Missile Defense — What’s The Rush?

from JoeUser Forums

Missile Defense Agency, since Rumsfeld took over has spent billions[ $7.8 billion] on land based star wars for continual testing, none of which has proved operational. Another $7 billion was appropriated for fiscal 2006. In 2004 MDA ran $370,000 over budget, despite the dire needs in Afghanistan and Iraq. The worst part of this is that there are no guidelines to spending, such as “prove weapons are operational and then buy.”

Now, I am not one to fault the Defense Department to try to make new technology work, but in light of the immediate needs of war and no particular threat lurking from future superpowers, it seems to me — and it’s not that we don’t already have strategic missiles — that MDA should put “star wars” on the back burner and pursue it logically and thriftily until new technology and software can be perfected before costly testing. In the meantime, support our troops in battle with the best equipment available. After all, it is not like the Manhattan Project whereby we were in a race to outpace Germany’s rush for the atomic bomb.

politics
11,102 views 35 replies
Reply #1 from JoeUser Forums Top
you have a terrific point, we need to curb spending NOW! and this would be a good place to start.
Reply #2 from JoeUser Forums Top
It's the administration brain trust sensing a "gap", to use the old Dr. Strangelove vernacular.

There's a perceived lack of defense from missiles thrown at us by some hypothetical threat. Whether it's North Korea, whose missiles couldn't hit the broad side of a barn from the INSIDE or China, whose missiles are exactly like ours because they've been stealing our technology out from under our noses.

Oh, don't forget the former Soviet republics.

Whether the perceived threat is real or imagined, this is where the administration gets the bright idea that we can shoot down missiles after they've already been fired at us.
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Reply #3 from JoeUser Forums Top
because star wars isn't, and really has never been about missile defense. Missile defense has been the excuse for the R&D for a whole new generation of laser weapons, most probably to be used to disable satillites.

See, I can be all jaded too...
Reply #4 from JoeUser Forums Top

It's the administration brain trust sensing a "gap",
Something like the intelligence gap.

See, I can be all jaded too...
WOW! Yes, there would be an awful lot of Direct TV subscribers pissed off, too.
you have a terrific point, we need to curb spending NOW! and this would be a good place to start
Yeah, especially when in five years DOD is planning to spend $60 billion and estimates down the road could be one trillion!

Reply #5 from JoeUser Forums Top
i remember reading an article about bush announcing his intention to immediately revive sdi and wondering--considering how easily we could be attacked with nuclear or biological weapons without one missle ever being launched--just how far up his ass his head had to be.

i was still mentally shaking my head about 2 hours later when i heard (i cant see the tv from here) the early morning news anchor announce that a small plane seemed to have accidentally collided with one of the world trade center towers.
Reply #6 from JoeUser Forums Top
Missile defense has been the excuse for the R&D for a whole new generation of laser weapons, most probably to be used to disable satillites.


there must be some sorta ratio between the amount of time it takes the us to develop working lasar weapons and the number of years required to sucessfully train iraqi military units?
Reply #7 from JoeUser Forums Top
Doesn't anyone here remember ABMs? From the days before ICBM MIRVs? They were limited by treaty to one location in the USSR and here. (Grand Forks, N.D.) with a limited number of interceptor missiles. We pretty much ignored ours after Multiple warheads became the standard but the Russians kept theirs up for a number of years.
MAD was still a guarantee due to the numbers of missiles vice the number of counter missiles. So that was definitely a case of keeping up with the Jones' (Or Ivans as it were)
I am sure Tracey and the Tin Foil Hat brigade would tell us that SDI is to prepare for the invasion from planet Gulbar or some such place.
Way to stay on topic KB.
Reply #8 from JoeUser Forums Top
Way to stay on topic KB.


over 20 years of development and we've yet to come anywhere close to hitting a target we ourselves launched. sorry, but there's a definite parallel to the amount of time required to train an effective standalone iraqi fighting force.

both endeavors involve a hole in space into which we seem compelled to toss enormous amounts of cash and effort in return for little if anything of value.
Reply #9 from JoeUser Forums Top
over 20 years of development and we've yet to come anywhere close to hitting a target we ourselves launched.


