Multilateral madness

By Lawrence Goldmuntz

National Review , August 15, 1994

U.S. negotiators are engaged in talks on the ABM Treaty that run in the same old MAD
grooves. If they don’t become bolder, they will merely help the MADness spread around the
world.

For a number of decades the only serious nuclear threat in the world was the one that Russia
and America posed to each other. Each responded to this threat by the deterrent threat of mutual
assured destruction (MAD) — a policy that left much to be desired, but which nonetheless
successfully maintained the nuclear stalemate. On the horizon, however, there is a threat to our
allies and to forwardly deployed U.S. forces from states not generally recognized to be reasonable
and thus deterrable. This threat, in its most serious manifestations, could materialize in
approximately a decade — about the time it would take us to deploy a credible defense system.

In addition to MAD there used to be three approaches to protecting ourselves. Two of the
three have now failed, and the Clinton Administration is in the process of compromising the third
approach, possibly to the point of destruction.

The first approach was to prevent proliferation by controlling the diffusion of technology. This
was to be accomplished by export controls and secrecy. It didn’t work. For example, the French
sold Iraq a “research” reactor, which was actually intended to produce weapon-grade plutonium.
Furthermore, many Iraqi engineers and scientists engaged in their country’s nuclear-weapons
programs were trained in the West; for example, the head of the Iraqi program, Jaffar Dhia Jaffar,
was educated in British public schools and at the University of Birmingham. The emigration of
Russian scientists may be another source of proliferating weapon capability.

The second approach was to prevent proliferation by the physical destruction of a threatening
weapons program. This was the approach chosen by the Israelis when they destroyed a French
reactor on the dock of Marseilles before it could be exported. When France finally succeeded in
exporting a reactor to Iraq, the Israelis proceeded to bomb the reactor complex just outside
Baghdad. This strategy was sharply criticized at the time, especially by U.S. Defense Secretary
Caspar Weinberger. But a more recent Defense Secretary, Dick Cheney, praised the Israeli action,
indicating that it “simplified” Desert Storm.

Still, there is little chance that the Israeli effort will be emulated by the United States itself. As one
American military officer put it, “Such action is not in our kit bag.”

By Land, Sea — and Space?

The third approach is to build the best possible ballistic-missile defense for ourselves and our
allies. Yet the budget for ballistic-missile defense has been cut by 50 per cent over the last two
years. All space-based options have been essentially canceled; the U.S. will rely instead on
anti-missile missiles launched from ground or sea platforms.

The United States’ experience so far with surface-to-air missile defense — the Patriot missile
system during the Persian Gulf War — was not encouraging. The Patriot system had limited
altitude capabilities and could not engage warheads until they had re-entered the sensible
atmosphere. Once in the atmosphere, the warheads inadvertently maneuvered, and the tankage
broke up, providing a field of decoys. Therefore, the Patriot had difficulty hitting the warhead. It
became more of a psychological comfort than an effective weapon.

The new generation of U.S. ground-based anti-missile missiles are designed to engage
warheads at higher altitudes than the Patriot — before they can effectively maneuver. But, if the
first shot is ineffective and a second anti-missile missile is needed, the engagement would probably
be in the sensible atmosphere, where the warhead could maneuver. Furthermore, although
deploying decoys for short-range missiles is difficult, decoy experts claim that every warhead can
be decoyed. And the next generation of theater missiles could, shortly after boost, dispense a
number of submunitions (smaller warheads making up the payload). Such submunitions — a poor
man’s MIRV (multiple independent re-entry vehicles) — could overwhelm defenses.

The most effective defense against ballistic missiles is one that destroys the missile during the
boost phase, when it is most vulnerable. The problems posed by submunitions, decoys, and
maneuvering warheads are then overcome. But boost-phase interception can be reliably
accomplished only from space. And this is precisely the option that is now unfunded.

Furthermore, any future development of this option is being bargained away in the discussions
with the Russians on “clarifying” the ABM Treaty, signed in 1972. Judging by the route that the
Administration is taking in these negotiations, we are giving up precisely the technology that is
most likely to prove effective in our defense and the defense of our allies.

A major issue in the negotiations of the U.S.-Russian Standing Consultative Commission is the
distinction between theater ballistic missiles and strategic ballistic missiles. The objectives of these
consultations are evidently threefold:

1. To preserve the current ABM regime, which limits investment in defenses against strategic
   ballistic missiles and, presumably, therefore reduces the incentive to build additional strategic
   offensive missile systems.

