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From: medin@lll-crg.ARpA (Milo Medin)
Newsgroups: net.space,net.politics
Subject: Re: Aviation Week on Star Wars
Message-ID: <1149@lll-crg.ARpA>
Date: Sun, 22-Dec-85 20:27:06 EST
Article-I.D.: lll-crg.1149
Posted: Sun Dec 22 20:27:06 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 25-Dec-85 02:37:38 EST
References: <1289@ames.UUCP> <772@petrus.UUCP>
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Organization: Lawrence Livermore Labs, CRG, Livermore Ca
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Xref: watmath net.space:5020 net.politics:12670

First off, if you speak with people who work in the SDIO, they
make no claims other than that this system is being built to
protect our military assets primarily, and damage limitation
to the population on a secondary basis.  The hype that some people
(not the SDIO) are using to sell the system as a total inpenetrable
defense is misleading.  

With regards to having 10-20 million dead, contrast that to 150
million dead.  That is a big difference.  At a recent SDI
debate at Stanford, a story was told about a recent picnic between
US and Soviet arms negotiators in which the weather got
worse all of a sudden, and people started to take cover under some
nearby trees.  The rain started getting harder, and leaking through
the trees.  At this point one of the Soviet negotiators said,
"You see, just like your SDI, it leaks!".  At which point one
of the US state dept. people pointed outside at the torrential
rains and retorted, "Ah, but would you rather be out there?"
To me, that exemplifies the case for damage limitation.
I agree the emphasis should be placed on not waging a war in
the first place, but what happens if deterrance fails?

I also brought up a point about building and deploying a conventially
built ABM system immediately to defend ICBM sites.  Such a system
that would get 80% of the incoming warheads would not have to
be space based and would not necessarily have to be all that
expensive.  The guy from the SDIO didn't like that idea
because it wouldn't be able to counter Soviet countermeasures
that could be used in the next 10 yrs.  The other guy (Dick Garwin)
said it'd be easy to build a system like that one, but there
isn't any need for it because our ICBM's aren't vulnerable.
So I guess my position falls in the middle for a change.  I think
the reply about countermeasures is extremely shortsighted
since a system like that wouldn't have to be space based and
could be quite robust.  Even a 50% kill rate would greatly
complicate the Soviet's targeting plans, and such a system
could still be built without violating the ABM treaty.  And
it certainly wouldn't be destabilizing, since a retaliatory
strike by the Soviets wouldn't be directed at empty ICBM silos
which cant be reloaded, but at cities typically far away from
the ICBM silos.

Phil, as for the case about MIRV's, I'm not terribly happy about having
MIRV's around either, but they are here and no amount of wishing
can wish them away.

It's been awhile since I contributed to this net, but I thought
I'd jump now that I had a little spare time.  

				Milo Medin
				medin@ames.ARPA
				...{lll-crg,seismo,riacs}!nike!medin