Missile defense BS

Bush and Rummy have spent over $30B and counting in tax dollars on a missile defense shield since taking office. I wonder how many armored Humvees and Kevlar vests that would have bought for our troops, or even shelter for Katrina victims and meals/healthcare for poor people. Basically, the premise of the defense shield is a network of radar installations on America’s flanks that can track threatening ballistic missiles in mid-flight or descent, then launch interceptor missiles to destroy the inbound bogeys before they reach their intended targets. I won’t get into to much detail here, but do read the interesting links if you’re curious. Basically my two-pronged criticism is this: missile defense is an expensive response to a low-probability threat (and therefore you may argue that it’s unnecessary), and the system in its current form performs so poorly nearly to point of nil protection anyway.

So why even build it? Of course it makes defense contractors like Lockheed and TRW a ton of money, assuages some ridiculous fears whipped up by conservative Chicken Littles, and might even make American hawks feel invincible against the Axis of Evil’s meager weaponry. Have we even progressed out of the Middle Ages? All this sounds like an alchemist at the carnival who exploits your ignorance/ego to sell an immortality potion for two gold pieces. To make a crude analogy – why would you need to buy $100 condoms if you and your spouse are disease-free and monogamous? Furthermore, would you spend $100 on a condom that fails over 30% of the time? If not, then don’t endorse Bush’s missile shield. So the taxpayers and our allies need to know the limitations of our capabilities, so we don’t sell them a lemon and find out the hard way if an enemy missile is ever launched. You trust that your vehicle airbag will work when you need it at the critical moment. Would you trust this administration on missile defense (an administration that has scorned science since day one and has very little competence on military strategy), when they previously made such predictions as “The jury is still out on global warming” and “Iraqis will welcome us with flowers and candy”?

Bush and company are concerned that terrorists and “rogue states” will launch ballistic missiles against US or allied targets. Since we all know that Al Qaeda will never possess a missile silo, that leaves only North Korea and Iran with the military technology and potential ill will to ever attempt such an attack. In recent history, we’ve seen that North Korea’s medium range missiles can’t reach the US west coast, and test launches often fail miserably. Their recent underground nuclear test yielded an explosion so wimpy that many analysts doubted it was even a fission reaction. Plus they don’t have the know-how to miniaturize a bomb so it fits on a missile tip. So North Korea is years off from pea shooters at best. Unfortunately no missile defense system can protect our Asian allies in South Korea/Japan from a short range Korean warhead, since the flight time and trajectory are too short. Even if their missiles were 100% accurate and could be equipped with a nuke, why would they bomb low-value targets like the Aleutian Islands or Kaui when everyone knows America’s reprisal attack will blow them off the map? Do we really think other nations are that stupid and suicidal? Just because a nation can do a thing doesn’t mean they will or must do that thing. America has the resources and know-how to eradicate many major diseases and reduce global poverty practically overnight, but do we? So why should we expect the Axis of Evil to attack us the first chance they get? Ever heard of deterrence measures? When the USSR got the bomb after WWII, did they immediately send bombers to Berlin or Washington? People need to chill out and get a grip. Not ignore the threat, but meter our responses in proportion to the risk.

Tensions with Iran are more heated and with stronger consequences. They have decent rockets and more critical NATO targets closer to its borders, but is behind on the nuclear technology. Although some EU nations have endorsed sanctions against Iran as punishment for their nuclear research, many European countries are trade partners with Iran, especially in fuels. Why would Iran want to nuke its richest customers outside of Japan? As former French president Chirac said, the Iran threat is way overblown because only a suicidal regime in Tehran would ever be so imprudent to fire off a few missiles against the West before getting obliterated by our counterattack. Now I am not insinuating that Tehran is somehow immune to foolish action, but many political safeguards would have to fall apart for their regime to ever consider authorizing missile attacks. They would have to feel so backed into a corner, like a desperate suicide bomber, that they might as well take a few infidels down with them if their doom was assured anyway. So that is where DIPLOMACY comes into play. If we stop saber-rattling and freaking them out, then maybe they would have no incentive to attack us. If he got the green light, Bush’s missile shield wouldn’t be fully operational in Western Europe until 2011 or so, and Iran might not even have a bomb and delivery technology by then. Plus the missile shield does nothing to address the threat of nukes delivered by short-range methods such as aircraft, torpedo, land vehicle, or smuggling.

