Quote:
Originally posted by Superbelt
Wecome to the new age of the arms race. New and better missiles are on the horizon which will be able to kill you much more efficiently.
While at the same time we are still insanely vulnerable to a suitcase nuke getting shipped through Baltimore.
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Well, quite. No nation that has ICBMs will launch them because of assured destruction. So long as destruction is assured, nuclear missiles are not going to be launched at America.
What about a crazy terrorist though? Would he hesitate regardless of retaliation? Nope. But terrorists don't have ICBMs (and sorry, they can't be passed of secretly either), but if they get ahold of a warhead and a Samsonite, they have a way. NMD is useless against that which is probably the only likely avenue of nuclear attack against us.
NMD makes us feel better because we feel like we are doing something about the threat. But we are only exascerbating it. We may be frustrated that despite all of our shiny spears in the deserts and plains of America, China holds us at detente with a few rusty ones. Can't we do something about them? So we build NMD and we don't understand that the world sees this as a bid for domination instead of detente, and more importantly, the world reacts accordingly.