Slashdot Mirror
Boeing Successfully Tests Anti-Missile Laser
dankinit writes "MSNBC is reporting that a 'Boeing Co.-led team has successfully fired for the first time a powerful laser meant to fly aboard a modified 747 as part of a U.S. ballistic missile defense shield.' The test called 'First Light' has a budget of $474.3 million in the fiscal year 2005 and is part of a larger $10 billion dollar missile defense system."
will be "Sharks", in fulfillment of the prophecy of Dr. Evil. . .
You are not the customer.
More and more, /. posts are days behind the rest of the news
If you forget about the future, the future will forget about you.
This is my first first post!
FP
The USSR is dead. North Korea has missiles which we *theorize* can hit the western coast of the USA, and they're not crazy enough to launch them. I think that nowdays we have a lot else we can spend money on besides a missile defense program which only half works.
but when was there ever a missile attack on any north american target? This money seems like a complete waste, that could have been spent on a much more useful project - like, say, an asteriod defence system.
.
Calling it star wars? and are they going to get sued for that now?
official america/military/bush/capitolism bashing thread here.
10 billion dollar squared, that must be a lot of money.
And apart from a loud "BOE-ING" sound when the laser was discharged, all went well.
Oakland can use, oh, say $20million of that. That's all. Geez.
Oh yeah, and can it stop dirty bombs in suitcases, or monitor Oakland's ports for suitcase nukes? Nope.
Ballistics, while scary, are not our biggest problem.
Here's an article mirror in case this one gets /.'ed.
The official site about this laser is here
""It showed they work," Kenneth Englade, an agency spokesman, said of the laser's six identical, pickup-truck-sized, modules linked to fire as a single unit. "The rest is fine-tuning."
For "fine-tuning" read: "everything the system is supposed to ultimately do." It's like writing the first 10 lines of code in a large project and saying "the rest is fine-tuning."
"Philip Coyle, the Pentagon's chief weapons tester under former President Clinton and a critic of early missile defense deployment plans, described the test on Wednesday as very important to people working on the program.
"They deserve a lot of credit for having gotten this far," he said in a telephone interview. "But they've still got a long way to go" to demonstrate shoot-down capability."
That's all this is, something important to the people working on the program. They want more funding. But as far as actually shooting anything down, well that's an entirely different matter:
"Among other technical challenges, Coyle said, engineers must figure out ways to fire the laser for the longer time needed to zap a missile without damaging the optics through which the beam passes -- a kind of technical Catch-22."
Details, details. But give us money and we'll happily explore the Catch-22 for a lot longer!
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Using a whole 747, when a shark is more than capable of wielding a laser of "frickin" spec....
Now, they still must
A- Improve duration & Power
B- Shootdown test... destroy a inflight dummy missile
And i guess C, get nuked by someone with the capability (nukes and missile range)... which is... hmmm... the Soviets? Iran? No... North Korea? No... China maybe? Aliens? Terrorists? Anyone?
Eureka Science News - automatically updated
The real question is, can this technology be extended so we can use sharks with frickin' lasers on their heads to shoot down anti-ship missiles?
Wouldn't it be just as easy to build a dome over the united states? a dome would be just as fesable and make as much financial sense as this missile system.
A little more work, another successful test, and I think we can all grab some popcorn to celebrate.
Now all we need is a house to fill with popcorn...
I know this because God has given me a sign. And told me to stop playing with myself.
-- Kent
...can it shoot down a suitcase? Because that's where the bombs are gonna be...
Comment removed based on user account deletion
You and everyone else with half a brain. However, all of our bitching won't change anything. It's the rich taking our money and making themselves and their friends richer and richer.
It doesn't have to do anything. It just has to look like it does something, then they can smile and pretend it's a useful device.
If there's a good chance your ICBMs aren't going to work, you won't even try, considering the fact that the retaliation is _sure_ to work.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
(U.S. Army Air Defense Solider) looks like im out of the job lmao
There hasn't been an attack because the threat of nuclear annihilation forced every war to be a COLD war.
But now america can threaten other nations with Nukes as much as they want! They have total defensive superiority!
I imagine the other countries could unite and have a ring of anti missile defense set up around U.S. Soil pretty quick but who wants another arms race? The American's that's who?
I guess that's why they never honour any treaties, what's the point if they can just NUKE everyone with NO HOPE of reprisals.
Is this technology meant to be used on civilian transport aircraft? Making my family vacation to California a military target for whatever theoretical enemy is launching missiles at us sure doesn't make me feel safer, how 'bout you? Also, as others have pointed out, aren't there more practical ways to use this money? The Fed is already creating an enormous deficit with its overspending- are the sci-fi dreams of a megalomaniac with brain disease really the most effective use they can come up with, given the imminent collapse of Social Security, rocketing tax burden on the middle class, a grossly underfunded education and public service budget, the floundering of oh so many state economies, and countless other fiscal crises?
This isn't such a big deal. All they did was fire a laser from a fuselage-sized building/room. They have not proven that it will work at high altitudes, much less actually hit the target.
I have gas, but my car uses petrol.
here are your Real Genius quotes
"I would say that 99 per cent of what my father has written about his own life is false." - L. Ron Hubbard Jr.
Just think what would happen if that $10 billion went towards a couple of public school systems.
Problems caused by government are never solved by more money. Twenty mil will solve nothing except the wealth problem.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
It's FRICKIN LASER BEAMS attatched to their heads!
w f.html
Soundboard: http://www.theflashgames.com/dr_evil_soundboard-s
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Great point, except that the Federal government should not be involved in bailing out any city's public schools. That is a local or state matter at most. This happened with Philadelphia schools a few years ago; they became the State's problem. Now tax money from all over the state gets to be thrown away on their failing schools.
worst sig ever. . .
That the USA has a successful test of a laser weapon is good news. I'd be interested to know what technologies the Japanese contributed to the laser weapon. It would be quite handy during the next submarine incursion.
The Japanese deploy a particle beam weapon and a laser. The laser knocks out the Chinese spy satellite. The particle beam weapon knocks out the sub.
sweet.
Take a gander at the Yahoo! News article about the shocking brutality of the typical Chinese.
This is absolutely ridiculous, and i really think all this money should be invested to help the population. Some people are starving, some people are sick. Why must we all put our money in fucking crap like missiles, anti missiles, going on the moon and shit. Nobody wants to fix things here ?? Kind of like when you're a developer and you find it boring to fix old apps compared to building new apps.
Help the population, stop spending the money on crap like that. The whole terrorism thing is used by the american administration to manipulate the population...
10 billions of american dollars, this would help a great deal of people in need of basic things like a home, food and things more important than pr0tact1ng t3h us fr0m t4h m4ss1l3s!
I have a feeling than in many years ppl will laugh at this whole idea, pretty much like flying cars didn't happen when 2000 came. And the artist's rendition pic on the article page is just pure sci-fi stuff.
100% of statistics are wrong.
First $474.3 million and then $10 billion dollars..
Imagine how many people it could help if they were spent healthcare instead.
Or maybe fund research to help protecting the enviroment and endangered species.
Anyone remember a few months back when an airline pilot got hit in the eyes by a laser beam while flying? I wonder if that was a mis-fire of this thing, and they tried to cover it up.
Come to the University of Mars! Classes starting soon!
I can't believe this funding... blah blah blah.. waste ... blah money better spent... blah blah.
when has miltary research ever helped consumer products and humanity in general with unforseen new products and spawning of newer greater more worthwhile ideas/theories in science?
That we're doing this as a hedge against a resurgence of hostilities against Russia. Russia's already increasing its spying in Britain back to Cold War levels.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
By Michael A. Lev Tribune foreign correspondent
The list of people who let down 25-year-old Huang Jin Bao--who, in fact, left him for dead by the side of the road--includes the police officers who ignored him and the ambulance driver who refused to pick him up because he had no money.
There was also the manager of the luxury townhouse development who took no interest in Huang's nearly lifeless body lying just outside his property, even though the incident began when one of the development's subcontractors fled without paying Huang's 800 salary.
This was why Huang, an itinerant carpenter, was standing outside Merlin Champagne Town with other construction workers demanding their money when a black Volkswagen sedan sped out of the parking lot and badly injured him.
For hours afterward, Huang lay unconscious, with a broken ankle and other injuries, disregarded by the development's security guards and passersby.
The police came and went, taking little interest. The ambulance driver too. When a second police patrol later grudgingly took Huang to a hospital--dumping him and several friends at the gate--doctors turned him away because he could not pay.
Back to the driveway
So Huang's friends, who also were fleeced by the construction boss, took him home. The next morning they carried him back to the driveway of Merlin Champagne Town. There they laid him, still dazed, on a cheap blanket as they wondered how to raise the 370 needed to get him medical care.
In China, it is survival of the fittest. It is a striking fact never addressed by the communist leadership that some of the biggest social problems facing China today--the big gap between rich and poor, the exploitation of peasants--are the same type of woes that led to the revolution of 1949.
The sense of enforced community that came with Chairman Mao's era is long gone, replaced by a burgeoning free-market economic system that rewards hard work but is not developed enough to offer protection to those who are vulnerable.
