ARMS-D-Request@MIT-MC.ARPA (Moderator) (01/09/86)
Arms-Discussion Digest Thursday, January 9, 1986 2:46PM
Volume 6, Issue 15.1
Today's Topics:
Parnas Papers
Re^n: KAL007
Automatic weapons
Soviet Defense
Testing SDI
self-fulfilling
Soviet Defense
[august: Aliens Among Us]
Deep Strike
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Date: Wed 8 Jan 86 20:01:10-PST
From: Jim McGrath <J.JPM@Epic>
Subject: Parnas Papers
Reply-to: mcgrath%mit-oz@mit-mc.arpa
Have also been published as "Software Aspects of Strategic Defense
Systems," Communications of the ACM, December 1985 (vol 28, # 12,
1326-1335). Comments to follow.
Jim
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Date: Thu, 9 Jan 86 01:55 EST
From: Andreas.Nowatzyk@A.CS.CMU.EDU
Subject: Re^n: KAL007
> for most of its flight, from the time it left Alaska until the Soviets
> picked it up. At that time, it was on a bearing of 246 from point
> of departure.
The plane was tracked by the civilian radar installations in Alaska and
by a military radar that was relayed to the civilian controllers. This
covered enough of the actual course to dismiss the magnetic heading
theory. Unlike INS navigation which maintains the absolute position
of a plane, a magnetic heading gives only the direction and must be
corrected to compensate for the winds.
...By the time the plane
passed the last VOR in Alaska, the deviation from the normal
course was already significant....
> If KAL007 was on magnetic 246. You can't have it both ways.
A 747 has even more than 2 ways of navigation that can be / and should
be used simultaneously. When the plane passed that VOR, their DME
should have displayed a distance of n miles to that VOR, while it
actually displayed m miles (I don't remember n & m, but the
difference was said to be abnormally high). If the pilots had used
these equipments (as they were supposed to), they should have noticed
this difference. This part of the flight was documented by radar
recordings.
To end my part in this discussion, let me state that I agree with the
conclusion of the article in "Der Spiegel" that both official versions
(US & SU) are unconvincing. If you are interested in more precise
information from that article, contact me with e-mail.
-- Andreas
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Date: 9 Jan 86 05:23 EST (Thu)
From: _Bob <Carter@RUTGERS>
Subject: Automatic weapons
From: Gary Chapman <PARC-CSLI!chapman at glacier>
the M-14. It's full automatic mode
wasn't very impressive, and it was heavy, but it was 10 times more
accurate than the M-16, unbelievably reliable, and it could fire the
same rounds as an AK-47, which meant if you found enemy ammo caches
you could use theirs.
Did you ever try it? Or know anyone who did? Without the cartridge
case rupturing and blowing white-hot powder gas back into his face?
The standard AK round is the 7.62x39mm M1943. The M-14 is chambered
for 7.62x51mm NATO. Shooting theirs in ours would give excessive
headspace of 11 millimeters.
The maximum safe headspace tolerance (the difference between "go" and
"no-go" gauges) for the M-14 is .004 inches, just about two orders of
magnitude less than you recommend.
_B
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Date: Thu, 9 Jan 86 09:06:55 EST
From: Herb Lin <LIN@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU>
Subject: Soviet Defense
From: lin
What do *we* in
the US consider to be legitimate *Soviet* defense needs? Never mind
about their paranoia -- what do we think?
From: Jeff Miller AMSTE-TEI 4675 <jmiller at apg-1>
> That should have been obvious from my answer. In general, we
see their defense needs as being far less than that of sheilding
their imperial encroachment.
I agree. Please be more specific; what specific needs do they
perceive (and for which they buy arms) that we deny the legitimacy of?
My point was that our techniques of command and control and of
logistics, which, like numerous other factors, increase combat
potential, are probably not so great that they would significantly
offset the Soviets capabilities in the same areas, which would, of
course, bring us back to square one in the bean counting.
Then why do we spend so much money on these things?
> What makes you think the Soviets don't spend as much or more in
the same areas?
That is not the issue. If we spend money on them ,we should get
credit for them. Besides, are you claiming that Soviet C3 and
logistics are comparable to NATO??
This is a specific case of a more general proposition -- the NATO
outspends the WP in defense even taking into account differences in
manpower costs, has more total people under arms, and has more
advanced military technology. How come the balance is so lop-sided??
> I am curious to hear the numbers you think are involved in
Europe, as well as your sources. The only way I can come up with
NATO outnumbering WP and Soviet forces as deployed against W.
Europe is to include US forces not currently stationed in Europe,
UK forces not currently stationed on the continent, and French
forces not currently stationed in France or Germany.
I will track down my sources on the people balance. I suspect a
semantic interpretation. Do you dispute the others?
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Date: Thu, 9 Jan 86 09:33:30 EST
From: Herb Lin <LIN@MC.LCS.MIT.EDU>
Subject: Testing SDI
From: Jim McGrath <J.JPM at LOTS-A>
(i.e. SDI is larger than Aegis, but the
systems are of comparable testing complexity).
Also, you better not use AEGIS as your model of reliability. Its
record in its first operational tests wasn't very good.
You are the second person to infer (incorrectly) that I was stating
that Aegis was reliable. I never stated that Aegis was reliable. I
was only comparing the relative difficulty of realistic testing
between the two.
AEGIS is designed for a 12-15 target for simultaneous intercept
capability; it has been tested on 3, and will not for the foreseeable
future be tested on 4 or more. In Operational testing (i.e., after it
was shaken down in development and commissioned for use), it lost 6/16
targets due to flaky software. If you think that realistic testing on
AEGIS was done, then I think you're wrong. Relative difficulty, you
say? If SDI will be as testable as AEGIS, we're in trouble.
Besides, AEGIS is enormously easier to test. Remember, it is a
real-time system. SDI will have to handle 10^6 potential targets in
30 minutes. AEGIS is designed to keep track of 200 targets within ~ a
half hour flight time.
Although I thought the logic of my message was clear, I'll restate it
in non-conversational tones:
1. are other systems of complexity similar to SDI? NOT software of
complexity similar to SDI, but systems (which includes hardware,
human actors, and general environmental interaction), since it is
only realistic to talk about testing systems, not software in
isolation.
No -- see above.
5. If you answered no to question 1, or hold SDI to a substantially
higher degree of reliability than existing systems, then the logic
fails. The problem I have with this debate is that the anti-SDI
people are not addressing either of these two points adequately.
On the former, people have been concentrating on size of code for
SDI.
I haven't been. Parnas hasn't been. Who has been?
I would not blame people if they did however. Big things are more
complex than little things.
On the latter point, I have not seen good reasons to require higher
reliability.
Ask Ronald Reagan.
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End of Arms-Discussion Digest
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