They still don't know what they're talking about..
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Space Wars
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· Score: 2
From the article:
"Method: Duplicate American space assets: surveillance, navigation, telecom, the works."
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"Downside: Cripplingly costly; Russians tried it and went broke."
Silly me. I thought it was a combination of the abject failure of the command economy model as a whole coupled with the military getting 1/3 of the Soviet budget. I guess I've been watching Commanding Heights too much lately.
"Method: Never mind fancy space assets. Obliterate Washington with a truck nuke."
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"Upside: Massively destructive, highly destabilizing. Heavy casualties among governing elite. Deadly shock to US national morale."
You know what happened to the last country who thought a single decisive blow would knock out civillian morale and their will to fight? They got two atomic bombs dropped on them.
Rule #1: Never piss off the American citizenry. Angry Americans are known for bloodthirstiness and holding grudges.
"Method: Detonate nuclear warhead in upper atmosphere, disabling spacecraft circuitry."
Popping off a nuke like that would piss off the American citizenry (see previous Rule #1). Besides, we have a communications medium that barely relies on electromagnetic broadcasts. It's called the internet.
Besides, for some reason I believe the Van Allen belt is well below most orbits. Once the noise in the belt dies down after a few hours, the satellites are still up there and the ground stations are still down here.
Oh, wait, that's right... I'm going by what has been historically documented about such an electromagnetic pulse and the author of the article is going by the pop culture definition of electromagnetic pulse...
"Method: Infest space with armed mobile nanosatellites. Sneak them up to expensive American space machines. Attach like limpets. Detonate on signal."
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"Upside: Sneaky, insidious, inscrutable."
Undetectable? How small are you intending to make these nanosatellites? NORAD can track objects smaller than an inch.
"Method: Spew sand into paths of orbiting Yankee assets, turning them into Swiss cheese."
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"Upside: Ultracheap."
Sand is cheap. Launching heavy sand into orbit is expensive. Or were you planning on using Star Trek-style transporters to get the sand up there?
"Method: Use mortars, bombs, or missiles against satellite ground stations."
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"Upside: Kills highly trained analysts, destroys specialized equipment. Bases generally easy to find, not well fortified."
What the fuck have you been smoking? "Not well fortified?" The vast majority of our groundstations were built in back when we were preparing for a nuclear war with the Soviets. Information assets like that were built in very hardened complexes, much like the Minuteman silos themselves. Take a look at NORAD.
"Method: Hide facilities underground. Scatter armadas of fakes on surface. Broadcast phony transmissions to fool spy sats. Camouflage everything."
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"Upside: Effective during wartime. Forces US to waste expensive munitions."
Three words: Ground-penetrating radar. Been in use since Vietnam. Has already trickled down into the civillian market.
Just because Wired writes an article or two about something doesn't mean they know a damned thing about what they're writing about.
Never played Risk as a child?
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Space Wars
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· Score: 2, Interesting
It seems like the author of the Wired article is another example of a pseudointellectual thinking he can play armchair general. Let's review:
In the early 1990's an air campaign against the Iraqis was very successful. The Iraqis did have a rather state-of-the-art air defense radar system but had no idea how to use it. The result was that they left their radar lit up all the time instead of keeping it off until there was nothing US planes could do to defend against them (like how the Serbians did in 1999). And this is only one example of the numerous mistakes the Iraqis made. The Iraqi's own ineptitude and lack of forethoughtdefeated them, not satellites.
In 1999 and Serbia, NATO was dropping so many munitions that we were running out of cruise missiles. But Belgrade still didn't budge. The campaign was beginning to resemble B-52 raids on North Vietnam. What stopped that conflict was a popular pro-democratic uprising. Not satellites.
Just last year we have a campaign to drive the Taliban from power in Afghanistan. We had all the pretty gun camera footage on CNN. But once again the big contributing factor to our "victory" wasn't our technological gap so much as a popular uprising. We didn't bomb the Taliban back to the Stone Age, just enough to give the Northern Alliance the upper hand. The Afghani people won that battle, not satellites.
And shooting down foreign satellites was mentioned. Anybody who actually thinks for three seconds about that idea realizes that that is a decided BAD idea. If we shoot down their satellites, they are within their rights to shoot down ours. And the US as a whole is far more dependant on satellite technology than any possible future belligerant.
Of course, we're talking about Wired magazine, so what else should I expect other than some half-wit who thinks he knows everything about everything because he made a little money off the internet?
While this is the first I've heard of such a system being used on a airplane, helicopter gunships have had look-aim systems in use for several years now. Take a look at later versions of the Apache and Super Cobra.
If he had half the political clout you claim he had we'd all have DC power outlets in our homes instead of the AC Westinghouse pushed.
Today's useless fact: When the electric chair was first developed and used, Edison pushed (successfully) to have the chair run on AC. His motive: He wanted to have AC associated with something deadly so that consumers would ask for DC instead.
I look at the headline. I look at it again. I see the word "watermark." I don't see copy-protection, I don't see crippling CD-RW or DVD+RW drives, I don't see the MPAA and RIAA going on a lawsuit spree, I just see "watermark."
A watermark is just that: A watermark. A way of determining the integrity of the watermarked object that is prohibitively difficult to duplicate. It doesn't prevent duplication per se, it just causes the ducplicate to proclaim that its a duplicate through the absence of that watermark.
Yes, there are all sorts of immoral and possibly illegal things hardware manufacturers can do by automatically scanning for watermarks, but the watermark itself is pretty much morally neutral. In fact, I can think of many good things that can be done with such a tool. If the RIAA ever got their thumbs out of their asses and realized they should be selling media instead of mediums, a watermark would give those consumers that care about such things a way of finding out if what they have is genuine.
Quite a few statements sound pretty bass-ackwards to me.
"Six months ago, most Americans were stunned to discover how differently others in the world regard us from the way we see ourselves."
Then why is it that not even minutes after the second plane hit most Americans assumed it was the work of Arab Muslim extremists in general and Osama bin Laden in particular? Sorry, the only surprise there was that they had the resources.
(Thankfully our good neighbors the Russians are on the verge of fixing these problems by becoming the world's number one oil exporter...)
Ask the average American what the rest of the world thinks of their country and the vast majority will answer with a resounding "They hate us." In fact, this sentiment is so strong that it has caused problems with the many people that actually like us.
"Invasive American culture -- from movies, music, fast-food -- have highlighted political and religious differences, from Europe to the Middle East and South Asia."
"Invasive?" Most of our cultural icons could care less about sales outside of the United States. There's more money to be made domestically with our high per-capita GDP than there is out in the Middle East or southeast Asia or sub-Saharan Africa. The Soviet Union collapsed because the average Soviet citizen wanted a pair of Levi's, not because we were air-dropping Levi's over Moscow.
"We seem to be running away from the world, and much of the world hates us for it."