There are no broad government programs to guarantee medical help for indigents and only a weak culture of reaching out to strangers in need.
Chinese people in trouble will look for help from friends, or people from the same hometown or business partners, but there is little sense of trust among people who don't know each other. Perhaps it is because China is overburdened by its population of 1.3 billion, making it impossible for people to feel responsible for everyone they see in need. Many people also ascribe a loss of public spiritedness to the horrors of the Cultural Revolution, in which minding your own business was a matter of survival.
There are few charities in China because the authoritarian government does not easily ease its controls to encourage private groups to organize. Religion, too, with its teachings of compassion or being a good Samaritan, represents only a small voice in a society where the government promotes atheism.
In the end, it may have been that Huang was ignored out of a simple concern that whoever took him to the hospital would get stuck with the medical bill.
A system in chaos
The government acknowledges the need to create a social safety net. But in the whirl of a country in transition from communism to capitalism, the system of overseeing the 100 million migrant workers like Huang who leave their peasant villages to strike it rich in the city is chaotic.
In general, migrant workers are treated as low-status outsiders who get little respect. Many, like Huang, who has only a 7th-grade education, are barely literate. There are hundreds of thousands of these itinerant construction workers in Beijing. They move from city to city, job to job, and get no medical benefits. They are paid annually and are at risk of being cheated.
In the hospital
You misunderstand. The missile defense system isn't an insurance against pissing off someone pretty big, it's a validation of pissing off someone pretty big.
Welcome to big stick foreign policy.
~Tirinal
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Not really, you need to do both. While the US may not fear missiles being launched at us, we do have allies, chiefly Israel, that do and having a defense platform like this flying around would limit Iran or Syria's ability to launch a few missiles their way. It could also be used to keep India and Pakistan from blowing each other up with their nuclear arsenals. This could potentially eliminate the threat of nuclear missiles altogether, leaving us to focus on other threats such as terrorists obtaining the useless nuclear material from newly useless missiles and making dirty bombs to set off at locations of their choosing.
for a living got 80s, DARPA saw BSD Today. It's about
Of the 4 overrides in my town, NONE provided an increase in student performance. Given that spending has increased significantly since 1950, yet learning is down I somehow don't think money is the problem.
YOU FAIL IT
I'm posting as AC because i'm embarassed to ask this, but if a missile is "chromed", does it still absorb the lasers heat?
Neil is that you? Yeah yeah, it's me... Neil...
...has about 20 tons of popcorn for sale. Please inquire at his home. Look for the Jiffy-pop foil scattered about the neighborhood.
HEY YOU!!! shut the hell up! You're giving them ideas!!
so if you need antivibration air cushions just to get a laser to lase how do you get it to work on a moving 747. it sound like they've got it to work on the ground. yay.
That the USA has a successful test of a laser weapon is good news. It will defend the homeland against Chinese nuclear missiles. Also, I'd be interested to know what technologies the Japanese contributed to the laser weapon. It would be quite handy during the next submarine incursion.
The Japanese deploy a particle beam weapon and a laser. The laser knocks out the Chinese spy satellite. The particle beam weapon knocks out the sub.
sweet.
Take a gander at the Yahoo! News article about the shocking brutality of the typical Chinese.
- Destroying the payload? If the ICBM is carrying toxic substances (viruses, bacteria, chemicals like sarin, or radioactive materials such as iodine, strontium, etc.), what happens to them? Do they just gently waft down through the atmosphere to the ground, where they could do a fair bit of damage? Biological materials might receive enough heat to be destroyed or rendered inert; radioactive materials can't.
- Actually hitting a live ICBM? It's one thing to hit a test dummy; it's quite another to hit a live missile.
- Handling a dozen (or more) ICBMs launched to arrive simultaneously at a dozen or more different sites across the US?
- Dealing with people smuggling in small weapons on ships?
- ...
This is reminiscent of the whole crypto argument: relying upon crypto to safeguard your data is like sticking a single stake in the ground and hoping the enemy will run into it. It might be a useful tool, but it's by no means the only thing we'd need to protect $REGION. Remember: we're not trying to protect against missiles. We're trying to protect against attacks using nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons. Missiles are just one subset of that, and arguably an increasingly less important subset to boot.2nd, if you are going to launch an attack on the united states, don't make the mistake of leaving much of it left to retaliate. The US is an angry country don't wake it, if you can't defeat it.
3rd, there is no reason not to have multiple defense systems because all of them have one or more alkalis heels. Developing more then one at a time is a good idea because you might spend five years to find out that it is just is not viable. You would have to start from scratch on a new system.The military uses radiance for a lot of thing because things fail.
--Don't forget that if we worked on only on missile defense system and it failed, to blame G.W. for no developing more then one system.
WARNING: Viewing This Sig May Cause Blindness.
Yeah, they started launching space shuttles off of 747's, they track down ICBMs and their fire plume upone disentegration on re-entry destroys the missile.
"brxref
Can it selectively allow missiles to get through, say to Berkely?
If everyone was as sure about this seemingly peaceful world in which we are living in we'd all just simply disarm.
But the truth is, missile technology has yet to reach its zenith. A vast majority of the countries today have the resources and knowledge to buy or construct them. Many are already doing so. We see the UN warning that fissible material and delivery technology is being traded freely on the blackmarket. Eventually, even non-representitive groups will have access to missile technology.
If we had the ability to predict major world changes with sufficient lead time to re-arm our military to protect ourselves, I'd agree that this type of technology isn't needed or even useful at this time. But when you can't make such predictions, you prepare to defend against the potentual threats you can see.
-- No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats, approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less.
Jeezes, if you would invest that kind of money in international / intercontinental relations and human aid, the world would be a much better place!
This starwars project sure cost a lot of money to combat a non-existing threat.
- Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.
Let us be clear: you hope Islam will one day kill off millions because they will not convert? And then become educated, civilized and toned down?
I kind of hope that, now that the world has seen the effects of holy wars that the education and toning down can happen without the slaughter of millions.
It's rare that you're presented with a knob whose only two positions are Make History and Flee Your Glorious Destiny.
From Command and Conquer: Generals expansion Zero Hour, King Raptor.
An omnidirectional barrier system capable of covering the entire US would be a good idea, though a few pinpoint barrier systems in each major city would probably be enough.
Well, that's sort of right, but misses the bigger benefit. The conventional method of stopping an incomming missile involves shooting it down while it's already descending into your own territory. If you hit it, but don't destroy the warhead, you can still get a lot of damage, as seen with scud missles.
The real benefit of using an aircraft mounted laser is the incredibly large effective range, and the ability to shoot down the missile during launch, and make any collataral damage occur to your enemy.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Doesn't someone just need to give their missiles a shiny reflective coating to foil any sort of laser defense?
No, but maybe it can stop someone, in a few years, from lobbing a nuke over the Pacific. Or maybe it can keep Fuckedupistan from shooting a newage SCUD at Weirdistan.
Can one airport security guard stop a Chinese ICBM from hitting Taipei? No, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't spend money on airport security. She might be able to stop another kind of attack.
Honestly, can you think of an easier target?
What would keep someone from giving their missiles a reflective mirror coating? Would this protect them, or is the laser too powerful?
Keep it up. Im sure your country will fall into civil war soon enough.
Why is it that we can't have mature discussion of military technology? Some ass always has to post wishing a previous poster and/or his country a quick death, herpies, or civil war.
Please grow up....for the children.
-- No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats, approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less.
Or how they kidnapped Japanese civlians.
Or how they starve their own population.
Or even how they test biochemical weapons on whole families - children and all: "The parents were vomiting and dying, but till the very last moment they tried to save kids by doing mouth to mouth breathing."
Fuck those bastards. We should nuke them
So yeah, they're crazy enough.
Of all the evil regimes to be apologetic for, North Korea is about as bad as it gets. Anyone who defends them is objectively defending evil.
Whats the point of this? In order to be successful, it has to be able to shoot down EVERY missile.
How does the system decide on targets? Radar.
All you need to do to defeat this is drop out shards of metal which show up as targets. If each missle turns into 10,000 potential targets the system will NEVER be able to cope.
I don't know what game the pentagon is playing, they know as well as anyone who thinks critically for 5 mins that this will never work.
Unless it can burn one down from boost phase, all it'll do is make funny fallout patterns from any thing w/a NBC warhead somewhere in friendly(ish)territory.
And if someone's going to be tossing those, I think they'll be able to target the flying radar reflector aka a 747.
Proof of concept is all this thing's really good for unless you're the contractor in need of $$$.
You beat me to the punch.
Of course, what I want to know is:
Why do so many Slashdotters think federal government funding is the key to so many local issues?
There are four boxes used in defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order.
Like in most wars, win, lose, or draw, as long as we kill 100:1 ratio of foreigners that's good shootin.
I may sound like a hick, but I garan-damn-tee you that you can't argue agin my logic.
America has done more damn good for the world than not, and the sooner we are a) safe from them and b) get all y'all to be regular [democratic, consumers] folks, the better off the whole world will be better off.
Yeah, let's have the Federal government take over all local schools. That way they can also achieve the high standards of the Washington D.C. school district.
