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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 - 12:19pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6677 of 6685)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Reading them now.

On a technical point, about resolution -- do you really thing trigonometry (sines and cosines) are independent of the basic facts involved in computations based on the pythagorian theorem ? -- On the issue of how much angular resolution can be increased, the question matters.

lunarchick - 12:45pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6678 of 6685)
lunarchick@www.com

^ ~

lunarchick - 12:52pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6679 of 6685)
lunarchick@www.com

Spherical aberration Blurring of a telescope image; it is due to the fact that the lens (or mirror) does not bring the light-rays falling on its edge and on its centre to exactly the same focal point.

rshowalter - 12:53pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6680 of 6685)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I think Garwin's proposal, which is specific, limited and clear, could be made to work.

I'll read more detail, more carefully, but I don't think that my judgement would change. Just personally, it might be fun to work on some of the controls - which are not hopeless for this particular proposal.

As I remember, that means I owe gisterme a profuse apology -- for saying the government had nothing that could work on paper.

This would work on paper, and could do so to full engineering detail.

That's a limited apology, directed to this specific subject matter.

Garwin also seems to feel that there would be a list of breakthroughs other approaches would take -- his list and my list may not be the same -- and they may be additive.

One thing I like about Garwin's proposal is that it is not destabilizing, if the Russians agree to it, and perhaps they ought to.

But in the course of making the arguments that might make it possible for the Russians to do so, it should be clearer than it is now to Russians and others that the probabilies of any missle defense that could change nuclear balances with any major power are far fetched.

And, with a sense of the probabilities, a sense of the limited modifications of the ABM treaty that might make sense, in view of circumstances, to all concerned.

* * * * *

While we get along with the business of getting the numbers of nuclear weapons way down in a manner that acknowleges the real (including psychological) security needs of the US, Russia and other parties.

gisterme - 12:56pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6681 of 6685)

WRT the boost phase intercept idea,

http://www.armscontrol.org/ACT/sept00/bpisept00.html

Mr. Garwin has suggested that along with some jointly operated shore-bases, interceptors could be based on large merchant-type ships. That's a workable idea, but ships within a couple of thousand km of a hostile place are subject to attack from aircraft or cruise missiles. Bad weather conditions could also render the ship temporarily ineffective.

The president has said he wants deep cuts in US strategic weapons, particularly ICBMs. Along those lines, the stand down of all of the peacekeeper (MX) missiles has been proposed and presumably will take place. Even though those are some of the most accurate missiles in the US invetory, they are only a small part of the total capability. There is a very large hammer riding aboard US Fleet Ballistic Missile (FBM) submarines. Presumably, if the ICBM stand down continues (let's hope) then some of those boats will need to be withdrawn from the strategic strike force.

Why not change the role of some of the existing Trident FBM submarines to a defensive one? Why couldn't a remodeled FBM submarine serve just as well as a launch platform for boost phase interceptors as it does for ICBMs? Nuclear submarines are practically invulnerable to attack, especially from nations like N. Korea, Iran and Iraq and they can travel undetected virtually anywhere in the ocean.

A modern FBM submarine has 24 launch tubes. Assuming (conservatively) that you'd need three interceptors to have a good probability of destroying an ICBM, a single converted FBM sub could knock out eight missiles. That seems well suited to the scale of defense proposed.

Use of a stealty launch platform would also mitigate the effect of poor weather conditions. Weather conditions could make launching missiles just as impossible for a submarine as for a surface ship but a potential adversary couldn't know wheter or not the submarine was in an area of bad weather as they may with a surface ship.

Just an idea.

lunarchick - 12:59pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6682 of 6685)
lunarchick@www.com

!

rshowalter - 01:03pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6683 of 6685)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Garwin's proposal is a "smart rock" proposal directed from a short distance at a relatively slow moving and brightly illuminated booster.

Get close enough to the launch sight, and such a thing can be made to work.

Get closer still, and a 50 caliber machine gun would be an effective boost phase interceptor.

lunarchick - 01:04pm Jul 6, 2001 EST (#6684 of 6685)
lunarchick@www.com

MD fact sheets

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