By whose assessment? For the last half-century the word that most often appears in anti-American rhetoric is "imperialist." The United States hasn't had a decidedly isolationist foreign policy since the Hoover administration. Heck, we're even trying to get ourselves a bigger role in the EU.
The shear fact that we literally have troops stationed all around the word puts the lie to your statement.
"Such forces make America not only the world's leading superpower, but probably its most feared and hated nation."
How would closing our borders make us the most feared and hated nation? Oh, that's right, we HAVEN'T closed our borders (unlike many European nations)...
Oh, by the way, we're not the leading superpower, we're the only one.
"International capital movement accelerated in the early 1980s under Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and financial markets became truly global only in the early 1990s, Soros says, after the collapse of the Soviet empire."
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"That period also happens to coincide with the most explosive growth of the Net and the Web"
*cough cough* What?!? In the late 1980's and early 1990's, nobody knew that there WAS an internet, and the World Wide Web was literally in its infancy in the early 1990's. It wasn't until 1995 or so that things started to really catch on. Revisionist history, anyone?
"It's no accident that nations who can't or won't are also incubators for political discontent and terrorism."
Money makes the world go 'round, huh?
No, the main factor in breeding terrorism isn't a nation's wealth but the distribution of that wealth. The Middle East and most of the Muslim world has class stratifications so sharp that they make the United States look like Marx's communist utopia. Capital from the oil industry, for example, isn't seen by the average Saudi on the streets of Ryadh. It's all hoarded by a select few families. Families like the bin Laden clan. Osama bin Laden has been very successful not because his original home of Saudi Arabia is poor, but because of the stark difference between his personal wealth and the destitution of the average Arab (a destitution that is conveniently blamed on the United States). Osama bin Laden can then afford the people as well as the equipment.
"Since capital can move anywhere in seconds, any nation-state's ability to exercise control over an economy has been radically undermined."
Many years ago there was a similar "new world order" coming to power. Economies had becomed so intermingled and interdependant that it seemed that there was a lasting peace on the horizon. What two major economic powers would go to war with each other when their livelihoods depended so much on one another?
You know what happened then? Archduke Ferdinand of the Austo-Hungarian Empire was shot in Sarajevo, the first of several million people to die in the Great War.
And here we are, once again at the dawn of a new century, supposedly on the verge of lasting world peace through economics. But I suppose you're arguning that this time is different, right?
"This was a huge club the British held over the Chinese government during negotiations over the transfer of Hong Kong."
I believe the British had used a similar club when they enforced their ownership of Hong Kong to begin with. Another possible example of history repeating?
"So, exuberantly costumed demonstrations aside, globalism is not about to evaporate or even weaken, not any time soon."
HAH! HAH! And again HAH! Have you taken even a cursory look at the state of national economies outside of the United States? Japan is facing an economic meltdown of Soviet proportions, dragging most of east and southeast Asia along with it. Rioting in the streets of Argentina that seems ready to set South American markets ablaze (and pretty much snuffing out hope for FTAA). The EU is held together by a few thin strands, and they're being tested as former communist states enter it. Even the decade's big success story China has seen its unemployment skyrocket along with its GDP. About the only reason the people who are doing alright are as well off as they are is the strength of the economy of the world's biggest importer. Nobody wants to get involved in an economic scene like that.
If you had said regionalism (ala the EU, NAFTA, etc.) I might have agreed with you. But globalism? Definately not this century, and the next isn't looking to good either.
As soon as I saw the subject line I knew there'd be a boatload of posts from all the pseudointellectuals about the end of the world and nuclear armageddeon and all that. Your typical knee-jerk reaction.
When all is said and done a nuclear bomb is one thing: a powerful explosive. A device that can generate more thermal energy than any conceivable chemical reaction. No more, no less. The typcal anti-nuke person feels the way they do because a nuke in their mind represents both the ability to destroy a city as well as a device primarily used against civillians.
First off, I hate to break it to you but we've had the ability to wipe out a city for a very long time now. Ask the Romans about Carthage sometime. All technology has allowed us to do is accomplish that goal more easily. Examples range from Moscow to Atlanta to Dresden. Eliminating nuclear weapons from the equation doesn't make that capability go away, it just makes it slightly more difficult (fuel-air explosives, anyone?)
And then there's the persistant vision haunting everyone's nightmares since 1945: using nuclear weapons against civillian targets. Sorry, but if your goal is to go after civillian targets there are weapons far more effective (and more terrifying) to use against a civillian population than nukes. Both chemical and biological weapons are very efficient at wiping out large numbers of civillians (moreso than nukes) and have the added advantage of leaving industrial infrastructure virtually unscathed. In fact, of the three accepted classifications of "weapons of mass destruction," the only one that has real uses that don't violate the Geneva Conventions are nukes. Chemical and biological agents are all but useless against a well-trained and well-equipped military force. Heck, I'm willing to bet the only reason nuclear weapons get more bad publicity than chemical and biological weapons put together is the fact that they're so shiny and visible and scary-looking compared to an invisible killer.
Not that any of the above matters because what we're talking about is developing nuclear explosives that are tactically useful rather than stratiegicly. Low- and sub-kiloton explosives that are small enough to have their uses on a battlefield. In such a situation having a device with a blast radius that large is more damaging to your own forces almost as much as those of your target's. The main focus of weapons design (ANY weapon) for the past few decades has been on weapons that are capable of putting a lot of hurt in as small an area as possible, the so-called surgical strike. Take a look at what India and Pakistan are doing with their weapons development. They're so focused on developing tactical nuclear explosives that they couldn't care less about developing thermonuclear devices. Both of them have tested devices with below-kiloton blast yields with virtually no fallout.
And speaking of fallout, fallout is both a tactical hinderance and a sign of inefficiency in the explosive. Unlike the "dirty bombs" the media is currently panicking over ("radiological" as opposed to "nuclear," if you will), those that are developing and those that are asking for tactical nuclear weapons want as little fallout as possible, preferably none. As it stands now, if a tactical nuke was used to open a hole in an enemy's defensive line, the only forces that could best exploit that hole are MBTs, and sending in tanks without infantry support can get quite ugly. Tacticians want something they can use against a designated target and still be able to capture that target with no ill effects.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't automatically mean ICBMs. A Minuteman III is just as able to carry mustard gas as well as it carries a thermonuclear warhead.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't automatically mean megaton-sized explosions capable of wiping out a city. We're probably nearing the point where we'll be able to use a kinetic-kill weapon to do the same thing.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't always mean the end of the world. Stratiegic weapons are all but useless in a tactical situation, but even if they weren't it IS possible to use just one and not unload the whole arsenal.
The only thing, the ONLY thing that "nuclear weapons" always means is "explosive devices based on fissioning atomic nuclei." Just as "gun" could mean anything from a pistol to Jules Verne's Columbiad, a hollow Californium bullet is just as much a nuclear weapon as Fat Man.