-- Will program for bandwidth
If I had mod points, I'd mod that once as insightful, and then come back and mod it again funny. I did laugh.
Again, great point, except that you give no justification whatsoever for your free-market-in-the-public-school-sector attitude. If your point is that we should get rid of public schools altogether you'd have a leg to stand on...but to merely say the federal government shouldn't support local schools requires some sort of handwavy proof.
If your argument is that it isn't the federal government's domain to support education, then we'd also expect the federal government to get out of university level funding. We'd also expect the federal government to stop regulating anything other than interstate and international transactions. If its just a matter of stopping bailouts maybe you'd mention the federal deficit, or the PG&E bailout, or what about Long Term Capital? But you mention none of these...you just don't want to help out urban kids.
No, what you are saying is that it's not worth 20M to prevent the over 200,000 kids that will go through OPS in the next 20 years from getting a crappy education. Holding kids responsible for financial mismanagement by a group of adults that took place in many cases before they were moved to Oakland, entered the USA, or were BORN is a ludicrous stand to take. A rational thinker would estimate the cost of trying in a court of law, incarcerating, paying welfare for even a few of these kids will quickly surpass 20M....but a self-made know-it-all who has taken Econ 1A will just chant the familiar free-market laissez faire refrains.
All the money in the world can't help that.
Remember general granger with his planes with a laser point defense system. Imagine f-22 raptors with a laser point defense system or general townes with his laser point defense system on his avengers. Isn't it better developing something that doesn't kill anyone but protects them. Would you rather have them make a bomb that can blow up something the size of alaska.
"OK Guys, the top brass are comming down next week, they are going to cancel our funding unless we show them something pretty dope! Ok, call Boeing, ask them if we can get a 747 nose, that way we can atleast make it look like it will fly, next we need to hide those big fat power cables. We can make up for the fact that our laser does jack shit by making it purple, fire for only 1/1000 of a second and turn some of this photo-sensitive cardbord black. Lets see if we can get another 4 years of money for this bullshit"
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Who shot JR?
You did, you did.
... against the Chinese, or maybe the rest of the planet. I seriously doubt that laser-equipped 747's would be required to stop Osama bin Laden from hijacking any more commercial aircraft and flying them into buildings.
An aware passenger population is all that is required to foil that strategy, and I'm pretty sure that everyone who flies is aware of the threat by now.
Or maybe W has seen Independence Day one time too many.
Then ask your members of Congress to scale back federal taxes so Sacramento can get that money from you instead, since they're the ones in charge of public schooling in California (unless you're talking about a different Oakland, of course).
It's interesting that giving the feds first crack at the trough gives them justification to spread into what was supposed to be the domain of the states, in your eyes as well as their own. Thanks, Sixteenth Amendment!
The whole point is to have multiple systems which can defeat incoming missiles at all points. If it passes one then the next system gets a shot. We start with the boost phase and 747, then we go to space based, then finally a ground based.
Each is going to have its own limitations, but also its own benefits.
The whole terrorism thing is used by the american administration to manipulate the population...
Yeah, just like those terrorists manipulated the planes into the sides of buildings and manipulated those 3,000 people to their deaths.
Do you think that didn't happen? This "whole terrorism thing" happened and if we don't work to prevent it, it will keep on happening.
So, adjust your tinfoil hat, and get back to work Senator Kerry...
IN response to all the people saying give this money to the school systems is it just me or has throwing money at something rarely if ever worked.
If you're blue and you don't know where to go to
why don't you go where fashion sits,
Puttin' on the ritz.
Different types who wear a day coat, pants with stripes
and cutaway coat, perfect fits,
Puttin' on the ritz.
Dressed up like a million dollar trouper
Trying hard to look like Gary Cooper (super duper)
Come let's mix where Rockefellers walk with sticks
or "umberellas" in their mitts,
Puttin' on the ritz.
Have you seen the well-to-do up and down Park Avenue
On that famous thoroughfare with their noses in the air
High hats and Arrow collars white spats and lots of dollars
Spending every dime for a wonderful time
If you're blue and you don't know where to go to
why don't you go where fashion sits,
Puttin' on the ritz.
Puttin' on the ritz.
Puttin' on the ritz.
Alas, it is not really going to be a bunch of missles that going to be the first major CBR (chemical, biological, or nuclear) attack on U.S. soil. It's going to be the first nut-job terrorist extremist, either foreign or domestic, who was manages to sneak a bogey, as a whole or piecewise, through one or more of the various ports available to them.
Coderz 4 Life
"True our students can barely read and write and over a third of them don't speak English, but hey look at that toilet shine!"
That's much more important than say improving our base knowledge and creating new high tech fields as well as military capabilty.
A better place to start is to string up school administrators by their budgets and take away all of their CEO paychecks and perks. It'll be amazing how many hundreds of millions of dollars a year will be freed up.
nuff asked
Plus ca change, plus c'est les memes choses.
Beedee, beedee, beedee, Way to go, Buck!
>alkalis heels.
o ry.html
I love it when people have used terms all their life without knowing what it means. No, this is not a spelling flame. That is not remotely a simple misspelling of Achilles' heel.
please indulge me...
http://www.wordexplorations.info/Achilles-heel-st
Achilles was the son of Thetis and Peleus, the bravest hero in the Trojan war, according to Greek mythology.
When Achilles was born, his mother, Thetis, tried to make him immortal by dipping him in the river Styx. As she immersed him, she held him by one heel and forgot to dip him a second time so the heel she held could get wet too. Therefore, the place where she held him remained untouched by the magic water of the Styx and that part stayed mortal or vulnerable.
Achilles was totally invulnerable in combat, but someone took him out by nailing him in the heel with a poison arrow.
To this day, any weak point is called an "Achilles' heel". We also refer to the strong tendon that connects the muscles of the calf of the leg with the heel bone as the "Achilles' tendon".
Gosh, it almost seems as if you are expecting Kim to sit back and say "D'oh, foiled again. Damn you Americans." Kim may not be the last word in stability, but I assure you his generals are.
Do you think other countries with war aspirations won't come up with alternatives to a missile delivery system in light of a laser defense? Do you really believe that the US can fund enough defense programs to counter-act each and every possible threat? Do you really believe a nuclear missile attack is probable, especially when biological agents are much cheaper and easier to develop?
Who's to say that another hundred years of peace will occur sans a missile defense (kind of like we have now)?
The cost of the system is grotesque in light of the amount of defense it provides, and especially when the means of future warfare isn't clearly defined. In short, you are putting all your eggs in one basket, which is extremely shortsighted and naive.
Fruit of Solace.
"It showed they work," Kenneth Englade, an agency spokesman, said of the laser's six identical, pickup-truck-sized, modules linked to fire as a single unit. "The rest is fine-tuning."
Right - after you get the laser to turn on, getting it to shoot down a nuclear ICBM from a 747 (at combined speeds of over Mach 24) is just "fine-tuning". That is, if you're targeting only hundreds of billions of Pentagon tax dollars, and you've already bullshitted enough of Congress and the media (including, apparently, Slashdot headline writers) to have the contracts signed.
--
make install -not war
There are over 70 schools in the Oakland school system 20 million dollars would barely hire an extra janitor per school a year.
$20million divided by 70 schools is over $285k per year. If that's what they're paying janitors, no wonder they've got problems!
Now, where'd I put that mop? Time to brush up my cleanin' skills and look for houses in Oakland.
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
Others here have talked about what a rathole money has gone down to no avail in public schools. How about
1) Offering the Oakland families some "choice" like charter schools? 2) Eliminating the teachers unions which have turned the public schools into political and multicultural advocacy centers, instead of places to learn?
Slashdot "libertarians": Small government for me, big government for those I disagree with. -1, I disagree with you
Americans are paranoid nuts, and this is incurable. Spending $10B on something that fixes the problem that does not exist while at the same time making airlines seem even less secure than we thought they were - this can only happen in the US. Something tells me the "Star Wars" shit is just around the corner. $200B in military spending that can be defeated by $1M (converted to Russian roubles) in research money.
The problem with the borders is a PC issue, the same people that hate every new weapon system also don't like our previous policy of actually shooting people trying to cross the border illegally. Why do you think the Army no longer is in charge of guarding it?
"Hello, ma'am. We're from Boeing. Terribly sorry about your dog Fluffy. Our laser misfired."
Is this real, or are we being conned again?
...there is little sense of trust among people who don't know each other. Perhaps it is because China is overburdened by its population of 1.3 billion, making it impossible for people to feel responsible for everyone they see in need.
Every chyld is special. Dominate the Earth. Guh.
Have you ever dreamed of a lush planet that you could travel to somehow? With all the luxuries, except without 6 BILLION FUCKING PEOPLE
No, what you are saying is that it's not worth 20M to prevent the over 200,000 kids that will go through OPS in the next 20 years from getting a crappy education.
What you're saying is that throwing a bunch of money at a failing school system is going to magically educate 200,000 kids. Sorry, but that won't happen. Besides, all public school students are getting a crappy education. It's what you learn outside of school that determines how far you will go in life.
hah. terrorists "planning" on using misiles now?