Now I am not making light of the nuclear threat. Even a small device can cause much death and destruction. The carnage at Hiroshima was caused by a puny bomb compared to our modern Apocalyptic warheads. But Ebola is also a scary and real danger. But why worry about it if your lifestyle and geography protects you from most forms of transmission, especially when the likelihood of outbreak is so low? There are plenty of scary things in this world to be worried about. Some are more pressing than others. If we invested $30B on fighting global warming a decade ago, maybe Bangladesh won’t be underwater in 50 years. Now to the second thrust of my argument: functionality. The missile shield doesn’t even work well! In test runs where the interceptor system pursued mock targets equipped with HOMING BEACONS on them (and last time I checked North Korea doesn’t do us such favors), it failed in 3 of 8 attempts. Results have even been doctored to make the system appear more effective than it actually can be in real-world practice. Does that make you feel safer from attack? The system is also terribly vulnerable to simple countermeasures, or dummy objects deployed by the enemy missile to confuse our interceptors. Conceivably, an inbound rocket would merely need to eject metallic objects of similar temperature, shape, and speed (to have a similar infrared signature, which our interceptors use to identify targets in pursuit), and our interceptors may hit the harmless debris and let the dangerous warhead pass. This is a low-tech countermeasure that our enemies could easily outfit on their missiles, which would render our $30B defense fairly impotent. Also equipping a missile with a radar-absorbing coating or internal cooling system (like our stealth aircraft) would reduce our interceptors’ ability to locate it.

So we’ve made strong arguments to establish that the missile system is unnecessary and ineffective. Furthermore, it also causes POLITICAL problems, as we’ve seen from Putin’s anger preceding the G8 summit in Germany. First Bush pulled America out of decades-long anti-proliferation treaties, and now he’s digging around in the former Iron Curtain. While it is comforting to some Americans to be the mightiest, unchallenged bully on the block (even if we are a benevolent, freedom-spreading bully), sometimes tranquility and harmony are better preserved by a balance of power rather than hegemony. We survived the Cold War just fine without a missile shield, and the Soviets were much deadlier than the Axis of Evil could ever hope for. Just like Iraq, an ostensibly defensive action can be misconstrued by others as overt aggression. A plan intended to make us safer could actually provoke a wider conflict. Placing US “defense installations” in Eastern Europe is another sign that can be construed as America’s desire for global military domination, and the hardliners in Moscow might consider risking escalation rather than sitting idly by while the US military encircles them in their own backyard.

Some leaders in Eastern European governments are happy to cooperate with Bush, but many of the citizens under the proposed shield are concerned if not furious. Right now the Bulgarian prime minister is kissing Bush’s ass on a state visit to include his country in the missile shield – but why the hell does Bulgaria think they need protection from Middle Eastern missiles? And this is another consequence of Bush’s PR campaign for missile defense: other nations form unrealistic expectations and unfounded paranoia over missile attack. The world is a more dangerous place if everyone is fearful and reacting irrationally to ghost threats.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6720153.stm

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/missile/etc/postol.html

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?chanID=sa006&colID=1&articleID=000A45A2-E044...

http://www.iht.com/articles/2006/08/31/opinion/edmissile.php

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=2864145&C=america

http://www.nuclearfiles.org/menu/key-issues/missile-defense/history/biden_mis...

http://science.howstuffworks.com/missile-defense.htm

http://slate.msn.com/?id=115350

http://www.wagingpeace.org/articles/2001/02/00_krieger_missile-defense-magino...

------------

Your thoughts bring a question to mind - has Bush been successful in
furthering military interests?

I remember not too long ago military bases were being closed in Ronald
Reagan's California and pundits were writing off an infantry force as an
antiquated 20th-century notion of warfare. Given that media coverage
(both traditional and "new") over the last 6 years has been dominated by
talk of terrorism, Afghanistan, and Iraq does the American public have a
different take on the relevance of the US military in 21st-century?
This morning I heard a piece on voters in Iowa and the few sound-bytes
which were included (all Republicans) indicated an exhaustion with the
war and impatience with the lack of results. Would it be fair to take
the results of this year's election as an answer to the question or will
military budgets in the first few years of the next administration be
the real indication of Bush's impact on US military interests?