Hell, at this point I wish we'd start using some tactical nukes here and there just to stop the damned knee-jerk reaction everybody has to the word "nuclear." Maybe then we could actually focus on some real problems, like the willingness to wipe out civillian populations to begin with. Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Amin and Milosevic did just fine without nukes, or hadn't you noticed?
Moderators: Go on, I've got the karma to burn. Make my day.
"hum, from what i've seen yet atomic bombs give away their force to the sides and upwards!?"
1.) Shockwave and other properties brought about from popping off an explosive in a fluid do tend to travel upwards (basic fluid mechanics/thermodynamics). Other effects like the actual blast and the EM flash (which includes radiated heat) are medium independent and are spherical. This is why an air burst does more damage than a ground burst.
2.) A nuke-pumped x-ray laser puts a metric fuckload of energy in any damned direction you please.
"This is just an additional development showing China's growing strength."
Economically? Perhaps. But keep in mind that we now live in a world where even India can launch geosynchronus satellites.
Militarily? HELL no. The People's Army is a joke and will continue to be so for the forseeable future (read "the 21st Century"). Non-Western cultures have historically had great difficulty adapting to both Western military doctrine and Western military technology (Japan is a bit of the exception that proves the rule). Their class structure (political, cultural or economic differences) is just too rigid. Combine that with the regime's historic fear of the military (officers are promoted based on loyalty more than military prowess) and you end up with a China that is lucky to have the title "regional power."
"It's economy... is the second largest in the world"
But its economy is based on manufacturing and industry, goods instead of services. China's economy relies on being able to find someone with enough money to buy their manufactured goods. The Chinese people can't do that now and won't be able to do that for a long time. If you want to find a large number of people who have the money to afford these goods, you're pretty much stuck with selling mostly to the US. The Chinese economy relies much more on the US economy than vice versa.
China has supplanted Japan as the #2 economy in the world. When the Japanese economy took a nose dive about a decade ago, east Asian markets suffered as well as a result. When the US economy sunk recently, the whole world felt the impact.
"We simply won't be able to compete in a full-out space race, on a dollar-per-dollar basis."
Yes, we will, and quite easily at that. The Shenzhou capsule and the Long March II F that launched it are based on the Soviet Soyuz capsule and Vostok booster. 1960's technology. Even with the help of Rosaviakosmos, it will take a lot of time and a lot of money for China to play catch-up with our spaceflight infrastructure, all the while we'll be advancing ours even further. The US has a 40 year head start.
And on top of that don't forget that we have the added advantage of having a Western culture to use these technologies.
"Another possibility is that the US will forge closer ties with other nations -- in North America, Europe, and elsewhere, so that our economy will be able to compete with those of China, India, and Russia,"
Again: A manufacturing-based economy neeeds a services-based economy in order to survive. If you have a car factory that makes $40,000 cars you still won't make any money if nobody can afford a $40,000 car.
India is making the transition into a service-based economy. They have some real innovators over there taking advantage of the largest English-speaking population in the world. But they still have that nasty caste system to deal with. Their economic growth may not be as fast as China's, but it will take them to a more secure conclusion.
Russia has two advantages going for it: an existing high-tech base (but they have some catching up to do in the consumer goods area) and a metric fuckload of oil (they're poised to beat out Saudi Arabia as #1 oil exporter). Couple that second one with a Western-esque culture and the currently warm political climate between them and the US and before too long you'll end up with Russia and the US locked together in a mutual admiration club. Baring a major political upheaval, Russia and the US are destined to work with each other far more than they work against each other. Visualize American oil companies buying Russian oil while those Russian oil employees buy shiny new Maytag washers and dryers.
"Lastly, we may indeed be relegated to second (or lower) place on the world's stage, in space and other fields."
While they may be catching up to us economically, it will be a long time indeed before anybody (especially China) has the wherewithall to compete with the US militarily, technologically or even politically.
"Face it, the only reason for a country to do manned space flight is to prove to the world that it has the expertise to deploy a credible ICBM force."
No, this is the 21st century. Ballistic flight paths are far easier (both in terms of horsepower and mathematics) than figuring out how to both orbit and deorbit something. Compare the Minuteman III to the Titan IV or even the old Atlas boosters some time. Being able to put a person into space tells others not that you have a credible ICBM force but that you're a credible competitor in the lucrative satellite launch market.
Pyongyang sending ballistic missile tests arcing over Japan is an example of nuclear saber-rattling. Dehli putting something into geosynchronus orbit is a commercial for Indian spaceflight. The PRC looking to put a person in orbit is an example of the second (while missile drills on the coast of the Straits of Taiwan are the first).
Besides, China really doesn't have a credible ICBM force. MRBMs, yes, but they only have a dozen or two nuclear missiles that could reach California, and even that's a stretch. And their submarine force could be found with a Geiger counter. The PRC would be hard pressed to match the ICBM force of France or the UK, let alone those of Russia or the US...
"Now it's China's turn to fly some astronauts so we will ph34r their 1337 missile skillz."
That's the LAST thing they want to say with their manned space program. The PRC is well aware that the People's Army is no match for even the forces of Taiwan. The reason Beijing is so interested in playing little diplomatic games like releasing reports on US human rights abuses and crying out against US hegemony is because that's the only option open to them for competing against the US.
"I expect that they will use the US antimissile project as an excuse to seriously increase their ICBM force above the current token levels,"
They have two mutually-exclusive choices:
1.) Develop ICBM technology to try to engage in a nuclear arms race they lost 40 years before they started.
2.) Democratize and develop their economy.
Beijing can't afford both. Option 2 potentially gives them the ability to try out option 1 (why they would I have no idea) a few decades down the line, but option 1 gives you a civil war within a decade as the people become more and more dissatisfied with their pathetic economy.
"so this manned space program fits in nicely."
If anything, the manned space program fits in nicely with option 2 above. It's something shiney to distract the Chinese people and give them a sense of hope for the Middle Kingdom's place in the world as their unemployment figures continue to rise (as they have been doing for the past year or so) as the economy shifts towards capitalism.
"We should use all of NASA's current budget to send much more frequent and capable unmanned missions to other planets."
Um... if we don't spend money on manned spaceflight now, when do we? The major goal of all interplanetary exploration is to look for new real estate.
... that simple ballistics is one of the few instincts we humans are born with (such as holding our breath when under water), an innate ability to judge an object's motion in free-fall. Something that came in handy when we were jumping from branch to branch or throwing stuff at predators. Something akin to the way cats can always land on their feet.
Of course, I'm not a biologist so I could be wrong...
"2) This "space program" is a thinly-disguised ruse. China is trying to maneuver itself into a two-front cold war, for many reasons, not the least of which is Taiwan.
No, that's the last thing they want. As it stands now the People's Army would have their heads handed to them by Taiwanese forces even without US intervention. Such is the price of not being able to trust your military.
