IMPACTS: NMD PROGRAM STARVES OTHER NEEDED USA DEFENSE PROGRAMS

NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE WILL SAP MONEY FROM OTHER PENTAGON PRIORITIES.

The system would be very expensive to build and to operate. The Joint Chiefs of Staff, in a January 1996 memorandum, have made it clear that they prefer an annual funding level of $500 million for National Missile Defense and $2.3 billion for theater missile defense, in part to preserve funding for more critical military priorities.

NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE CREATES A FALSE SENSE OF SECURITY, AND THUS FAULTY DEFENSE PLANNING

"Star wars is not just fiscally irresponsible though. It presents a false sense of security. It is like putting a $5,000 burglar alarm on the front door of your house, and yet keeping the front windows of your house open and the back door of your house unlocked. Now, surely some thug or some terrorist smart enough to put a nuclear warhead on the top of an ICBM missile, would have the intelligence to take that warhead, rent a U-Haul truck, and deliver it to any city within the United States."

Rep. Chet Edwards - February 15, 1996

NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE COSTS ARE ASTRONOMICAL

The costs of a missile defense system have become astronomical. The Congressional Research Service revealed in 1995 that the Pentagon spent $70.7 billion on Ballistic Missile Defense activities from fiscal year 1984 through fiscal 1994 without producing any deployable systems or major technological breakthroughs. This figure is 121 percent higher than the $32.6 billion amount generally attributed to BMD.

Congress and the Administration have continued to generously fund the BMD program. Congress appropriated $1 billion more for ballistic missile defense in fiscal year 1999 than the $3.6 billion requested by the Administration, even though senior Pentagon officials advised against it. In early January 1999, the Clinton administration announced a plan to pledge $7 billion over six years to actually build a limited missile defense system. Air Force Lt. Gen. Lester Lyles, who leads the missile defense program, says that more money cannot accelerate research and that efforts to build a ballistic missile program are going as fast as technology permits. On October 2, 1998 Deputy Defense Secretary John J. Hamre told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the current effort is Aas close as we can get in the Department of Defense to a Manhattan Project" C World War II's crash effort to build an atomic bomb.

DEFENSE FUNDS SPENT ON NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE ARE WASTED

The money lavished on missile defense is especially egregious in light of the fact that military experts know that the technology is not ready. In a 1998 report released by the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization, which oversees the BMD program, retired General Larry Welch warned that the national missile defense program was Ahighly unlikely" to succeed because it lacks coherence and a realistic plan. The Welch panel reported that out of 17 tests of Ahit to kill" interceptors since 1982, only four, or 23 percent, actually hit their targets. Worse still, of the 14 tests directed against high-altitude targets, only two, or 14 percent hit their targets.

The "3 plus 3" program of National Missile Defense is problematic because, as senior military officials have stated, the technology will not be ready for deployment. The Pentagon's director of operational and test evaluation warned Congress in February 1998, that NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE was filled with technical and scheduling risks because, Aif deployment is required by 2003, the NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE program will have to compress the work of 10 to 12 years into six years."

THE UNITED STATES CANNOT AFFORD THE HUGE EXPENSE FOR A SYSTEM OF DUBIOUS EFFECTIVENESS.

In 1995, the Congressional Budget Office estimated that the cost to build, deploy and operate the ballistic missile systems envisioned in the "Defend America Act" through the year 2030 was between $78 and $184 billion. While the newest versions of a national missile defense have been slimmed down, the cost will still be large. The National Missile Defense cost would be in addition to a huge theater missile defense cost. Moreover, the costs of major weapons systems tend to be higher than originally estimated.