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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Bilow who wrote (15184)	12/31/2001 5:58:24 AM
From: Bilow	Respond to of 281500

Hi all; In finding the above link to the equations of war, I also found this fascinating little book by Jerry Pournelle. Here's his argument for continuing the "arms race": <<< The nature of technology makes meaningless the gunpowder era phrase 'arms race'. It is fashionable at present to speak of the action-reaction arms race, in which each power constructs weapons for fear that the other has done so. According to this theory, the primary reason nations arm themselves is that they react to others. The newest catch phrases are "arms race stability" and "assured stability". These slogans are essentially undefined by their authors, who advocate that the U.S. simply opt out of a Technological War we can't afford. The Soviet Union, under this notion, will also see the advantages of "arms race stability" and likewise abandon the struggle. The money saved by both sides can be invested in social programs and increased consumption. We make no doubt that there will be other such catch phrases and buzz words, and that they will also remain undefined and only loosely coupled with reality. In fact, in the Technological War, opposing powers essentially react to the seemingly impersonal stream that carries them along. They really have no choice and never will have so long as the current flows and there is asymmetry of information between them. The technology stream exists independent of the will of those who create technology. The direction and pace, however, are more amenable to control by strategists. To continue our analogy, the fog over the technological battlefield is made denser by confusion caused partly by deliberate deception and partly by self-deceptions. Only when the Communist states have transformed themselves into open societies and there is a complete exchange of information -- that is, when the fog has lifted from the stream of technology -- can meaningful efforts to arrange the contest on a more economical and less risky basis be successful. Until that time we must engage in the Technological War. >>> jerrypournelle.com To this I would add that since our weapons systems are designed about a decade before they can first be used, it's even more complicated than he outlines above. -- Carl

To: Bilow who wrote (15184)	12/31/2001 4:16:21 PM
From: frankw1900	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Bilow. Shooting down ICBMs. It's mostly a software problem these days, I think. The attacking missile is coming in so fast the defending warhead has a very small window of opportunity to explode in the right place. Decoy warheads on the attacking missile complicate the problem. The Patriot system seems to be improving so I don't think designing or building such a system is impossible or necessarily unaffordable. The size of such a system to defend the whole huge area of the US might make it very expensive, especially if it were space based. On the other hand a space based system might have economic payoff because of the infrastructure it might require. I think, long term, ground hugging cruise missiles present a more difficult problem because they could be hard to detect especially if they're very fast. Strategy wonks find anti missile defence interesting for reasons hinted at in the article. The Russians and Chinese don't want their lack of weapons parity to be too great because some of them get feelings of insecurity and, of course, their lunatic fringes find it good grist for their mills. An anti missile defence system that works certainly is not a defensive panacea. Who wants all sorts of radioactive crud falling on their country? (It would appear even depleted uranium armour piercing munitions present a health hazard). The thumbsuckers just get all trembly when they hear of a new weapon system whatever it is. They don't understand countries always have a right to defend themselves. It's one of the things that defines them.

To: Bilow who wrote (15184)	1/1/2002 1:21:27 AM
From: Maurice Winn	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 281500

Carl, <"The prospect of an American missile defense system did, however, help goad the Soviets into mutual cuts in our nuclear arsenals." If the American plan were militarily impossible, then how did it goad the Soviets into doing anything? Did we fool the Soviets into thinking that something impossible could be possible? > Gorby and the USSR were not goaded by the star wars threat into cuts in nuclear weapons. Gorby announced a unilateral test halt while the Americans were treating him like a continuation of the post WWII cold war against Stalin and Krushchev. It took the USA a long to time to figure out what was going on with Gorby. They looked really dopey from my local political analyst group's point of view. The USSR was interested in nuke reductions irrespective of the star wars stuff. They were not pushed in the slightest by the remote prospect of a semi-effective space shield. Also, the self-congratulatory claim of victory in the cold war, with the USA military spending bankrupting the USSR was also wrong. Places implode without any help from the outside. Anyone who had had anything to do with the USSR would not have been surprised that when a civilized person like Gorby tried to drag the USSR out of the Leninist, Stalinist, Brezhnev murderous repressive regimes, with Glasnost and Perestroika, it would be easy for the horse to get the bit between its teeth. The self-deception of the USA government and swarms of Americans is quite frightening [no, they are no worse in self-deception than other countries and I think better than most, but it's frightening when the USA goes nuts, not when Fiji goes nuts]. I think the star wars defence is a bit like Iridium as a space-based mobile phone service. Technically possible but a bad return on investment because there are much better ways to skin a cat. A better return on investment would come from reconstituting the UN and resolving the foundations of most conflicts. Mqurice