On top of that all of their economic reforms are very expensive both in terms of money and public morale. They simply couldn't afford a nuclear arsenal much bigger than their current (paltry) stockpile, let alone something that could match the US arsenal (with our without the warheads we're putting into storage).
While China does need some sort of rivalry with the US in order to give itself a sense of purpose and importance, they have to make sure to do it in a way that that doesn't piss us off too much. Look at how quiet they've gotten suddenly after our newly declared war on terrorism.
"(a) no one has ever seen a phase change in the fabric of spacetime (I'm not sure the concept even makes sense, personally)."
I'm just an undergrad so I could be way off the mark, but it's been my understanding that it's been more or less accepted that space-time went through at least one of those phase changes as it cooled after the Big Bang.
A consistant software environment between Windows and Linux? Hey, sure, whatever. Sounds like a good idea. But on consoles? Not just no but HELL no! The people who think this is a good idea are the same people that can't understand why people buy consoles instead of PCs to begin with.
When all is said and done consoles are popular because they provide a consistant gaming experience. A game developed for GameCube (for example) will run on my GameCube exactly the same way it does on my neighbor's GameCube, and they both run the same way as the GameCube down the street. I know I can go out and get a copy of Super Smash Bros. Melee, put the disk in, turn on the console and start playing. I don't need to study the fine print to find the hardware requirements as that's all taken care of by one word on the front: GameCube. I don't need to wait for the game to figure out what hardware I have because the publishers already know exactly what I have. This can only happen when the hardware is proprietary and consistant among all users.
When the hardware becomes a commodity (as it is with PCs), you no longer have that consistancy. My copy of Half Life runs differently on my computer than my neighbors computer (which has a little more RAM), and we're both different from the experience the computer down the street (with a different video board) has. I can't just walk into Best Buy, grab a copy and walk out. Instead I have to study the minimum and reccomended hardware requirements and wonder where exactly my computer fits into all that.
But even more damning is the effect that commodity hardware has on game publishing. Time and time again programmers have shown that if you give an inch they take a mile. Many (if not most) software (especially games) are designed to look best on hardwre that was released last week, and if you don't have that hardware you're up a creek. A PC bought this year will just barely be able to play games released next year and won't be able to play games two years down the road. And most of that bloat is extraneous crap, insignifigant improvements picture or sound to the point that most of the games on the market today are aimed to sell based on the Ferret Effect ("Ooh! Shiney!").
If you commoditize console hardware you'll end up with a market that looks just like the PC game market. Instead of games being written for a console they're instead written for an ideal hardware platform. Suddenly you'll need to know quite a bit more about your hardware than just the manufacturer. A console on the market today will be obsolute in a year instead of 5-7. And console prices will jump up to damn near double their current prices as hardware manufacturers no longer have 5-7 years to recoup losses from low release prices. More and more game publishers will aim for the quick buck generated by tweaking the polygon count instead of focusing on outdated things like "plot" and "playability."
Replayability? Why bother to include that in a game? As time passes and your hardware improves, you'll be less and less able to play older games anyway. Try playing MechWarrior on a PC capable of playing MechWarrior 4. WarCraft on a PC capable of playing WarCraft III. Your old hardware could play them fine, but why would you hang on to it since the new hardware will play the old stuff anyway? Besides, you had to sell it to afford the new console...
Suddenly the console market falls through the floor as gamers decide that with all this fustration they may as well use their PC instead. Many others blow the dust off their old consoles as they long for the days of just having to push the power button to play a game. Besides, those games are from a day when games were meant to be replayed.
Making the console market a commodity will take away all the reasons the console market has been successful to begin with. Unlike PCs they're easy to use, consistant, relatively inexpensive and won't be obsolete for at least half a decade. And no one company has a monopoly on the software environment.
"what games actually use 100% of the hardware they are running on?"
When you're talking console games, quite a few. Especially as you near the end of the life cycle. This is one of the big differences between consoles and PCs.
PCs suffer from a vicious bloatware cycle, where hardware performance increases one week and software size increases the next (compare the latest version of MS Word to an old copy of WordPerfect 5). These increases constantly feed each other so that it's rare to find a PC fully utilized by a program.
Consoles on the other hand have their hardwares' lives artificially extended by their manufacturers, mostly by their proprietary hardware formats. Software publishers can't go all out as they can on the PCs because the consoles' hardware imposes a limit that will be around for 5-7 years.
As the life cycle of a console reaches its end, publishers are quite close to the limits imposed by the hardware and are usually looking for tiny little ways to tweak their software to get just a little more performance out. Compare Final Fantasy VII to Final Fantasy IX. Super Mario 64 to Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Heck, at times it can be difficult to believe that Super Mario Bros. 1 and 3 are both for the same system.
Christmas is almost upon us (never too early to start the advertising blitz) and it's time to figure out what kind of totally useless gimick those people with $50,000 burning a hole in their pocket (don't we all?) can get their kids for Christmas. Now, do they get a 2' tall robot, or ten Segways?
"China, North Korea and Russia would become loose cannons in a new, unbalanced (3-to-1) cold war which could quickly turn hot, possibly even as a matter of course."
Russians tend to dislike China more than we do. North Korea is starving its own people and still doesn't have much money to spend on the military. China has too much money tied up in bettering their economy to spend it on missiles.
And when all is said and done, Russia and the US are apparently headed towards forming a mutual admiration club, especially since Russia will soon be the world's biggest oil producer by far.
"The US's refusal to see beyond its own commercial/political interests and become a true citizen of the world comes back to haunt it in a thousand different ways."
Name one country whose international policy isn't driven by self-interest. Or can't you?
"so that we are no longer hated,"
You can't please all of the people all of the time. Especially when they number 6 billion.
"and thus we no longer need vast mililtary capabilities."
We don't need our "vast military capabilities" now. Putting our Fifth and Seventh Fleets out in the Indian Ocean doens't help defend North America in the least.
But do you realize how many countries would bitch and moan if we pulled our troops out of their country? Japan for starters would actually have to have their own military with the PRC looking at them from across the Sea of Japan. The Indian Ocean (including the Persian Gulf) would be a haven for piracy until/unless Inida actually spent money on its own navy. South Korea may not be very happy with us right now, but imagine how they'd react when we stop defending their northern border. Hell, even Saudi Arabia would be very unhappy to see a complete US pull-out.
Slashdot Mirror
From the article:
"Method: Duplicate American space assets: surveillance, navigation, telecom, the works."
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"Downside: Cripplingly costly; Russians tried it and went broke."
Silly me. I thought it was a combination of the abject failure of the command economy model as a whole coupled with the military getting 1/3 of the Soviet budget. I guess I've been watching Commanding Heights too much lately.
"Method: Never mind fancy space assets. Obliterate Washington with a truck nuke."
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"Upside: Massively destructive, highly destabilizing. Heavy casualties among governing elite. Deadly shock to US national morale."
