Abstract
The debate over whether the United States should deploy a national missile defense (NMD) has been raging since the 1960s. 1 In the fall of 1967, Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, reacting to pressure from Congress to deploy an ABM system, laid out a tortured rationale–now being recycled–for building a “light” national missile defense. In a speech to the editors and publishers of upi, McNamara noted:
“Were we to deploy a heavy ABM system throughout the United States, the Soviets would clearly be strongly motivated so to increase their offensive capability as to cancel out our defensive advantage.”
McNamara went on to explain the distinction between a “heavy” (or anti-Russian) ABM system and one that would be deployed to defend the United States against an emerging Chinese nuclear threat, announcing that:
“We have decided to go forward with this Chinese-oriented ABM deployment; and we will begin actual production of such a system at the end of this year.”
Before concluding, the defense secretary cautioned: “The danger of deploying this relatively light and reliable Chinese-oriented ABM system is going to be that pressures will develop to expand it into a heavy Soviet-oriented ABM system.”
Plus ça change
The debate over nmd has not changed much in the 30-odd years since McNamara's speech. The principal arguments for a “light” nmd still include neutralizing China's nuclear capability, although that goal has been somewhat muted, together with a requirement to protect the nation against a small-scale attack by a rogue state or an unauthorized or accidental launch by a major nuclear power.
The principal arguments against deploying NMD have not changed much, either. They focus on technological drawbacks, the high cost, skepticism about the system's performance, the ill-defined nature of the threat, the system's uncertain architecture, the ease of circumventing the system, and the impact it would have on the U.S./Chinese/Russian strategic relationship.
Technological drawbacks
The fact is that we do not have an NMD system that is capable of intercepting an incoming ballistic missile warhead. As Cong. Tom Allen, a Democrat from Maine, pointed out recently, “The hit-to-kill test record of our missile defense systems is only 22 percent–four intercepts in 18 tests.” And in high-altitude tests, which involve the sort of technology that is envisioned for use in the NMD, “The success rate is only 13 percent (2 for 15), with 10 consecutive failures since 1991.”
Even the U.S. military has been restrained in its appraisal of NMD technology. In a recent interview, Gen. John Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that “the simple fact is that we do not yet have the technology to field an NMD. We have in fact put some $40 billion into the program over the past 10 years, but today we do not technologically have a bullet that can hit a bullet.”
The cost
The United States has spent more than $60 billion on ballistic missile defense programs over the last 15 years, and Congress has approved another $4.2 billion for missile defense this fiscal year. The Clinton administration has proposed spending $10.5 billion over the next five years to step up the development of a workable NMD system. According to the General Accounting Office, it could cost more than $28 billion to deploy an NMD at a single site by 2006.
And there is, of course, no guarantee that the system will work, even after a $28 billion investment. Lt. Gen. Lester Lyles, director of the Ballistic Missile Defense Office has repeatedly told Congress that the problems facing the program are not related to funding, but to physics. In addition, there is no guarantee that the system will be confined to one site–or to the current design. Nmd advocates are pushing for two to six sites and for space-based components.
System performance
Even if the United States can solve the technological problems facing a “hit-to-kill” nmd system, there would still be little or no basis for judging the ability of a highly complex (and fragile) system to work under battle conditions, faced with potential countermeasures and a determined adversary. Because it never will be possible to have any degree of confidence in the system's reliability in battle, it would be extremely risky to claim that it will be able to protect the nation from attack.
An ill-defined threat
The most popular rationale for a “light” nmd is to respond to the threat of a small-scale missile attack from a rogue state–North Korea has been the most recent nominee for this role. But there is no rogue-state long-range missile threat at present and–the recent Rumsfeld report notwithstanding–it is unlikely that one will emerge in the next decade. Long-range ballistic missiles are difficult–and costly–to design, develop, deploy, and/or conceal. Rogue states that want to threaten or attack the United States would surely do so with less complex and less costly systems.