Under the “clarified” treaty, the U.S. would continue to rely on retaliation — MAD — to deter a
major strategic attack. Small strategic attacks against U.S. or Russian territory could be opposed
by the limited defenses permitted under the ABM Treaty. (But even these limited National Missile
Defenses are essentially unfunded.)

2. To permit the development and deployment of defenses against theater ballistic missiles so
   long as they could not be used to protect either the Russian or the U.S. home territories against
   strategic missiles.
3. For all practical purposes to continue the ban on space-based missile-defense systems.

Meeting these objectives will not achieve the fundamental goal of the ABM Treaty: safety and
stability at low cost. The threat has changed since 1972, when the ABM Treaty was signed, and
so have defense technologies.

1. The immediate threat is from short and medium-range theater missiles targeted against the
   Russian southern and eastern frontier regions and against American allies in the Middle and Far
   East.
2. There is an emerging threat from decoys, maneuvering re-entry vehicles, and submunitions
   dispersed from theater missiles after burnout. These could probably defeat present and planned
   ground-based missile defenses.
3. The U.S. has recently succeeded in developing some components of space-based defense
   systems that could provide Russia and our regional allies with better protection against
   sophisticated theater missiles than ground-based alternatives could.
4. 4. Although a Russian — U.S. strategic-missile exchange seems remote, the capability is still
   there. Increased reliance on mutual defense could lead to additional sharp reductions in strategic
   offensive missiles; and there is no need to limit defense if it is mutual.

Distinctions with Little Difference

Our negotiators propose to differentiate between strategic and theater ballistic missiles by the
re-entry velocities of their warheads. Long-range strategic warheads would be defined as those
with a re-entry velocity of 7 or more km/sec; theater ballistic missiles, as those with a re-entry
velocity of less than 5 km/sec. This limit is derived from the now outmoded Soviet Strategic
Missile, the SS-N-6 (which was assumed to be covered by the ABM Treaty), and from the
Chinese CSS-2 (sold to the Saudis as a theater ballistic missile), each with a re-entry velocity of
approximately 5 km/sec. Presumably our negotiators intend to permit any theater ballistic-missile
defense system to have the capability of intercepting targets with re-entry velocities of up to 5
km/sec. If a system has the capability of intercepting re-entry vehicles with a greater velocity, it
would be disallowed for theater deployment.

A defense system’s capability would be inferred by National Technical Means, presumably
based on observations during the testing phase. This estimate of capability depends heavily on the
questionable premise that a theater commander would be loath to use a weapon beyond its tested
capability — although this is what we did with the Patriot in the Persian Gulf War.

In fact, a defensive missile broadly capable of intercepting a 5-km/sec warhead could intercept
a 7-km/sec warhead under favorable engagement geometries. The number and coverage of
favorable engagement geometries increases with the number of deployed theater ballistic missiles.
Thus, Russian theater-ballistic-missile defenses, deployed on Russian territory, could well have
some capability of attacking strategic ballistic warheads that are re-entering at 7 km/sec, even
though the tests were conducted against a warhead with only a 5-km/sec re-entry velocity.

Furthermore, the “clarification” will evidently not limit the type of warhead that can be used in
the anti-ballistic-missile system. The Russians are likely to use nuclear warheads that have kill
radii of approximately 1,000 meters against opposing warheads. In contrast, the U.S. THAAD
theater defense system, which uses kinetic energy, must actually hit its target to “kill” it. The
Israeli Arrow Defense System, with a high-explosive warhead, has a kill range of tens of meters.
The U.S. is not likely to arm our missiles with nuclear warheads, and so our defense capability
and that which we provide our regional allies will be inferior to the Russians’.

From all this, it seems that the current U.S. negotiating position traps the United States into an
asymmetrical ABM posture. The Russians would need many theater defense missiles deployed
along their southern and eastern frontiers, and could, as we have seen, use these missiles against
strategic missiles. The U.S. needs no theater ballistic defense missiles deployed on its territory
(Canada and Mexico are not a threat), and so will have none available to help with defense against
strategic missiles. This asymmetry is not crucial at the present level of strategic-missile
deployment, since there are enough weapons to punch through these defenses. But the defense
asymmetry becomes more important as the number of strategic weapons is reduced below
START II objectives.