You know what happened to the last country who thought a single decisive blow would knock out civillian morale and their will to fight? They got two atomic bombs dropped on them.
Rule #1: Never piss off the American citizenry. Angry Americans are known for bloodthirstiness and holding grudges.
"Method: Detonate nuclear warhead in upper atmosphere, disabling spacecraft circuitry."
Popping off a nuke like that would piss off the American citizenry (see previous Rule #1). Besides, we have a communications medium that barely relies on electromagnetic broadcasts. It's called the internet.
Besides, for some reason I believe the Van Allen belt is well below most orbits. Once the noise in the belt dies down after a few hours, the satellites are still up there and the ground stations are still down here.
Oh, wait, that's right... I'm going by what has been historically documented about such an electromagnetic pulse and the author of the article is going by the pop culture definition of electromagnetic pulse...
"Method: Infest space with armed mobile nanosatellites. Sneak them up to expensive American space machines. Attach like limpets. Detonate on signal."
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"Upside: Sneaky, insidious, inscrutable."
Undetectable? How small are you intending to make these nanosatellites? NORAD can track objects smaller than an inch.
"Method: Spew sand into paths of orbiting Yankee assets, turning them into Swiss cheese."
...
"Upside: Ultracheap."
Sand is cheap. Launching heavy sand into orbit is expensive. Or were you planning on using Star Trek-style transporters to get the sand up there?
"Method: Use mortars, bombs, or missiles against satellite ground stations."
...
"Upside: Kills highly trained analysts, destroys specialized equipment. Bases generally easy to find, not well fortified."
What the fuck have you been smoking? "Not well fortified?" The vast majority of our groundstations were built in back when we were preparing for a nuclear war with the Soviets. Information assets like that were built in very hardened complexes, much like the Minuteman silos themselves. Take a look at NORAD.
"Method: Hide facilities underground. Scatter armadas of fakes on surface. Broadcast phony transmissions to fool spy sats. Camouflage everything."
...
"Upside: Effective during wartime. Forces US to waste expensive munitions."
Three words: Ground-penetrating radar. Been in use since Vietnam. Has already trickled down into the civillian market.
Just because Wired writes an article or two about something doesn't mean they know a damned thing about what they're writing about.
It seems like the author of the Wired article is another example of a pseudointellectual thinking he can play armchair general. Let's review:
In the early 1990's an air campaign against the Iraqis was very successful. The Iraqis did have a rather state-of-the-art air defense radar system but had no idea how to use it. The result was that they left their radar lit up all the time instead of keeping it off until there was nothing US planes could do to defend against them (like how the Serbians did in 1999). And this is only one example of the numerous mistakes the Iraqis made. The Iraqi's own ineptitude and lack of forethoughtdefeated them, not satellites.
In 1999 and Serbia, NATO was dropping so many munitions that we were running out of cruise missiles. But Belgrade still didn't budge. The campaign was beginning to resemble B-52 raids on North Vietnam. What stopped that conflict was a popular pro-democratic uprising. Not satellites.
Just last year we have a campaign to drive the Taliban from power in Afghanistan. We had all the pretty gun camera footage on CNN. But once again the big contributing factor to our "victory" wasn't our technological gap so much as a popular uprising. We didn't bomb the Taliban back to the Stone Age, just enough to give the Northern Alliance the upper hand. The Afghani people won that battle, not satellites.
And shooting down foreign satellites was mentioned. Anybody who actually thinks for three seconds about that idea realizes that that is a decided BAD idea. If we shoot down their satellites, they are within their rights to shoot down ours. And the US as a whole is far more dependant on satellite technology than any possible future belligerant.
Of course, we're talking about Wired magazine, so what else should I expect other than some half-wit who thinks he knows everything about everything because he made a little money off the internet?
While this is the first I've heard of such a system being used on a airplane, helicopter gunships have had look-aim systems in use for several years now. Take a look at later versions of the Apache and Super Cobra.
One simple word: pillbox. Chews Tanyas up to shreds and keeps looking for more.
"In fact, few people today have ever heard of the guy. Good old Tommy Edison made sure of that."
:)
I've heard of Tesla plenty of times. I continually had to deal with his invention in C&C: Red Alert.
If he had half the political clout you claim he had we'd all have DC power outlets in our homes instead of the AC Westinghouse pushed.
Today's useless fact: When the electric chair was first developed and used, Edison pushed (successfully) to have the chair run on AC. His motive: He wanted to have AC associated with something deadly so that consumers would ask for DC instead.
I look at the headline. I look at it again. I see the word "watermark." I don't see copy-protection, I don't see crippling CD-RW or DVD+RW drives, I don't see the MPAA and RIAA going on a lawsuit spree, I just see "watermark."
A watermark is just that: A watermark. A way of determining the integrity of the watermarked object that is prohibitively difficult to duplicate. It doesn't prevent duplication per se, it just causes the ducplicate to proclaim that its a duplicate through the absence of that watermark.
Yes, there are all sorts of immoral and possibly illegal things hardware manufacturers can do by automatically scanning for watermarks, but the watermark itself is pretty much morally neutral. In fact, I can think of many good things that can be done with such a tool. If the RIAA ever got their thumbs out of their asses and realized they should be selling media instead of mediums, a watermark would give those consumers that care about such things a way of finding out if what they have is genuine.
Quite a few statements sound pretty bass-ackwards to me.
"Six months ago, most Americans were stunned to discover how differently others in the world regard us from the way we see ourselves."
Then why is it that not even minutes after the second plane hit most Americans assumed it was the work of Arab Muslim extremists in general and Osama bin Laden in particular? Sorry, the only surprise there was that they had the resources.
(Thankfully our good neighbors the Russians are on the verge of fixing these problems by becoming the world's number one oil exporter...)
Ask the average American what the rest of the world thinks of their country and the vast majority will answer with a resounding "They hate us." In fact, this sentiment is so strong that it has caused problems with the many people that actually like us.
"Invasive American culture -- from movies, music, fast-food -- have highlighted political and religious differences, from Europe to the Middle East and South Asia."
"Invasive?" Most of our cultural icons could care less about sales outside of the United States. There's more money to be made domestically with our high per-capita GDP than there is out in the Middle East or southeast Asia or sub-Saharan Africa. The Soviet Union collapsed because the average Soviet citizen wanted a pair of Levi's, not because we were air-dropping Levi's over Moscow.
"We seem to be running away from the world, and much of the world hates us for it."
By whose assessment? For the last half-century the word that most often appears in anti-American rhetoric is "imperialist." The United States hasn't had a decidedly isolationist foreign policy since the Hoover administration. Heck, we're even trying to get ourselves a bigger role in the EU.
The shear fact that we literally have troops stationed all around the word puts the lie to your statement.
"Such forces make America not only the world's leading superpower, but probably its most feared and hated nation."
How would closing our borders make us the most feared and hated nation? Oh, that's right, we HAVEN'T closed our borders (unlike many European nations)...