Supporters of a “light” nmd also claim that it would protect the United States against an unauthorized or accidental launch by a major nuclear power. But the CIA–and Strategic Command–believe that an unauthorized or accidental Russian (or Chinese) nuclear launch is highly unlikely. According to the cia, “Russia employs an extensive array of technical and procedural safeguards and China keeps its missiles unfueled and without warheads mated.”
Some proponents of nmd nonetheless fear that Russian early-warning and command-and-control capabilities are fragile. They believe that a “light” nmd would be an important insurance policy against an unauthorized launch. The problem is, of course, that no one can predict how large an unauthorized attack would be.
The most likely scenario–a launch prompted by a false radar reading and ordered by the commander of ground-based missile forces (possibly without consulting the political leadership)–would involve hundreds or even thousands–of warheads. It would overwhelm any missile defense. 2 In any case, the United States and Russia are taking steps to address the danger of a misreading by the Russian early warning system by arranging to share information on worldwide ballistic missile launches.
Uncertain architecture
Because it is impossible to characterize the extent of the threat posed by rogue nations, by an unauthorized or accidental launch, or by China, it will be difficult to design an appropriate NMD response. Whatever the size of the initial deployment or the system's capabilities, there will be constant pressure from conservatives, hawks, and “Fortress America” proponents to expand and upgrade the system.
Unfortunately, there is no way of determining the number of defensive interceptors (if they would work) that would be required to deal with a threat by a rogue state (one to 10 warheads), an unauthorized launch (200 to 1,000 Russian warheads), or a Chinese launch (20 to 400 warheads). Because there is no limit to the repertoire of potential threats, there is no way to agree ultimately on the size or performance level of an NMD system that would adequately protect the United States.
Ease of circumvention
Given its complexity, cost, and ease of attribution, a longrange ballistic missile is a most unlikely choice for the delivery of a weapon of mass destruction against the United States. Assuming that a rogue-state threat against the U.S. homeland does come about, delivery of a weapon by ship, aircraft, van, or truck seems more likely.
If a “light” NMD will do nothing to protect the United States against the most likely roguenation attack scenarios, it could, nonetheless, convey a false sense of having done something to respond to the threat. As Cong. Chet Edwards, a Texas Democrat, observed, building an NMD “is like putting a $5,000 burglar alarm on the front door of your house, and yet keeping the front windows of your house open and the back door of your house unlocked.”
Finally, a rogue state that is technologically sophisticated enough to develop and deploy a long-range ballistic missile with a nuclear or a biological agent-dispersing warhead would also be technologically capable of devising methods that would confuse the sensors of an NMD system.
The impact on strategic relations
The most compelling argument against a “light” NMD is the impact it will have on the U.S./Chinese/Russian strategic relationship. The serious repercussions missile defenses will have on the nuclear force postures of these three nations make NMD deployment a significant security issue as well as a colossal waste of money.
China made clear its views on missile defense during Secretary of State Madeleine Albright's recent trip to Beijing. China considers U.S. efforts to develop and deploy NMD and theatre missile defenses (TMD) a direct and deliberate effort to marginalize that country's nuclear deterrent (it currently has about 20 long-range missiles aimed at the United States) and to undercut its ability to influence developments in the region (particularly as regards Taiwan and Japan).
Amb. Sha Zukang, China's top arms control official, has asserted that Beijing, at least, still believes in the interaction between missile defenses and offensive weapons and that the U.S. deployment of a “light” NMD will inevitably force China to increase the size of its long-range missile forces. In a speech to an international nonproliferation conference at the Carnegie Endowment last January, Ambassador Sha remarked that “if a country, in addition to its offensive power, seeks to develop advanced TMD or even NMD, in an attempt to attain absolute security and unilateral strategic advantage for itself, other countries will be forced to develop more advanced missiles.”
Moscow, on the other hand, is desperately short of funds, and Russia is likely to reduce its strategic nuclear forces to 1,500-2,000 warheads whether or not START II and III are formally implemented, and whether or not the United States deploys a “light” NMD. But, if China increases the size of its nuclear deterrent forces, and if the United States deploys both extensive TMDs–which are likely to have some significant strategic intercept capability–and a “light” NMD, Russia is certain to resist nuclear force reductions below START II/III levels.
