Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ucbvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!mgnetp!ihnp4!zehntel!dual!ucbvax!faustus From: faustus@ucbvax.UUCP (Wayne Christopher) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Star Wars defense Message-ID: <1650@ucbvax.UUCP> Date: Fri, 17-Aug-84 14:20:57 EDT Article-I.D.: ucbvax.1650 Posted: Fri Aug 17 14:20:57 1984 Date-Received: Sun, 19-Aug-84 03:14:19 EDT Organization: U.C. Berkeley Lines: 39 From net.genenal: > OK, I'll bite. Why is the Star Wars defense system such a bad idea? > > For 40 years now, we've been treated to a balance of terror, an arms race > that doesn't stop, where the core concept is best understood by its acronym: > MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). > > Suddenly, it becomes well within the realm of technology to do just what > all the peace-loving people want: to make nuclear weapons obsolete, without > replacing them with even WORSE destructive weapons. Instead of us saying to > our opponents "If you destroy us, we'll make sure YOU don't survive, either" > we simply being able to say "Your nuclear attack won't work." Let's put it this way. Say a race for space weapons begins (the sort that knock out ICBM's). If we could guarantee that there would be no time when one power could be immune from attack from the other without the other having the same immunity, that would be fine. Otherwise we will eventually arive at a very dangerous position -- we can bomb the Russians with complete immunity from their bombs. Think of what someone like Reagan would do in a situation like this. You can be sure that he wouldn't let such a wonderful opportunity pass by, never mind things like the loss of innocent life, fallout (which would not be restricted to the USSR either), and so forth. And I'm sure that the Soviet leaders would think in exactly the same way. More problems -- these satellites are not only restricted to the destruction of ICBM's, they are also designed to knock out other satellites. So we have yet another non-global warfare alternative for escalation of a conventional conflict. If the Russians have this capability, you can be sure that if a conventional war starts, the first thing they are going to do is knock out all of our communications satellites, making us virtually blind and deaf (whereas they are much less vulnerable to satellite war than we are). This can only lead to further escalation. Wayne