Oh, by the way, we're not the leading superpower, we're the only one.
"International capital movement accelerated in the early 1980s under Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, and financial markets became truly global only in the early 1990s, Soros says, after the collapse of the Soviet empire."
...
"That period also happens to coincide with the most explosive growth of the Net and the Web"
*cough cough* What?!? In the late 1980's and early 1990's, nobody knew that there WAS an internet, and the World Wide Web was literally in its infancy in the early 1990's. It wasn't until 1995 or so that things started to really catch on. Revisionist history, anyone?
"It's no accident that nations who can't or won't are also incubators for political discontent and terrorism."
Money makes the world go 'round, huh?
No, the main factor in breeding terrorism isn't a nation's wealth but the distribution of that wealth. The Middle East and most of the Muslim world has class stratifications so sharp that they make the United States look like Marx's communist utopia. Capital from the oil industry, for example, isn't seen by the average Saudi on the streets of Ryadh. It's all hoarded by a select few families. Families like the bin Laden clan. Osama bin Laden has been very successful not because his original home of Saudi Arabia is poor, but because of the stark difference between his personal wealth and the destitution of the average Arab (a destitution that is conveniently blamed on the United States). Osama bin Laden can then afford the people as well as the equipment.
"Since capital can move anywhere in seconds, any nation-state's ability to exercise control over an economy has been radically undermined."
Many years ago there was a similar "new world order" coming to power. Economies had becomed so intermingled and interdependant that it seemed that there was a lasting peace on the horizon. What two major economic powers would go to war with each other when their livelihoods depended so much on one another?
You know what happened then? Archduke Ferdinand of the Austo-Hungarian Empire was shot in Sarajevo, the first of several million people to die in the Great War.
And here we are, once again at the dawn of a new century, supposedly on the verge of lasting world peace through economics. But I suppose you're arguning that this time is different, right?
"This was a huge club the British held over the Chinese government during negotiations over the transfer of Hong Kong."
I believe the British had used a similar club when they enforced their ownership of Hong Kong to begin with. Another possible example of history repeating?
"So, exuberantly costumed demonstrations aside, globalism is not about to evaporate or even weaken, not any time soon."
HAH! HAH! And again HAH! Have you taken even a cursory look at the state of national economies outside of the United States? Japan is facing an economic meltdown of Soviet proportions, dragging most of east and southeast Asia along with it. Rioting in the streets of Argentina that seems ready to set South American markets ablaze (and pretty much snuffing out hope for FTAA). The EU is held together by a few thin strands, and they're being tested as former communist states enter it. Even the decade's big success story China has seen its unemployment skyrocket along with its GDP. About the only reason the people who are doing alright are as well off as they are is the strength of the economy of the world's biggest importer. Nobody wants to get involved in an economic scene like that.
If you had said regionalism (ala the EU, NAFTA, etc.) I might have agreed with you. But globalism? Definately not this century, and the next isn't looking to good either.
I'm tempted to keep the settings as they are. A while ago I set my mailing address to:
1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
Washington, DC 20500-0001
At any rate I'm noticing the site is running a tad sluggishly. Have we slashdotted Yahoo?
As soon as I saw the subject line I knew there'd be a boatload of posts from all the pseudointellectuals about the end of the world and nuclear armageddeon and all that. Your typical knee-jerk reaction.
When all is said and done a nuclear bomb is one thing: a powerful explosive. A device that can generate more thermal energy than any conceivable chemical reaction. No more, no less. The typcal anti-nuke person feels the way they do because a nuke in their mind represents both the ability to destroy a city as well as a device primarily used against civillians.
First off, I hate to break it to you but we've had the ability to wipe out a city for a very long time now. Ask the Romans about Carthage sometime. All technology has allowed us to do is accomplish that goal more easily. Examples range from Moscow to Atlanta to Dresden. Eliminating nuclear weapons from the equation doesn't make that capability go away, it just makes it slightly more difficult (fuel-air explosives, anyone?)
And then there's the persistant vision haunting everyone's nightmares since 1945: using nuclear weapons against civillian targets. Sorry, but if your goal is to go after civillian targets there are weapons far more effective (and more terrifying) to use against a civillian population than nukes. Both chemical and biological weapons are very efficient at wiping out large numbers of civillians (moreso than nukes) and have the added advantage of leaving industrial infrastructure virtually unscathed. In fact, of the three accepted classifications of "weapons of mass destruction," the only one that has real uses that don't violate the Geneva Conventions are nukes. Chemical and biological agents are all but useless against a well-trained and well-equipped military force. Heck, I'm willing to bet the only reason nuclear weapons get more bad publicity than chemical and biological weapons put together is the fact that they're so shiny and visible and scary-looking compared to an invisible killer.
Not that any of the above matters because what we're talking about is developing nuclear explosives that are tactically useful rather than stratiegicly. Low- and sub-kiloton explosives that are small enough to have their uses on a battlefield. In such a situation having a device with a blast radius that large is more damaging to your own forces almost as much as those of your target's. The main focus of weapons design (ANY weapon) for the past few decades has been on weapons that are capable of putting a lot of hurt in as small an area as possible, the so-called surgical strike. Take a look at what India and Pakistan are doing with their weapons development. They're so focused on developing tactical nuclear explosives that they couldn't care less about developing thermonuclear devices. Both of them have tested devices with below-kiloton blast yields with virtually no fallout.
And speaking of fallout, fallout is both a tactical hinderance and a sign of inefficiency in the explosive. Unlike the "dirty bombs" the media is currently panicking over ("radiological" as opposed to "nuclear," if you will), those that are developing and those that are asking for tactical nuclear weapons want as little fallout as possible, preferably none. As it stands now, if a tactical nuke was used to open a hole in an enemy's defensive line, the only forces that could best exploit that hole are MBTs, and sending in tanks without infantry support can get quite ugly. Tacticians want something they can use against a designated target and still be able to capture that target with no ill effects.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't automatically mean ICBMs. A Minuteman III is just as able to carry mustard gas as well as it carries a thermonuclear warhead.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't automatically mean megaton-sized explosions capable of wiping out a city. We're probably nearing the point where we'll be able to use a kinetic-kill weapon to do the same thing.
"Nuclear weapons" doesn't always mean the end of the world. Stratiegic weapons are all but useless in a tactical situation, but even if they weren't it IS possible to use just one and not unload the whole arsenal.
The only thing, the ONLY thing that "nuclear weapons" always means is "explosive devices based on fissioning atomic nuclei." Just as "gun" could mean anything from a pistol to Jules Verne's Columbiad, a hollow Californium bullet is just as much a nuclear weapon as Fat Man.
Hell, at this point I wish we'd start using some tactical nukes here and there just to stop the damned knee-jerk reaction everybody has to the word "nuclear." Maybe then we could actually focus on some real problems, like the willingness to wipe out civillian populations to begin with. Hitler, Stalin, Pol Pot, Amin and Milosevic did just fine without nukes, or hadn't you noticed?
