OK, this question has nothing to do with whether or not you think it works. My question has to do with the reaction of other counties. Why are they so pissed off about it? Countries like China says we’re being aggressive. AGGRESSIVE? Uhm, excuse me, pointing missiles at them is aggressive, building up troops to fight them is aggressive. Attacking them is aggressive. How is building up our own defense (again, regardless of whether it works or not) aggressive? And what about the other countries that are against this? Why do they care?
Besides violation of certain strategic defense treaties, the thing boils down to MAD or Muatual Assured Destruction. The world had a certain balance to it. If we bomb them, they bomb us and we are both screwed. You can’t win a nuclear war.
If “star wars” works, however, we might be able to bomb them past the stone age without fear of reprisals. Given the US’s somewhat deserved tendency for imperialism, this understandably makes a few nations nervous.
It would give us a HUGE advantage on the world stage. “You don’t like it? Well what ya gonna do about it, Ivan? How about you Chang? You want a piece of me?” We could conceivably take over ANY country just by giving them an ultimatum. Obey us or die.
-Beeblebrox
“If there’s anything more important than my ego around, I want it caught and shot now.”
They care because they can get people here to oppose it. This gives us an advantage very simple. Now saying that we are being the aggressor is a crock of $#!+. They just don’t like what we are doing, I say screw them - it’s our country and we will defend it in whatever way we see fit.
Also Re: the treaty
1: is was made with the former Soviet Union not Russia not China.
2: It was made between enemys - Russia is not our enemy.
3: Opal had nothing to do with this treaty but lets all say hi.
I want to point out that the former administration gave away technology to China that most likely boosted their balistic missle program 20 years - we need something to command the lead again.
The people in other countries find it distasteful that one of their neighbors should seek to develop the ability to nuke them with utter impunity.
The method by which the administration is going about it is also raising hackles worldwide. Not only is the administration expecting other nations to sign on to what the president calls “vague notions” about missile defense, but it seems to expect world leaders to happily exchange hard fought nonproliferation measures with nothing more formal than a nod and a wink between friends.
-Sure k2dave has a point when he brings up Reagans sale of advanced computer technology to China in the eighties, other countries have gotten more sophisticated since Nixon, but that’s hardly evidence of the sort of “missile gap” that would require us to respond by igniting a new arms race.
Yeah, I was thinking that it does sound like the other countries are jealous. And as for China’s government, who cares what they think?!
Mutually assured destruction is a proven deterrent and way to keep the peace. After all, we haven’t been involved in a nuclear war, right?
Also, I’ve got this stone in my shoe that keeps away tigers. It’s a proven deterrent. After all, I haven’t been mauled by a tiger, have I?
We have offered to share the technology with Russia, successor state to the Soviet Union in the ABM treaty. This may well wend its way to another forum, but for the moment we’ll forge ahead here.
As others have hinted, the ABM treaty was a product of MAD, which was viable when there were only a few nuke-capable countries with ICBMs. That situation is changing and various rogue states are actively pursuing acquisition of the requisite technology to lob one over here, or there, or wherever.
Previous thought was along the lines described above; i.e., that it would allow us to launch an attack without fear of retribution. That worked when there were only two players in the game, both having a lot to lose.
It is not truly hard to imagine a scenario wherein some Sadaam like fellow might be enticed to take out Miami knowing full well that we could make a wasteland out of 80% of Iraq, but he’d still be in control when it was over and it won’t hurt the oil.
The greatest threat may not be the Iraqs and Irans of the world (although they certainly merit attention). China is fast high grading their strategic military capabilities, and to the Chinese leadership, people are cheap.
Improving defence would also give other countries incentive to develop more capable missiles. Which can then be used against other countries besides the US. Didn’t Putin say that Russia will develop multiple warhead missiles (also banned by the current treaty) if the US goes ahead with the missile defence? You can understand how Europe would feel about that.
beatle again mentions the Chinese, which highlights yet another reason why other perceive the US moves as a threat. While official pronouncements of the administration have so far been that the prospective NMD will not be capable of functioning at a level to neutralize Russian or Chinese nuclear capabilities the scuttlebutt all seems to suggest that the presidents long term goal is to create a barrier that is impenetrable to any and all types of attack. Just today for instance, the pentagon let the public know that it intends to renew tests on the star wars space-based “brilliant pebble” system. That’s not the sort of system we need to protect ourselves against Rambo style attacks from rogue nations, and the rest of the world knows it.