Furthermore, the proposed approach to “clarification” does not address the most serious
evolving theater threats. For example, theater ballistic missiles could deploy chemical or biological
submunitions shortly after boost. If the aggressor’s objective were to terrorize a civilian target,
accuracy of the re-entry vehicle would not be important. It is not unreasonable to estimate that
such a threat may appear in about a decade.

Also within the next decade, one can expect that theater ballistic missiles will be capable of
deploying decoys and maneuverable re-entry vehicles. Such a development enormously
complicates the task of the defense. It was a major factor in our decision in 1972, at the time the
ABM Treaty was signed, to rely on Mutual Assured Destruction rather than active terminal
defense. Boost-phase defense, which is necessary to counter such a threat, was not
technologically feasible at that time.

The boost phase of a short-range 600-km theater missile lasts for approximately one minute.
Thus, boost-phase interception requires very prompt detection of a missile launch — which adverse
cloud and weather conditions can make difficult or impossible. If the intercepting missile is
ground-launched, it must have extremely high acceleration (15 to 30g over a one-minute period)
so as to arrive at the target before burnout. Alternatively, but also with major difficulties, one
might depend on airborne or space-borne lasers to deposit enough energy on the missile’s boost
motor to destroy it before burnout. A third approach would depend on high-performance aircraft
– with anti-missile weaponry cued by all-weather sensors — to attack mobile launchers as they were
moved from hiding or to attack missiles during boost phase. This airborne approach also has
obvious drawbacks. It is not likely that we will be notified of an impending attack, so we must
patrol continuously. Furthermore, these aircraft may have to fly over enemy territory and in any
case are subject to attack.

Brilliant Pebbles

Instead of attacking offensive missiles with explosive warheads, another approach was to force
them to blow themselves up by making them collide with something in mid-course. The first
incarnation of this idea was “Smart Rocks” — chunks of solid matter scattered from a heat-seeking
missile that could find a launched missile and intercept it. A later refinement was called “Brilliant
Pebbles.” These are small satellites with independent sensors and propulsion that can guide
themselves to collide with and destroy theater missiles during launch. These Brilliant Pebbles were
initially designed to attack strategic ballistic missiles, whose boost phases last approximately three
times as long as the boost phases of theater ballistic missiles. This means that, to counter theater
missiles, Brilliant Pebbles would have to accelerate faster and orbit at a lower altitude (with a
consequent need of thrust augmentation to overcome atmospheric drag). Preliminary estimates
indicate these requirements may be achievable with reasonable modifications of the original
design.

It is estimated that 350 Brilliant Pebbles could have intercepted at apogee the most intense
Scud attack launched at Riyadh during the Persian Gulf War. It is further estimated that 600 to
800 Brilliant Pebbles could have intercepted these Scuds before any attempt could have been
made to launch submunitions. These Pebbles would have been launched in an orbit whose
inclination matched the latitude of the launch sites. In a case where launch sites were over a
broader range of latitudes, the number of Pebbles would have to be increased, and if the boost
phase and the range of the missile were shorter than the Scud’s, the number of Pebbles would
have to be increased even further. On the other hand, potential increases in the acceleration
capability of the Pebbles’ rocket motor would tend to decrease the number required.

We have been discussing Brilliant Pebbles as the preferred approach to destroying a theater
missile during boost phase. However, they actually have less capability against theater missiles
during boost than does a space-borne laser (though greater capability to intercept missiles during
mid-course). The drawback to the laser is that it requires a constellation of twelve 65,000-pound
satellites. The most practical launcher would be the Russian Energia; otherwise, two Titan 4
boosters would be required to launch components that would be assembled in space. The system
would not be available for deployment before 2006, if the development program continued at its
previous modest funding level. But even this development budget has been compromised by the
House for fiscal 1995. This is clearly a mistake, because its capabilities complement those of the
Brilliant Pebble system.

Star Wars

Some of the early spaced-based defenses that previous Administrations proposed seemed
far-fetched. For example, nuclear-pumped X-ray lasers were not practical. Detractors coined the
phrase “Star Wars.” These detractors adopted the ideology that space must not be “weaponized.”
However, it was already fully weaponized with offensive weapons — the most dangerous weapons
ever devised, nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. Why deny space to the defense?

A worldwide deployment of ground- or sea-based theater ballistic missile defenses would
actually be more expensive than a space-based system. Furthermore, the space-based system is
expected to have the additional capability of boost-phase interceptions, which ground-based
systems cannot accomplish. Our negotiators “clarifying” the ABM Treaty must not give away the
space deployment option.

