Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site ames.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!houxm!vax135!cornell!uw-beaver!tektronix!hplabs!ames!barry
From: barry@ames.UUCP (Ken Barry)
Newsgroups: net.followup,net.politics
Subject: Re: Star Wars Defense
Message-ID: <500@ames.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 30-Aug-84 19:27:52 EDT
Article-I.D.: ames.500
Posted: Thu Aug 30 19:27:52 1984
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Sep-84 13:34:08 EDT
References: <150@oliveb.UUCP>
Organization: NASA-Ames Research Center, Mtn. View, CA
Lines: 97

[]
	Let me begin by thanking Jerry Aguirre for one of the most reasonable
postings questioning the "Star Wars" idea that I've seen; serious questions
are better than reflex responses based on political ideology. I am certainly
not competent to answer all his questions, but I'll attempt to do what
I can.

> What I would like is for someone who is proposing the "Star Wars" plan
> to answer the question of how we defend a space based weapons system.
> Before Star Wars there was a lot of news about the development of
> killer satellites and other weapons capable of destroying satellites.
> At that point the worry was over loosing our surveillance and
> communications but the same vulnerability would seem to apply to space
> based weapons systems.  I think the question about what happens when
> the other side puts a hundred pounds of gravel in the reverse orbit
> ought to be answered also.

	I think we have to take a long view; we will certainly not have
a large-scale, space-based ICBM defense for some decades, yet. All that
has been proposed so far is to spend money to determine feasibility.
The questions you raise are ones which will need to be answered by these
feasibility studies. For now, I can only suggest that we are likely to
have a much larger presence in space, generally, by the turn of the century,
and we will have to think about defending our spy satellites, communications
satellites, and space-based industries by then, even if we do not choose
to build a space-based ICBM defense.

> About the only way I can see to counter this kind of threat is to put
> up thousands of small individual systems along with thousands more decoy
> systems.  But none of the proposed systems seem to be along this line.

	Actually, General Daniel Graham's "High Frontier" concept is
precisely along these lines. He suggests an armada of ~440 low-cost ICBM
killers using the low-tech "throw-gravel-at-'em" approach instead of
the high-tech beam weapons.

> If we put up a billion dollar weapons system and they knock it down
> with a million dollar weapons system then I think we lost out on the
> deal.

	I agree. This is all part of the feasibility question, and the
feasibility of space-based ICBM defense has not yet been demonstrated.

> This brings me to another related question.  Suppose we build
> this weapons system and someone knocks it down (or for those who
> believe it can't be knocked down, suppose they try).  Is that grounds
> for war?  Do we open a whole new area for "incidents" like we had with
> the U2 reconnaisance flights.

	If someone makes a massive attack on our space-based defenses,
be it successful or no, there are two obvious responses: first, full
nuclear alert. One of the advantages of space-based defense is exactly
this; we get more than 10-30 minutes warning of a nuclear strike BECAUSE
they'll attack our space-based defenses and warning systems first. The
other obvious response is to attack THEIR space-based defenses (we can
assume that, if they take our defense seriously enough to attack it,
they would want to have a similar system, themselves). One possible outcome
of such a preliminary "space war" (which would involve little or no direct
danger to humans) is that one side would be left in a losing position
where further action (i.e. atomic attacks on the other country) would
be suicidal (their defense survived, yours didn't). In this scenario,
an atomic war which would otherwise have occurred has been avoided.

> If that isn't enough for discussion what if happens someone launches a
> strike against us and we knock out all the incoming weapons?   Do we
> still launch a counter strike?

	See above. Instead of a choice between only two unacceptable
alternatives (surrender or massive retaliation), we would have many options.
We could demand their verified destruction of their atomic arsenal, under
threat of doing it for them with selected strikes against military targets.
We could do nothing immediate, proving our peaceful nature to the world
at large, but still having all our missiles safely in their silos, while
they would require much time to replace their spent offensive capability.
Though I doubt they'd bother, since we would have just proved that capability
worthless. Or we could use our new military dominance to make them pull
in their horns, generally. If we assume the attacker to be the Soviets,
for instance, we would have the clout to demand their withdrawal from
Afghanistan, to make them give greater autonomy to their Eastern European
client states, etc.
	Let me close by pointing out that this is not intended as a thorough
defense of the space-based defense concept, but just an attempt to partly
answer the questions raised by Jerry Aguirre. There are other serious
questions that have been raised, and while I am attracted by the idea
of an effective defense against atomic attack, I am far from convinced
of its feasibility, myself. But I do think it's worth spending some serious
money to try to discover if "Star Wars" can offer us an alternative to
the present nuclear nightmare.

        [The opinions expressed herein are my own foolishness, and do not
necessarily reflect the views of anyone that matters.]

-  From the Crow's Nest  -                      Kenn Barry
                                                NASA-Ames Research Center
                                                Moffett Field, CA
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
        Electric Avenue:              {dual,hao,menlo70,hplabs}!ames!barry