🚀 go-pugleaf

Andrew Cott (cott@ll.mit.edu) wrote:

: Exactly.  While those against missile defense worry about doomsday 
: scenarios, crowing the MAD doctrine, they miss the true foreign policy 
: leverage a TMD system (either in the field militarily, or around major US 
: cities) provides. Heck, if Hussein had an ICBM and *no* nuclear warhead to 
: mount on it, why shouldn't he mount a chemical/biological/explosive payload 
: on it and point it at Central Park?  He wouldn't have to announce it's 
: existance, just "leak" it to the US foreign service.  Then, when he next 
: moves on Kuwait, do we risk another military action--hoping for a 
: malfunction on that rocket?  

He probably would not do it for the same reasons that he did not mount 
chemical heads on the SCUDs launched agaisnt Israel.  What would he 
gain by launching and ensuring Iraq's complete destruction?  The fact 
that Hussein attacked Kuwait was not a failure of deterrence.  The costs 
associated with such an adventure were not well laid out for him, whereas 
he seemed to realize that chemwar against Israel would do far more than 
just invite a couple a conventional bombing raids.

[snip]

: As a terrorist weapon, an ICBM forces the US to retaliate with global force 
: to an attack.  Now, which would we rather do: launch planes and rockets on a 
: foreign country that has delivered deadly agents from the comfort of their 
: own home, or capture and prosecute human agents who reak havoc on our own 
: soil and deal *diplomatically* with the offending nation?  Which scenario 
: forces escallation?

This is a far more interesting point.  But what you are implying is that
we should indirectly fuel another nation's determination to attack by
explicity saying "we won't make you pay the ultimate price."  I have no
quarrel with using diplomacy, God knows, but because these potentially
offending nations realize we have the means and will to respond to any
such attack, they wisely choose not to do so.  Diplomacy is involved by
making sure that your adversary knows what your interests are _before_
trouble starts.  In addition, for my money, I would rather invest funds
where the _likely_ threats are going to come from; as others in this
thread pointed out, a terrorist-like attack that is difficult to trace to
a specific nation is more likely the way to get at the U.S. 

: If we, as a nation, are going to be active in international conflicts, we 
: should *not* rely on sticking our nuclear forces in the face of anyone who 
: disagrees with our position and has rockets that can reach the US.  Not only 
: is that a world noone could possibly *want* to live in, it's no way a 
: country *should* behave, full stop.  

I don't think anyone on either side of this issue is suggesting we 
brandish our nukes about like so many cutlasses.  The fact is, nukes 
exist and I don't think there is any way to put that genie back in the 
bottle.  Nonetheless, deterrence, which is not all that *hard* IMHO, 
should work well against national actors that value their survival.

: Finally (this *was* going to be a quick reply), the proclamations Reagan was 
: making about an impenetrable shield was newsreeling.  At that time, however, 
: the fish he was frying was the USSR.  Different world now, and it appears 
: it's the anti-missile-defense people that are missing the boat.  

Wasn't it a line of crayon (remembering the old commercials;))  there may 
be an argument for ATBMs for the battlefield, i.e. a Patriot that is 
designed for the task.  However, from a strategic standpoint, BMD is 
money spent for an extrmely unlikely event.  Better to spend on the real 
threats . . .

--
David Birdsey | "Don't rejoice in Victory. For while you've killed the
              |  Beast, the bitch that bore him is in heat again." 
                                                      -Bertholt Brecht
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