians have two key problems, not only at the level of "rationality" -- but also at the level of deep, multiply reinforced association and emotion.

For many years, Americans worked hard to convince Russia that they were on the recieving end of a ruthless, merciless, immediate first strike threat. We succeeded in convincing the whole culture of that, very deeply.

The 1972 ABM treaty was part of an enormously elaborate sham -- to convince the Russians that we were MUCH farther ahead on anti-missile technology than we were, and much farther along than they could imagine getting, based on what they knew. We set out to fill them with axiety about everything associated with ABM technology, and succeeded.

Now, the US is saying: "trust us" about our missile defense proposals.

Under the circumstances, that's asking for a lot.

(I feel that's putting the matter gently.)

applez101 - 02:21pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3762 of 3800)

Question to all on the forum:

Some have posited the view that NMD can play a useful role in essentially making reductions of missile stockpile (START) publically palatable. My question is this: do we really need an expensive, wibbly, NMD as an adjunct to nuclear weapons reductions? Especially if the real risk, at least in the medium term is both proliferation of WMD technology & arms and a destabilized global peace policy (MAD, ABM, etc.).

Secondly (and you can see where I'm angling), should such an NMD plan include weaponizing space, is it a suitable trade-off for reduced commercial & new national space access and increased risk of 'cascade'?

I beg to oppose NMD & space weaponization.

rshowalter - 03:04pm May 12, 2001 EST (#3763 of 3800)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I oppose NMD, and weaponization of space.

But I feel that the US is showing a great deal of fear, here, in an area where some fear is justified, but where history needs to be understood.

Since WWII - when mass bombing of civilians, first done without public understanding - became an "accepted" aspect of war - the US, more than any other country, has worked to legitimize mass death by bombing -- and then, legitimize the idea that nuclear weapons could be used in war.

Terrorists, all over the world, have been studying these AMERICAN arguments.

A great deal of propaganda effort, and psychological warfare, has made nucs "thinkable" in a terrible, abhorrent, and humanly impractical way.

We need to delegitimize any use of nuclear weapons (and, I'd say, bombing, as well) and "put the genie back in the bottle."

If people looked straight at what nucs do, and how they have been used as threats, I believe that major steps toward reducing nukes toward 0 (an objective gisterme and I share, by the way) could be taken.

Threats of NMD and space weaponization (neither technically very viable options) may be useful -- if they motivate what really needs to be done.

We need to find ways to reduce the odds of nuclear weapons killing and injuring people and the earth.

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