ARMS-D-Request@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU (Moderator) (10/18/86)
Arms-Discussion Digest Friday, October 17, 1986 5:38PM
Volume 7, Issue 34
Today's Topics:
The Right To Know -- Trump Cards vs Broad Brushes
Fossedal asserts 80%+ effective SDI imminent
The one-way street
Sandia
Stealth technology
Re: The Right to Know
Fuller and Liddel-Hart - please post complete reference
Truman and Japan
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Date: Wed, 15 Oct 1986 12:40 EDT
From: LIN@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
Subject: The Right To Know -- Trump Cards vs Broad Brushes
I repeat my original question to you, which you *still* have not
answered. WHAT issues of policy turn on WHICH classified details?
> Is your claim that a detailed
> knowledge of the questions you raise is necessary for determining what
> would happen if a war broke out?
No. I'd like to know if we're already at war, for starters.
Answer: NO.
how come we got an immobile mobile missile (the MX), when it was
researched and developed specifically to be mobile and thereby
avoid launch-on-warning predelegation? Are US missile designers
all that incompetent, or was it a secret decision to disregard the
public's express demands?
How is this a fundamental question? What basic issue is at stake that
could be resolved with classified information?
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Date: Wed, 15 Oct 1986 12:45 EDT
From: LIN@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
Subject: Fossedal asserts 80%+ effective SDI imminent
From: jon at june.cs.washington.edu (Jon Jacky)
Does ANY technically-informed person believe this figure is plausible?
Is there ANY weapons system that is 80% effective against a determined
and well equipped opponent under actual battle conditions?
I seem to recall a public statement (from Weinberger?) asserting the
effectiveness of Safeguard to be 50%.
What do you mean by "effectiveness"? I believe that in the Falklands,
over 80% of the Sidewinder missiles fired hit their targets. But 80%
of the incoming warplanes were not shot down. In other owrds, I sort
of understand what 80% effective might mean in the context of BMD.
I'm not sure I understand it in the context of other weapons.
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Date: Wed, 15 Oct 86 10:43:42 PDT
From: Clifford Johnson <GA.CJJ@forsythe.stanford.edu>
Subject: The one-way street
> agreements to locate US military bases all over the world wouldn't
> exist unless we had a military edge over those countries.
> Note that the threats don't have to be stated explicity or publicly
> (that's what diplomats are for), nor do they have to be executed
> directly by US armed forces; the US can get foreign leaders to respond
> without firing a shot. Once US power has been used, the assumption
> that the US is a force to be reckoned with is built into all diplomacy
> with the US, and no overt threat is necessary (it's similar for the
> Soviet Union, too).
Related to this matter is the theoretical "two-way street", a concept
derived from the de facto one-way street. When the U.S. wanted to
make Flyingdales a phased radar, Britain asked for its share of the
work. The result led one British general to remark, "So this is what
they call the two-way street? They build the radar and we shovel the
cement."
Another instance is an ally's "automatic response level," as
programmed by the RAND Strategy Assessment Center. See The Mark III
Scenario Agent: A Rule-Based Model Of Third-Country Behavior In
Superpower Crises And Conflict, RAND N-2363-NA. A battery of
indices describe, or rather, define the conduct of each
nonsuperpower. For example, allied countries are classified into
dependent-captive, dependent-satellite, reliable-staunch,
reliable-reliable, reliable-moderately, reliable-reluctant,
reluctant-reluctant, reluctant-soft, and reluctant-neutral. If
there is a "serious" threat (threats are categorized too, of
course), then a relaible-staunch ally is programmed to move to a
low-alert, but other reliable allies would not. If there is an
"indirectly-grave" threat, then the reliable-staunch ally moves to
full-alert, the reliable-reliable ally to sustain-alert, and the
reliable-moderately ally to low-alert. There are various
conventions for writing programmatic decision tables to implement
rules of conduct. I quote:
"A rule that has the FRG mobilize its armed forces if the GDR
mobilizes its troops. Further, let us say that we want the FRG to
match the level of its mobilization to the GDR's, so that Bonn does
not respond to, say, a large Warsaw Pact exercise as if it portended
imminent conflict. Finally, we want all NATO countries (including
the FRG) to increase the alert level of their troops to the
equivalent of the United States' DEFCON 3 if the GDR is seen to be
mobilizing completely... Using these data we can write the
following RAND-ABEL rule:
IF the Mobilization-status of the GDR is full
THEN
(
LET the Mobilization-status of the FRG be full.
FOR (every country whose alliance is) NATO
(
LET the alert-status of the country be DEFCON3.
)
)
ELSE IF the mobilzation-status of the GDR is partial
THE LET the mobilization-status of the FRG be partial.
ELSE IF the mobilzation-status of the GDR is peacetime
THEN LET the mobilization-status of the FRG be peacetime.
While no country ever responds to the international situation
'automatically,' it is useful for modeling purposes to simplify
processing demands by treating certain categories of behavior as
though it did. When perceived threat is low (less than grave), a
modeled nation will behave in a way that is primarily conditioned by
its relations with its superpower ally. If it tends to be a
reliable ally of the superpower it will follow that tendency by
agreeing to repond more or less as the ally has requested. This is
termed "automatic response." Each response pattern, or temperament,
has an automatic response limit built in... A crucial part of the
distinction among temperaments is the different automatic response
limit associated with each one. Less 'reliable' allies will have
lower automatic response limits. If, however, the actor perceives a
grave, indirectly mortal threat, SCENARIO AGENT will put it through
a second phase of information-filtering, effectiveness assessment."