---------------

Yeah, I mean as far as I know defense spending scaled down under Clinton (due to world events and national priorities), but has ballooned under Bush, much under the premise of the War on Terror post-9/11. Our wars cost something like $30B a month? Maintaining big bases in Germany, Central Asia, the Gulf, and Korea ain't cheap either. Our Navy also costs a ton and doesn't provide as much value as it did during the Cold War (well, we do have to safeguard Americans against arrr Cap'n Jack Sparrow). Maintaining our bloated nuclear arsenal costs billions a year too. Health care for military personnel is very pricy, and still we get crap like Walter Reed rats. And all this doesn't even include defense research and all those pork projects that make Boeing rich and give us nothing useful in the end. But the money doesn't come out of thin air. Of course Bush has slashed budgets of "civilian" government offices and even closed down some domestic military bases (much to the chagrin of the local Congressmen).

So yeah, defense spending is a joke, but that's nothing new. I think the US spends more than Russia, China, UK, and France combined. We also are the #1-2 arms exporter (depending on how you count it), fueling small wars and conflicts all over the place. We're one of the few nations that opposes the prohibition of landmines, cluster bombs, and space weapons - guess why? We signed pacts outlawing chemical and bioweapons research but actively engage in it (so do other nations though).

So in terms of allocating resources for the military, definitely Bush has been successful, but much of that is due to 9/11 and Iraq (who in Congress dares vote no to a supplemental appropriations bill and not support the troops?). But in terms of "strengthening" the military, I would say he has done the opposite. As my previous emails have described, his Iraq campaign is totally draining our ground forces. Tens of thousands wounded, and tens of thousands more exhausted after repeated tours of duty. Morale is quite low. The Middle East climate is very hard on our men, vehicles, and equipment too. The only good thing coming out of our Mideast wars is our troops and commanders are gaining a lot of experience dealing with Muslim cultures, fighting in desert/urban areas, counterinsurgency, and such. Probably they're not learning much considering the poor rate of progress (but more the fault of DC rather than the troops). They will be better trained to handle the next Mideast conflict whenever and wherever that may be. But in general, Iraq has become a major black hole that retards our efforts to address flashpoints in the rest of the world (Sudan, Somalia, Lebanon, Pakistan, Colombia, former Soviet republics, etc.).

I guess under Clinton we were kind of disassembling the Army because we probably weren't ever going to fight a protracted conventional ground war like Korea ever again. The Rumsfeld plan was to evolve into a sleeker, more agile and high-tech military. But all that went to pot with Iraq, when we once again became bogged down in a drawn-out war of occupation, except this time the enemy uses sucide tactics, we don't have a draft, and we fomented a civil war. The worst part was Rummy thought he could have it both ways: slim down the Army and win in Iraq. He failed in both, and didn't make many friends butting heads with the uniformed men.

There was also this NPR piece about only yes-men being promoted in the military under Bush. During the buildup to Iraq, Gen Shinseki vociferously opposed the Rumsfeld plans and called for at least 200,000 troops to manage the postwar occupation properly (history shows he was right). Rummy dissed him, assured us Iraq would be a piece of cake, and Shinseki had to step down somehow. The other generals too notice and many fell in line. Only yes-men who think like Bush got promoted, which is scary because it narrows the vision of the Pentagon and risks it becoming a partisan wing of the White House like the Justice Department under Gonzales.

So some have benefitted under Bush, but probably more like defense contractors like KBR, Blackwater, and Lockheed than the average US grunt. Death peddlers get their research budgets expanded, while the National Institutes of Health are scrapping by to try to cure cancer and AIDS. And before Iraq, I think our military was generally respected in much of the world outside of the Muslim World. Now most nations associate the US soldier with occupying oppressor. The shames of Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, Haditha, and others have scarred the military's reputation. So apart from the physical pains the military has endured under Bush, they are now more despised and not trusted around the world. They will need a major PR enema after the election.