...hah!
wtf are they gonna do? ride them in from Iran? Iraq? N. Corea?
its a shame when a country cant feed its own people,
and goes out, to stick its nose in other contries buisness.
we should stick to our own immediate needs 1st.
which includes making the quality of life a little better,
not improving the quality of "military defense"
blah. im not convinced.
i voted kerry.
and in 2008, Hillary for President, Kerry for Vice President!
Well actually that's about right for a CA school system. They'll spend 1/4 of the money on doing a study on how to best spend the money, spend an eighth on actually hiring someone, and the last quarter on how it effects their mandator test results, and the rest quarter for raises for the upper management.
Knowing the terrorists won't get past our lasers.
1000 miles is right.
Even if they do get this laser working the way it's supposed to, it will still be insanely expensive to have 747's aloft circling the "trouble areas" of the world 24/7. Due to range limitations, it might be impossible to take out a missile launched from the center of Iran or China without leaving international airspace. Also, these 747's better have some pretty good countermeasures onboard to prevent the
enemy from just shooting them down before an attack.
Anyways, even if the entire system works as advertised, a "rogue state" could still get the nuke to the U.S. using a ship, submarine, or simply stashed away in one of the million cargo containers that arrive here each day. If highly-enriched uranium is used to make the bomb (that's the route Iran is taking), a simple lead shield would make the bomb undetectable without entirely dissasembling the cargo.
For a very detailed analysis of the technical hurdles blocking the completion of a missile defense shield, check out this article.
pi = 3.141592653589793helpimtrappedinauniversefactory7
Just curious
They'll spend 1/4 of the money on doing a study on how to best spend the money, spend an eighth on actually hiring someone, and the last quarter on how it effects their mandator test results, and the rest quarter for raises for the upper management.
;)
And then lose an eighth in the accounting?
God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
What if we were to build a system, have "tests" that were passed with flying colors, then declare we had an operating missile defense system. It could deter a country like North Korea from a belligerent act, deciding we would feel free to respond without fear from a missile attack. I mean the only way to expose this thing as a fraud would be to launch a successful ballistic missile attack vs America or our allies, which would be pretty crazy even if you were 100% sure it would work.
Having read TFA, they suggest that this laser is to be used as part of a boost phase missle defense system. Not too long ago, the APS did a review of such a system, including hypothetical airplane based laser systems. The conclusions suggested the system would most likely be only partially effective (depending on the country launching, the target in question, and the type of rocket). Even when effective, such a system, "could cause live nuclear, chemical, or biological munitions to fall on populated areas short of the target, in the United States or other countries.".On the topic of airborne lasers, the executive summary says, "The Airborne Laser now under development could have some capability against liquid-propellant missiles, but it would be ineffective against solid-propellant ICBMs, which are more heat-resistant." The analysis took into account technical factors but did not even consider factors like cost.
It seems these programs are pretty foolish. Not bad for employing us physicists and engineers, but probably a waste of money. The "success" mentioned in the article seems to be that the laser fired. Apparently all that's left now is to make it fire long enough to disable a missle, design a targeting system, mount it and a suitable power source on an actual aircraft, and get it all to work together in an actual situation on an aircraft. In other words, it's no where close to working, and even when it does work odds are it probably won't be that useful (according to the APS).
Working on this sort of system might make sense if we had unlimited resources, but given that resources are quite limited this doesn't seem like a good way to spend them. As far as terrorism, missles just don't seem to be a vary likely attack methodology relative to other things, so it would make sense to spend most of this money on defenses that are likely to work against real imminant threats. That would include things like much more rigorous screening at ports and other homeland security items. Let's not forget that the guys who got the whole terrorism scare started used nothing but plane tickets and box cutters. It makes sense to defend against the other easy attack methods first. In terms of defense against other nations, the MAD doctrine seems to have been pretty effective and should continue to be as long as we have an imposing military. The money should be spent on maintaining a feasibile military threat to our likely agressors (even in the face of our obligations in Iraq) and on things that will definitely reduce threats like disarmerment and nuclear non-proliferation.
"You call it a new way of thinking; I call it regression to ignorance!" -- Operation Ivy
Other than being pissed away on Public Schools. Of course your statement is that standard inane response of someone who doesn't have a real one.
Sure it would be nice if we spent defense money elsewhere but this world is chock full of crazies who see nothing wrong with killing innocents. Some in fact think targeting innocents is far more viable.
Back to your comment. Spend the money on vouchers and let parents decide which school system or type best teaches their kids. Public Schools exist only to service the Teacher UNION and not the students. The local city here (Atlanta) is a prime example of this problem with far more admins than necessary.
We love to talk that our children our are most valuable investment but we saddle them with people protected by tenure and lawsuits. We are no longer concerned that a teacher cannot even pass the test given to the students.
That 10b will be just going down a know rat hole. Better it possibly lead to something that actually serves people.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
but to merely say the federal government shouldn't support local schools requires some sort of handwavy proof.
Umn. He's right. It's a state and local issue... Why must the feds be involved in local schools? What authority does the individual state have?
"Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge"
- Charles Darwin
about radars before you go making statements like that.
All your base are belong to Google.
The small country of botswana has successfully tested a short range missle with mirrors surrounding the entire outer shell.
One test eyewitness said it looked like a disco ball flying through the sky.
After checking expired auctions from ebay, this reporter found that indeed several hundred decommissioned , referbished, large disco balls were shipped to winning bidder, rocket_scientists@botswana.mil 3 months ago from a retired grandmother in Las Vegas, USA. She declined to comment fearing reprisals under the patriot act.
As I said above, the military doesn't have a choice, they do what the CIVILIAN ELECTED leadership in DC tells them to...
**Note I usually post crap, but usually a much higher quality level of crap than this. Usually has complete sentences and everything. Spell cheker is optional though.
...without another troll coming to his defense.
Thanks for proving the point.
-- No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats, approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less.
Protected against bird and lightning strike
Doesn't it strike you that such a design would be rendered useless if a bird smashed dead center on the window? Isn't that the way it is with America's goal of technology superior defense? It tends to be designed to defend against very high tech attacks, but is totally useless against lower tech attacks like a flock of birds, a huge amount of flying rocks, or a fog machine?
There is no sanctuary. There is no sanctuary. SHUT UP! There is no shut up. There is no shut up.
How fragile is a launch vehicle? A solid fuel rocket turns into an explosion with a perforation, we saw that in 1986. A liquid fueled rocket probably isn't much better.
There are SLBMs cruising around on patrol aboard their SSBNs right now. Those SLBMs are the real danger to a country like North Korea. Their fixed ICBMs are the target of this system, and a rich target it is, if you can hit it.
HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
Remember recently that the US airforce had made plans to arm space? If we can launch a series of defense satellites with these lasers, terrorist leaders could be hit from space, they would never come out of their holes. Also the net of satellites could be used as a shield against any asteroids headed for earth. What is worrisome is the potential for the rest of the world feeling as if being held hostage by the US. Its pretty much the same thing as that last Bond movie.
Abandon all hope ye who enter here...
Phew, this will surely keep terrorists from bringing bombs on to crowded buses.
The problem is not throwing money at the school systems. You can't expect this to work. Schools can't make up for the lack of parental guidance in kids today. You throw that same money at the parents instead of the schools and you get welfare.
However, military R&D has advanced the U.S. standard of living to what it is today. It also serves the primary purpose of the government and that is to preserve itself and enable it to protect its citizens.
The development of the Polaris submarine fired missile... a ludicrous concept at the time probably deterred an nuclear exchange and provided a critical scientific stepping stone for the entire U.S. Space program and all the technology that has stemmed from it. This technology has benefited most of the industrialized world.
Just like the previous poster, you give no proof or logic whatsoever. "Umn. He's right" doesn't get us any further than the original statement. Why is he/she right? The federal government gives money to universities, public and private, around the country. Are you seeking to stop those payments? What about the numerous less-related other subsidies and incentives, such as those for Native American whalers in Alaska, importers of chinese ceiling fans, and NASCAR track owners? The federal government recently spent a billion dollars (50 OPS bailouts worth) repairing Florida. As far as I know, hurricanes are not mentioned in the Constitution. If you are for the federal government behaving as it was intended by the Constitution in all cases, then you've got a leg to stand on. But, since you exclusively mention OPS, your comments imply ulterior motivations.
Aim it at the teachers union HQ, and anyone who opposes vouchers. That's a pretty good start right there and will have a lot more impact than sinking 20 million (or 200 million) into schools as they are.
What you fail to see is the many countries across the world that do have missle capability, next to other people they do not like. The US can help reduce tensions if they can offer some degree of protection against said missiles. Otherwise the world is going to be able to do quite a number on itself quite without any US help.
You are of course just blinded by your hatred for the US, so to that extent I guess you can be forgiven for your failure of vision.
An alien ship can land tomorrow and destroy the United States with its alien weapons of mass destruction. Now, quick, let's divert all the money there is in the economy to building an anti-alien-ship system. I bet if this was repeated on TV a hundred million times, the US populace would wholeheartedly approve gutting their own country for some paranoid's dream.
