"There are thousands of Patriot systems--a direct outgrowth of SDI"
Talk about ignorance. The development of the Patriot system started in the 1960s. It was first deployed in the mid-1970s. The goal of SDI was taking out ICBMs. The Patriot system operates in a totally different regime. Two completely disjoint sets of problems.
"But more importantly, the progress you mention is nonlinear -- and neither has been the funding."
There has been funding for almost 30 years. And not at a low level either.
"But the ultimate goal of securing the nation against missile attack is achievable and will be done in the next decade or two"
Or three or four...
Think of it as the new fusion. "We are 20 years from practical fusion". That has been true for 50 years. Why haven't we turned the corner on fusion? Because, while the science is well understood, there are all kinds of twists and turns before implementation.
The problem of protection from IRBMs and shorter range missiles might be solvable in a few decades. Might not, but there is a chance. Scenarios where IRBMs are used is a much more constrained problem. Stopping ICBMs is a different class. For one, no one sees thousands of IRBMs being used in an attack. Stopping 90%(to pick a figure) would hurt, but wouldn't be fatal. For another, some of the counter measures aren't possible for IRBMs. They are more likely to be visible from the target in launch phase, making decoying more difficult.
The type of ICBMs that SDI was supposed to counter is a much, much more difficult problem. Decoying is a lot easier. And killing them either kinetically or through direct energy weapons is a lot more problematic. In addition, the numbers are much higher and stopping 90% is not much better than stopping none. Even 99% doesn't help a lot.
And that is where Uncle Carl got it right. The numbers kill us. And decoying makes the task even more difficult. Not to mention other counter measures. While "physically impossible" is an exaggeration, it isn't off by all that much.
Edward Teller was a brilliant man. But, he liked to latch onto simple ideas. The heart of his proposals on SDI were nuclear pumped, X-ray lasers. Which, you know, are really neat. We just don't know how to build one. All attempts have failed. Without these things, his SDI proposals couldn't work.
Really, given your enthusiasm, your ignorance is appalling. You show no signs you actually understand the problems, much less the scientific or engineering challenges. It seems like your support is totally faith-based. |
