Why Pentagon Spells ‘Safety’ N-M-D

The failure of the Pentagon’s latest National Missile Defense test on Jan. 18 reopened the debate over how fast to proceed with deployment of an NMD system. But the real question is not when to deploy missile defense but whether to do it. These test failures were nothing new, and despite what “star warriors” would like the U.S. public to believe, missile defense will do little to protect our country and much to enrich the Pentagon and its key defense contractors.

Since President Ronald Reagan’s “Star Wars” speech in 1983, the United States has spent more than $60 billion on missile defenses, with current funding at $4 billion a year. Yet, to date, these funds have produced precious little beyond a few mostly negative test results. The latest variation on Reagan’s shield against nuclear weapons has been restructured to focus on the seemingly more realistic goal of defending all 50 states from an accidental missile launch from Russia or China, or from attack by a rogue nation such as Iran, Iraq or North Korea.

As we approach the 17th anniversary of Reagan’s 1983 speech, which promised to render nuclear weapons “impotent and obsolete,” the most remarkable legacy of his upbeat assessment is how consistently missile defense has failed to meet virtually every performance goal set for it. The most recent intercept test failed after the interceptor’s infrared sensors malfunctioned. Last October’s “successful” intercept test is now under scrutiny after reports revealed the test was filled with flaws. Only after the interceptor veered off course, following a decoy balloon, was it able to detect the smaller, dimmer warhead drifting close to the decoy. As Tom Z. Collina of the Union of Concerned Scientists said, “They got lucky.”

In the face of calls from opponents and supporters alike to postpone a June 2000 deployment decision until after the November elections, the Clinton administration has made no adjustments to its timetable. Another intercept test is scheduled for April, and if it succeeds in hitting its target, the U.S. military will meet its own minimum standard to conclude that a missile-defense system is technologically feasible.

A total of only 19 tests are scheduled for the National Missile Defense system. By comparison, the Patriot missile, which has a far less demanding mission, succeeded in 17 out of 17 tests before it was developed and deployed. And the Safeguard antiballistic-missile system, deployed for just a few months in the 1970s, underwent 111 tests, including 58 successful intercepts in 70 attempts.

Moreover, in regards to the overall program, a panel of missile defense experts, headed by former Air Force Chief of Staff Lawrence D. Welch, released a report highly critical of the NMD program last November. The report pointed out that the NMD program was beset by a “legacy of over-optimism” among government and defense officials and “instead of unusual clarity, there is unusual fragmentation and confusion about authority and responsibility.” The panel also warned that a “high risk of failure remains” because of “compressed” testing schedules and lack of spare parts.

Given its dubious track record as the Pentagon’s most expensive weapon-development program ever ($60 billion and counting), plagued with technical glitches, cost overruns and project mismanagement, just what has spawned this new drive for missile defense?

The 1998 congressionally mandated Rumsfeld Report asserted that the ballistic-missile threat facing the United States is “evolving more rapidly” than had been reported in the past. Though the report did not explicitly address missile defense, it helped gather momentum for the current antiballistic-missile efforts. The makeup of the commission, which was headed by former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, calls into question the objectivity of its report. Rumsfeld is listed as a supporter of the Center for Security Policy, a pro-”Star Wars” conservative think tank, in its annual report, and he is also a board member of Empower America, which ran a series of pro-”Star Wars” radio ads during the 1998 elections.

But this emerging threat of attack has been exaggerated. The so-called rogue states, including North Korea, Iran and Iraq, are still many years--if not decades--away from mastering the technology to produce and mount a nuclear weapon that can be delivered to a target thousands of miles away by means of a multistage ballistic missile. North Korea, which carried out a missile test in late 1998, put its missile program on hold to pursue negotiations with the United States after former Defense Secretary William J. Perry’s visit last May.

Thus, Washington is spending billions of dollars addressing one of the least likely threats to U.S. security. Unlike a bomb delivered via a suitcase, or some other low-tech delivery method, the origins of a ballistic missile are impossible to disguise. The prospect of a devastating counterattack by the U.S. should be enough deterrence for any would-be foe contemplating a missile attack an U.S. soil.

With more than $34 million spent on lobbying and a whopping $6.9 million doled out in campaign contributions during the 1997-98 cycle from the top four missile-defense contractors (Lockheed Martin, Boeing, TRW and Raytheon), much of this missile-defense revival may well be politically driven. The big four have also been major contributors to the Center for Security Policy, run by Frank J. Gaffney Jr., a former Reagan official. Gaffney’s group has received more than $2 million in corporate donations and has six Lockheed Martin executives on its board of advisors. The center has worked closely with such “Star Wars” enthusiasts as former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Sen. Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), who spearheaded the recent defeat of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in the Senate. Both men have been awarded the center’s “Keeper of the Flame” award. Rumsfeld won the award in 1998.

Missile-defense advocates tend to gloss over what is really at stake here: four decades of arms-controls and arms-reduction initiatives. Let’s face it, the only really effective means to safeguard against nuclear weapons is by seeking ways to eliminate nuclear weapons altogether. But the United States has placed arms control on the back burner. Deployment of a National Missile Defense system, far from providing a reliable defense, risks endangering existing arms controls and spurring a new nuclear-arms race.

Russia has made it clear that future reductions in its nuclear arsenal via the START treaties--treaties that would reduce the number of deployed strategic warheads about 75% from current levels--are conditional upon continued compliance with the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty. The ABM treaty limits each country to one national missile defense site with no more than 100 interceptors, thus ensuring that each country is susceptible to the dangers of the other’s nuclear arsenal.

In addition, Russia has vowed to deploy more of its Topol-M missiles if the U.S. deploys a NMD system. The Topol-M missile is designed to overcome an antimissile system by using decoys and multiple warheads on each missile.

As for China, which has only a handful of ICBMs capable of reaching the U.S., missile defense could well provoke it to deploy more long-range missiles in response.

The United States should be supporting preventive measures like the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and further reductions of nuclear arsenals with Russia. As far as the ABM treaty, both Russian U.N. Ambassador Sergei V. Lavrov and Russia’s commander of strategic missile forces, Vladimir Yakovlev, have said that Russia is willing to work with the U.S. to address concerns about missile development by rogue states, but that the ABM should remain intact. Ultimately, getting rid of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles will provide a far more effective defense than relying on costly, pie-in-the-sky schemes such as National Missile Defense. *