February 20, 2004 :: Tech Central Station :: Analysis
In an article entitled Missile Defense: The Dangers and Lack of Realism, George Rathjens and Carl Kaysen of the Council for a Livable World savage plans to deploy missile defenses. Although efforts to withdraw from the ABM Treaty began shortly after Bush entered office in 2001, Rathjens and Kaysen allege that the 2004 deployment is an election year ploy. They then proceed to recount the tired arguments against missile defense trotted out over the past 30 years. By comparing Bush’s 2004 “election year” deployment to that of LBJ’s similar proposal for 1968 (when LBJ was not running for reelection), they both confuse the reader and date themselves, both in the obsolescence of their arguments and their refusal to see that the doctrine of mutually assured destruction may not be as applicable today as it may have been during the Cold War, if ever. Just as they and others had argued against Reagan’s SDI program, that it shouldn’t be done unless it was 100% effective, so the same arguments are made again now. The benefit of deployment:
depends on whether any deployed defense might be essentially 100% effective. This, however, will certainly not be the case with President Bush’s announced deployment, nor do we believe it likely with any system that might evolve from it. Like it or not, nuclear deterrence is likely to be with us during the first part of this century, as it was during much of the last.
Their adamant “like it or not” refusal to consider any alternative to MAD betrays, at the very least, an ignorance to take account of changed global circumstances. The bankruptcy of the Cold War doctrine of MAD so often emphasized on missilethreat.com is very well articulated in an article responding to the CLW screed. Charlie Rainbolt at TechCentralStation.com zeroes in on their logical flaw. Even if a system is not 100% effective—no defense is—some defense is better than none. Paradoxical and sophisticated arguments for “strategic stability,” which required Americans to be vulnerable in order to be safe, are simply no longer persuasive in a world of wide proliferation and irrational actors.
(Article)» CLW attack on BMD deployment
» More stories on: Analysis, Policy
