Missiles of the north: if the U.S. Department of Defense decides to develop its Missile Defense Program in Alaska, billions of dollars and many jobs are headed this way

Alaska Business Monthly, April, 1999 by John Pohl

The FAS believes this persistence to develop a National Missile Defense system will help decrease national security rather than increase it, despite dubious results so far. "To go down the list," Pike said, "the Russians have made it clear that their interest in arms control would be significantly diminished if the U.S. deploys the National Missile Defense system.

"The Chinese are obviously not happy and I think it stands to reason that they would build up their forces to a level necessary to overwhelm it. The Indians view themselves as the equals of the Chinese and I don't think they would want to be left behind in that buildup process.

"Pakistan follows India, and if you've got China, Pakistan and India engaging in a significant nuclear weapons buildup, it will be hard to talk North Korea out of their program and increasingly difficult to talk Taiwan and Japan out of getting nuclear weapons."