Missile defense: the Administration's defense of the ABM treaty is threatening the defense of the country - anti-ballistic missile

National Review, Sept 25, 1995 by Duncan L. Hunter

The Administration's defense of the ABM treaty is threatening the defense of the country.

Rep. Hunter, a Republican from the 52nd District of California, is chairman of the House National Security Committee on Military Procurement and co-chairman of the House Missile Defense Caucus.

IN the 1920s, budget cutting and a misunderstanding of new technology combined to cripple the development of military aircraft. Experts argued for the continued invincibility of the battleship. Air-power enthusiast Brig. Gen. William "Billy" Mitchell, in tests conducted between 1921 and 1923, proved them wrong by sinking four battleships, including the German Ostfriesland, which was considered "unsinkable" after surviving heavy shell hits without serious damage at the Battle of Jutland. Yet critics went to great lengths to explain away the tests. Mitchell was even court-martialed in 1925 for protesting too loudly in public about the country's lack of military preparedness. Only when Pearl Harbor was attacked 16 years later (as Mitchell had predicted) did Mitchell's reputation change from that of an eccentric to that of a prophet.

The Aircraft Age has now been succeeded by the Missile Age, and the 1990s debate on missile defense is eerily similar to the debate of Mitchell's day. As in the 1920s, critics of the new technology have tried to discredit evidence of its potential -- most notably, the performance of the Patriot missiles during the Gulf War. The Patriots certainly left much to be desired. However, they were new systems, with only a limited design potential for anti-missile purposes, and even so, they blunted the enemy's attack and did wonders for allied morale. And the technology can be expected to advance. The Patriots are as primitive compared to what is being developed in the Strategic Defense Initia-tive (SDI) as Mitchell's fabric biplanes were to the warplanes that have come since.

SDI, launched by President Reagan in 1983 to protect the U.S. from nuclear-missile attack, was an integral part of the strategy that won the Cold War. Because we are living in the Missile Age, its importance has outlasted that conflict. President Bush recognized this and proposed GPALS (Global Protection Against Limited Strikes) to protect the U.S. homeland, American troops overseas, and supporting allied assets. The system was to incorporate land-based interceptors to defend both distant military theaters and the continental United States. However, the first line of strategic defense was to be composed of one thousand space-based interceptors known as Brilliant Pebbles.

The Clinton Administration promptly scrapped GPALS and all other space-based projects. Both strategic and theater missile-defense programs were cut substantially. National missile-defense efforts are currently limited, in the words of the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, to "achieving and maintaining technical readiness . . . to provide the ability to rapidly (within 2 to 4 years) develop and deploy ABM Treaty - compliant ballistic missile defenses . . . given adequate funding." President Clinton's policy, in other words, is to wait until an unambiguous threat materializes before launching a program requiring several years to counter it, and then only within the bounds of an arms-control agreement negotiated over twenty years ago.

Critics of strategic defense argue that the demise of the Soviet Union makes it unnecessary. But hundreds of Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles deployed by the governments of the former USSR are still operational, as are hundreds more submarine-launched missiles. The future of Russia and other former Soviet republics is unclear. Even if stated nuclear-reduction goals are reached, Russia will still possess some 3,500 nuclear warheads in the year 2003.

China poses similar questions for Asia. While China currently has only about a dozen ICBMs, it is building more. New designs include multiple warheads and mobile systems. In addition, China has 70 to 100 intermediate-range missiles and two submarines with 12 missiles each. Cruise missiles are under development. Peking is also exporting technology to Iran and Pakistan.

Some two dozen other countries are working on "weapons of mass destruction" (nuclear, chemical, and/or biological weapons) and over a dozen are developing ballistic missiles to deliver these weapons. The list of missile-armed states includes militant regimes like Iran, North Korea, Syria, and Libya, all of which could acquire usable nuclear weapons by the year 2000. The list also includes such would-be regional hegemons as Brazil and India. In response to the latter, Pakistan is developing its own missiles. Iraq is still trying to protect the core of its programs.

Missiles are cheaper to purchase and operate than modern combat aircraft. And, unlike conventional bombing attacks, missile strikes cannot be intercepted by fighters or standard anti-aircraft weapons. They can overcome the air supremacy that has been enjoyed by the U.S. in every conflict since World War II. Absent an effective defense, even crude weapons can thus be very useful.