Get used to it folks, you ARE vulnerable. Some of the vulnerabilities can be fixed by careful diplomacy. Spending billions on the military will not help against ICBMs. If North Korea really decides to take out the US, they can build something more sophisticated than single-warhead ICBMs, and you won't have systems against multi-warhead ICBMs in the next 20 years at least. And by then someone will invent something else.
At the same time, we only inspect a small percentage of the 300,000+ shipping containers that enter this country every year.
Why use a missle when you could Fedex your weapon and be relatively untraceable? Aren't we missing something here?
After all, we're each much more likely to die of heart disease, be killed in a car wreck, or be murdered on the streets than be killed by terrorists or a nuclear bomb...even if we assume that 9/11/is the norm.
Well, it might not quite be able to take out a missile in boost phase yet.
But, happily, it *is* powerful enough to engrave Bono's signature on the side! The hope is that the weight of the irony having Bono's name attached to an instrument of death will weight the missile down enough to have it fall from the sky.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
If you did even the tiniest bit of research I'd give you the tiniest bit of respect, but you haven't.
"All public school students" are not getting a crappy education. There are several world-class public universities in the USA that give less than crappy educations. In the K-12 level, there are numerous school districts that consistently turn out top-notch students. Compare Bellevue, WA and Oakland, CA to see what kind of differences exist.
OPS is actually over 100M in the hole. I don't know the figures, but I'd estimate interest and principal on this could be 10M a year. For the federal government with a 1T budget this is only a few minutes worth of spending, but to take 10M per year from a local school district hampers ability to educate. 1,000 teachers in Oakland were just sent layoff notices on top of the over 300 laid off in 2002. Not all of those will go, but firing hundreds of teachers is a quick recipe to "magically" undereducate.
"The USSR is dead."
And of course, all their missiles just up and vanished, right? Lets not forget the two countries you listed are the only ones that have missiles. While we're at it, thank you for banking the security of the United States on the sanity of somebody like Kim Jong Il. Frankly you're missing the point of having defenses such as these at all. they are for the off chance that some world leader psycho does decide to play your odds and pops a missile off because they don't think we'll call their bluff. After all, that's what N. Korea is betting on. They don't think we'll do anything after telling them to halt production. It's what Saddam betted on. Frankly, I think the cost of prevention is well worth guarding against the cost of letting even one slip through.
Besides, last time I checked, we were spending money on measures besides a missile defense program. Namely the retaliation against Afganistan, premptive strike against Iraq, disarmament of Libya, and from now on, a large hammer over the heads of those who would use less conventional means against us in the middle east. money equally well spent, IMO.
You need a FREE iPod Nano
Not the sound of an ICBM, the sound of the point about the system being used for short range missles in other theaters of operation zooming right over you.
And I think a few moderators might have heard a bit of that as well.
When other countries launch SCUD type missiles, might it not be better to stop them before they land somewhere? And isn't it better the US focus some military research into things that simply prevent missles from reaching targets instead of how to blow things up a little bigger?
The fewer missiles that can hit things, the safer the whole world can be (if the US shares the tech).
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Because the need for military is a result of immaturity?
Perhaps the thought that you can do without one is a clearer sign of said condition.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Take a look at this Map
See all those color places on the map that hold US miltary bases? Now look at all the places around them that can reach by spitting.
Not to mention that a program like this is not just for the US, but for things likr protecting NATO allies.
If you start thinking globally it makes a lot more sense.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
were called "terrorists" because they went after civilian targets. Is it just me, or is the "American" English language expanding the word to apply to all enemies of the state?
.
Kind of scary that I almost read through the parent post without giving it a second thought . .
Sdelat' Ameriku velikoy Snova!
No, what you are saying is that it's not worth 20M to prevent the over 200,000 kids that will go through OPS in the next 20 years from getting a crappy education.
And what you're saying is that more federal money will magically fix the problems, which is contradicted by several decades of evidence.
How to solve most of our problems: 1.Lots of nuclear plants. 2.Cure aging.
I think that has more to do with the political party the people of DC vote for. Every election result I have seen is 90% for the dems and it has been that way as long as I know. Maybe its time for a change.
Free Unix? Free Windows. http://www.reactos.com
I live in one of the academically top school districts in my state. Tops in standardized tests, etc. For this, I am very grateful.
This district also has one of the highest property tax rates in the state, most of which goes to the schools. I pay my share of that tax.
The state, by court mandate, changed the school building finance system so that a major portion of the funds to build new schools comes from the state. Trying to equalize building funds between different districts. This increases my state taxes while saving the district some of their building expenditures.
I spend, out of my pocket, $3,000+ dollars a year for my children to participate in band, drama and other school programs. For example, you know how the band travels to play at football games at another school? The district provides school busses to take the band to the game. Do you know who pays the costs of those busses? Nope. In my district the parents of the band students pay for the busses!
I go to open houses to hear 8th grade social studies teachers ask for donations of copy paper. I buy tissues for my kids to take for general use in their classrooms. I buy snacks for a whole 2nd grade class every 28 days. My wife, as PTSO secretary of the elementary school, sat in a meeting where they used donated parent money to buy staples for the school administration office because they haven't gotten any from the district for nearly two months. The PTSO also pays for the faculty lounge water cooler. I go to school concerts to hear my kids play and hear the teachers and administrators ask for donations. My kids then come home wanting to become a sales force for the school by going door-to-door selling cookie dough and wrapping paper.
I pay all this tax money, almost the highest in the state, and they can't buy staples and paper for their teachers. Something is very wrong here! And I am sick of being told that I am supposed to give more of my money to the wasteful idiots who don't know how to manage what they already get and I am already picking up the slack out of my pocket!
Is a laser to shoot a missle down better spent on schools? Let's debate that AFTER the schools show they can get the job done without soaking the tax payers!
Reading over the comments I think I am the only person who saw the movie.
Free Unix? Free Windows. http://www.reactos.com
dirty bombs are only as dangerous as the initial explosion, the radioactivity is pathetically weak and no threat at all. The military have researched using them themselves and come to that conclusion.
Kim Jung-Il may not be very stable, but keep in mind that North Korea is a very insular country, and most of what we hear about it gets passed through the propaganda mill. Crazy leaders with nukes sell more newspapers.
Also, the United States has a history of hyping up the threats posed by other nations. The Soviet threat was exaggerated right up until their fall. And more recently, Iraq.
North Korea might have a crazy leader, but I'd say U.S. paranoia combined with it's stated "policy of pre-emption" is the greater threat to world peace.
If it shouldn't be bailing out the school system, it should stop taking the taxes that used to go to support the schools.
Fat chance.
Personally, I agree totally. The schools should be supported locally. Unfortunately the taxes that used to be spent on the schools have been hijacked by both the Feds and the state (different tax sources) on the grounds that they could "redistribute it more fairly". (I forget who I'm quoting...sorry. Rumsfield perhaps?) HAH! They took the money, and returned only a fraction of it. The result was the schools with marginal support has less than marginal support. This has been happening increasingly since the 1950's, perhaps slightly earlier, but not before 1940. Now the schools are down to being supported by property taxes, which are essentially frozen (2/3 vote required for any increase, and many people don't have kids). Every once in awhile the govt. mandates a new program, and makes a temporary grant of enough money to run a test program, but not enough money to really run it. Currently it's testing. Everybody is focused on passing multiple choice tests. Everyone. Because that's what the school budgets depend on. And they have to do better every year, or the budget is cut, but the requirement for testing doesn't get dropped. Can anyone see where this leads?
Of course, it's not really that good. Certain programs have been dropped because of the focus on testing. Like PE. Like anything that isn't on the test. Because that's what the budget depends on. So the teachers "teach to the test" regardless of what their students need. And regardless of whether their students can speak english. (I think we have 17 languages in the average school. And many of those kids ONLY speak their native language. Good luck in getting them to pass the test. But if you don't, your budget gets cut...)
Budget gets cut. Many of the schools around here run out of toilet paper partway through the year. There wasn't enough money in the budget. Teachers sometimes bring their own roll, and have the students check it out and back in.
It's no wonder to me that every person who can afford to is sending their kids to a private school. The public schools have been turned into something much worse that what caused me to hate school when I was growing up. Not that kid gangs are under control. Most parents try to keep their kids inside all the time. The streets are too dangerous.
Yes, we have a really fine government. One that's really caring and effective.
Not.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
What if you miss the target, how far will the laser go?
Can't you just divert the laser?
How much damage would it do to a human?
Can you use it from the sky on humans?
So, you are saying that current US policies are providing me with safety now that half of the muslims in the world are feeling cornered and you can find home-made terrorists on the corner of every hyperbolic street? I beg to disagree, and many with me. As you seem to like making assertions for the rest of us, let's have a global vote about this, shall we?
It's so typical: "Well, that entire religion has hated us, many people in this world hate us, but we have more and better weapons, and kick their ass any day. Bring it on!"
Surely that attitude makes me have faith in America. With the current administration being what it is, every new weapon is bad news. Every time America should say something wise, they bring on a new weapon. Bush is a toddler with a gun. And it has been proven that invasions^H^H^Hpre-emptive strikes are no problem to this administration, and lies are good enough to serve as motivation. Just tell me, what reason do I have to I trust you and consider America as an enlightened nation and not as one of those fundamentalistic blind countries with governments that like to play with weapons bigger than their brains?
