Posted on 12/18/2002 10:20:08 AM PST by Stand Watch Listen
Missile defense came out of the lab and into the field yesterday, with President Bush's announcement that the U.S. will deploy a limited system to defend the U.S. and its allies against missile attack by 2004. Somewhere the Gipper is smiling.
There's nothing easy or simple about the task ahead, and Mr. Bush stressed that the first stage will be "modest." Yet even the initial capabilities he outlined can only be deemed spectacular when compared with where the U.S. stood barely a year ago, much less where it stood when Ronald Reagan laid out his defense vision in his famous 1983 "Star Wars" speech.
Consider: On December 13, 2001, Mr. Bush made known his intention to withdraw from the ABM Treaty, which had severely limited the development of effective anti-missile defenses. This January 2 Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld announced the establishment of the Missile Defense Agency, tasked with designing and deploying a missile defense shield for the U.S. and its allies. On June 13, the ABM Treaty ended. Yesterday Mr. Bush announced a plan for deployment; who says Presidential elections don't matter?
This is a remarkable trajectory, and shows how much the nation's strategists and scientists can accomplish when they put their minds to it (and when they are unencumbered by lawyers and diplomats enforcing an antique treaty). It doesn't hurt that there's scarcely an American unaware that North Korea already has missiles capable of attacking Alaska and is rapidly upgrading. Iranian and Iraqi missiles can reach into the heart of Europe.
"The aim here," Assistant Secretary of Defense J.D. Crouch told us in an interview, "is to get some capability out there quickly." That's because there's an immediate threat but also because it will help push us up the learning curve. "This is not a final architecture," Mr. Crouch stresses. The idea is to follow the models provided by the JSTAR military surveillance plane and the Predator stealth plane. Both were still in the experimental phase when they were called into service in the Gulf War and Afghanistan, respectively.
The past year has seen a string of technological successes in numerous missile-defense programs, including several that will be part of the initial system: ground-based and sea-based defenses, the advanced Patriot (PAC-3) anti-missile system, and sensors located on land, at sea and in space. The airborne laser -- likely ready soon after 2004 -- is extremely promising for shooting down enemy missiles in the boost phase, that is, not long after their launch.
Perhaps the most remarkable achievement, however, has been in anti-missile diplomacy. In one year, we've moved from a world in which most U.S. allies were grumbling about a "dangerous arms race" to one in which they are eager to be part of a U.S.-led missile defense system.
The best example is NATO, which last month in Prague announced that it would "examine options" for building a missile shield to protect population centers. Even France has suddenly discovered a passion for defenses and now wants to get in on the mobile anti-missile program known as Meads being developed by the U.S., Italy and Germany.
Britain and Denmark are likely to acquiesce to U.S. requests for upgrading early-warning radars in Yorkshire and Greenland that are essential to tracking missiles originating in the Mideast. Russia is cooperating in a number of missile-defense programs and several Eastern European countries have held up their hands to participate.
Japan may have the world's most pressing interest, given its natural concern that Pyongyang could test another ballistic missile like the one that landed too close for comfort in the Sea of Japan in 1998. The head of Japan's Defense Agency, on a visit to Washington this week, let it be known that Japan wants to move its joint program with the U.S. out of the study phase to development and deployment. Japan already has purchased several U.S.-made Aegis ships, which could provide a sea-based platform for defense of that island nation.
In short, Mr. Bush's announcement yesterday marks the beginning of the future of missile defense. It also marks the final nail in the coffin of the Cold War "MAD" doctrine of mutually assured destruction. Just as Mr. Reagan predicted, again ahead of his time, America's leaders will finally be able to do more than watch in horror if a missile is launched against the U.S. homeland.
Socialists have learned to hide behind many names and colors. Most Democrats today are indistinguishable from traditional Socialists. This map, with the socialist voters in blue rather than their customary red, shows they cluster together in the big cities, which are also the big missile targets. If we got into a nuclear exchange, most of the survivors would be Bush voters. Gore voters would be vaporized. The Star Wars defense shield should be called the Gore Voter shield.
County by county map: click
That Gore won the majority of the votes is a moot point since the game was played to win the Electoral College, not the most votes. Had the game rules been different then Bush would have played the game differently and would have focused on winning more city votes. The purpose of the Electoral College is to prevent mob rule by the city dwellers.
Are you against a missile defense shield, now knowing that it benefits city dwelling Democrats much more than the country Republican simpletons? Is it that you are against any government spending that results in the hiring of well paid mostly white and asian males? Or are you in denial of what humans are and where we come from? Humans are warmakers. We are the genetic product of thousands of years of war. We are programmed to make war. To believe Democrats can create a socialist utopia and make war a thing of the past is a misunderstanding of basic human nature. Many socialist mind viruses can get you and your offspring killed.
The trades in Alaska are ecstatic. The building season is extending right on through the winter according to Dokken, and it looks like construction will continue for at least a few more years.
That makes Alaska a prime target, of course, having the ABM system here, but Alaska was also the only target N Kor could reach anyway.
If you had any clue as to how the system worked, you'd understand (a) how it protects more than Alaska and (b) why it's getting sited at Fort Greeley.
I'll bet you're one of these guys out here in California who thinks electricity just magically comes out of those funny holes in the wall...
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