Deploying even a “light” NMD will thus have three perverse outcomes for U.S. security. In seeking to protect the United States against an unknown and undefined challenge, NMD will stimulate the growth of a potential Chinese threat, hamper efforts to further decrease an existing Russian threat, and put significantly deeper nuclear force reductions out of reach for the foreseeable future.
In the end, it is difficult to consider nmd anything but an ill-conceived response to an uncertain and undefined threat. Nmd will provide no protection against the most likely dangers that will face the United States in the coming decades and it will be impossible to have any confidence in the protection that nmd theoretically might provide. Finally, nmd will destabilize the strategic relationship among the United States, China, and Russia. In the long run, the deployment of a national missile defense system will diminish U.S. security, not enhance it.
Footnotes
MISSILE DEFENSE: Not such a bad idea
By Michael Krepon
Michael Krepon is president of the Henry L. Stimson Center in Washington, D.C.
Throughout the Cold War, if either the United States or the Soviet Union had deployed meaningful missile defenses, the other side clearly had the means to compensate by increasing offensive forces. The 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty recognized this fact of life.
The ABM Treaty never postulated that missile defenses were bad; only that they would have the unfortunate consequence of damaging arms control efforts. The treaty's preamble is plain regarding purpose: Restraints on defenses–not their complete elimination–are a means toward the goal of “limiting strategic arms.” Limited defenses (200 interceptor missiles) were expressly permitted by the treaty. A 1974 protocol subsequently halved this number.
Despite the end of the Cold War, some analysts continue to place deep cuts and defenses in direct opposition to one another, confusing the treaty's means with its ends. Even with Russian nuclear forces facing wholesale obsolescence, with force levels sure to fall greatly over the next 10 to 15 years, many supporters of the ABM Treaty oppose amendments to it that would allow protection against a limited range of low-probability but high-consequence ballistic missile attacks on U.S. soil. Emerging nuclear dangers require new and creative approaches that embrace both deep cuts and defenses.
Instead of rehashing past debates over the ABM Treaty, it would be useful to change the terms of the debate to reflect new circumstances.
While the treaty permitted limited area defenses, it does not permit limited national defenses. I believe there are now several persuasive reasons to reconsider the utility of limited defenses.
First, nuclear threats have become more diffuse and more troubling now that the Cold War is over. The barriers to developing a three-stage missile that can travel intercontinental distances and acquiring fissile material for warheads have been lowered appreciably. North Korea has demonstrated what a country of limited means can do in both respects. Pyongyang also has a track record of selling its new “product lines” to other countries.
U.S. cooperative threat reduction programs in Russia are extremely useful, but the best designed and implemented U.S. initiatives cannot guarantee against the leakage of fissionable material, or chemical or biological weapons.
The vast majority of Russian experts in dire straits patriotically refuse to help countries of proliferation concern, but the “brain drain” continues to be a problem. The expertise for making weapons of mass destruction and multi-stage ballistic missiles is likely to be for sale. Confident, rosy predictions about missile and nuclear nonproliferation would be unwise at this juncture.
Would a small Third World state such as North Korea launch a ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead against the United States, knowing that it would be utterly destroyed in retaliation? If one wants to inflict terrible damage on U.S. citizens, why not use means that are more covert and “deniable”–truck bombs, perhaps?
The logic behind these questions seems persuasive, but I cannot assume that, for example, the current North Korean leadership thinks the same way I do. In the event that they think differently about matters of life and (mass) death, it would be useful to have limited defenses as an insurance policy.
A second military rationale for limited ballistic missile defenses during the coming decade is to deal with the possible unauthorized launch of a few ballistic missiles from Russia. This rationale remains largely–and strangely–unmentioned in the current debate, although I believe it to be more likely than the North Korean-type scenario. The Central Intelligence Agency's assessment of the “fail safeness” of Russian command-and-control systems is hardly reassuring.
