STAR WARS: SUICIDE OR SURVIVAL? by Lord Alun Chalfont : (Little, Brown: $16.95; 169 pp.) : STAR WARS--A DEFENSE EXPERT’S CASE AGAINST THE STRATEGIC DEFENSE INITIATIVE by Robert M. Bowman (Tarcher: $14.95, hard-cover; $7.95, paperback; 180 pp.)

“Let me share with you a vision of the future which offers hope. It is that we embark upon a program to counter the awesome Soviet missile threat with measures that are defensive. Let us turn to the very strengths in technology that spawned our great industrial base and that have given us the quality of life we enjoy today.” Thus, on March 23, 1983, President Reagan introduced his Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), which became commonly known as the “Star Wars” program.

As a military research program, SDI was formed in unorthodox fashion. According to news reports, the President’s announcement was a surprise to virtually everyone in the Department of Defense. It has been remarked that widespread prior deliberations were avoided in order to organize SDI as quickly as possible and at the highest possible funding level. That goal was met.

Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger established the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization in January, 1984. Its director, Lt. Gen. James A. Abrahamson, reports to Weinberger. SDI received $1.4 billion for fiscal 1985 (beginning in October, 1984) and $2.8 billion for fiscal 1986. If the $4.8 billion requested for fiscal 1987 is approved, SDI will become the largest program for research and development of weapons in the budget for the Department of Defense.

According to a Congressional staff paper, the total projected cost of $33 billion for the period 1985 to 1990 would make SDI the largest military research program in the department’s history. That cost is more than double the amount that, before the President’s speech, was expected to be spent on ballistic missile research during the same period.

The Strategic Defense Initiative is defined broadly as a research program to determine the technical feasibility of a comprehensive ballistic missile defense program. Specifically, the results are intended to serve as a basis for decisions regarding deployment of defense systems in the 1990s and beyond. Although not now part of its main effort, analysis of strategic issues will soon be given more support within SDI.

Since its beginning, SDI has been a controversial program. The debate is likely to become more intense during the next few months as Congress considers the budget for 1987. By far the most important long-range issues concern the strategic and political justification for greatly expanded ballistic missile defenses and the technical feasibility of the systems envisioned with the SDI program.

The debate on strategic issues initiated by the formation of SDI has been largely a renewed examination of questions discussed in the 1960s and early 1970s. In 1972, the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty was agreed upon as the leaders of the United States and Soviet Union became convinced that strategic defenses theoretically tend to upset or destabilize the strategic balance, causing a dual arms race involving both defensive and offensive systems.

Agreements reached in the 1970s therefore placed constraints simultaneously on strategic offense and defense. One of the fundamental problems for SDI is Article V of the ABM treaty, which prohibits development, testing and deployment of sea-based, mobile land-based, and space-based ABM systems.

There is little disagreement among experts and policy-makers that under present world conditions, research on ballistic missile defense systems must continue in the United States. The controversy surrounds the quantity and character of the work proposed under SDI. A primary cause of conflicting views is the idea, expressed in the President’s speech and implied by SDI, that the United States would proceed beyond research programs and seriously consider deploying space-based missile defenses in violation of the ABM Treaty.

The search for a leakproof shield against ballistic missiles envisioned by the President in his speech has long since been abandoned, even by supporters of SDI. Proponents of space-based missile defenses base their hopes on extraordinarily complex and imperfect systems that opponents regard as unrealistic. Because determination of technical feasibility is a matter for experts and is the stated purpose of SDI, the lay person has difficulty deciding whether space-based defenses might be realized successfully.

In “Star Wars--Solution or Suicide?” Lord Alun Chalfont recognizes but does not try to assess the central problem of technical feasibility. He supports SDI as an “attractive enough proposition” and places his analysis in the context of world politics and strategy. Partly in response to vocal opposition to SDI, he seeks a “rational response” to the present U.S. Administration’s program. Much of his book repeats well-known arguments favoring SDI, but as a European with experience in government and journalism, Chalfont presents some views that are probably not widely known in the United States.

Chalfont shares with other supporters the belief that SDI provides the “catalyst for a new approach . . . to the central political and ideological confrontation” between the two superpowers and their respective allies. He pleads that SDI is “too important and complicated to be assailed with arguments derived from discredited strategic doctrines and based upon outmoded habits of strategic thought.” To support his position, he summarizes current strategic doctrine and develops his primary reasons for supporting SDI. None is new, but the discussions are refreshingly concise and clearly written.

The first reason arises from the desire to move away from the strategy of mutually assured destruction (MAD) and achieve real reductions in arms. He succinctly states the nuclear dilemma as the problem of reducing nuclear stockpiles “to a level at which the capacity to deter a potential enemy from going to war remains, without posing a threat of total global disaster if deterrence should ever fail.” With brief discussion and dismissal of other approaches to solving the problem, Chalfont sees SDI as a possible means of resolving the dilemma and achieving arms reduction. One observer has called this strategy SAD (strategically assured defense).

