National Missile Defense
Recently, President Clinton signed into law the National Missile Defense Act of 1999. What is a national missile defense (NMD)? A NMD is in theory "a technological shield that could destroy all incoming missiles" (Cirincione and Von Hippel 1). A NMD would most likely employ ground-based missiles that would intercept and destroy incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM). ICBMs are missiles that are capable of hitting targets thousands of miles away from their launch site. The National Missile Defense Act "calls for developing a missile-defense system that could protect the United States from an attack by a handful of nuclear armed ballistic missiles" (Ballistic Missile Defenses). It is important to realize the proposed NMD would not be designed to protect against an all out nuclear attack featuring hundreds of missiles. President Clinton is expected to make a decision on whether or not to deploy a NMD as early as June of 2000. Is a NMD a good thing for the !United States? I believe the United States should not develop and deploy a NMD system. The many proponents of a NMD such as President Clinton, Congress, and various military officials have devised a number of reasons why a NMD is needed. According to
Ambassador Sha Zukang, China's top arms control official, stated "the U. Nuclear weapons have been used as a deterrent from their inception. Without satisfying all three of the conditions, t!he coercive power of a rogue state would be very small. The writers of the ABM Treaty realized a NMD "would encourage the development of increasingly powerful offensive weapons to penetrate them" (Selling Russia). Deployment of a NMD would be devastating to international relations and the ramifications of such actions are endless.
Common topics in this essay:
Russia China,
ABM Treaty,
Graig George,
Chat Edwards,
Race Stability,
Program Mendolsohn,
United States-would,
Congress President,
ICBM United,
Agency Russia,
missile defense,
ballistic missile,
abm treaty,
nov 1999,
von hippel,
pag online internet,
arms control,
proposed nmd,
russia china,
deploy nmd,
1999 available,
ballistic missile defense,
nov 1999 available,
nuclear dangers 1999,
reduce nuclear dangers,
|
Acceptance Essays
