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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Dan3 who wrote (130104)	12/27/2000 2:23:37 AM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1571793

Besides, the whole thing's irrelevant since far and away the most credible threat is delivery via suitcase, not ICBM. Dan, At the present time, I believe that to be true. At some future point, there may be a country capable of launching an armada of missiles (I don't think Russia is capable of such an attack at the present time) that effectively could wipe out the US. Apparently, it was concluded some time ago that are only defense in such an event was to either make a preemptive strike against the aggressor nation, preventing the launching of their missiles, or launching a retaliatory strike upon learning that foreign missiles were headed our way. Either way, the world is screwed; not just the US and the attacking country. And that's another reason why a defense system is a fairly ineffective measure. The odds of the human race surviving a nuclear holocaust are pretty slim......which brings us to the conclusion that the best defense is not having an exchange of missiles in the first place. ted

To: Dan3 who wrote (130104)	12/27/2000 11:55:06 AM
From: pgerassi	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1571793

Dear Dan3: Optical sensing systems can be made EMP insensitive yet guide their interceptors to target during boost phase. This is the venerable technology employed by the Sidewinder Missile for over 40 years. By destroying the missile during boost phase, it would not get close to this country and if destroyed early enough, would even keep those radioactive debris in the host country. Nothing would stop agression more than a nuke which was blown back to the launching country from such an intercept and subsequently detonates. Remember that in the boost phase, an ICBM is a bright, easy to locate, target. Also, this type of decoy is very expensive to make (ICBMs are not cheap even when not being used as a transporter of nukes). Granted, the current proposal is not a boost phase intercept. However, there are ways to protect systems from an EMP burst. Typically most systems that are tempest certified are also able to stand a minor burst (If they stop RF energy (which is what an EMP burst is) from leaving, they stop it from coming in). Any system surrounded by a superconductor would automatically be protected from an EMP burst (unless the size causes the superconductor to stop being one) as well as any in a magnetic shield such as the Mu Metal shield used in old H100s. Another way is for a sensor to have a second electronics package in a shield and after a few seconds, a mechanical watch dog timer, connects the systems to that package which survives the EMP burst. Now the sensor is active and can hunt down the ICBMs that follow. This method could be used to protect after one or two preceeding EMP bursts. Such a capability would be designed into any defense system deployed by us. Pete