The Politics of Perfect Safety

by Frieda Gardner, WAMM

Get ready for the military world's latest acronym: "NMD," standing for "National Missile Defense." NMD is the Clinton-era's version of Ronald Reagan's SDI (Strategic Defense Initiative), popularly known as "Star Wars," for its promise that our brilliantly programmed missiles could pick off any piece of offensive weaponry launched against us.

Note the "D" in both acronyms. Like heroes in the popular movie Gladiator, we never want to start a fight; it's just that we are forced by someone outside our borders to defend ourselves as best we can. But of course our other big line of defense--the Cold War's intercontinental ballistic nuclear missiles--continue as part of the MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction) system. Despite all the recent arms reductions, America and Russia can still annihilate each other.

Meanwhile, NMD seems designed to emphasize protection rather than the violence and desolation of MAD. It invites the public to enjoy the fruits of our innovative genius and to live in a state of "perfect safety."

So far, however, despite an expenditure of $60 billion between 1983 and 1999, SDI/NMD/Star Wars has been marked by failure and uncertainty. First, in addition to being hugely expensive, our experts have not yet been able to build the thing. Our defensive missiles, for example, have mistaken decoy balloons for our actual "test" incoming missiles.

Second, both the Reagan and Clinton administrations have been less than honest about our tests. In The Nation's "Star Wars II: Here We Go Again" (June 19, 2000), William Hartung and Michelle Ciarrocca point out that Star Wars "marketing . . . has been accompanied at every step by exaggerated technical claims, misleading cost estimates and outright lies."

At least one 1984 Lockheed test was rigged. At least one defense industry employee has testified to forced misrepresentation of a NMD interceptor test. At least one independent analyst has had his criticism classified as "secret" by the Pentagon. Moreover, most of the oversight of NMD testing rests in the hands of the corporations which are producing the things being tested.

Third, many of our allies do not like the Star Wars idea, reasoning that it may: a) deflect global attention away from arms control (Russia and America have, at present, a combined total of 30,000 nuclear weapons, if one counts deployed and undeployed nuclear warheads, reserves, and short-range weapons); b) de-stabilize or even violate current disarmament and test ban treaties; and c) encourage yet another expensive global round of reactive, copy-cat Star Wars research and development.

Star Wars, old and new, looks like another addition to the Department of Bad Ideas. Yet here we are in the summer of 2000, three months before a presidential election, and the great defense beast growls noisily, still hungry no matter how much it is fed. In turn, Lockheed-Martin, Boeing, Raytheon and TRW, the biggest defense contractors, feed tons of cash to candidates and lobbyists.

The right-wing Center for Security Policy, with its long history of NMD promotion, is busy at work. Candidates Bush (in the name of disarmament!) and Gore (in the name of prudent national security!) play their patriot cards, agreeing that NMD will help to win us peace. Jesse Helms and twenty-five senators say they will squash any disarmament proposal that tries to restrain the forward motion of NMD.

And Clinton, worried about his "legacy," has yet again moved toward the right. He is said to be concerned about the shortness of summer in Shemya, Alaska, because that's where the Pentagon wants to pour a concrete launching pad for NMD "hit to kill" test missiles. In short, NMD is being propelled by the forces of what Hartung and Ciarrocca call the "three Cs of contemporary U.S. politics: conservative ideology, Clintonian cowardice, and corporate influence."

Clinton should worry about his legacy. The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists recently moved its famous "doomsday clock" ahead by eight minutes to mark the Clinton administration's negative progress toward nuclear disarmament. Not only has Clinton failed to sign a major arms control agreement, but he could not persuade the Helms-enslaved Senate to ratify the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. And predictably, Clinton's strange idea that NMD does not violate the terms of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty met with strong disapproval from Vladimir Putin at their recent meeting. Even the ever-cautious New York Times has urged Clinton to ditch the "tortured" reasoning of White House lawyers and "find the political courage to postpone the [NMD] decision."

As we go to press, some surprising developments have occurred. Clinton's "rogue nation" concept--the idea that there are a band of countries outside the bounds of civilized discourse, liable to commit random acts of terror based on paranoid (!) reactions to U.S. policy--has suffered some serious reality-blows. For example, the recent warming of relations between North and South Korea indicates that the North might not necessarily launch its as-yet-undeveloped missiles at our cities. In fact, on June 20, 2000, the State Department decided to exchange the words "rogue nations" for the far-milder "states of concern."

Clinton has backed away from worrying about the concrete in Shemya, Alaska and loosened-up on his test-date options; he seems inclined to let Bush/Gore decide what to do about NMD, especially since it looks as if a "do or die" missile test might not go our way. Perhaps deep frowns from both Russia and China, election-year nerves, and that elusive "legacy" have given him pause.

This slight pause in the NMD momentum provides a good opportunity for protest and disarmament activism. There are still plenty of commissions, panels, politicians, and lobbyists wanting that concrete to be poured. And our defense budgets are bigger than they have been in years (with $4.6 billion slated for NMD work in the next fiscal year). "Perfect safety" is a delusional goal, because it ignores our human capacity for both creativity and destruction. As has been true for so many years, we would better serve ourselves and the globe by dreaming up peace, and the justice which underlies it.

Editor's Note: After this article was submitted, the New York Times reported the failure of the latest $100 million NMD tests, stating that "the kill vehicle did not separate from the rocket" (July 9, 2000).

 National Missile Defense Resources

Council for a Livable World
110 Maryland Ave. N.E., Suite 409
Washington, DC 20002
202-543-4100 (phone)
202-543-6297 (fax)
clw@clw.org
www.clw.org

Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space
P.O. Box 90083
Gainesville, FL 32607
352-337-9274 (phone)
globenet@mindspring.com
www.globenet.free-online.co.uk

Global Resource Action Center for the Environment (GRACE)
15 East 26th Street, Suite 915
New York, NY 10010
212-726-9161 (phone)
212-726-9160 (fax)
www.gracelinks.org

Union of Concerned Scientists
2 Brattle Square
Cambridge, MA 02238-9105
617-547-5552 (phone)
617-864-9405 (fax)
ucs@ucsusa.org
www.ucsusa.org