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Pentagon’s $10-billion bet gone bad
Long piece at the LA Times that documents all sorts of problems with ballistic missile defense projects that have not worked out as originally proposed. It's a one-sided story and I'm not smart enough to find all the biases. Do defense projects sometimes fail? Sure -- that's what happens in R & D. Sometimes the new super theory works in practice, sometimes it doesn't. That's the difference between theory and practice. Does that mean the Pentagon "wasted" the money? Depends on your viewpoint. When a project yields a new defense system that works (e.g., the F14, the A10, the Abrams tank, the Apache helicopter, etc) then everyone's happy. When it doesn't, and there are lots of examples of those, well then...
Parts of ballistic missile defense work -- THADD, the Standard 3 missile, etc. Remember how the "smart" said it would never work? Some of it does. Some parts don't. I suppose we could just wring our hands, proclaim that we can't defend ourselves, and go sign another deal with Iran.
I think I'd prefer we keep trying. |
Posted by: Steve White 2015-04-05 |
