The Missile Defense Debate

Abstract

Well before 2000 election, George W. Bush and his inner cir cle were clear on a few things, one of which was missile defense. If they won, it would become centerpiece of national security policy, even if all or most of world's other major capitals see national missile defense (nmd), especially U.S. approach to it, as irrelevant or un responsive to plausible threats and a potential danger to global security. There are various ways of looking at missile defense. Dispassionate advocates argue that it might actually have some deterrent value at some future moment against some violence-prone regime or possibly offer some protection against an accidental launch. And in any case, just deploying a missile defense could raise society's comfort level? its confidence that government was doing all that it could to pre vent irrational actors of world from doing what has been called the unthinkable. Less candid proponents favor a system with declared purpose of managing a threat from rogues of world but envisage it as first step toward a system really designed to neutralize China's modest strategic arsenal or expanded Chinese arsenal they expect to see. Other, even more strenuous advocates favor a thick multi-layered system?combining land-, sea-, and space-based components?that would neutralize Russia's forces, along with China's. Many, probably most, opponents regard missile defense as capable of contributing nothing but trouble. They see it as threatening deterrence and arms control structure, starting with Anti-Ballistic Missile (abm) Treaty; as inevitably creating major difficulties with America's