nyquil, by the way, if you want to see more of the views from the other side, take a looks at some of the following: http://www.heritage.org/Research/AsiaandthePacific/china-taiwan.cfm http://taiwansecurity.org/ Also, I'm a big fan of Bates Gill's writings too. But he's been awfully quiet recently after taking over the helm of CSIS China. Check out some of his earlier stuff too. Remember, the score may have changed, but the players haven't.
Recommend reading this report too. http://www.defenselink.mil/pubs/20030730chinaex.pdf ANNUAL REPORT ON THE MILITARY POWER OF THE PEOPLE¡¦S REPUBLIC OF CHINA ...While seeing opportunity and benefit in interactions with the United States -- primarily in terms of trade and technology -- Beijing apparently believes that the United States poses a significant long-term challenge. In support of its overall national security objectives, China has embarked upon a force modernization program intended to diversify its options for use of force against potential targets such as Taiwan, the South China Sea and border defense, and to complicate United States intervention in a Taiwan Strait conflict. Preparing for a potential conflict in the Taiwan Strait is the primary driver for China¡¦s military modernization....
And you people think the PRC is some kind of "boogeyman" to justify spending money on defense! God, you people are naive as hell. Of course I'd rather we not have to spend the enormous gobs of money we spend on defense. But unlike you pacifists who cry "boogeyman" and "toothfairy" every time someone brings up a defense issue, I live in the real world full of real dangers. So you kids enjoy living in your world of rose-colored spectacles where the U.S. is the enemy of freedom and an "imperialist" bastion of intolerance and hatred. We adults will ensure that you have the freedom of life and speech to continue to hurl your nonsensical, globalist bits of flak.
The rationale for creating nuke stockpiles was to be used as a deterrent. When the Soviet Union achieved the technology, that evolved into MAD. In no way would current space weapons tech help deter N. Korea from blowing up S. Korea. The threat isn't from nuclear weapons, but from throusands of artillery shells aimed at Seoul. The technology to prevent that doesn't exist, and if even we did acheive significant gains in less than 5-10 year, that still gives our enemies a window to carry out their plans. So in S. Korea's case, you'd be accelerating MAD because of the instability of Kim Jong Ill. We shouldn't spend an exorbant amount of money in space because the returns on an imperfect technology aren't worth it at this point. In the event that our enemies see us as a threat, they don't have to achieve the same degree of sophistication in technology in order to counter whatever we bring out. Their simplest alternative is to produce more. It would be like buying a 100 dollar GI Joe action figure that could only shoot one gun competently.
The problem lies with your reasoning and on what you think would be in space. Denial of space to the enemy is going to be the big thing if we fight another symmetrical (conventional) war. The Russkies have already developed ways of messing with our GPS and communications satellites. Handcuffing ourselves via inane sentiments is not logical. Like I said earlier, if I have a bazooka at my house, according to your reasoning, you are MORE likely to attack me because I have superior weaponry. It is more like the other way around. Our enemies will use the "destabilization" line to convince people in this country of your political persuasion that to do so would invite aggression, when in fact, it would deter aggression. Mind you, I'm not talking about sticking nukes in space. But I have no problem with us possessing operable ASAT systems (the one we developed in the 80's was killed by the wussy liberals in Congress who feared the Soviets and didn't want to "provocate" them by a satellite killing missile) or developing countermeasures to enemy attempts to destroy our GPS and comms satellites.
To PROVOKE fear is precisely the aim of an army, deterrence. I would hope our arms and men provoke plenty of fear in plenty of people all over the world, particularly those not friendly to us. And frankly if putting more advanced hardware into service doesn't provokes our enemies, then really we ought to reconsider their effectiveness. When China buys AWACS-killers and develops ASAT capabilities, do they worry about provoking us? When North Korea builds nukes and fires those ballistic missiles, do they worry about provoking us? No. They are positively jumping for joy. We do not live in a Cold War where the ability of both sides to destroy each other has escalated into a meaningless numbers game (i.e. the ability of enemies to kill far more than 100% of each other). China and N Korea doesn't have the power to destroy us 50000 times, like the old USSR. When we strengthen our arms, we have the potential to eliminate their threat to us altogether (at least in a nuclear sense). Improving arms would not necessarily just add or subtract a magnitude of mutual annihilation, but may actually keep Americans safe from harm. In this context, the Cold War terminology of provocation, arms race, etc. is meaningless. If we can achieve total military superiority for our nation in the face of imminent threats, in our quest to protect our own people from the likes of Bin Laden or Iran, in our quest to protect our democratic allies (like South Korea and Taiwan), it would be irresponsible not to.
