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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 - 10:13am Jul 10, 2001 EST (#6838 of 6839)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

almarstel_2001 , this forum's "Vladimr Putin stand-in" has made the following postings between 6/9/2001 and 6/14/2001.

If a person samples the many posts in these linked directories, at random, I think that person would be impressed at the intellectual quality, and the quantity, of almarstel_2001's attention to this thread.

MD4644 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:15am . . . . shows DIRECTORIES of almarstel's numerous and distinguished postings set out in Cast of characters -- a "PUTIN STAND-IN" -- almarstel2001 (1-9)

. . . .

Directory-linked lists of distinguished efforts, usually long postings, sometimes interesting references, by almarst_2001: MD4645 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:19am ... MD4646 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:20am
MD4647 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:20am ... MD4648 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:21am
MD4649 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:22am ... MD4650 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:22am

And a change-clarification in negotiating position in MD4651 rshowalter 6/9/01 7:32am

There's been much work since. I'll be reviewing some of it.

rshowalter - 10:14am Jul 10, 2001 EST (#6839 of 6839)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

I've done extensive summaries of this thread, with links in the Guardian Talk thread Psychwar, Casablanca, and Terror , starting at #151 http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/160

Summaries of this thread after July 14 (#207) http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@@.ee7a163/218 that reads in part:

"This thread is the single most important TALK thread for discussions of military balances and peace, and I deeply appreciate the chance I've been given to post here. .

" Since Missile Defense 4433 rshowalter 6/6/01 1:48pm there have been 906 postings.

" The NYT forums have now reinstalled a search function, after a long time -- and it seems to be the same one the Guardian uses, with search page lengths the same as in these TALK threads.

" The NYT Missile Defense thread is being extensively used, and discussion and controversy are continuing. Main contributers are:

" almarst_2001, previously almarstel2001 who, since March 5 has acted as a "Putin stand-in" in the Missile Defense forum , and shows extensive connections to literature, and to Russian government ways of thought.

" gisterme , who since May 2nd has acted as a "Senior Bush administration advisor stand in" who shows some plausible connections to the Bush administration.

" Posters ( beckq , cookies ) who, according to the dialog, are the same poster, who I'd interpret as "stand-ins" for former President Clinton since August 2000

"Me, and Dawn Riley, who have been arguing for improved communication, and as much nuclear disarmament as possible within the imperatives of military balances, since September 25, 2000

"Counting search pages, for characters, gives some sense of the participation. Here are the number of search pages for these posters (as of today )

Putin stand-in, Almarst --- 66 search pages.

Bush Advisor stand-in, gisterme ----- 59 search pages

Clinton stand-in, beckq, or cookies2 ----- 7 search pages

Dawn Riley - - - - 115 search pages

Robert Showalter - - - - 166 search pages (saturated)

I've contributed the most words to the MD thread, and Dawn the most citations and the most connection to the news.

But the involvement of the "stand-ins" has been very extensive, too, represents an enormous work committment on thier part, and their postings are, I think, very impressive. The involvement of these "stand-ins" continues. I believe that their work has assisted in the focusing of problems where neither the US nor the Russians were clear about how to make contact with each other before.

This Missile Defense thread is an ongoing attempt to show that internet usages can be a format for negotiation and communication, between staffed organizations, capable of handling more complexity, with more clarity and more complete memory, than could happen otherwise.

I believe that is something relatively new, in need of development, and clearly needed. I feel that progress is being made, and that impasses that were intractable before may be more tractable now.

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