End quote. I was unable to discover an "automatic response limit" for
action requests made by nonsuperpowers to superpowers; not that
the program does not provide for their automatic processing, it
seemingly provides that superpowers not accede to requests from
allies without the information-filtering phase of analysis.
Yours reliably-staunchly, Cliff
To: ARMS-D@XX.LCS.MIT.EDU
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Date: 16 Oct 86 2:15-EST
From: sam mccracken <oth104%BOSTONU.bitnet@WISCVM.arpa>
Subject: Sandia
-----
Jim Morton says that the Livermore lab is next to Sandia. Isn't Livermore in
California? I've never been to Livwrmore, but the last time I went to Sandia
it was in Albuquerque.
------------------------------
Date: Thu 16 Oct 86 14:32:44-EDT
From: Marc Vilain <MVILAIN@G.BBN.COM>
Subject: Stealth technology
A recent article in the Boston Globe cast doubts on the effectiveness
of so-called stealth technology.
According to the article, the essence of the technology underlying
the new generation stealth bomber is the same as that used for the SR-71
spy plane (the so-called Black Bird). The aircraft is made hard to
detect by giving it an extroardinarily skinny "cross-section": looking
at the aircraft straight on, there doesn't seem to be much plane there
at all. The advantage of this approach is that it's hard to detect the
plane if it's coming right at you. The disadvantage, according to the
Globe article, is that to make the cross-section skinny you must
increase the size of the craft in other dimensions, length in
particular. If you're looking at the SR-71 from the side or the bottom,
it makes a fantastic radar reflector.
The article quotes some disgruntled military administrator, who
lambasts the SR-71-style stealth technology. It also quotes an air
traffic controller who said that he always knew when spy missions were
being flown over his area, because the SR-71 was always the brightest
object in the sky.
Incidentally, the stealth bomber (which "officially" doesn't exist)
is being developed by Lockheed, the manufacturers of the SR-71.
marc vilain [MVILAIN@G.BBN.COM]
PS: A quick scan through my files didn't immediately reveal the Globe
article, but if anyone is interested (or insists), I will try harder to
unearth the reference.
PPS: I suspect that there must be other tricks hidden up the stealth
sleeve than narrow cross-sections (fancy radar jamming perhaps?).
Anybody know more about this?
------------------------------
Date: Thursday, 16 Oct 1986 12:07:03-PDT
From: jong%delni.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM (Steve Jong/NaC Pubs)
[Gary Chapman, Arms-D v7 #31:] "... the Air Force (is)
confident it can track with absolute accuracy all aircraft
approaching the U.S. (with Teal Ruby), and these would be
intercepted either by interceptor aircraft or air defense
missiles."
This statement implies we're safe from Soviet air attack. I guess
I'd like to hear some informed estimates as to the kill rate the
Air Force expects to achieve. I admit this mode of warfare is
easier to defend against, but I'm not expecting 100% protection or
anything near that.
------------------------------
Date: Thursday, 16 Oct 1986 12:08:29-PDT
From: jong%delni.DEC@decwrl.DEC.COM (Steve Jong/NaC Pubs)
Subject: Re: The Right to Know
[Clifford Johnson, Arms-D v7 #33]: "...How come we got an
immobile mobile missile (the MX), when it was researched and
developed specifically to be mobile and thereby avoid
launch-on-warning predelegation? Are US missile designers all
that incompetent, or was it a secret decision to disregard the
public's express demands? When the Soviets wanted a mobile
missile, they built one.
Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by mere
stupidity.
If memory serves me correctly, the MX designers wanted to have
their cake -- a mobile missile -- and eat it, too -- silos. Thus
we had the ludicrous "shell-game" basing scheme. I believe one
study showed that the concrete would require more water than was
available in the southwestern United States.
Putting MX missiles in minuteman silos was simply a political
compromise to keep the program alive. No one thinks they're any
safer there than Minuteman missiles are.
Aren't the Russian mobile missiles just stored on railroad
flatcars? They're not bunkered in any way, are they? At least
they're mobile.
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 16 Oct 86 09:10:51 PDT
From: jon@june.cs.washington.edu (Jon Jacky)
Subject: Fuller and Liddel-Hart - please post complete reference
> (Tom Tedrick says) anyone discussing arms should really think of Fuller
> and Liddell-Hart as required reading.
Please post complete reference - title, year, publisher (or journal/volume/pps)
of the works to which you are referring.
-Jonathan Jacky
University of Washigton
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 17 Oct 86 06:02:47 PDT
From: ihnp4!utzoo!henry@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU
Subject: Truman and Japan
> ... private Truman papers suggest that the
> purpose of using the atomic bomb against Japan was more to ensure that
> Stalin didn't get his troops there before Japan surrendered, thus
> fulfilling his promise to Roosevelt, then to end a war with a
> vanquished nation.
It should be noted that Truman, regardless of his motives, probably made
the right decision. The Japanese may have been vanquished by Western
standards, but they were *NOT* willing to surrender. Without the atom
bombs, any serious attempt at surrender negotiations would have provoked
a military coup -- there almost was one anyway. I discussed this at length
a few years ago, in a message that appeared in both Arms-D and Politics; I
can dig it out again if Herb thinks it worth republishing.
Henry Spencer @ U of Toronto Zoology
{allegra,ihnp4,decvax,pyramid}!utzoo!henry
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End of Arms-Discussion Digest
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