What about those pesky Iraqis attacking us every day in spite of the presence of 130,000 US troops? Even if they are afraid, it doesn't do much good without a political solution to motivate them to not attack us, unless we think we can kill them all. I believe this only worked for the Germans in Warsaw.
You're right. I would never suggest that we use might alone in foreign policy. Many other posters on this board will know my stance on the Palestinian issue. Without a political approach that wins the hearts and minds of Iraqis and Muslims worldwide, the moment our military leaves will be the moment we lose all control and all our efforts go to waste.
What about the famous "Star Wars" project under Reagan? Sagan led the charge against it even making fun of the concept at one point. The point still standing that, when all is said and done, it's simply impractical to implement military deployment, of any kind, in space especially when considering the cost: WHY STAR WARS IS DANGEROUS AND WON'T WORK By Carl Sagan, Hans A. Bethe, Henry W. Kendall, Kurt Gottfried, Richard L. Garwin, Victor F. Weisskopf The following statement by six prominent scientists on the dangers of Star Wars appeared as part of a letter to The Wall Street Journal on January 2, 1985 http://www.nybooks.com/articles/5561 A nearly impermeable strategic defense system would indeed have the capability to "save lives" rather than to "avenge them," to replace strategic deterrence by defense. But such a system is not in the cards, as even the program's director, General James Abrahamson, readily admits. Anything short of an impermeable system tends to undermine, not improve, US national security. Here are some of the reasons that we consider the Star Wars scheme unworkable and a grave danger to the United States: -- Underflying: Star Wars does not defend against, or even address, low-altitude delivery systems--bombers and cruise missiles, and "suitcase" nuclear weapons. By themselves, they are able to destroy both nations; Star Wars would accelerate their development. -- Overwhelming: The number of strategic warheads in the Soviet arsenal (as in our own) is about 10,000. If even a few percent of these warheads exploded on US territory it would represent an unparalleled human disaster and effective collapse of the United States as a functioning political entity. The Soviets could keep ahead of any American Star Wars system because it is cheaper to build new warheads than to shoot down old ones (and easier to shoot down orbiting defensive systems than incoming missiles). -- Outfoxing: It is cheaper to build countermeasures than to build Star Wars. Some decades in the future when a (still highly permeable) US Star Wars system might be deployed, the Soviets would have added tens or hundreds of thousands of decoys and other penetration aids to their arsenal. Their objective would be to fatally confuse the American Star Wars system, which can never be adequately tested except in a real nuclear war. -- Cost: Former Secretaries of Defense Harold Brown and James Schlesinger, and senior Pentagon spokesmen of this Administration, have all estimated the full Star Wars cost as hundreds of billions to one trillion dollars. -- Soviet preemption: Despite US reassurances, the Soviets perceive Star Wars as part of a US first strike strategy, allowing us to launch a preemptive attack and then to destroy the remnant of any surviving Soviet retaliatory forces. In a time of severe crisis, this may tempt the Soviet Union to make a preemptive first strike against the United States. -- Institutional momentum: When a trillion dollars is waved at the US aerospace industry, the project in question will rapidly acquire a life of its own--independent of the validity of its public justifications. With jobs, corporate profits, and civilian and military promotions at stake, a project of this magnitude, once started, becomes a juggernaut, the more difficult to stop the longer it rolls on. We do not oppose defense in principle. We are in favor of carefully bounded research in this area, as in many others; we are also concerned that the line between research and early deployment of key Star Wars components not be blurred. Several of us have devoted considerable effort to research on missile defense. Some of us have advocated missile defense for individual missile silos. But we agree with Department of Defense experts who make it clear that cities cannot be so protected. Mr. Schlesinger has said "in our lifetime and that of our children, cities will be protected by forebearance of those on the other side, or through effective deterrence." Hans A. Bethe Richard L. Garwin Kurt Gottfried Henry W. Kendall Carl Sagan Victor Weisskopf Cornell University Ithaca, New York
The neocons spelled out how they want to militarize space in "Rebuilding America's Defenses." You can find it on the Internet. Kinda grim reading: preemptively attack Iraq, Iran, Syria, North Korea, put bases throughout SE Asia around China, and militarize space. And we liberals are accused of spending?
We're already charring the earth with weapons and pollution. Might as well scorch the sky while we're at it.
