"We can only hope and pray that saner minds will prevail in Russia. I would like my kids and grandkids to have a normal life. Even surviving a nuclear exchange, would not offer much of a normal life. It would probably we a short and painful one."
By now, we have all heard the trials and tribulations of NASA in getting the Artemis I rocket to launch. It seems that NASA has more problems than Carter has pills these days. What should be easy peasy for the organization which put Apollo after Apollo on the Moon more than 50 years ago, has been like a third grader becoming a, well, rocket scientist. Seems we need a good rocket scientist in getting Artemis I to light off. The magic has gone out of the hat for NASA.
When Ronald Reagan was President, he hoodwinked the Soviet Union by telling them we had a Star Wars AMB system, set up and ready to go. Why in the 1980's, would the Soviets believe we could do something like that? Because of what we did in the 1960's and 1970's with the Apollo Program. They thought we were wizards when it came to rocketry. Well, we were back then. Just not Star Wars wizards.
Time has gone on. The Soviet Union is gone, but Russia remains. Russia, who owns more nukes than any other country on Earth. So we have some defenses against a nuclear attack. It is called the GBI (Ground Based Interceptor) System. Will it work? I sure hope so. Will it work against a nuclear saturation attack by the Russians? Maybe, maybe not. How about against the new hypersonic missiles the Russians claim to have? Unknown.
Here is what we know and what we don't know. We know the GBI system has been tested against our own "dummy" ICBM missiles, and had some success. We do know we also have some AEGIS SM variants which have shown some success in being ICBM deterrents. Those are what we know about. I believe there are also some things that DARPA has cooked up which have not made the light of day as yet. Lasers, particle beam weapons, and so forth.
All this being said, the wise people who walk this planet still know one immutable fact of life. A nuclear war is unwinnable. MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction), still rules the day. It is the only true deterrent to a nuclear exchange. But - here is the fly in the ointment. The world's newest crazy man, Vladimir Putin, now believes he can win a nuclear war against the west. That the subsequent "nuclear winter" is only a fable. That he can nuke Ukraine, and the fallout will not affect the western regions of his country. In short, Putin is a moron. He has become the Thanos of our generation. He can snap his fingers (by pushing his red launch button), and much of the world's population will disappear.
We can only hope and pray that saner minds will prevail in Russia. I would like my kids and grandkids to live a normal life. Even surviving a nuclear exchange, would not offer much of a normal life. It would probably be a short and painful life, at that.
"All this being said, the wise people who walk this planet still know one immutable fact of life. A nuclear war is unwinnable. MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction), still rules the day. It is the only true deterrent to a nuclear exchange."
ReplyDeleteMaybe less "unwinnable" than unknowable. MAD's never been tested, & presumably no one wants to try that. "Little Rocket Man" seems to think it doesn't apply to his country, but the joke's on him! Not only are his nukes unnecessary, as North Korea was never invaded since the war--despite these weapons' absence--but his country simply isn't big enough to survive a nuclear strike.