By treating Russia lightly at a time when it is relatively weak, we also degrade our ability to negotiate future treaties with that country should it, or a successor state, ever again become a serious threat to US security. Of course if we give them the precedent of backing out of ABM, what could possibly stop a resurgent Soviet Union (or similar) from legally backing out of the space treaty and flying unstoppable nuclear weapons platforms over everyone’s heads ?
Nations fear those who they perceive as a threat. Nations perceive any other nation with better strategic capabilities as a threat. “Star Wars” makes gives the US a large strategic advantage.
We have covered MAD. Joel needs somebody to explain the specific treaties involved. That is what this forum is for.
We should move the political discussion to GD. Unfortunately, I’m too lazy to start it right now. For this thread, all we need is an educated explanation of the treaties.
Before we move the thread, though (ain’t I a hypocritical Bastard?)
Joel?!
What?!
They are are a huge trading partner. We make a whole lot of money off of them. If we didn’t, there is no way in Hell that they would have the most favored nation status that they do now. Free trade (not a discussion of NAFTA) is what made us the richest nation on the planet.
Not to mention that they have ICBMs and the largest military on the planet.
“makes gives”? What am I, Drunk?..
Oh,… yeah
-Beeblebrox
“Walk softly and carry a big stick”
-Theodore
(so, it’s not Douglas Addams, but I thought it fit)
I started a GD thread on this topic. Man, I gotta get a life!
From scr4:
An incentive they didn’t have already? It’s us pushing them into it, right? They wouldn’t even think about high grading their offensive military capabilities if we’d just park the cars and go home. All of those regional conflicts would just go away? No Azerbajiani would ever consider lobbing weapons of mass destruction at Khazakistan without our wicked influence?
From Squink:
I should hope that is the long term goal. The short term goal is to be able to defend against the lone horrific weapon launched from a vagabond state. That is the near term threat.
Let me reiterate that we have offered to share the technology with Russia and, I suspect - since they are a major player whose role will only increase in the next few decades - we’ll share the technology with the Chinese whenever they discover people.
We have also stated over and over that this system is being set up to stop missiles from rogue states, not neutralize the nuclear arsenals of major powers. Our insistence that our goals are limited in the face of evidence to the contrary makes other nations nervous
The question here is why other nations are nonplussed by “son of star-wars”, not whether it’d be the coolest thing since sliced bread.
Some people think the missile defence would give them more of an incentive, tipping the balance. I don’t want to debate if that is true, I’m saying it is a common argument against the missile defence.
I will try a non-partisan answer here.
Many countries, including China and Russia, see NMD as a destabiliser. In theory it could give the US an advantage in any nuclear war, since the US would be able to strike without fear of effective retaliation. The whole concept of Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) relies on the balance between opponents; nobody strikes first because the retaliation would be just as devastating.
Other countries, notably in western Europe, have mixed feelings. While they nominally trust the US not to misuse such a defense, they also worry that it could damage relations with countries such as China and Russia. Many Europeans don’t want to be caught in diplomatic rows or hot wars.
As to why the US should even care what anyone else thinks, that’s an easy question. The US does not exist in a political vacuum, isolated from the rest of the world. Decisions made outside the US can and do affect American citizens, whether people like it or not. If the US was to trample on the concerns of other states it runs the risk of other countries restricting trade, refusing to sign or honour treaties, or in extreme cases a greater risk of terrorism.
I know this is a flawed analogy, but bear with me: you may have the right to arm yourself to protect your home in any way you see fit, and your neighbours can go whistle. But if you do, you may find your neighbours will no longer lend you their stuff, help out with the babysitting or involve you in their little social gatherings.
(Okay. That was an appalling analogy. Stick to the paragraphs above it.)
Given how well Mir worked, this fails to fill me with some sense of dread. Well, actually it should fill the entire world with a sense of dread since you never know when one of those babies is going to slip out of orbit and crash into a random location on Earth.
Actually, I asked a question once somewhat related to this but it was never answered. In the event of war with a space capable nation, what would really stop us from being able to take out their space guns before they take out our space guns? Granted, we don’t have any space guns yet, but if we (and they) did. But I’m guessing that the process of getting a ballistic missile to fire from space could be detected same as it can be detected on Earth. It doesn’t give us any real advantage but puts us back at stage one like MAD does. (For the record, the original question was what would stop us from just ramming Chinese satellites with the space shuttle, perhaps not literally, in the event of a war with China to take out some of their abilities that they couldn’t mess with on our end).