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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 - 09:59am Jul 8, 2001 EST (#6763 of 6769)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

MD5995 rshowalter 6/25/01 1:30pm .... MD5996 rshowalter 6/25/01 1:57pm

" Me, I don't know, but these things don't sound so easy. . . "

Indeed, the administration is expressing confidence that it can do jobs that are impossible.

We have alternatives that are attractive, but not pursued, because the Bush administration backs schemes that cannot stand up to competent crossexamination.
MD5997 rshowalter 6/25/01 2:02pm

We also have a knowlege base, extensive and deep, which tells us for sure that some things are not going to be doable in the foreseeable future. We can be sure that some of the miracles claimed by the military-industrial complex, especially on lasar missile defense, cannot be true.
MD5998 rshowalter 6/25/01 2:45pm

We can also be sure that patterns of decieving the Congress have been well established, for a very long time, and continue.
MD6000 smartalix 6/25/01 2:52pm ... MD6001 rshowalter 6/25/01 3:05pm

smartalix - 10:48am Jul 8, 2001 EST (#6764 of 6769)
Anyone who denies you information considers themselves your master

gisterme,

Let's tackle your points one at a time.

First, since neither Iraq nor Korea have, or will have, ICBM capability for the forseeable future, any discussion of their capability is moot. That is why I dismiss the "rogue state" hypothesis central to the missile defense argument of the dumya administration.

Second, we have belittled the Russian space capability often, yet they have managed to break all records for long-endurance space flight, and have a higher boost capability than we have right now.

My comment on titanium shielding was for the warhead I still maintain the easy feasability of that approach of warhead hardening. The booster could do with lightweight ablative armor, since the standoff distance of the intercept laser would be so great as to tax the limits of its effectiveness in the first place. This is not even taking into effect clouds, atmosphere, etc.

As far as shield weight goes, an ablative layer weighing "a couple of caddilacs" would be easy for a military-modified Proton-K, for example, as it has a low-earth orbit (all you need for an ICBM) payload boost capability of "only" 21,000 Kilograms, over 46,000 pounds.The Energiya booster has a capability of 100,000 Kilograms, over 220,000 pounds. If Russia renewed their side of the Cold War, cost wouldn't be an object in their re-militarization.

I notice you didn't follow up on plating the warhead and/or booster with gold or iridium.

Here is a very cheap ($8,000) fiber-optic gyro, completely self contained. It is immune to vibration and other outside vectors.

A good example of a rotating booster is the space shuttle. It must rotate about its axis as it positions itself for orbital insertion. why couldn't a booster just keep on rotating?

If Russia (and China) started to crank out lots of missiles to overwhelm our "shield" that would not be a good thing, and could easily be avoided by simply not instigating a renewed missile escalation.

However, the best manner of defeating an ABM "shield" is to launch many lightweight missiles, like the SS-27 you refer to. It has a shorter engine-burn time, to minimize satellite detection on launch.

Again, this does not address the core issue, the disingenuous agrument of a "rogue nation" launch.

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