According to unclassified remarks by National Intelligence Officer Robert Walpole, unauthorized launches should not be a problem “as long as current security procedures and systems are in place.” But is there any reason to doubt that Russian command and control will be severely stressed over the next decade or more? There have already been harrowing reports of breakdowns in command and control, including the temporary takeover last fall of a nuclear-powered attack submarine by a deranged sailor who killed his shipmates.
I am uncomfortable with confident assertions by missile defense critics that there is nothing to worry about regarding Moscow's command-and-control apparatus, and that if there is a problem, it will be on such a massive scale that limited defenses would be of no help.
Who among us can confidently foreclose the possibility that a small group of very angry and highly trained Russian officers and soldiers will seek to gain control over a few ballistic missile launchers? If this scenario cannot be dismissed, how can limited ballistic missile defenses be ruled out?
Further, ballistic missiles, like nuclear weapons, can be used for coercive purposes. The threat to use ballistic missiles carrying weapons of mass destruction has much greater utility than actual use, which would generate devastating retaliation.
Missile flight tests and deployments can therefore be used to extract political or economic concessions, to dissuade a stronger state from taking military action in support of a weaker friend or ally, to break down alliance cohesion, and to achieve other political objectives without resort to military force. The successful coercive use of ballistic missiles for any such purpose can also weaken nonproliferation regimes.
The prudent deployment of defenses could foster alliance cohesion, reinforce nonproliferation regimes, and counter coercive threats. Because such political rationales for missile defenses could be open-ended, common sense criteria should guide defensive deployments.
Earlier this year, the Committee on Nuclear Policy, a collegial effort by 40 non-governmental experts, identified six criteria: Missile defenses should have a clearly defined, achievable mission; they should be proven through repeated, rigorous testing; they should be affordable; they should be cost-effective at the margin; they should be pursued in a balanced fashion along with other cooperative threat-reduction efforts; and they should have the net effect of reducing the nuclear dangers they are supposed to counter. (For more on the committee's work, see the Stimson Center website, www.stimson.org/policy/.)
Although the reasons for reconsidering the deployment of a limited national missile defense system have been persuasive to me, critics suggest otherwise. They offer many arguments:
▪ Deployment of missile defenses would upset U.S.-Russian deterrence equations and could even be perceived by Russian leaders as threatening Russia's nuclear deterrent.
With Russia facing growing economic distress over the next decade and unable to replace dangerously aging nuclear forces, it is true that Russia's nuclear forces will become a shadow of their Cold War selves.
But even assuming Russian reductions to several hundred deployed strategic nuclear weapons, as Bruce Blair and John Steinbruner of the Brookings Institution predict, the Kremlin would still be able to place Washington and other key targets “at risk.” No U.S. president could assume that limited defenses would be able to negate Russia's sophisticated nuclear arsenal, even at much lower levels. The U.S. Russian deterrent equation would continue despite limited, ground-based defenses.
▪ Deployment of a national missile defense system, critics say, would kill the START II and START III treaties. But hard-liners in the Russian Duma and the U.S. Senate have smothered treaties even in the absence of prospective missile defenses.
Russia's nuclear forces will drop well below START III levels in any event (due to Russia's inability to replace aging warheads). Whether or not START II eventually enters into force, it is in the interests of both countries to secure deep and verifiable reductions in nuclear forces.
Russia will understandably resist changes to the ABM Treaty. Over time, however, Moscow is likely to agree to adapt the treaty to changing circumstances, just as it approved new guidelines for advanced theater missile defenses after years of strenuous objections. But a rigid approach by Moscow–or by treaty supporters in the United States–can kill the treaty altogether.
▪ Critics of missile defenses argue that they will cripple prospects for cooperation with Russia, which is necessary to successfully reduce nuclear dangers. They are right about the importance of cooperation with Russia: any U.S. deployment initiative should be accompanied by greater efforts at cooperation.
In addition to efforts already under way–the Nunn-Lugar and lab-to-lab programs and the Nuclear Cities Initiative–the United States has begun to help Russia with early warning of ballistic missile launches. If further cooperation is spurned, this should be Moscow's choice, not Washington's.
