Subject:
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Re: Are we doing the right thing?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sat, 1 Sep 2001 04:55:49 GMT
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Viewed:
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746 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Tim Courtney writes:
> "James Simpson" <jsimpson@rice.edu> wrote in message
> news:GIy92A.9r3@lugnet.com...
>
> > Which is exactly why that foolish missile-defense nonsense is so dangerous.
> > We're liable to create just the right conditions for a nuclear "incident" with
> > this money-sink, er, national defense system. This whole issue just makes me
> > sick to think about it.
>
> With that logic, I'd expect you to next say that bulletproof vests on police
> officers invite criminals to shoot them.
I don't think that's a fair extension. Bulletproof vests are
*not* sold as a guarantee of protection, rather as an added
margin of safety in given situations.
The problem with missile-defence is precisely that which James
and Dave pointed out: it creates a fiction that a nuclear war,
however limited, is winnable. The lack of any parity in the
rest of the world with regards to an effective--or even partially
so--ABM system is even worse, because it encourages calculations
of "reasonable" loss.
This is precisely what happened in WWI. It wasn't that anyone
wanted four years in the trenches, eating blood and mud and steel,
or being reduced to cooking cats on the home front (yes, it really
did happen in Austria and parts of Germany). *Every* major power
had a reason to want to go to war, but more importantly, every one
of those powers believed it had some special quality that gave it
an edge and would make victory speedy and complete. They believed
in invulnerability--Germany's Schlieffen plan (which actually would
have worked had von Kluck not panicked, but that's another story),
Britain's navy, France's rapid mobilization, and Russia's numbers.
Can you imagine this with nuclear weapons? Between 1905 and 1914,
the powers of Europe increasingly baited each other and deluded
themselves into believing what I've described here. The result
was the greatest carnage the world had seen since the Golden Horde
of Genghis Khan rampaged though Eastern Europe and China.
If we build an anti-missile system, it's going to lead us into
serious trouble through complacency or cockiness. If we share the
technology, mark my words, someone will one day decide they've got
the edge. If nobody has a defence, then every nation-state has
the trump card and nobody will dare make the move. Deterrence
worked for 52 years--why change it now? (See below for my response
to your "hypothetical.")
> It is imperative to our national security that we defend ourselves against
> attacks. Especially because the weapons of mass destruction are making their
> way into the hands of terrorists.
What weapons are these? Ballistic missiles? Have you EVER heard
of a terrorist organization launching an intercontinental ballistic
missile? Heck, when have terrorists ever even managed to use more
than a mortar, which I'll remind you doesn't shoot more than a few
hundred meters? Are you aware of the amount of infrastructure
and investment required to produce a reliable ICBM and keep it in
running order? China has had access to Russian/Soviet technical
expertise for a long time now and they *still* don't have anything
that can reach US soil (AFAIK). We're not talking model rocketry
here--you can't just take it apart, assemble it in the desert, and
shoot it at the Evil American Great Satan Imperialists [tm pending].
Someone said it more eloquently than me, but I'll paraphrase:
It's not the nation-state with a nuclear missile you need to worry
about. It's the terrorist sailing up the Hudson in a little motor-
boat with a slightly radioactive (and possibly ticking) beer cooler
at the other end who will be the real threat. The terrorist will
have no territory or population you can threaten in return, unlike
the nation-state whose power base is always in peril.
Nuclear terrorism won't come from above--it'll come from within,
and just when we foolishly believe we're safe. But also don't
*over*estimate the ruthlessness of terrorists--the sheer horror
of the nuclear nightmare is anathema to most of them. All the
"Iron Eagle III" fantasies about bloodthirsty Muslim nuke-fiends
do is convince Americans that terrorists and the societies from
which they hail are somehow not worthy of the label "human." (If
you don't believe me, look back at the first three or four days
after the OKC/Murrah bombing--everyone was sure it was some Arab.)
Even terrorists have goals, and it's not normally violence for
violence's sake.
Wow. Get a historian started, and see what happens? ;)
best
LFB
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Are we doing the right thing?
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| (...) with (...) me (...) On the other hand, there is something to be said for Tim's extension (though it's clear that he meant it as counterfactual) as worth thinking about. If I were preparing an action of some kind that had a plausibility of (...) (23 years ago, 1-Sep-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
| | | Re: Are we doing the right thing?
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| "Mr L F Braun" <braunli1@pilot.msu.edu> wrote in message news:GIywD1.6y3@lugnet.com... (...) Neither is our missle system guaranteed protection, from what I understand of it. (...) Now, that's a good point. I'm definitely against nuclear war, but (...) (23 years ago, 2-Sep-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Are we doing the right thing?
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| "James Simpson" <jsimpson@rice.edu> wrote in message news:GIy92A.9r3@lugnet.com... (...) With that logic, I'd expect you to next say that bulletproof vests on police officers invite criminals to shoot them. It is imperative to our national security (...) (23 years ago, 31-Aug-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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