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Missile Defense

Technology has always found its greatest consumer in a nation's war and defense efforts. Since the last attempts at a "Star Wars" defense system, has technology changed considerably enough to make the latest Missile Defense initiatives more successful? Can such an application of science be successful? Is a militarized space inevitable, necessary or impossible?

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rshow55 - 07:35am May 8, 2002 EST (#2077 of 2080)

Behind the Terrorists By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/07/opinion/07KRIS.html describes results of a conference and. . . ends " And in trying to uproot terrorism, perhaps we should think in new directions, like extending trade or, especially, trying to confront feelings of humiliation that may well be more explosive than poverty or illiteracy. "

from October 20, 2000 to March 29, 2001, (beginning shortly after my web conference of September 25 MD1597 - MD1603 rshow55 4/21/02 3:22pm ..) lchic and I were involved with a Guardian Talk thread that was featured (linked) on the Guardian's Middle East web page for that time. The heading read.

Emotional Peace in the Middle East Started by rshowalter at 09:09am Oct 10, 2000 BST

We are in an impasse that is just as dangerous as it looks in the Middle East. It looks like an emotional crisis, and whatever else it may be, it is surely just that. Here are some basics about the impasse, and the radically different ideas and feelings now at play

The Israelis have been looking for a limited, coexisting place of their own in the Middle East, and have been fighting for their lives, outnumbered, for more than half a century. They've wracked their brains to find ways to coexist, and tried to forgive all manner of insults, injuries, and consistent themes and variations of genocidal threats upon them.

true.

The Israelis have become militarily effective in the extreme, in all sort of warfare, including psychological warfare, and the Palestinians are now psychologically so reduced that they are "fighting" by having a rabble of unarmed, fanatical children throw rocks at Israeli soldiers, hoping to provoke the Israelis into killing them, and hoping that their death, in this way, somehow leads to a workable human situation.

also true.

It is now clear how upset the Palestinians are, and they have said that they feel so degraded, so demasculinized, that the only thing they see remaining to them is a fight to a self sacrificing death, under conditions where they are only fodder to be cut down by disciplined troops.

That's not conducive to peace. The psychological state of the Palestinians must be adressed, including the (considerable) role in that psychological state due to effective psychological warfare by the Israelis. Livable, masculine and human roles for the Palestinians must be worked out, mutually, between Israel and the Palestinian governments and people. The Israelis have to let this happen - which means that both sides have to understand the psychological degradation of the Palestinians.

Anybody blame the Israelis for using any and all pyschological warfare technique against the Palestinians, with the Israeli risks as they've been? I find them blameless. This was life and death. All the same, for peace, some psychological warfare injuries need to be acknowledged, and healed.

The physical compromises necessary for peace are now, after much effort, largely in place.

The emotional healing is absolutely necessary, too. It needs to be begun.

If Palestinians are to become a nation, they can't ask their children to fight by throwing rocks at armed and organized soldiers. And if Israel is to have peace, the Palestinians have to become a working nation.

We are looking at emotional problems, that are no accident, but that are at least as dangerous as they look.

They need to be adressed. Only the truth, only a situation where "everybody is reading from the same page" can possibly work here. The situation is too desperate and too complicated for anything else. Anybody interested in talking about this?

M. Robert Showalter mrshowalter@thedawn.com

rshow55 - 07:35am May 8, 2002 EST (#2078 of 2080)

Had I been permitted to communicate more directly with the government,, and with the back-and forth that face to face communication permits, some of the conclusions in the conference Krostof reports in Behind the Terrorists http://www.nytimes.com/2002/05/07/opinion/07KRIS.html might have been reached earlier, and lives saved. A number of other issues might have been better handled. As it was, I worked according to the instructions I'd been given, and the promises I'd made, and did my best.

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