Moving Beyond ABM

Bipartisanship won another impressive victory in Washington last Friday when the U.S. Senate approved the complete $8.3 billion missile defense package that President George W. Bush had requested in his original budget plan. Prior to the recent terrorist attacks on the Pentagon and the World Trade Center, Senate Democrats had pushed for a bill allocating only $7 billion for missile defense. What a difference two weeks can make. On Friday, the Democratic majority agreed to the extra $1.3 billion, and gave Bush the option of setting aside some of the money for anti-terrorism measures.

Our newly reinforced national unity is certainly helping to yield some pragmatic policy decisions. America’s missile defense program requires more funding to make significant strides, and now these monetary needs have been satisfied. President Bush’s next step should be to begin testing anti-missile systems in real-world scenarios with more complex technology.

To do so, however, he will have to withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, a move that has still not gained overwhelming support among Washington liberals. Many congressional Democrats continue to view the ABM Treaty as a cornerstone of nuclear stability in the modern world. Before the tragedies of Sept. 11, Bush had declared that the U.S. wanted a complete overhaul of the treaty. He stressed that he would unilaterally pull out of the agreement if Russian President Vladimir Putin did not compromise. Upon witnessing the carnage in New York, Washington, D.C. and Pennsylvania, it became clear that there is no longer any time for revising or amending ABM. We need to withdraw promptly.

The 1972 pact is limiting our defense capabilities at a time when national security has been directly threatened. While inhibited by this agreement, we remain vulnerable to future missile attacks by rogue nations or terrorist groups.

The money President Bush has secured for missile shield development could be more effectively employed if we used our most scientifically innovative technology in trial-run procedures. Thus far all testing has been confined to a tiny Pacific island and an area inside White Sands, New Mexico. Both locations are rather unsophisticated, and critics have correctly argued that a more realistic setting is needed. After all, why shouldn’t we be able to run the most advanced tests possible, when so much is at stake?

Bush wants to construct a testing site in Alaska where various radars will be able to monitor individual targets heading towards the U.S.––just the sort of conditions we need to determine the workability of our technology.

But an Alaskan test bed would violate ABM because it could serve as the operational base for an actual anti-missile system.

No problem, Senate Democrats may say. Why don’t we consider alternative options?

Liberals find the concept of a “boost-phase” defense rather appealing. Richard Lowry of the National Review indicates that such a system “would knock down a missile before it really got started.”

Unfortunately, Lowry then explains that “the ABM Treaty bans mobile interceptors, making boost-phase defense —which would be based on ships—illegal. Indeed, even testing boost-phase capabilities is banned.”

The Bush administration had hoped to conduct a test in February involving a combination of several radar and defense programs. Again, however, ABM makes such testing illegal. We also cannot test a space-based interceptor against target ballistic missiles. Indeed, the treaty takes quite an extreme stance on this issue. Such space-based testing is banned even if the missile being “intercepted” was indisputably a theater-range missile.

But let’s just imagine that, despite the draconian restrictions, the U.S. was able to develop a fully functioning anti-missile program. Our foreign allies would object if Bush withheld the technology from them, for the fight against terrorism is an international campaign, and we shouldn’t be the only ones to have such advanced protection. The international press would surely brand him, once again, as an “isolationist.” And, of course, their point would be well taken. Would Bush be able to mitigate these concerns by transferring anti-missile system components to Japan, incooperation with the emergent Navy Theater-Wide program? Would he be able to use our innovations to upgrade Israel’s Arrow missile defense? No, because Article IX prohibits such assistance: “Each Party undertakes not to transfer to other States, and not to deploy outside its national territory, ABM systems or their components limited by this Treaty.” The U.S. wouldn’t even be allowed to transfer “technical descriptions or blueprints of ABM systems and their components” to our allies. The treaty would thereby paralyze opportunities for international cooperation.

Clearly, for America to develop the most effective and technologically sophisticated missile defense system with global possibilities, Bush must withdraw America from ABM. Skeptics of missile defense have long questioned the authenticity of testing procedures. We can only alleviate their concerns by abandoning the treaty.

And this is Bush’s dilemma. Whether or not he scraps ABM, many Democrats and liberal pundits will unfairly criticize him: they want the sophisticated testing, but they also want to maintain the 1972 agreement.

His detractors may not admit it, but dumping ABM would ultimately be more beneficial than keeping it. The arrangement is a relic of past hostility and does not account for today’s terrorist climate. If the U.S. is going to make a full commitment to constructing a missile defense shield, which now appears to be the case, then we must go all the way with it.

Investing $8.3 billion in anti-missile programs will accomplish very little unless we also shed the chains of ABM. What good is a limited defense system when such comprehensive capabilities are within our grasp?

This is another personal test for President Bush. His magnificent congressional address last Thursday was marked by an unapologetic and principled commitment to our national security. He reaffirmed the practical notion that nations who harbor terrorists should fear the United States. When Iran illegally develops nuclear weapons or North Korea fires test missiles over Japan that have the range to hit Hawaii, they are blatantly demonstrating that they don’t fear us. Military strikes against Osama bin Laden and the Taliban government will certainly help to reconfirm our unmatched power, but we shouldn’t stop there. The day that America can legitimately protect its citizens from incoming missiles is the day that even the most volatile rogue state will be afraid to launch an attack. Such protection could also immobilize any chemical or biological weapons that terrorists might have hoped to deploy.

As former President Ronald W. Reagan used to say, our goal should be “peace through strength.” An all-encompassing missile defense would be our greatest strength. This was Reagan’s vision, and President Bush can make it a reality.

Duncan M. Currie ’04 is a history concentrator in Leverett House.