Missile Defense Critics See No Answer to Decoy Problem

Space News ^ | 06-24-2003 | Randy Barrett

[spunkets]

There'd be absolutely no legitimate reason to publically state and allow discussion of how decoys would be handled. So Reed, Levin and the "concerned scientists" are just making political noise, intended to boost their agenda.

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

Well, I thought of a solution to the decoy problem. What does a police officer do when someone shoots blanks at him? Does he whine and cry like a liberal weenie? Nope.

[AdamSelene235]

Interception gets much, much easier when you use a nuke tipped interceptor like the Russians do (shhhh....its a secret).

Close counts in horseshoes,handgrenades and nukes.

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

Good point. And, for every move, there's a counter move. That's no reason to sacrifice a queen for a pawn.

[Zathras]

You got that right.
Bring back Spartan and Sprint.

[Prince Caspian]

"They're making political judgements, not technical judgements," Reed said.

Maybe, maybe not. Any decision under the guise of a "technical judgement" that assumes that knowledge and capabilities are static and not readily subject to radical revision with continued scientific advances, could be said to be political, as well.

And who said "political judgements" are bad? It seems quite appropriate to me that a nation would make a "political judgement" concerning its security and how to utilize its resources, and then do whatever is necessary to make the technical aspects of the implementation materialize. Anything is possible, given the right political vision, commitment, and sufficient resources.

Mere "technical realities" represented as a snapshot of current capabilities and thinking should never solely dictate political decisions, especially when involving national security.

[Arthur Wildfire! March]

The more another nation works on decoys, the more it shows its hand, especially in the lower budget rogue states, which is our highest risk problem.

[AdamSelene235]

this...is wrong tool!

[Reagan is King]

Well if such stalwart national defense leaders (/sarcasm) such as the Union of Concerned Scientists and Carl Levin are against it then it must have an excellent chance of working.

And how about this blurb:

Postol has been poring over missile defense test data, pinpointing deficiencies and, occasionally, leaking sensitive documents to the press.

A real quality researcher there.

[MistrX]

The problem is that the missiles need to be destroyed in the boost phase, when they are essentially a giant Roman candle, not during re-entry.

[spunkets]

The rats would like to hand us over as a goodwill gesture. They're not interested in defense. As long as US defense is strong, Dashole and his crowd will be deeply saddened.

[SevenDaysInMay]

Answer: Forward deployed ship launched ABMs in quantity for launch mode intercepts with payback Boomers on station to reshape continents with dancing dunes when necessary. Our mortal enemies' societies shouldn't have to worry about half-lives.

Which Americans should we not defend? Flyover country?

[InterceptPoint]

The problem is that the missiles need to be destroyed in the boost phase, when they are essentially a giant Roman candle, not during re-entry.

True enough but it is very difficult to make the detection, the decision to launch and actually launch and deliver the countermeasure in that time frame.

For a missile defense system, the decoy threat is real and work on this problem goes back at least 30 years so one could assume some progress has been made. I would think that any definitive simulations or tests that have been made pro or con would carry a very high security level. You really don't want the bad guys having a clue as to where you stand with this.

OTOH, a little disinformation can be valuable. Kind of a Brer Patch thing if you are old enough to remember Song of the South. If we let it out that we can't handle a simple decoy (when in fact we can) then we dilute the enemy's resources when he develops clever decoy systems. That could be going on here. This is, I believe, a signal processing/software/detection issue and as the computers get better and the resolution of the radars in terms of pointing accuracy and tracking get better progress is bound to be made on this front.

This will all be moot when we get a really good Airborne or Space Based Laser nuke killer flying. That is the ultimate solution. Just destroy them all, the real ones and the decoys.

[pfflier]

Critics: These are the same people that said:

1) Travel at over 60 mph would suck the air out of your lungs.

2) Man couldn't fly.

3) Man couldn't fly faster than the speed of sound.

4) Man couldn't fly in space.

5) We couldn't land a man on the moon.

6) We couldn't hit an object in space.

7) We couldn't do it again.

8) We couldn't do it with 100% accuracy.

9) Color TV is impossible

10) Everything that was going to be invented was invented by the end of the 19th century.

The only thing critics don't criticize is their disastrous track record.

[Moonman62]

There'd be absolutely no legitimate reason to publically state and allow discussion of how decoys would be handled.

Don't you know the first act will be to call all the liberals to let them know how we solved the problem, so they can call all their commie buddies and let them know.

[Moonman62]

Maybe, maybe not. Any decision under the guise of a "technical judgement" that assumes that knowledge and capabilities are static and not readily subject to radical revision with continued scientific advances, could be said to be political, as well.

Liberals also like to refer static economic models when it comes to pushing their marxist agenda.

[Capitalism2003]

solution...put small nukes on our satellites...if someone sends over a barrage of missles, detonate a nuke in the path...nothing will get through...problem solved.

[dark_lord]

The only country that can massively attack us is Russia. Our missile defense shield is not going to work against them. But it can work against ICBMs from N. Korea -- no matter how many decoys they launch. So that is not really the problem. The fundamental problem is this.

For a country that has a developed nuclear capability, say the PRC, they don't need ICBMs. It is better to put the nuclear warheads on long range cruise missles. Those can be built with a 5000 to 7500 mile range. There are no technical problems for cruise missiles with that range. They can be designed to fit into standard cargo containers and loaded onto, then launched from merchant cargo ships. True, if we were already at a state of declared hostilities they would be less useful, but in a Pearl Harbor situation they would work very, very well. And the anti-missile shield would not work against them at all.

Now before some pin-headed weasal jumps up and starts yelling "liberal weenie" I wish to point out that I am not saying an anti-missile shield is useless. I am merely pointing out that for a "middle tier" nuclear power going the ICBM route is neither necessary nor optimal.

[kerosene]

Bring back Spartan and Sprint.

Did someone say, "Spartan?"

Did someone say, "Sprint?"