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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 - 07:29pm Jul 27, 2001 EST (#7514 of 7543)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

MD7251 rshowalter 7/19/01 5:15pm

" We've had a lot of Dr. Strangelove in our international arrangements. Maybe we can't do away with all of it, though I think we can.

" But we could use some of the Mary Poppins virtues, too. "

Plenty of ugliness, all around. No getting rid of all of it. But we can do better -- with fewer negatives, and more positives. To do it, again and again, we need more of a sense of proportion.

A sense of the quantitative -- a sense of the core mathematical question, which is "how much?"

Disproportion is ugly and there's plenty of it.

I wish that Bush and his high officers, when they found things getting ugly, would think harder about the ideas they were basing their decisions on. They could be wrong - - in both a practical and moral sense. The two kinds of "wrong" go together pretty often.

I wish for the same about Putin, as well. He needs to assess the size of his risks, his costs, and his opportunities.

lunarchick - 07:56pm Jul 27, 2001 EST (#7515 of 7543)
lunarchick@www.com

Alex : sounds as if there's scope for a book entitled The international deplomacists book of ettiquette .. red-ribboned complimentry copies of which might be handed to arrogant visiting dignitaries worldwide.

In Aussie arrogance equates with 'The tall poppy syndrome' .. if folks get 'too big for their boots' they're downsized.

Things are gearing up down-town, for Ted Turner's games - with a weightlifting sector Showalter - if only Ted has sent you a complimentary ticket ... supposed to be the world's best event. The top Aussie weight lifters used to have USSR addresses. Hard to understand why anyone would want to 'lift' now the fork-lift truck is so readily available !? We have a female Aussie-Russo high jumper who's our number one darling! She'll get marketing deals .. but .. hairy weight lifters .. not noticed any on the advertising circuit!

Post Ted's World Games Lizzie and the Commonwealth Conference steam into town. Did you know that this is now a loose affiliation, and lots of countries opt to join - who never flew the union jack. They go to meet leaders, network, and 'learn' re problem solving - as applies to their particular situations. This is the area of work that Lizzie likes .. sounds as if she's a catalyst for fixing and solving - and that's her joy.

Police on local 'protest' crowd control will NOT carry guns - they usually do. Tourism matters.

lunarchick - 08:07pm Jul 27, 2001 EST (#7516 of 7543)
lunarchick@www.com

The USA economy is running at 1982 levels - little leaguing along!

Bush saying that the tax cut will help the economy, but, didn't the high returns go to those not in need ... and those with needs - so much so that they hadn't paid tax - got nothing.

rshowalter - 08:20pm Jul 27, 2001 EST (#7517 of 7543)
Robert Showalter showalte@macc.wisc.edu

Ideas matter. Power depends, very often, and in the long term, decisively, on ideas that people are actually willing to commit to. . . . MD7078-79 rshowalter 7/16/01 9:54am

Arrogance matters -- a nation state that holds others in contempt weakens itself, because other nation states have real power -- individually and collectively MD7449 lunarchick 7/26/01 8:22am . . and Americans, supported by "respectable" institutions, can forget this -- vitiating US power FLYING INTO TURBULENCE by Peter Martin http://www.intellnet.org/news/articles/peter.martin.flying.into.turbulence.html

And viewpoints, both nationally and internationally, do shift

MD7491-3 rshowalter 7/27/01 10:17am

MD7494 lunarchick 7/27/01 10:45am ... MD7495 rshowalter 7/27/01 11:00am
MD7496 lunarchick 7/27/01 11:02am ... MD7497 rshowalter 7/27/01 11:05am
MD7498 lunarchick 7/27/01 11:09am ... MD7499 rshowalter 7/27/01 11:15am

The most powerful approach, quite often, for both individual and nation states that live in interdependent worlds ( all of them) is one that they can be proud of, both among themselves and in relation to their public.
MD7447 rshowalter 7/26/01 5:09am ... MD7448 rshowalter 7/26/01 5:20am

To flaunt that public opinion doesn't dissipate all power -- but it does reduce power, and strengthen adversaries.

lunarchick - 08:26pm Jul 27, 2001 EST (#7518 of 7543)
lunarchick@www.com

Looking at the USA and trade, the farming lobby votes for the right (?), and the Republicans want to repay them. The general public like cheap goods in the shops - as per China supply line. The WTO China post above showed that America has a desire to TRADE.

If the Missile situation is just a gruesome-ploy-play, and below and beyond that, the issue is trade. The question for Russia is how to trade with the USA - now that Hammer(search) isn't around anymore to conduct complex batar.

The Americans want-in with franchaise, business and commerce. These relate to refined business process.

Russia is educated, smart, and has a unique culture - which they could harvest into marketing product. If it's simple to turn the clock back to 1963 for status matters, why not hit the 1900 mark for tradition and marketable culture and trademarking. The business processes could be looked at and refined - along with use of sophisticated database 'enterprise' systems - to give winning systems. Ultimately wealth comes in part from the development and application of advanced process. (Heaps of scope for this in China too). The USA don't have a monopoly re power - it's derived from doing lots of things in the 'smartest' way.

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