Quote Originally Posted by Furunculu5 View Post

Q: Do i need to continue?
A: ..............................
As far as I am concerned you shouldn't have even started. What I've had to say about contradictions in your original statement I've already said. Nothing to add there.

But the point here isn't about current ability, it's about potential. If U.S. continues to invest in that technology, it may at point become advanced enough to limit Russia's nuclear capabilities. At this point it doesn't change much in the grand scale of things, but what about 2020 or 2050? Following that logic. US shouldn't have made a fuss about North Korean nuclear program because they don't have the advanced missiles that can reach US. No immediate threat. But, of course thing might change and North Korea may acquire that technology in ten or twenty years.

So at the present situation, Russia will naturally want to keep existing balance of power. After installment of the shield, it's first action is to re-target some of it's missiles. If the shield becomes more effective Russia's answer will probably be more missiles and more advanced missiles, because it is much cheaper than developing their own shield. Russian economy still isn't strong enough for that. By pumping money into that shield, US will force Russia to pump money into more missiles, and it may very well trigger another arms race. Russia won't have any other choice if it wants to keep the current balance of power and its position in the world.

I fully understand American logic behind the idea of ABM shield. They've made enemies on all continents and the idea that some of them may acquire nuclear weapons is certainly not pleasing, so the ability to protect themselves from that is very useful. And if the shield becomes more effective so that it can actually stop some Russian missiles, all the better. Don't think that no one really thought of that in the US. I can't believe that if that actually happens someone will be surprised - "Look, we've developed technology that can stop Russian missiles. What, you don't say! Well, bugger. We can't use it since we said that the shield won't be useful against Russian missiles." With these things taken into account, I totally understand Russian position. They want to keep the existing balance of power and they rightfully fear that the shield might potentially be used to limit effectiveness of their nuclear arsenal...