Lil; We already have total military superiority. The PRC might not be able to blow us up 5000 times but we have the ability to blow them up 5000 times. Your argument makes no sense. You are saying the PRC is more of a threat than the Cold War USSR because unlike the USSR the can't blow us up back if it there is a war. bammaslammer; You're bazooka isn't going to do you any good if someone sneaks into your house while you're asleep and stabs you with a kitchen knife. In fact you're bazooka isn't much a deterrent for street crime because it takes a long time to load and isn't very accurate. Unless a robber is going to attack your house by ramming it with a hummer your bazooka isn't going to do much. Your bazooka analogy though is a good analogy for trying to fight the last war. The effort to weaponize space is fighting the last cold war when the threats we now face using space weapons against them is about as effective as using a bazooka to deal with a cat burgler. As I said earlier I have nothing philosophically against the ABM or space weapons but think its a waste of time and resources when there are much more pressing security issues.
heya sishir, i agree with many of your philosophical and sociopolitical observations. however, on this we simply disagree. i do urge you to take a look more closely at the purported aims of the space programs before you dismiss them. Military Space Programs http://www.fas.org/spp/index.html Missile Defense / Star Wars Programs http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/program/index.html Global Nuclear Forces Guide http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/index.html If properly implemented, it can protect Americans from three major threats: Rogue states (N Korea, etc.), China, and accidental/hijacked missile launches. We spent 100b on preventing future planes crashing into buildings. I personally believe that ballistic missiles pose a far more imminent threat to Americans.
Lil, You've shown your true color. So, stop pretending to be a peace loving sister when you talk about Taiwan, OK? You use "we" a lot. Sounds like a true Amercian patriot. However, do you know America's one-China policy? Do you think provoking conflict between the U.S. and China is in the interest of America? Are you going to feel proud in the U.S. with your yellow face after China is destroyed 5000 times? After China is destroyed 5000 times, don't you think the air quality in Taiwan will drop a little bit?
That's why you have an arsenal of weapons. The analogy is still accurate. We have to defend our comms and GPS satellites because without them, we will not be able to wage the sort of war we would like to. You talk about an outdated Cold War mentality....MAD is one of those concepts from that bygone era. We need to be able to defend ourselves from it because there are some who would not exercise restraint in using them. Better safe than sorry.
You are right. That should be priority #1. I'm quaking in my boots worried about all the danger from other countries that our satellites are facing right now. Why countries are just lining up to take a shot at those sitting duck satellites. Why oh why are we wasting our effort on fighting terror?
If we don't worry about those satellites we can: -kiss those GPS guided precision goodbye, along with navigation for both civilian and military applications. -kiss our secure comms bye-bye. Yeah, we don't have anything to worry about....sure, right.
That's very questionable whether that type of threat is imminent because that is the most easily deterrable. The PRC aren't suicidal and know that any attempt to attack the US using a missile will result in immediate destruction. Further the PRC knows that they don't even have the ability to launch a counter attack on a US nuke strike. This isn't even MAD because there is now way that the PRC or anyone short of Russia can hope to mutually destroy the US. North Korea is a trickier situation but the same math applies to them. They might build a missile that could strike LA but they will be destroyed immediately too. It is an open question whether they are suicidal but odds are they are not as they haven't launched an invasion of South Korea yet. They want nukes and missiles because they are paranoid not because they have a serious desire to attack us. As far as terrorists they've already seen they can seriously damage the US more effectively and cost efficiently through covert action. If you're Al Qaeda why waste money trying to build or buy an expensive missile system that's technology and size will be impossible to hide in a cave in Afghanistan when for around $200K you've already proven you can deliver a devestating blow to the US? Anyway all of that only matters if space based weapons and ABM systems technologically can work which is still far from proven. Most test have been failures and there hasn't been a test remotely approaching realism where a missile is fired from an unknown location with an unknown target. In fact in most cases the test have been rigged so that not only do the interceptors know where, when and what trajectory the missile is on but missiles have also been rigged to be easier to be detected. There are other more fundamental problems regarding the technology behind these weapons that I won't go into because I will be here for hours describing those. Missile defense and space weapons so far are more sci-fi nerd wet dream than practical defense alternatives. Dealing with the threats we know it makes no sense to invest the billions, probably trillions, in trying to develop technology that isn't really needed and unproven. I will concede that there are two areas where that sort of technology might be needed. The first is in the case of accidental launch. In that case that will only work if the country that has the accident tells us well ahead of time where the missile was launched from, where its heading, its flight specs and what counter measures might be automatically deployed. Even there it is very doubtful we would be able to intercept it. The second threat is asteroids because the technology needed to stop incoming ICBM's would be similar to stopping incoming asteroids and we don't have to worry about asteriods deploying countermeasures. Also no need to apologize for disagreeing with me on this issue. I wouldn't come here if I expected everyone to agree with me on every issue.
There's a more practical and more cost effective solution to this. In the event of hostilities have replacement sattelites on standby prepped for immediate launch if a GPS, communication or surveillance satellite gets taken out. That was the Soviets' strategy to counter potential US anti-satellite weapons and relies on proven technology.