Chalfont’s argument rests on the view that because it presents the offense with uncertain success, strong defense (if it works) is a deterrent, providing offensive forces do not become too strong. To put such a proposition into practice, it is essential that both sides agree to the existence of limited defensive systems and to control of offensive arms.

Chalfont is well aware of the problems but provides no new prescription for the difficult task of moving from the present state of MAD to a world that contains significantly fewer nuclear weapons. He does not show how to avoid the destabilizing effects accompanying unilateral deployment of strategic defense systems; he argues mainly that defense as a deterrent must be considered a serious alternative to present strategy, a view common to all supporters of SDI.

A major reason for Chalfont’s support of SDI is Europe’s special position in the confrontation between the two superpowers. NATO’s strategy for the defense of Europe rests on the doctrine of “flexible response,” or “gradual deterrence.” It is NATO policy to invoke first-strike use of tactical nuclear weapons if Western Europe is unable to stop invasion by the conventional forces of Eastern Europe.

Like many Europeans, Chalfont suspects that should an invasion occur, the United States would probably not support a first strike because of fear of Soviet retaliation with strategic nuclear weapons directly against the U.S. mainland. According to this view, the coupling of American and European security would not survive a real test. Therefore the present reliance of NATO on offensive nuclear weapons is unacceptable. SDI implies Chalfont’s preferred shift to deterrence based on defense.

Chalfont takes as given that the Soviet Union’s military strategy includes a willingness to fight and win a nuclear war. Hence he is convinced that the U.S.S.R. is engaged in a significant continuing program of developing strategic defenses. Since he also is willing to make the leap of faith that space-based defenses may well be technically feasible, he sees three possible contingencies in the future: The Soviet Union but not the United States may have strategic defenses of the sort envisioned in SDI; the United States but not the Soviet Union may have strategic defenses; or both superpowers may have strategic defenses.

The first implies the opportunity for Soviet nuclear blackmail of the West and therefore cannot be allowed. The last is worrisome because while the United States and Soviet Union would then be protected, the concept of flexible response would be destroyed. Europe would remain vulnerable, with its deterrent forces having lost their credibility. Moreover, the United States might be attracted to unilateral arrangements with the Soviet Union.

Thus in Chalfont’s view, strategic reasoning requires that Europe cannot afford not to support SDI. A lesser reason for Chalfont, but certainly appealing to European industry, is the prospect that SDI may provide significant financial support of research and development of high technology in Europe.

“Star Wars--Solution or Suicide?” merits reading as a presentation of some pro-SDI arguments not usually heard in the United States. However, gaps in Chalfont’s reasoning and his failure to address satisfactorily the technical feasibility and the destabilizing effects of space-based defensive systems divorce his analysis from reality.

In contrast to Chalfont’s positive evaluation of SDI, “Star Wars: Defense of Death Star?” is an indictment of it. With a breezy and often aggressive style, Robert M. Bowman presents views that have been discussed extensively by many eminent opponents of SDI. Because of his experience as an Air Force officer and later as a manager in industry, Bowman is comfortable discussing the technical aspects of ballistic missile defense. His conclusions concerning strategic issues are largely consistent with those developed more thoughtfully by his predecessors.

Bowman is concerned primarily with space-based defense systems intended to destroy ballistic missiles during the boost phase immediately after launch. It is the possibility for that kind of system that distinguishes the current debates about strategic defense from those that led to the 1972 ABM treaty. Opponents of SDI maintain that if the United States deployed boost-phase defenses, the Soviet Union would perceive them as enhancing U.S. ability to carry out a successful first strike: The defensive systems could be used to destory Soviet missiles launched in retaliation.

Thus the defensive weapons become offensive armaments. The Soviet response to deployment would certainly include increasing their own offensive capabilities.

Moreover, defenses placed in space are also anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons. Space is already militarized with the presence of surveillance satellites, an integral part of the strategic balance. The “weaponization” of space achieved by developing the capability for destroying satellites is inherently destabilizing. Hence, Bowman not only opposes SDI but consistently argues for ASAT arms control. Opponents of SDI will agree with many of Bowman’s conclusions, but may be less enthusiastic about the manner in which they are presented.

The book was originally published privately by Bowman’s Institute for Space and Security Studies. In several places, the author quotes publications and press releases from the institute, items that were probably prepared by Bowman. That practice, evidently intended to convey an impression of wider immediate support for the author’s work, serves rather to detract from the book’s appeal.

Probably the main virtue of “Star Wars: Defense of Death Star?” is its fairly detailed discussion of arguments opposing SDI, in a form reasonably accessible to people not expert in technical or strategic issues.

There are sound reasons for continuing research on ballistic missile defense at a suitable funding level and for appropriate purposes. Many writers have emphasized that the chief purposes are to strengthen deterrence and to understand current technologies in order not to be surprised by possible Soviet advances in offense and defense.

Understanding the means necessary to penetrate Soviet defenses is essential for the United States to maintain a capable deterrent. The required research programs can be carried out within the constraints of existing arms control agreements and without contemplating deployment of space-based defensive systems. Those are vital issues not treated by either book.