Are you "absolutely" sure of this? If it does work, do you honestly think they're going to tell everyone? Does the military tell us every time they come up with a "new" secret weapon? Nope, don't think so.
Reply #10 from JoeUser Forums Top
That's not true, Kingbee. The results have been less than stellar, but there have been successful tests.
Reply #11 from JoeUser Forums Top

Here's a scenario:

North Korea makes a deal with Venezuala's Hugo Chavez -- oil in exchange for a handful of medium range nuclear missiles.

What do you think the US response to that SHOULD be?

a) Ignore it.

b) Invade Venezuala

c) Have some sort of missile defense system

d) Other (please specify)

 

Reply #12 from JoeUser Forums Top

Brad just gave you the sceneario.  The Rush?

You want your kids or grandkids to fry?

Extra Krispy with honey bee sause?

Reply #13 from JoeUser Forums Top
The results have been less than stellar, but there have been successful tests.


if you can point me to any post-2001 results in which the test scenario wasn't so contrived as to guarantee some sort of success claim and in which the claim was based solely on actually intercepting and destroying targets, i'd be very happy to check it out. prior to 2001, there is nothing which meets those standards.

i'll concede the tests do one thing successfully...coolest outdoor lightshow i've ever seen.,
Reply #14 from JoeUser Forums Top
a) Ignore it.
b) Invade Venezuala
c) Have some sort of missile defense system
d) Other (please specify)


a and c are essentially the same thing at this point.

as for d, why not use the 'web off the west coast with duct tape' plan already proposed for attacks by north korean icbms?

if there was no other choice but invasion, it would sure say volumes about the consequences of cutting off your nose to spite your face. perhaps instead of developing preemptive nuclear attack strategies (or any nuclear strategy other than non-proliferation), we coulda focused on minimizing the chances north korea--or iran--had anything to give chavez?
Reply #15 from JoeUser Forums Top
First ship to shoot down a multi-stage missile

I'm looking for the laser test I saw results of once. The link is a missile-to-missile test, but it was successful nonetheless. The whole intitiative Canada opted out of was for a missile based system if I am not mistaken.

People keep acting like "Star Wars" was some big failed experiment, but in reality it never got underway. It wasn't that the technology failed, it was just never supported enough to be undertaken at a credible level.
Reply #16 from JoeUser Forums Top
"f you can point me to any post-2001 results in which the test scenario wasn't so contrived as to guarantee some sort of success claim and in which the claim was based solely on actually intercepting and destroying targets, i'd be very happy to check it out. prior to 2001, there is nothing which meets those standards. "

Kingbee:

Here's a link to an article on the White Sands tests. Here's another reference to the project. If they are exaggerating, etc., feel free to point out where. According to that article there is expected to be a battlefield version by 2010, and it is capable of knocking out katusha rockets right now.

It says in the last 8 years they have spent 300 million on it. You'll have to admit that is akin to what they pay for existing systems, much less building one from R&D to working reality.

P.S. The present battlefield laser system tests are an extension of a Clinton thang.

Reply #17 from JoeUser Forums Top
a) Ignore it.
b) Invade Venezuala
c) Have some sort of missile defense system
d) Other (please specify)
a.We can't go on thinking that every dissident country is ready to jump our ass. b.No more invasions, please. c. Slowly, surely, but less expensively. d. New diplomacy.
Reply #18 from JoeUser Forums Top
"We can't go on thinking that every dissident country is ready to jump our ass."


I wonder how many people looking at a map of the world in 1941, would have imagined that that teeny island nation, already locked in an unwinnable war with an entire sub-continent, would insanely attack yet another nation of great power and resources.

We're beyond that now, granted. If we wanted we could have Venezuala flattened and paved in a matter of months and they'd not be able to do shit about it, frankly. The fact is, though, we'll ALSO never be able to win a war in that way every again since we are constantly in desperate need of world approval. So we should ignore threats from these nations?

The problem with that is Chavez wouldn't attack us in a conventional way. He'd supply weapons for individuals to do it, or try and do it economically, or maybe there might be a wild possibility of an "axis"-like situation. He was anxious to get money into Afghanistan when he saw what happened on 9-11.

