Tuesday, December 05, 2006
Future Threats and the Democratic Congress
Spook86 at In From The Cold has an interesting post today (well, I find them all interesting, but this one particularly so) about the mindset of Sen. Levin (D-MI) and like-thinking Dems concerning ballistic missile defense. In essence, he thinks the Dems are going to establish impossible criteria for success for the system. When these criteria are not met, Levin and his friends will then have an excuse to kill the program. If such a thing occurs, the US will have zero capability to defend against ballistic missile threats by rogue states such as North Korea, Iran and Venezuela.
This is not good.
It is especially not good in light of Russia's ongoing development of anti-missile countermeasures for its ICBMs and a new nuclear delivery system called a hypersonic glide vehicle, which is maneuverable and would presumably be difficult-to-impossible to defend against with existing anti-ballistic missile weapons.
I have no idea what Levin is thinking, but lacking anti-missile defenses would seem to force us back into the mutual assured destruction posture of the Cold War. I know of nobody who liked that strategy (with the possible exception of movie director Stanley Kubrick, who was extremely successful with Dr. Strangelove), but at the time it was that or concede. Presumably Sen. Levin and his friends have an alternative proposal that they think will provide the nation with defenses against nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. Alternatively, Sen. Levin must believe that there is no real threat from such missiles and so building defenses against them is a waste of money and resources. The latter would put Sen. Levin in the same category as San Francisco Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval, who believes that the US should not have a military, any differences being merely a matter of degree.
Anti-ballistic missile defense systems are very complex and cutting-edge, and so are long lead time items. Decisions made today will affect US defense capabilities 15-20 years in the future. If Sen. Levin's views prevail, that future will be much riskier for the Nation than might otherwise be. God save us, because Sen. Levin and his allies won't.
This is not good.
It is especially not good in light of Russia's ongoing development of anti-missile countermeasures for its ICBMs and a new nuclear delivery system called a hypersonic glide vehicle, which is maneuverable and would presumably be difficult-to-impossible to defend against with existing anti-ballistic missile weapons.
I have no idea what Levin is thinking, but lacking anti-missile defenses would seem to force us back into the mutual assured destruction posture of the Cold War. I know of nobody who liked that strategy (with the possible exception of movie director Stanley Kubrick, who was extremely successful with Dr. Strangelove), but at the time it was that or concede. Presumably Sen. Levin and his friends have an alternative proposal that they think will provide the nation with defenses against nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. Alternatively, Sen. Levin must believe that there is no real threat from such missiles and so building defenses against them is a waste of money and resources. The latter would put Sen. Levin in the same category as San Francisco Supervisor Gerardo Sandoval, who believes that the US should not have a military, any differences being merely a matter of degree.
Anti-ballistic missile defense systems are very complex and cutting-edge, and so are long lead time items. Decisions made today will affect US defense capabilities 15-20 years in the future. If Sen. Levin's views prevail, that future will be much riskier for the Nation than might otherwise be. God save us, because Sen. Levin and his allies won't.
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