10nfl1-Nukes-Cover
BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSE DOES NOTWORK IT IS NO PROTECTION
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| BALLISTIC MISSILE DEFENSE DOES NOTWORK IT IS NO PROTECTION AGAINST A FIRST-STRIKE Timothy Bradley, Univ. of IL Urbana, Mar. ΚΌ06, Why a ballistic missile defense program is the wrong path to US national security Defense & Security Analysis, p. 95-96 The simplest reason to abort the ballistic missile defense program is that it is not technically feasible. One reason to believe that the program is not going well is that the past two tests December 2004 and February 2005) were complete failures, with the interceptor failing to launch' What makes this more disappointing is that, when the program started. President Bush made a promise that it would be finished and operational by the end of 2004. A likely verdict is that this was apolitical ploy to bolster popularity before the presidential election in November 2004. In this case, politics got in the way of commonsense. The current state of the program is ailing, with a former Pentagon chief of testing, Philip Coyle, stating "Of course we don't have any capability to do that stop a ballistic missile attack. For the president to sort of dare them to fire missiles is really misleading and even reckless. The fact that current tests have been unsuccessful in specifically controlled environments does not foster hope for the program to succeed in an unpredictable military engagement. The type of engagement that the program would be facing is another issue. Currently, North Korea does not appear to have long-range ballistic missile ability, though it could in the next 10-15 years. In that case, even if the missile defense program were operational, it would stand no chance of interception. Any nuclear ballistic missile attack on the US from forces such as North Korea, China or, possibly, Russia would consist of massive strikes, containing numerous missiles. Even an operational system would not be able to stop all of these projectiles, and only a few missiles need to hit their targets to cause major damage to the US's infrastructure. Some argue that it is better to have some sort of system, even if it is not necessarily guaranteed to work. This argument simply does not hold water. We are dealing with many thermonuclear warheads being launched at dense US populations if ten missiles are fired from North Korea, and seven are intercepted and destroyed, that still leaves the possibility of cities such as Los Angeles, Portland, and Seattle all being destroyed completely. The fact is, the chance of hitting even seven out often incoming missiles is extremely rare. 10NFL1-Nuclear Weapons Page 114 of 199 www.victorybriefs.com Download 1.23 Mb. Share with your friends:
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