I just think if we reserve our right to defend ourself only when there is a possibility of the US being directly attacked and occupied, we are losing site of the fact there are a great many other ways to strike out and make war on another nation.
Reply #19 from JoeUser Forums Top
I wonder how many people looking at a map of the world in 1941, would have imagined that that teeny island nation, already locked in an unwinnable war with an entire sub-continent, would insanely attack yet another nation of great power and resources.
They miscalculated the sleeping giant. But we are and must stay vigilant, but not paranoid. Fidel never dared make an aggressive overture, why would Chavez? 
Reply #20 from JoeUser Forums Top
"They miscalculated the sleeping giant. But we are and must stay vigilant, but not paranoid. Fidel never dared make an aggressive overture, why would Chavez? "


Again, that would depend on what you call an "aggressive overture". Do I think there will be Venezualan landing craft on American beaches? Nah. I don't think there are any leaders, not even Lil Kim, who would even consider a face-to-face war at this time.

If you look at how we are drawn into the biggest wars, though, you'll see a lot of paralels. A lot of different interests are beginning to congeal around the world into a recognizable mass, and Chavez has take the intitiative to pick a side.

His interest in the nuclear aims of Middle Eastern nations who will definitely be attacked by Israel if they come to fruition... well, you can see how things might blow up into a confused mess fairly quickly. Add to that his alignment with Castro, 90 miles from the US mainland, and his ties to Columbian militant factions. Consider the amount of material that is smuggled into the US every year from nations like Columbia.

Each piece doesn't add up to much, but if there is another world conflict, he has lots of little bothersome strings to pull, and is in the position to reach out and touch us more easily than most others.
Reply #21 from JoeUser Forums Top
thanks for the link. the last test about which i was aware took place earlier in the year.

The link is a missile-to-missile test, but it was successful nonetheless. The whole intitiative Canada opted out of was for a missile based system if I am not mistaken.

People keep acting like "Star Wars" was some big failed experiment, but in reality it never got underway. It wasn't that the technology failed, it was just never supported enough to be undertaken at a credible level.


rather than quote extensively from either of these sources, i'm just gonna provide the links. this one documents the tweaked data to which i alluded. Link

if you're familiar with the playover controversy arising from war games conducted in 2002 (as i recall), you'll recognize the technigue.

* * * *

despite uncharitable allegations to the contrary, i'm notta rocket scientist. i'm also not able to find too much more detail about the november test. however, i think the article you'll find here Link--even though it's over a year old--explains why the test is really much less of a success than it appears at first glance.

without meaning to be argumentative, if $80 billion isn't 'enough support' what is?
Reply #22 from JoeUser Forums Top
According to that article there is expected to be a battlefield version by 2010, and it is capable of knocking out katusha rockets right now.


because the mthel system utilizes a chemical laser, it avoids problem of generating sufficient power. unfortunately, my understanding is the technology's not gonna be of much use against icbms or anything other than close-range battlefield missiles.

i've yet to hear of any advances in airborne or space-based lasers that would make them workable in real world situations.
Reply #23 from JoeUser Forums Top
if $80 billion isn't 'enough support' what is?


Well this is the miltary industrial complex we're talking about here KingBee. 80 billion dollars is only going to cover a few of crates of hammers and a couple of concrete pads.

Whatevers left after that will surely be swallowed in "consultancy" fees for the PR firms negotiating a secondary round of funding..... although by that time the cost of a hammer will have doubled... so they'll probably need another 100 billion.

Just as well the Administration is cutting back on all those pesky social programs like public education and healthcare isn't it? This is an Administration with clear priorities afterall.
Reply #24 from JoeUser Forums Top
Kingbee:
well, $80 billion over 20 years. It costs us $2.2 billion each all told to end up with 20 B-2s. I'm sure you remember how people reacted to spending money on them back in the early 80's.

I do think we should demand more results, and there is probably a cottage industry built up around the waste involved. I think in the long term, though, we'll end up seeing results. I'm a sucker for seeing money go to research instead of the usual pork, though. Much of what we have today can be traced back to military r&d in one form or another.
Reply #25 from JoeUser Forums Top
d) Other (please specify)


Naval blockade. Sink the ships transporting the things, if necessary.

Of course, if the deal's anything like the missiles they "sold" Saddam, there's nothing to worry about.


Fidel never dared make an aggressive overture, why would Chavez?


Fidel's more a "I like being supreme commander of my own country" pragmatist, whereas Chavez is more of a "go out in a blaze of glory" loon. I think Manuel Noriega would be a better comparison for Chavez.

I wonder if the Kennedy boys wouldn't have considered allowing Soviet missile sites "an aggressive overture?"