▪ Critics of missile defenses argue that the United States should work with Russia to reduce nuclear dangers–for example, by de-alerting ballistic missiles–so that missile defenses are not needed. Reducing the alert rate for nuclear forces is vital if the United States hopes to reduce the possibility of unauthorized or accidental launches from Russia. But Russian nuclear dangers are so complex that it would not be prudent to foreclose the option of a last line of defense.
▪ National missile defense, suggest the critics, is too expensive. But affordability is not the issue: Funding for limited national missile defenses constitutes less that two percent of the defense budget.
▪ Critics argue that no one would be foolish enough to attack the United States by means of an intercontinental ballistic missile, making a limited national defense system an expensive boondoggle. But what if this confident assumption were proved wrong and no interceptors were available for national defense? What would critics of limited defenses then say to their fellow citizens?
I hope no one would be so foolish, crazy, or angry to ever launch a limited ballistic missile attack against the United States, but I am not completely persuaded that others will act rationally.
▪ Critics of missile defenses correctly note that there are easier and more likely ways to use weapons of mass destruction against U.S. citizens, such as truck bombs. True, and more concerted efforts are needed to address these concerns as well.
▪ Limited missile defenses would inexorably expand, critics argue, wasting more money and causing more damage to arms control.
“Mission creep” is, indeed, a worry. While it may be possible to counter a small number of warheads, the prospects for stopping a massive attack–the sort that even an impoverished Russia could launch–are nil. Defensive deployments must be linked to achievable missions, which are necessarily limited.
▪ Missile defenses, goes the litany, won't work effectively and can be easily swamped by counter-measures. This is certainly true for massive attacks, but not necessarily for the most worrisome post-Cold War threats that are limited in nature. (Russian and Chinese resistance to missile defenses suggest that they have more respect for U.S. technology than domestic critics.)
While it is unwise to discount in advance how well defense contractors can utilize modern technologies, they have yet to prove, under rigorous operational testing, that they can intercept a small number of rudimentary warheads. Until they do, national missile defenses should not be deployed.
▪ Defenses, critics assert, will increase friction with China and stimulate growth in Chinese nuclear forces. Further, China's posture of nuclear restraint could be overturned by missile defenses, especially advanced theater missile defenses provided to Taiwan.
This is a powerful argument. There are many reasons for friction–and cooperation–between the United States and China that are unrelated to missile defenses. Even without the prospect of U.S. national defenses, Beijing has had more strategic modernization programs under way than the United States and Russia combined.
Beijing won't say what its current requirements are or how they would change in the event of a limited national missile defense deployment. But there clearly is a risk that China will increase its planned level of effort. It is a worrisome possibility, one that must be weighed against the growing nuclear dangers against which limited defenses could have utility.
The debate over deep cuts v. defenses made sense during the Cold War, but it has been overtaken by events. Both arms control and defense advocates want to reduce nuclear dangers, yet they are unable to join in common cause, remaining wedded to arguments rooted in the 1970s.
The time has come for new thinking about old problems. Deep cuts and defenses can be compatible and stabilizing as long as they are pursued cooperatively. The crux of the problem isn't limited defenses; it is an unchallenged, Cold War nuclear theology that generates interlocking hair-trigger alert rates and massive attack options. Mutually reinforcing U.S. and Russian nuclear orthodoxy continues to undermine efforts for deep cuts as well as effective defenses.
A limited national missile defense system can help reduce nuclear dangers, but only if pursued in the context of wider efforts at cooperative threat reduction. It is time to stop pitting defenses against deep cuts. We must now deal collaboratively–in the United States as well as with Russia–with the new complex of post-Cold War nuclear dangers.
1.
This section relies heavily on Morton Halperin's classic study, Bureaucratic Politics and Foreign Policy, pp. 1-7.
2.
On February 10, 1999, the Washington Post ran a sobering story about a false Soviet radar reading that occurred in September 1983. A former Soviet watch officer recalled that he suspected the reading was an error because monitors showed only five incoming missiles. “They don't start [a war] with only five missiles,” he recalled.