Article

2003-12-04 Down Under

Australia Agrees to Missile Defense Role

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Posted by Steve White 2003-12-04 2:01:50 AM|| || Front Page|| [1 views since 2007-05-07] Top

#1 Sh**, this will get the lefties (here in Australia) stirred up!

Howard is obviously drawing the issues for the next election. The good news is that the Australian labor party has elected someone as it leader who is on the record as saying 'Bush himself is the most incompetent and dangerous President in living memory.' and the media here is taking him to task for it.

I just love it when the left gets pushed into nasty corners because of their irrational prejudices. Reagan was stupid and brought down the Soviet Union. Bush is stupid and ??

I rate Howards chances in the next election as better than average. I think you can bet on elections in Australia. Mmmm!

Posted by Phil_B 2003-12-4 3:26:01 AM|| 2003-12-4 3:26:01 AM|| Front Page Top

#2 The idea is to make the weapons arsenals of rogue states obselete. They will then have to devote a greater portion of their wounded GNP's toward upgrading or adopt a differnt course.

Posted by Super Hose 2003-12-4 4:48:32 AM|| 2003-12-4 4:48:32 AM|| Front Page Top

#3 If I was an Australian politician or in the Australian military I would be looking at Indonesia with a very jaundiced eye. If the fundos ever take over there and in Pakland things could start to get really dicy

Posted by Cheddarhead 2003-12-4 10:54:32 AM|| 2003-12-4 10:54:32 AM|| Front Page Top

#4 I think some cold Fosters tonight. Several as a matter of fact.

Posted by Lucky 2003-12-4 1:04:31 PM|| 2003-12-4 1:04:31 PM|| Front Page Top

#5 If the fundos ever take over there and in Pakland

Eh? When was Pakistan ("the land of the pure") ever free of the fundos? Its whole reason for existence is the establishment of an Islamic state.

Posted by Robert Crawford 2003-12-4 1:57:35 PM|| [http://www.kloognome.com] 2003-12-4 1:57:35 PM|| Front Page Top

#6 Qazi or Fazl ranting and raving is a different matter from Qazi or Fazl actually warming the Seat of All Power...

Posted by Fred 2003-12-4 2:40:46 PM|| 2003-12-4 2:40:46 PM|| Front Page Top

#7 Having read the online editions of the Australian dayly newspaper. There is an interesting subtext here.

Its clear that there is a USA, Japan, Australia axis developing who's primary purpose is to face down China. The Norks just seem to be a convenient pretext. It probably explains why there has been an increase in Chinese sabre rattling recently. A son of star wars that works will make invading Taiwan a whole lot harder.

Posted by Phil_B 2003-12-4 5:31:51 PM|| 2003-12-4 5:31:51 PM|| Front Page Top

#8 Phil, I think that daily is dreaming. The Norks shot missiles over Japan. The Australians got bombed in Bali. China seems to be helping with the Norks.
I beleive that the US is not pleased with the Taiwanese politician that is trying to antagonize the Chinese to help his reelection. There is two much going on already to start messing with the Chinese.

Posted by Super Hose 2003-12-4 5:44:39 PM|| 2003-12-4 5:44:39 PM|| Front Page Top

#9 If not Foster's a VB. ;)

Posted by eLarson 2003-12-4 6:08:15 PM|| 2003-12-4 6:08:15 PM|| Front Page Top

#10 Or are we working on satellite coverage?

I have no current knowledge of technology approaches being considered these days, but during the 1980's Strategic Defense Initiative, one of the advanced research areas was the Directed Energy Weapons program ... i.e. lasers which could, IIRC, be space-based. There has been a lot of progress on laser technology in general & it will be interesting to see if any of it emerges in a missile defense system.

The Kinetic Energy Weapons program, i.e. "smart rocks" was another of the bleeding edge SDI efforts. Haven't followed progress here.

Right now there is a lot of work happening on smart swarms of weapons. Imagine a group of smaller missiles that form a self-organizing communications network. One gets shot down & all the others confer, decide whether or not to retarget some of them in order to make sure the highest priority targets are hit.

Don't know if this has any defensive applications or if it is entirely for offensive use ....

One way or another, computing and communications will be central to ballistic missile defense.

Posted by rkb 2003-12-4 8:38:01 PM|| 2003-12-4 8:38:01 PM|| Front Page Top

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