While theater missiles are not a direct threat to the territory of the U.S., they constitute a threat
that greatly concerns our allies in the Middle and Far East — Japan, South Korea, Turkey, Israel,
the Gulf States, Saudi Arabia. This threat could decisively limit our ability to form coalitions to
help stabilize our interests in those regions. These allies would be inclined to appeasement before
exposing their urban populations to destruction. U.S. interests are served to the extent that we
can provide the best achievable protection for our allies against modem theater missiles. Such
missiles are also a direct threat to Russia, with all the potential for instability that that implies.

A Common Future?

The U.S. and Russia have defense objectives that are more nearly common than at any time
since the battle of Stalingrad. Also, Russian space capabilities are complementary to those of the
United States. Their launch capability exceeds ours, and our space-interceptor and satellite
capabilities exceed theirs.

Could cooperation on space-based defenses serve the interests of both countries? Could all
protected countries be assured that the defense systems would work without the possibility of
interference? Could a common defense program lead our allies and adversaries to moderate any
inclination to construct offensive ballistic-missile capabilities? Could cooperation between Russia
and the U.S. lead to the inclusion of such countries as South Korea, Japan, Turkey, Israel, Saudi
Arabia, and even NATO members that may feel threatened by theater missiles from the southern
shores of the Mediterranean?

Our negotiators claim that Russia’s military leaders are not interested in space defenses at this
time. They are operating under severe budgetary constraints. It is also reported that the Russian
military is suspicious of any cooperative arrangements with the United States.

Russian fears might be overcome by many techniques. For example, if the Brilliant Pebble
defense were deployed only at such an inclination as to defend against launches from Libya, Syria,
Iran, and Iraq, it would be incapable of attacking Russian strategic-launch sites.

Should it also be desired to prevent launches from North Korea by such a system, the
inclination of the defending satellites would have to be increased, and a small percentage of
Russian strategic-launch sites could be threatened. There are some options for handling this by
having some degree of joint control of the system. These options must be explored with the
Russians before negotiators conclude that Russian suspicion of the U.S. precludes cooperation.

If U.S. and Russian confidence in such a system developed, it could be extended from a mutual
defense against theater ballistic missiles to a mutual defense against strategic ballistic missiles
launched from sites on the American or the Russian land mass. This is certainly more attractive
than a defense posture based on mutual assured destruction. Furthermore, this would obviate the
need to build ground-based ABM systems to defend either the U.S. or Russia.

No Band-Aids, Please

This should be the agenda of an energetic and relevant review of the ABM Treaty, rather than
the limited and potentially destabilizing Band-Aid now proposed, which only attempts to “clarify”
the boundary between theater and strategic ballistic-missile threats.

It seems that the first step in such a process would be for the U.S. — Russian Standing
Consultative Commission to study the safety, costs, and effectiveness of a joint space defense as
compared to the alternatives. After all, there is precedent for this. The U.S. is now paying Russia,
Ukraine, and others to dismantle some of their nuclear warheads.

If, despite offers of U.S. financing, use of Russian boosters, and shared control of the system,
the Russians reject a joint space-based defense system, the U.S. has the option of implementing
such a system by itself. The first stage could be implemented only to protect our allies against
theater ballistic missiles. If the Russians wanted, the system would protect them from any theater
ballistic missiles launched from the same sites. Later, the space system could be expanded to
provide defense of the U.S. and (again if they were willing) the Russian land mass.

Our negotiators, or the people who give them instructions, should be bolder than they now
seem. At the very least, they should not agree to limit research or development in any area that
could contribute to missile defense. The needed imagination of our negotiators must be matched
by sufficient courage on the part of the Department of Defense and the Congress to fund a
space-based missile-defense system.

If we cannot provide a meaningful defense for our allies, the alternative is that it will become
clear to those countries that nuclear deterrence is their only defense. We will then have a world of
multilateral mutual assured destruction, where Pakistan could destroy or coerce India (and vice
versa), North Korea could destroy or coerce South Korea and, perhaps, Japan (and vice versa),
and so on for Iraq and Israel, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and others. The stability of the bilateral
mutual assured destruction that now exists between Russia and the U.S. would seem blissful, but
only by comparison. On the other hand, successful ballistic-missile defenses, especially if they
were controlled by both Russia and the U.S., would tend to discourage extensive investment in
missile offenses. Take your pick: effective missile defense or nuclear proliferation.