Donald J. Trump versus the think tanks
Since President Donald J Trump first formally proposed a strategic defense of America in December of 2017, opponents have mounted a public campaign against it. It is a well-trod path of resistance. They first claim it “can’t possibly work.” Then, “even if it COULD work, it will be prohibitively expense and unaffordable.” Finally, “even if it could work and even if the Congress were foolish enough to pay for it, it can be easily overwhelmed, defeated and spoofed.”
How do I know this? Because this is exactly the trajectory of reasoning the opponents of the Strategic Defense Initiative adopted in the 1980s.
Many have debunked and rebutted these anti strategic defense chestnuts since the 1980s, but the Gold Standard of why Strategic Defenses make sense and should be developed and deployed and why the chain of criticism doesn’t hold water still stands. It is an article in Commentary Magazine from 1985 by noted physicist Professor Robert Jastrow entitled, “Ronald Reagan Versus the Scientists.” At that time SDI opponents included scientific notables like Carl Sagan and Richard Garwin, and members of congress like Les Aspin, John Kerrry and Al Gore. Today opponents largely come from researchers at think tanks. It is time to revive Bob Jastrow’s dominating analysis, it doesn’t need much updating as the arguments against are always the same.
Jastrow laid out the case for SDI in an exhaustive 5,000-word essay that began by addressing the essential nuclear deterrence case, Mutual Assured Destruction or MAD for short. MAD means you can destroy my nuclear forces and value targets, and I can destroy yours…. I can’t stop you and you can’t stop me, you start, I finish. MAD still holds today with Russia and soon China. Some call it, ‘a delicate balance of terror.’ But MAD is continuously pressured by developments on all sides with new and better weapons and systems aimed at creating and maintaining a military advantage…thousands of ICBMs with highly accurate nuclear weapons of varying destructive power, some even generating very little effects other than deadly neutron pulses capable of killing thousands but leaving physical damage to a minimum. Some of these weapons are maneuverable and capable of carrying and deploying cheap and light decoys. The name of the game is to make your opponent’s strategic choices always harder and more painful than your own. To assert what is termed “escalation dominance.”
Both Reagan and Trump argued that MAD is not only unstable, especially in a nuclear multipolar world, but that it is fundamentally immoral and unacceptable to Americans who expect their government to protect them by physical means rather than psychological hopes of rational behavior, especially if it is technologically feasible. And all Americans have witnessed a possible future against long range missiles in Israel launched from Iran leaving strategic defense opponents clinging to the famous Marx brothers’ riddle, “who are you going to believe, me or your own two eyes?” Americans understand this and that’s why they support a Golden Dome.
In his work in 1985 Jastrow dispatched the feasibility argument first – it can work, you can hit a bullet with a bullet for example. Today this is self-evident with the Patriot and THAAD missile systems interceptors deployed, tested, and used in the field today and which are at the root capability of the Israeli Iron Dome system. The case for space-based interceptors both kinetic (hit to kill) and laser is equally obvious and demonstrable and although much development and test work awaits the argument that they simply “won’t work” is past its time. Jastrow had a heavier lift in 1985, but it is no brainer today, defense against strategic weapons by multiple means IS feasible.
The stouter case is “it is unaffordable and too expensive.” Jastrow also took it apart. Let’s look at the assumptions in the “its unaffordable case.” Read the fine print, “we assume the system must be 100% leak proof”. What they mean is that if only one weapon makes it through the defense regardless of where it impacts, it will be a catastrophic failure and therefore useless. With that core assumption, the base case for the unaffordable cost analysis includes thousands of interceptors, thousands of detectors, 100% accurate threat identifiers and a 100% safe, secure, and completely competent real time command and control system, incapable of error! Of course, there is no mention of the current situation where less than 100% reliability and infallibility of the existing command and control system could mean an unintended launch of our nuclear weapons with a devastating second strike from Russia or China. (I mention the current film, A House of Dynamite for reference). As Jastrow masterfully observed, opponents in the nuclear MAD agreement don’t simply amass vast nuclear forces to randomly attack soft civilian targets, they do so to disarm or disable enemy forces that threaten them to create a military advantage or simply the perception of a military advantage. As a result, defenses need only be very effective, not nearly perfect, to deny any militarily significant objective and plan for success. What is the minimum level of effectiveness and what are the deterrent benefits along the way to full deployment is open to debate, but 100% effective is simply not. And the fact that the threat of accidental launch can be mitigated or a rogue regime with a small arsenal of nuclear weapons can be completely thwarted without a single detonation on the United States is a benefit worth the price and national peace of mind alone.
Cost turns out to be an ‘independent’ variable not a ‘dependent’ one, one that can be changed and managed based on the assumptions and facts on the ground. Early nuclear strategists asked regarding offensive nuclear arsenals “how much is enough?” Enough deterrence and protection for strategic defenses may well be far less than perfection, ask the Israelis.
Spoofing, decoying and confusing with chaff is another canard. Existing sensor systems, and interrogating radar and thermal scanning systems can easily separate and then intercept the wheat from the chaff. Jastrow already had that knocked in 1985. If anything, technological advancements since 1985 have made each of these cases stronger, in many cases much stronger.
In the end, stopping Golden Dome development, test, and deployment by arguing it won’t work, is massively unaffordable and easily overwhelmed is the goal of the opponents today as it was with the Strategic Defense Initiative in 1985. Counterintuitively for them, no defense is regarded as the best defense, even though it means as Henry Kissinger said, “your choice is suicide or surrender.” What then is their preferred alternative? MAD forever? I don’t know for sure, but I do know what the aims of the opponents in the 1980s were, they said so directly, “arms control agreements”. Save all the money save all the risk, make the world safer by interlocking arms agreements, “build bridges, not walls” is the essence of their case. Supporters of Strategic Defense including the American and Israeli people prefer the Robert Frost formulation as did Bob Jastrow, “good fences make good neighbors.”
Dr. Mark Albrecht was the Executive Secretary of the National Space Council and principal advisor on space to President George H.W. Bush (1989 – 1992). He was the senior member for civil and national security space on the Trump Presidential transitions of 2016 and 2024.