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089886/
Can one airport security guard stop a Chinese ICBM from hitting Taipei?
That depends upon the muzzle velocity and targeting capability of the security guard launch system.
It won't be safe, no matter how much money you spend.
t m
Check this out: http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/icbm/r-36m.h
First of all, in the event of a massive nuclear conflict, you won't be able to shoot down all launching missiles. Second of all, once this thing separates into 10 warheads, you're lucky if you shoot down two out of 10. And guess what, you need to shut down all 10. When Russians rolled out this thing, Reagan administration pooped their pants.
So let's consider this (very possible) situation. The US starts massive development of anti-ICBM system thereby threatening the balance of power. Russians will only need about three hundred million dollars (in rouble equivalent) to re-start production of Satan rockets. Right now, Russian government doesn't give a flying fuck about the opinion of the US, they could easily do so (heck, maybe the effort is already underway).
So what do we end up with. The US is testing its anti-missile system. Russians _already_have_ missiles that fly right through it unscathed. They only need to dust off their old nuclear attack plans, and here you go, they can boil fish right in Missisipi river.
And that's something they had _back_then_. They haven't exactly spent all this time twiddling their thumbs. So if shit hits the global fan, you can expect a swift and merciless response.
5-10 years from now the Chinese, Indians, Pakis and Koreans (and possibly Iran) will have the same shit.
My point is, the only true safety measure in an environment where nuclear weapons become commodity is _diplomacy_ and _diplomacy_only_.
"While the US may not fear missiles being launched at us, we do have allies, chiefly Israel, that do..."
Ah, yes. Israel: the fifty-first State.
Mmmmmm... Bold, yet refreshing!
And no, this isn't another "Real Genius" reference (Though I was highly tempted), but this COULD be a progression towards the militaristic aspect of the set of philosophies set down by the great scientist Nikola Tesla. To have a defensive network capable of destroying a hostile target from a great distance is a fine deterrent for war, and only offensive countries would try to have anything else.
Really, think about it: If all countries had a defensive network of these, America wouldn't be so quick to bomb civilian targets...
3 degrees of separation from Vladimir Putin
PS - There was a good article in this past months Discover Magazine regarding the Missile Defense Initiative, and how low-tech solutions can beat most if not all of the US's tactics at this point.
Looks absolutely ridiculous. Smart missiles won't be able to keep a straight facing.
I know you are psychotic, but please make an effort.
But they were poorly used. The Germans were a generation out of synch - French tanks were heavier, better armed and armored...and distributed evenly among infantry units, rather than concentraited.
Oddly enough, Charles DeGaul was a pioneer in armored warfare, and the Germans learned a lot from him. The French army did not.
In the air, the Germans had quality and quantity on their side, and better doctrine.
So it wasn't really tech that separated them. Remember, much of the German army was horse-drawn throughout the war. It was mostly the application of tech. There were also issues of competence and morale and poor cooperation among allies.
Any ally of the US is an automatic 51st state. It's getting old, asshole.
But that's exactly the line of thinking that bring this world to the brink of nuclear conflict sooner or later. And once this shit hits the fan there will be no survivors, whether or not you have the anti-missile system (which you won't have, because it's 100 times easier to build a rocket defeating such a system than a system capable of shooting it down).
So my recomendation to the US would be to quit stepping onto other countries' toes and engage into a massive diplomacy effort which would either delay the proliferation of nuclear weapons (there's no stopping it), or reverse the buildup of nuclear arsenal in countries that already have NW, and at the same time put checks in place to reduce chances of extremist people becoming presidents in other countries, at least those potentially capable of producing nuclear weapons.
Need an example of when such an effort would be beneficial? Kim Jong Il is your man. Tiny, piss-poor nation which has nothing to lose. Push more nations into this state, and you'll have tens of millions of angry people wanting revenge. Continue your policy directed at disintegration of Russia, and you'll have no less than _eight_ piss poor nations on its territory and all of them will have nuclear weapons of such immense power and reach, you may never build a system to neutralize them.
When I said in five years they'll have "the shit", I meant multiple-warhead ICBMs, which can't be shot down. And they'll make them at 1/100th of the cost of the US anti-missile system.
Now, you can prevent them from making these ICBMs in the first place. But who's gonna do this in this nation of overconfident paranoids?
You guys don't have no spacecraft anymore. :0)
WWII was the worst thing to happen to the rich, powerful bastards that run things since the Black Plague. When you kill off half your workforce you've got to treat what's left pretty well. Plus there were all sorts of revolutions and power changing hands. Even if your average dumbass doesn't learn from histroy, the Dick Cheney's and Kim's of the world do. These people don't want revolutions and glorious wars, they want status quo and the power they have now.
Moreover, why the hell would you bother invading a country with troops when you can do it economically. A large part of America is owned by foreign gov'ts (especially the Saudi's I hear). When you own that much of a country, all you need to do is threaten to pull out your investments (and wreak the economy) and *bam*, you get whatever you want. Real power is telling someone what to do. How you get this power is irrelevant. Why bother with a messy, expensive war when a nice profitable economic war is so much easier?
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
From the drudge report. (cut/paste)
FORMER HEAD OF CIA'S OSAMA BIN LADEN UNIT SAYS THE QAEDA LEADER HAS SECURED RELIGIOUS APPROVAL TO USE A NUCLEAR BOMB AGAINST AMERICANS
Fri Nov 12 2004 12:02:34 ET
Osama bin Laden now has religious approval to use a nuclear device against Americans, says the former head of the CIA unit charged with tracking down the Saudi terrorist. The former agent, Michael Scheuer, speaks to Steve Kroft in his first television interview without disguise to be broadcast on 60 MINUTES Sunday, Nov. 14 (7:00-8:00 PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.
Scheuer was until recently known as the "anonymous" author of two books critical of the West's response to bin Laden and al Qaeda, the most recent of which is titled Imperial Hubris: Why the West is Losing the War on Terror. No one in the West knows more about the Qaeda leader than Scheuer, who has tracked him since the mid-1980s. The CIA allowed him to write the books provided he remain anonymous, but now is allowing him to reveal himself for the first time on Sunday's broadcast; he formally leaves the Agency today (12).
Even if bin Laden had a nuclear weapon, he probably wouldn't have used it for a lack of proper religious authority - authority he has now. "[Bin Laden] secured from a Saudi sheik...a rather long treatise on the possibility of using nuclear weapons against the Americans," says Scheuer. "[The treatise] found that he was perfectly within his rights to use them. Muslims argue that the United States is responsible for millions of dead Muslims around the world, so reciprocity would mean you could kill millions of Americans," Scheuer tells Kroft.
Scheuer says bin Laden was criticized by some Muslims for the 9/11 attack because he killed so many people without enough warning and before offering to help convert them to Islam. But now bin Laden has addressed the American people and given fair warning. "They're intention is to end the war as soon as they can and to ratchet up the pain for the Americans until we get out of their region....If they acquire the weapon, they will use it, whether it's chemical, biological or some sort of nuclear weapon," says Scheuer.
As the head of the CIA unit charged with tracking bin Laden from 1996 to 1999, Scheuer says he never had enough people to do the job right. He blames former CIA Director George Tenet. "One of the questions that should have been asked of Mr. Tenet was why were there always enough people for the public relations office, for the academic outreach office, for the diversity and multi-cultural office? All those things are admirable and necessary but none of them are protecting the American people from a foreign threat," says Scheuer.
And the threat posed by bin Laden is also underestimated, says Scheuer. "I think our leaders over the last decade have done the American people a disservice...continuing to characterize Osama bin Laden as a thug, as a gangster," he says. "Until we respect him, sir, we are going to die in numbers that are probably unnecessary, yes. He's a very, very talented man and a very worthy opponent," he tells Kroft.
Until today (12), Scheuer was a senior official in the CIA's counter terrorism unit and a special advisor to the head of the agency's bin Laden unit.
Developing...
Life is not for the lazy.
So the terrorists use planes to destroy buildings, so whos clever idea is it to equip these planes with lasers how are we going to shoot these planes down if they are hijacked by terrorists.
Boeing can now sell laser proved missiles.
Yes, the "Lazer" was invented by alan parsons, so Lets call this "the allan parsons project".
Tyler: You don't know where ive been, Lou. YOU DONT KNOW WHERE IVE BEEN!!
Any ally of the US is an automatic 51st state.
Especially France...
