Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site fisher.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!allegra!princeton!astrovax!fisher!david From: david@fisher.UUCP (David Rubin) Newsgroups: net.followup,net.politics Subject: Re: Star Wars Defense Plan Message-ID: <284@fisher.UUCP> Date: Wed, 22-Aug-84 08:28:00 EDT Article-I.D.: fisher.284 Posted: Wed Aug 22 08:28:00 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 23-Aug-84 00:43:10 EDT References: <966@ulysses.UUCP>, <363@vu44.UUCP> <189@ho95b.UUCP> Organization: Princeton Univ. Statistics Lines: 23 Bill Stewart suggests: " A 95% effective defense may not help much against 10,000 warheads, but against a few dozen missles it reduces the damage to "acceptable" levels. (If we're talking about total destruction of Europe, the government might be willing to risk an additional 20 or 30 million Americans)." If the purpose is to launch a "demonstration" of a few dozen missiles which might effectively be thwarted by a Star Wars defense, it would be a safe bet that a Soviet (or American, for that matter) leader would make that demonstration with SLBM's or Cruise missiles which were relatively immune to a Star Wars defense. As I pointed out in an earlier article, even an effective Star Wars is effective only against land-based ICBM's. The 95% figure that's bandied about by proponents not only assumes technological success, but also assumes that the Soviet nuclear force stays fixed in size AND composition. I'll break the news to you now: it won't. David Rubin {allegra|astrovax|princeton}!fisher!david