Moderators: Go on, I've got the karma to burn. Make my day.
"hum, from what i've seen yet atomic bombs give away their force to the sides and upwards!?"
1.) Shockwave and other properties brought about from popping off an explosive in a fluid do tend to travel upwards (basic fluid mechanics/thermodynamics). Other effects like the actual blast and the EM flash (which includes radiated heat) are medium independent and are spherical. This is why an air burst does more damage than a ground burst.
2.) A nuke-pumped x-ray laser puts a metric fuckload of energy in any damned direction you please.
"This is just an additional development showing China's growing strength."
Economically? Perhaps. But keep in mind that we now live in a world where even India can launch geosynchronus satellites.
Militarily? HELL no. The People's Army is a joke and will continue to be so for the forseeable future (read "the 21st Century"). Non-Western cultures have historically had great difficulty adapting to both Western military doctrine and Western military technology (Japan is a bit of the exception that proves the rule). Their class structure (political, cultural or economic differences) is just too rigid. Combine that with the regime's historic fear of the military (officers are promoted based on loyalty more than military prowess) and you end up with a China that is lucky to have the title "regional power."
"It's economy... is the second largest in the world"
But its economy is based on manufacturing and industry, goods instead of services. China's economy relies on being able to find someone with enough money to buy their manufactured goods. The Chinese people can't do that now and won't be able to do that for a long time. If you want to find a large number of people who have the money to afford these goods, you're pretty much stuck with selling mostly to the US. The Chinese economy relies much more on the US economy than vice versa.
China has supplanted Japan as the #2 economy in the world. When the Japanese economy took a nose dive about a decade ago, east Asian markets suffered as well as a result. When the US economy sunk recently, the whole world felt the impact.
"We simply won't be able to compete in a full-out space race, on a dollar-per-dollar basis."
Yes, we will, and quite easily at that. The Shenzhou capsule and the Long March II F that launched it are based on the Soviet Soyuz capsule and Vostok booster. 1960's technology. Even with the help of Rosaviakosmos, it will take a lot of time and a lot of money for China to play catch-up with our spaceflight infrastructure, all the while we'll be advancing ours even further. The US has a 40 year head start.
And on top of that don't forget that we have the added advantage of having a Western culture to use these technologies.
"Another possibility is that the US will forge closer ties with other nations -- in North America, Europe, and elsewhere, so that our economy will be able to compete with those of China, India, and Russia,"
Again: A manufacturing-based economy neeeds a services-based economy in order to survive. If you have a car factory that makes $40,000 cars you still won't make any money if nobody can afford a $40,000 car.
India is making the transition into a service-based economy. They have some real innovators over there taking advantage of the largest English-speaking population in the world. But they still have that nasty caste system to deal with. Their economic growth may not be as fast as China's, but it will take them to a more secure conclusion.
Russia has two advantages going for it: an existing high-tech base (but they have some catching up to do in the consumer goods area) and a metric fuckload of oil (they're poised to beat out Saudi Arabia as #1 oil exporter). Couple that second one with a Western-esque culture and the currently warm political climate between them and the US and before too long you'll end up with Russia and the US locked together in a mutual admiration club. Baring a major political upheaval, Russia and the US are destined to work with each other far more than they work against each other. Visualize American oil companies buying Russian oil while those Russian oil employees buy shiny new Maytag washers and dryers.
"Lastly, we may indeed be relegated to second (or lower) place on the world's stage, in space and other fields."
While they may be catching up to us economically, it will be a long time indeed before anybody (especially China) has the wherewithall to compete with the US militarily, technologically or even politically.
"Face it, the only reason for a country to do manned space flight is to prove to the world that it has the expertise to deploy a credible ICBM force."
No, this is the 21st century. Ballistic flight paths are far easier (both in terms of horsepower and mathematics) than figuring out how to both orbit and deorbit something. Compare the Minuteman III to the Titan IV or even the old Atlas boosters some time. Being able to put a person into space tells others not that you have a credible ICBM force but that you're a credible competitor in the lucrative satellite launch market.
Pyongyang sending ballistic missile tests arcing over Japan is an example of nuclear saber-rattling. Dehli putting something into geosynchronus orbit is a commercial for Indian spaceflight. The PRC looking to put a person in orbit is an example of the second (while missile drills on the coast of the Straits of Taiwan are the first).
Besides, China really doesn't have a credible ICBM force. MRBMs, yes, but they only have a dozen or two nuclear missiles that could reach California, and even that's a stretch. And their submarine force could be found with a Geiger counter. The PRC would be hard pressed to match the ICBM force of France or the UK, let alone those of Russia or the US...
"Now it's China's turn to fly some astronauts so we will ph34r their 1337 missile skillz."
That's the LAST thing they want to say with their manned space program. The PRC is well aware that the People's Army is no match for even the forces of Taiwan. The reason Beijing is so interested in playing little diplomatic games like releasing reports on US human rights abuses and crying out against US hegemony is because that's the only option open to them for competing against the US.
"I expect that they will use the US antimissile project as an excuse to seriously increase their ICBM force above the current token levels,"
They have two mutually-exclusive choices:
1.) Develop ICBM technology to try to engage in a nuclear arms race they lost 40 years before they started.
2.) Democratize and develop their economy.
Beijing can't afford both. Option 2 potentially gives them the ability to try out option 1 (why they would I have no idea) a few decades down the line, but option 1 gives you a civil war within a decade as the people become more and more dissatisfied with their pathetic economy.
"so this manned space program fits in nicely."
If anything, the manned space program fits in nicely with option 2 above. It's something shiney to distract the Chinese people and give them a sense of hope for the Middle Kingdom's place in the world as their unemployment figures continue to rise (as they have been doing for the past year or so) as the economy shifts towards capitalism.
"We should use all of NASA's current budget to send much more frequent and capable unmanned missions to other planets."
Um... if we don't spend money on manned spaceflight now, when do we? The major goal of all interplanetary exploration is to look for new real estate.
... that simple ballistics is one of the few instincts we humans are born with (such as holding our breath when under water), an innate ability to judge an object's motion in free-fall. Something that came in handy when we were jumping from branch to branch or throwing stuff at predators. Something akin to the way cats can always land on their feet.
Of course, I'm not a biologist so I could be wrong...
"2) This "space program" is a thinly-disguised ruse. China is trying to maneuver itself into a two-front cold war, for many reasons, not the least of which is Taiwan.
No, that's the last thing they want. As it stands now the People's Army would have their heads handed to them by Taiwanese forces even without US intervention. Such is the price of not being able to trust your military.
On top of that all of their economic reforms are very expensive both in terms of money and public morale. They simply couldn't afford a nuclear arsenal much bigger than their current (paltry) stockpile, let alone something that could match the US arsenal (with our without the warheads we're putting into storage).