Money diverted from war and war research and spent on nanotech/biotech can and will bring the cures for all the diseases of aging and make it possible to slow, stop, then reverse aging...it's just that we need to convince all the warmonger types that it can be done, funny thing, when we do get close to demonstraiting age revesal in mice (in what, 6 to 8 years from now), you can be sure that the top policy warmongers world-wide will make sure that they get the benefits of this research while the average joe (who pays for all the war research), will be fed all the usual propoganda that patriotism is good for us all (this applies across the entire pollitical spectrum, just look at how many wars have been successfuly fought that way these last 100 years!!). Besides, the usefull career lifespan of engineers is what, 45 years, programmers, even less? With all the new millions of new generations of geeks (engineers, programmers, scientists) that are going to be educated in china, india, russia etc. why would you want to get old and unemployed and zapped in some future war, it would be much better to use our tallents and to not get old, that way you could have a better opportunity to get some work and not be unemployed due to your age (remeber, if you are young AND very experienced, you have a better chance of getting that job), whereas if it's like today, and your OLD and experienced, you just get fired...after all, remember, science and technology gave us the radio and TV and computer, before that, life was very different (especially for geeks, very boring), average people did not expect these breakthroughs to happen, but they did...Xerox and IBM could not see the future racing towwards them, but Apple and Bill gates did!!! We now have the specter of massivelly destructive war technologies (nano/bio/AI) headed in our direction....we can embrace them and have really cool, messy wars, or we can embrace them and have really cool nanotech anti-aging solutions with also massivelly boosted brain capcities so we can understand and do really cool nerdy things, with cheap nanotech (who need intel, grow your own nano-computer) so what's it to be?
He's a product of that system. What do you expect?
Quite a bit of the money that the Feds give universities has to do with research grants. The FL expenditure includes repairing Federal facilities and loans to inviduals/businesses affected by the disaster, a natural one that could not be avoided. Oakland's school woes are the result of their own incompetance and corruption. The current school administration should be taken out and hung from lamp posts. Apparently the local population is too stupid, lazy, drugged-up, or whatever to stand up and clean house. You want the Feds to come in and fork over a bunch of cash because the school situation? That would only encourage other districts to do that same damn thing. Let Boeing get this thing working, and then just have it circle Oakland zapping idiots in the local govt.
Because too damn many of them are brainwashed college kids that have had mommy & daddy pay for everything and have never had to work for a damn thing. Since they haven't had to work for a living and have never experience self-sufficency, it's just natural to want big Uncle Sam step up and pay for everything.
Some of the problems are of local origin and can't be fixed anywhere else:
For a couple of very informative yet entertaining rants on these subjects, I suggest that you read this regarding the former, and this regarding the latter. Then read the rest of the first site, especially some of the links.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
You can only avoid a problem via MAD if mutual destruction is unacceptable to the enemy. This is emphatically not true for some of the apocalyptic visionary nuts we're facing; Al Qaeda not only doesn't mind death for the sake of striking blows, it seems to seek it out. We certainly could incinerate Pakistan if Al Qaeda got hold of its arsenal and destroyed New York and Los Angeles, but that would be cold comfort to those New Yorkers and Angelinos fortunate enough to survive.
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
I'm feeling a Real Genius flashback...
Anyone know anyone at Boeing who has braces?
"Boeing, this is God. Stop your foolishness at once."
Where's Lazlo when you need him!!!
And what you're saying is that more federal money will magically fix the problems, which is contradicted by several decades of evidence.
No - what he's saying is that LESS federal money will make the problems worse. Which is completely different, and also self-apparent.
Of course, if you WANT India and China to overtake the US, by all means cut school funding and make it so only rich kids can get a decent education. Just don't be surprised when the underclass you create completely fails to become as productive as the well-educated and well-motivated working classes of the rapidly-developing world.
--ccm
Too much Law; not enough Order.
No mater where you go, there you are...about a block from Taco Bell.
The aims of the military setting off a dirty bomb would be very different to the aims of a terrorist. Using weak radiation against an enemy force equipped with NCB gear may not be very effective. Using such a device against a civilian population would be a different matter entirely.
flossie
Write now. Defend liberty
The military and its associated industries have a proven track record of falsifying test results of anti-missle systems. The original Patriot in Iraq I, the tests last year, and now I suspect here.
Let's look at the "evidence": An artist's conception of a plane-based laser system shooting down a missle. This is similar to the "evidence" Powell offered to the UN for Iraqi mobile bio-weapons labs. It's coming up on two years later and we still haven't seen actual pics of those.
Switzerland's defense budget in 2002 was $3.3 billion, they have 3,500 troops, and have even bought US made F/A-18 Hornets.
You do realize than there isn't a weaker or stronger between the US and the world, right ? This is more of a symbiotic relationship. if the US start destroying the weorld, their economy and own population way's of life would go the down crapper since they CANNOT sustain it without the rest of the world. The rest of the world OTOH could very well live without the US. Imagine *JUST* a second that the rest of the world would say "from now on, we , the world, boycoitt fully the US". No more oil from orient. no more primary ressource. no more China manufactured product. no more european product. Nothing. How quick do you think the US would fall ? OTOH if the US close completly its frontier to the rest of the world, sure things would go bad a few month until economical curent stabilize themselves.
And that's it. most of the world need *manufactureed* product, which the US produce less and less, whereas US main product, "services" is a luxury for the rest of the world.
"The majority of the planet is weaker than the US, dependent on the US, or desperately in need of the US for protection or stability." so much for the rebuttal of this.
As for this : "The US is significantly safer in many, many ways. However, it is clearly not secure." I will let civil libertarian judge themselves the veracity of that. I will certainly prefer be at the mercy of a few terrorist attack once a while rather than see the slow rise of a police state in my own country, but hey, it is your own country after all. If you wish we can put collar with tracking device , as well as microphone linked to a carnivore like big network system on everybody in the country, thus completly defeating forever terrorist and making US a looooot more secure.
C. Sagan : A demon haunted world:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0345409469/
visit randi.org
Liquid fueled rockets have to be topped up with volatile liquids, like liquid oxygen, shortly before launch. This is not really practical for missiles -- nuclear missiles, or bazooka shells. The very first ICBMs were liquid fueled. And the change to solid fuel was seen as a big improvement.
Umm, can't this be foiled simply by coating the missile with a reflective surface?
They could use this for assassination.
Even if the final system can't track a Mach 6 object, I'm sure it can be manually aimed at a stationary target making a speech 300km away.
Better if you can fire the laser in a nonvisible light wavelength, AND fire it so it passes close to a big thundercloud - ionizing the air and inducing a big visible lightning zap from the cloud to the target. Go look up laser induced lightning.
Then it'll look like an "Act of God" - the target apparently being killed by lightning.
Why shoot down missiles if you can shoot the person that orders them to be launched and make it look like it was a freak incident?
Potential apps? Sure, I can see plenty. In fact I wonder if assassination could actually be one of the main apps (secret of course - rather politically incorrect).
Have they even been able to display a high level of accuracy from MTHEL?
So now we can fire missles at airplanes for fun and watch the missles explode in mid-air by the laser!
Hallvar Helleseth (hallvar)
..now if Boeing can come up with an anti-inconspicuous-guy-carrying-a-bomb-laden-suitc ase-laser, I'll start feeling safe.
Oh wait, CAPPS-II and removing our shoes before boarding an airplane has already completely removed that threat.
Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage
This is a defense system that keeps quite a few people in the IT sector employed.
"Little things hitting each other. THAT'S WHAT I LIKE!" - Time Bandits
If you're worried about nukes, then focusing on the delivery mechanism doesn't seem that effective.
A "dirty bomb" just blows radioactive material in an area. This is completely different from a nuke. Just because the missle isn't 100% effective anymore does not mean that the nuke becomes ineffective.
A "dirty bomb" is not a nuke.
A "dirty bomb" is a bunch of conventional explosives and some form of radioactive material. The bomb goes off and spreads radiation in a small area.
A suitcase nuke is a small nuke. It can level a city.
A "dirty bomb" only spreads radioactive material in the immediate blast area. Then it relies upon wind to blow it further. The further it goes, the less risk there is from it. Eventually, it is only slightly higher than regular background radiation.
Also, the radioactive material after the blast is just the dust. This will be cleaned after the first rain. The rain will concentrate the dust in areas the rain normally concentrates in. The sewers or the rivers or the oceans.
Also, the radiation damage usually does not show up in people for years. Then they get cancer earlier and at a higher percentage than the rest of the population.
Dirty bombs are not really any threat to anyone. They require additional material that can be detected and they don't give much more destructive capabilities.
It doesn't cure cancer or tuck me into bed at night either... what exactly is your point? Fixing the Oakland school system won't shoot down a missle. What's the price of tea in China?
Look at North Korea. Look at Iran. Look at Pakistan's market in nuke technology.
Countries are focusing on getting nukes.
When do they stop being "exceptions" to you and become the rule?
"In fact, one of the BBs sunk at Pearl Harbor was also named USS South Dakota, a sister ship of the USS Arizona."
d r. htm#sd-cl
w wi i.htm#sd-cl
r /h istory/pearlharbor_facts.html
r ea tyi m.ht ml
Sorry, that is incorrect.
http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/battleships/
http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/battleships/us_
South Dakota
B-49 - BB 49
Laid down by New York Navy Yard 15 March 1920 . Designation BB 49 assigned 17 July 1920. Suspended 8 February 1922 when 30.5% complete; cancelled under the Washington Treaty 17 August 1922; stricken 25 October 1923, and scrapped by 15 November 1923.
http://www.hazegray.org/navhist/battleships/us_
Built by New York SB, Camden, NJ. Laid down 5 July 1939, launched 7 June 1941, commissioned 20 March 1942.
