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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 - 08:02am Jul 2, 2001 EST (#6400 of 6404)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I think for this thread, it is more interest to talk of output I've gotten from this "optimal invention" approach that might offer examples of things that the military industrial complex might do, more profitable for all concerned than missile defense efforts that technically cannot work, and perhaps, for world peace, should not work.

Here are things that I believe can be achieved --

Very large area solar cells on the equatorial oceans. It should be possible to generate enough hydrogen to serve all word energy needs, forever. Hydrogen would interface well with existing energy sources and capital installations, from early prototype stage to the largest possible scale. This would be a practical and permanent advance in the human condition, and would reduce some major and chronic causes of war and conflict between nations.

Very large area aquaculture on the equatorial oceans. With shallow layers of ocean surface water isolated so that they can be fertilized and harvested, aquaculture could could be used for carbon sequestration for full control of global warming. Aquaculture could also supply essentially unlimited nutrition for animals and people. This would be a practical and permanent advance in the human condition, and would reduce causes of conflict and war.

Seawater distillation could be achieved at an energy cost not much more than twice the thermodynamic limit cost. I believe that cost per liter might be 1/10 to 1/50th the cost today. Scaling to serve cities and countries would be feasible. Much of the United States is short of water, and could benefit. This would be a practical and permanent advance in the human condition, and would reduce a major cause of conflict and war.

(at a lower level of certainty) :A much more efficient way of getting large masses into space (if not in orbit around the earth, then in moon, sun or plantary orbits) appears to be possible -- and would be a good cooperative job for Americans and Russians - - the Russians would be better on the basic design, the Americans better on some of the execution. If this were possible, a major constraint on space exploration, which has almost stopped progress for many years, could be blasted through.

In my judgement, many other useful things could be done. -- and many of them would take the resources that the military industrial complex is now squandering on projects that barely work or cannot work.

These are just "back of the envelope" thoughts I have -- comparable in many ways to the "back of the envelope" designs DOD is not backing on Missile Defense. But there is a difference. These are all well within the realm of the possible, and subject to reasonable cost estimation, with information in the open literature.

I've suggested that the impossibility of the administration's missile defense proposals (which are far fetched indeed given what's known about signal resolutions and controls) be examined, in public, by setting out the miracles that DOD would have to achieve, in the sense of very large advances on what could be done with established knowledge in the open literature.

The very same approach would show how possible -- in context, even easy, it would be to get global warming, human energy needs, and other basic human needs under far better control than they are now -- for less money than the administration is proposing to squander - to the reckless endangerment of the world, on missile defense programs that are, as I've used the phrase before, shucks .

rshowalter - 08:04am Jul 2, 2001 EST (#6401 of 6404)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

With just a little honesty, the US, and the whole world, can do much better than it is now doing. The US military industrial complex can have plenty to do -- honorable work --without the need for lying -- work within the capacities of the technical people there.

Currently, things are much worse, they are corrupt and uncomfortable for the people involved, and they are unacceptably dangerous.

I've been prepared to answer questions many times before, and am still prepared to do so. On September 25, 2000, after a long and interesting dialog that started with a proposal in
MD266 rshowalt 9/25/00 7:32am . . . MD267 rshowalt 9/25/00 7:33am
MD268 rshowalt 9/25/00 7:35am ... MD269 rshowalt 9/25/00 7:36am
I made an offer
MD304 rshowalt 9/25/00 5:28pm . . . That offer stands.

rshowalter - 08:10am Jul 2, 2001 EST (#6402 of 6404)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I have some promises to keep to gisterme , but must go to a meeting, and tend to some things, before I keep them.

The mechanism of getting full peace with the Russians, and sorting things out in other ways-- is available.

There are many ways to do it.

But the people involved have to be talking about what matters, in the contexts that are really there.

rshowalter - 08:12am Jul 2, 2001 EST (#6403 of 6404)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

In my view, this is worth listening to, for those who have not done so. We need to attend to what matters, and we need to exercise judgement.

After the first 9 minutes, the message is mostly secular. It is preached in a Baptist Church where many are of Jimmy Carter's persuasion on many issues. Most of the people in that church are Republicans -- some active, and ranking, in Republican organizations.

http://www.wisc.edu/rshowalt/sermon.html

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