Why Missile Defense Won't Work
A TECHNICAL ANALYSIS

Counter-Measures

Even if the missile defense system were to function perfectly during tests, it doesn't mean that it would work in the real world. A good example of this is the Patriot theatre defense system.

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The Patriot

Most ballistic missiles possessed by nations hostile to the US are called "theater" ballistic missiles because of their shorter range - 30 to 3,000 kilometers (19 to 1,864 miles). The Patriot was designed to protect US troops from these threats, destroying or deflecting a missile by exploding an interceptor nearby. The Patriot succeeded in all 17 of its tests. However, when it was used during the Gulf War to destroy Iraqi Scud missiles, it failed in most or all of its Scud engagements even though the enemy employed no obvious counter-measures. Unexpected maneuvers and breakups of Iraqi Scud missiles in the Persian Gulf War thwarted the U.S. Patriot missiles' ability to destroy them. Before the war, Patriot (above-left) was successful in all tests was against ballistic-missile targets, which flew on stable, smooth trajectories.

Aside from non-perfect launches, other, deliberate, ways of foiling the defense system are available.

Overwhelm the defense

• Build more missiles than the defense can intercept
• Put multiple nuclear warheads on each missile
• Deploy chemical or biological agents in many small submunitions

Hinder warhead identification

• Deploy replica or traffic decoys
• Hide warhead in one of many metal-coated balloons
• Surround warhead with thousands of tiny radar-reflecting wires called chaff
• Disguise warhead among debris from exploded booster rockets

Hinder warhead detection

• Jam Radar
• Lead attack with nuclear explosions to blind infrared detectors
• Encase warhead in cooled shroud so it is invisible to infrared detectors
• Shape the warhead or the shroud soit reflects less radar energy
• Cover warhead with radar absorbing materials
• Attack missile-tracking satellites and coastal radars

Prevent the interceptor from hitting the warhead

• Hide warhead behind screens or large balloons
• Launch low-flying cruise missiles and shorter-range ballistic missiles from ships
• Add thrusters to warhead to enable maneuvers

Shrouded warheads are one way an attacker might "blind" a missile defense system. Interceptors use an array of infrared sensors to target room-temperature warheads (300 kelvins; 80 degrees Fahrenheit) as far as a few hundred kilometers away. A warhead shrouded in cold liquid nitrogen (77 kelvins) would radiate an infrared signal less than one millionth as intense, making it invisible until it came within a few hundred meters of the interceptor, too late to do anything.

Even though missile defense probably won't work technically, one crucial argument remains: that the presence of a missile defense shield would deter non-nuclear countries from pursuing nuclear weapons, since they would think that they wouldn't be able to penetrate the shield and actually use them. Another argument - for the other side - is that nuclear countries like Russia, China, and North Korea, would feel threatened by the defense shield and would build up nuclear weapons to make sure that they would be able to overwhelm it.

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