Operated in the Pacific through most of WWII, mainly in support of the fast carrier forces, and some shore bombardment duty. Sustained moderate damage in a night gun action with the Japanese battlecruiser Kirishima and escorting cruisers off Guadalcanal, 15 November 1942; overhaul and repairs at New York Navy Yard completed February 1942. Operated in the Atlantic, with the Royal Navy, February-August 1943, then returned to the Pacific. Received minor bomb damage 19 June 1944. Final light armament was 17 quad 40mm AA and 73 single 20mm AA.
Decommissioned to reserve 31 January 1947. Stricken for disposal 1 June 1962, sold 25 October 1962, and subsequently scrapped.
http://plasma.nationalgeographic.com/pearlharbo
"Don't forget that the US (and most of the armed world) was still under the Washington Treaty at that time,"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Naval_T
http://www.ibiblio.org/pha/pre-war/1922/nav_l
The treaty was voided in 1936 by Japan
Treaty Between the United States of America, the British Empire, France, Italy, and Japan, Signed at Washington, February 6, 1922
The feds run the DC school system? Interesting. I didn't know that.
Presenting a list of US military operations in various countries does not seem to fit the definition of "anecdote".Data is not information. You are presenting the data of military spending as if it were information about global beliefs. They are not the same.
The fact is, more countries are pursuing nuclear programs now. That is "data". Now, you can interpret that "data" in any way you want to. Personally, I believe it reflects an increased awareness of what needs to be done so the US will not attack your country. So, in that case, your data does not support your assumption, but the data I have does support mine.
Oakland has the power of taxation and self-governance so if Oakland A) really thinks schools are in need of improvement, B) is prepared to actually do so, and C) think that money is required, then D) it can raise the money itself and do it. Why does money have to pass through the Washington DC filter and be doled back out to fix what amounts to a local problem? (I'll give the real answer that no one in local government will utter: the feds can run deficits whereas state and local governments have to balance their books. That's why they look to Uncle Sugar for funds. That, and it's always easier to put the arm on some taxpayer in, say, Biloxi, who doesn't vote for you.)
And in fact the core technology was developed in conjunction with Israel, so rest assured they already have it. http://www.spacedaily.com/news/laser-00g.html
I liked www.imdb.com/title/tt0090056/
If terrorists highjack this plane, will it shoot itself?
terrorism -- The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological. See also antiterrorism; combatting terrorism; counterterrorism; force protection condition; terrorist; terrorist groups. (JP 3-07.2)
Bard E. O'Neil (Insurgency & Terrorism) - "Terrorism is a form of warfare in which violence is direct primarily against noncombatants (usually unarmed civilians), rather than operational military and police forces or economic assets (public or private).
[On forms of terrorism] [...] Because these acts are carried out by autonomous, nonstate actors, they have been referred to as transnational terrorism to distinguish them from similar behavior on the part of individuals or groups controlled by sovereign states (international terrorism)."
"So unmerciful is life, that everything afterwards is too late."
Ballistics, while scary, are not our biggest problem.
Neither are Oakland's schools. Hey, you were the one implying we should only fix the biggest problem.
Would scare the living shit out of most of you. Lets just say, that they are not pissing the money away, but are hoping to reduce, not eliminate the results what is believed to be a most likely turn of events in the next few years. If you are getting your information about world events and the political situation from the big mainstream media, your a fscking mushroom. (hint). The idea is to get people to be just aware enough of the "possible" problem so that they support the defense spending, while at the same time preventing widespread panic and the ensuing economic collapse just from the fear factor. If it makes any difference, I dont live in a major city anymore, and am prepared for things to heat up at some time in the future. Yes, there is some serious waste and profiteering in defense contracting. But, there is also a serious get it done aspect as well. The "cold war is over" propoganda has effetively put us in a serious "pants down" situation.
Because we all know that if Oakland suffered a catastrophic earthquake tomorrow that they would not receive Federal disaster relief. Uh huh. . . Because it's not in the Constitution. Feeding and clothing millions of displaced families who may have lost everything they own is a little different than funding public schools.
worst sig ever. . .
Lasers like this are intended to stop a small number of missiles from a rogue state like Iran or North Korea. As far as the public knows, we would still never be able to do anything against a large number of missiles like what we would have had if we had been in an all-out war with the Soviet Union. That was the whole Mutually Assured Destruction (MAD) concept of the Cold War.
Terrorists aren't going to be developing nuclear weapons. To do that, they would need fissile material. For fissile material, they would need a large scale infrastructure of mining and refining. There is more of a danger of a rogue state such as Iran or North Korea giving nuclear weapons to terrorists. Of course, the reason that they don't is because they know that if they did, we would totally destroy them. Now, if Iran were to use a nuclear weapon against Israel or if North Korea were to use a nuclear weapon against Japan or South Korea, it would cause worldwide chaos.
We do keep good relations with large sane countries, by the way.
Anyway, this is a small-scale solution. We do not have a large scale solution at all (as far as we know).
My other first post is car post.
Houses are built in unsuitable places (e.g. in Florida). Nature points out this error using hurricanes. In many cases, the people who lost everything were living in places which were known to be unsafe and yet they built/bought/rebuilt homes there. In light of this, I find this comment of yours difficult to support.
Feeding and clothing millions of displaced families who may have lost everything they own is a little different than funding public schools.
The kids in Florida whose families lost their homes are not responsible for living in an unsuitable location. The kids anywhere in the U.S. whose families live in (educationally) poor school districts are not responsible for living in an unsuitable location. In each case, however, their parents are responsible. How do you justify supporting families in one situation but not another?
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Comment removed based on user account deletion
I'm sure they can get this beam to work, but it won't be long for countries to coat their missiles with a coating that reflects the wavelength that this laser uses. That would increase the amount of time it takes to heat up the missile. Also rotating the missile will do a good job of spreading out the heating. Whereas a green missile might be destroyed in 5 seconds, a gold or silver missile might take 50 seconds, and a rotating gold or silver missile might take 3 minutes. By then the opportunity to kill the missile has passed. I think the real app for this would be an assassination beam to kill high profile targets on the ground. If you suspect that your enemy is in a car on the ground, zap him. He can't hide from a laser from above. It would also work extremely well against enemy aircraft.
Laser-triggered lightning discharge and it's done by *GASP* non-Americans! Guess we have to vaporize Malaysia as soon as their chip fabs get too old to be useful...
Mal-2
How is the Riemann zeta function like Trump rallies? Both have an endless number of trivial zeros.
Re:Any problems? (Score:0)
by Anonymous Coward on 03:34 AM November 14th, 2004 (#10811816)
Any ally of the US is an automatic 51st state. It's getting old, asshole.
------
Anyone who has to cry 'asshole' from behind the cover of Anonymous Coward is both: an Anonymous Coward and an Asshole.
I'll bet you're a damned Freeper, too.
Pfft!
Mmmmmm... Bold, yet refreshing!
Saying the Maginot line was a failure in 1940 is a vast oversimplification. Most of the French mistakes were social and tactical, not technological or even industrial. France going into World War II had more tanks, more planes, and certainly a better navy than the Germans. French equipment, on paper, was at least as advanced as their German counterparts, although Germans had radios in their tanks.
But where the Germans shined was in tactics. They concentrated their firepower at weak spots and sought to encircle armies. They attacked throught the low countries with one arm, and then, with another, smashed through with a bold drive straight to the sea, which did a few things - they captured channel ports, they cut off the British from the French, and they surrounded the French Army outside of France. So in one fell swoop they forced the British to leave France and killed the French Army. There was some final fighting by the French but they were overcome. Really, once the Panzers reached the channel ports, the war was over for the French.
German morale was high going into the battle of France. They had conquered Poland the previous year, and badly mauled the Allies in Norway not long before. On the other hand, France was filled with defeatists and morale was abyssmal.
Later in the war the allies would come to cope with German tactics. The Russians would learn to withdraw to avoid encirclement, or, use their salients as a base to attack German weak spots of their own. Americans greatly improved communications, the idea of dialing in fire missions - so the whole air and artillery could be placed at the behest of the ground units. And the Germans could never quite counter the allied round the clock strategic boming campaign.
This is my sig.
I knew they'd find a good use (generator) for my steam-enhanced nitrogen symbiotic engine. http://www.newpath4.com/icyhot7.htm . Sure would be nice if they'd shoot me some research bucks this time... Reckon I'll have to settle for being infamous. hehehehe
Looks like he'll have his five megawatts by mid-May.
Thank you!
"Creativity is allowing ones self to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep" - Scott Adams
What happens if you miss? Does the laser fry some unfortunate location on the ground, ocean, moon, someplace light years away?
Does it ozonize the atmoshpere?
Follow the news more, buddy - the rest of "us" don't need a link to big stories like this. But all the links you could want are here. Of course the White House (though not Bush personally, AFAIK) has since denied the statement was ever made. It all boils down to who you think is more of a liar - the White House Press Secretary (an ardent Bush defender) or Pat Robertson (an ardent Bush supporter).
There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion. -- Francis Bacon
A recent article in Aviation Week reported a study by a think tank that shows that this tremendously expensive project will actually be practically useless in combat, thanks to its limited range and the extreme vulnerability of a lumbering 747, which is just about the biggest target you can strap wings onto. Oh boy.