BATTLEFIELD OF THE FUTURE
Battlefield of the Future - Air University Press
Battlefield of the Future - Air University Press
Create successful ePaper yourself
Turn your PDF publications into a flip-book with our unique Google optimized e-Paper software.
<strong>BATTLEFIELD</strong> <strong>OF</strong> <strong>THE</strong> <strong>FUTURE</strong><br />
the United States as the protector of their security, and they<br />
are apprehensive about what effect that might have . If the<br />
Japanese decide they must go their own way, and renounce<br />
their constitution and develop a very aggressive outreach in<br />
military capability, what would that do to the whole Pacific<br />
Rim, or to the countries that well remember WWII? So, it's<br />
important that we have the ability to share ballistic missile<br />
defenses with a country like Japan .<br />
Working with the Russians, the Japanese, and others will<br />
also affect the Chinese . The number of warheads the Chinese<br />
have is significant in terms of inflicting pain, but in terms of<br />
attacking Russia or the United States, they are probably not<br />
decisive . The Chinese are pragmatic, so you can work with<br />
them if you understand what their internal concerns are, such<br />
as control of the Chinese border . So I think that over the long<br />
term, if you ignore them in this regard and work with the<br />
Russians, the Japanese and countries like that, you can then<br />
say to the Chinese, "By the way, we're going to neutralize your<br />
ballistic missiles ."<br />
Does it mean we'll have peace? No, I don't think so . I think<br />
you have to ask yourself this one question : "Would it be a<br />
better world if we had ballistic missile defenses and no nuclear<br />
weapons, or nuclear weapons and no ballistic-missile<br />
defenses?" I think that this is the choice, and I think that is<br />
where we need to have the vision and the courage to take on<br />
this mission of ballistic missile defense in new-era warfare .<br />
Reducing Nuclear Arsenals<br />
One of the greatest potential benefits of ballistic missile<br />
defense specially shared warning and wide-area defensesis<br />
in reducing the value of nuclear ballistic missiles . There is a<br />
significant domestic value here as well, but the costs of<br />
developing, deploying, and operating such defenses are not<br />
trivial . In fact, in the current budget environment, you can't<br />
expect the military to take the lead . But I think ballistic<br />
missile defenses would compete very well, particularly if you<br />
trade them off against the cost of maintaining nuclearweapons<br />
forces .<br />
60