While China does need some sort of rivalry with the US in order to give itself a sense of purpose and importance, they have to make sure to do it in a way that that doesn't piss us off too much. Look at how quiet they've gotten suddenly after our newly declared war on terrorism.
"(a) no one has ever seen a phase change in the fabric of spacetime (I'm not sure the concept even makes sense, personally)."
I'm just an undergrad so I could be way off the mark, but it's been my understanding that it's been more or less accepted that space-time went through at least one of those phase changes as it cooled after the Big Bang.
"Anyway, what Microsoft is doing with Kerberos is perfectly legal and allowed by the standard."
New mantra for you and others like you who are confused by all this:
This is the punishment phase, not the trial.
This is the punishment phase, not the trial.
This is the punishment phase, not the trial.
What you just said is akin to asking "Why should a convicted murder be put in jail? Travelling around the country is perfectly legal."
1.) If there are states still holding out, how can you consider it over?
2.) What does a president's opinion have to do with state governments?
3.) When did presidential terms get extended to 8 years?
4.) How does McDonalds enter into all this?
A consistant software environment between Windows and Linux? Hey, sure, whatever. Sounds like a good idea. But on consoles? Not just no but HELL no! The people who think this is a good idea are the same people that can't understand why people buy consoles instead of PCs to begin with.
When all is said and done consoles are popular because they provide a consistant gaming experience. A game developed for GameCube (for example) will run on my GameCube exactly the same way it does on my neighbor's GameCube, and they both run the same way as the GameCube down the street. I know I can go out and get a copy of Super Smash Bros. Melee, put the disk in, turn on the console and start playing. I don't need to study the fine print to find the hardware requirements as that's all taken care of by one word on the front: GameCube. I don't need to wait for the game to figure out what hardware I have because the publishers already know exactly what I have. This can only happen when the hardware is proprietary and consistant among all users.
When the hardware becomes a commodity (as it is with PCs), you no longer have that consistancy. My copy of Half Life runs differently on my computer than my neighbors computer (which has a little more RAM), and we're both different from the experience the computer down the street (with a different video board) has. I can't just walk into Best Buy, grab a copy and walk out. Instead I have to study the minimum and reccomended hardware requirements and wonder where exactly my computer fits into all that.
But even more damning is the effect that commodity hardware has on game publishing. Time and time again programmers have shown that if you give an inch they take a mile. Many (if not most) software (especially games) are designed to look best on hardwre that was released last week, and if you don't have that hardware you're up a creek. A PC bought this year will just barely be able to play games released next year and won't be able to play games two years down the road. And most of that bloat is extraneous crap, insignifigant improvements picture or sound to the point that most of the games on the market today are aimed to sell based on the Ferret Effect ("Ooh! Shiney!").
If you commoditize console hardware you'll end up with a market that looks just like the PC game market. Instead of games being written for a console they're instead written for an ideal hardware platform. Suddenly you'll need to know quite a bit more about your hardware than just the manufacturer. A console on the market today will be obsolute in a year instead of 5-7. And console prices will jump up to damn near double their current prices as hardware manufacturers no longer have 5-7 years to recoup losses from low release prices. More and more game publishers will aim for the quick buck generated by tweaking the polygon count instead of focusing on outdated things like "plot" and "playability."
Replayability? Why bother to include that in a game? As time passes and your hardware improves, you'll be less and less able to play older games anyway. Try playing MechWarrior on a PC capable of playing MechWarrior 4. WarCraft on a PC capable of playing WarCraft III. Your old hardware could play them fine, but why would you hang on to it since the new hardware will play the old stuff anyway? Besides, you had to sell it to afford the new console...
Suddenly the console market falls through the floor as gamers decide that with all this fustration they may as well use their PC instead. Many others blow the dust off their old consoles as they long for the days of just having to push the power button to play a game. Besides, those games are from a day when games were meant to be replayed.
Making the console market a commodity will take away all the reasons the console market has been successful to begin with. Unlike PCs they're easy to use, consistant, relatively inexpensive and won't be obsolete for at least half a decade. And no one company has a monopoly on the software environment.
"what games actually use 100% of the hardware they are running on?"
When you're talking console games, quite a few. Especially as you near the end of the life cycle. This is one of the big differences between consoles and PCs.
PCs suffer from a vicious bloatware cycle, where hardware performance increases one week and software size increases the next (compare the latest version of MS Word to an old copy of WordPerfect 5). These increases constantly feed each other so that it's rare to find a PC fully utilized by a program.
Consoles on the other hand have their hardwares' lives artificially extended by their manufacturers, mostly by their proprietary hardware formats. Software publishers can't go all out as they can on the PCs because the consoles' hardware imposes a limit that will be around for 5-7 years.
As the life cycle of a console reaches its end, publishers are quite close to the limits imposed by the hardware and are usually looking for tiny little ways to tweak their software to get just a little more performance out. Compare Final Fantasy VII to Final Fantasy IX. Super Mario 64 to Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Heck, at times it can be difficult to believe that Super Mario Bros. 1 and 3 are both for the same system.
Or...
4. Gravitational mass is no longer tied to inertial mass.
Christmas is almost upon us (never too early to start the advertising blitz) and it's time to figure out what kind of totally useless gimick those people with $50,000 burning a hole in their pocket (don't we all?) can get their kids for Christmas. Now, do they get a 2' tall robot, or ten Segways?
No no, you forget, RMS has declared the new new official name of Linux to just be "GNU."
"China, North Korea and Russia would become loose cannons in a new, unbalanced (3-to-1) cold war which could quickly turn hot, possibly even as a matter of course."
Russians tend to dislike China more than we do. North Korea is starving its own people and still doesn't have much money to spend on the military. China has too much money tied up in bettering their economy to spend it on missiles.
And when all is said and done, Russia and the US are apparently headed towards forming a mutual admiration club, especially since Russia will soon be the world's biggest oil producer by far.
"The US's refusal to see beyond its own commercial/political interests and become a true citizen of the world comes back to haunt it in a thousand different ways."
Name one country whose international policy isn't driven by self-interest. Or can't you?
"so that we are no longer hated,"
You can't please all of the people all of the time. Especially when they number 6 billion.
"and thus we no longer need vast mililtary capabilities."
We don't need our "vast military capabilities" now. Putting our Fifth and Seventh Fleets out in the Indian Ocean doens't help defend North America in the least.
But do you realize how many countries would bitch and moan if we pulled our troops out of their country? Japan for starters would actually have to have their own military with the PRC looking at them from across the Sea of Japan. The Indian Ocean (including the Persian Gulf) would be a haven for piracy until/unless Inida actually spent money on its own navy. South Korea may not be very happy with us right now, but imagine how they'd react when we stop defending their northern border. Hell, even Saudi Arabia would be very unhappy to see a complete US pull-out.