Obama’s BMD Policy Comes Under a Two-Pronged Assault
As I have noted previously the Obama administration's approach to Ballistic Missile Defense has a number of flaws. Two very important critical analyses have emerged just recently that have re-ignited the debate on BMD. These analyses are worth exploring a tad. The first, by Yousaf Butt, is a mix of strategic-conceptual critique and technical critique. The second, from Ted Postol and George Lewis, is primarily technical. But the purpose of the latter critique is to demonstrate BMD's conceptual flaws through revelation of its technical shortcomings.
The second, i.e. Postol and Lewis, critique has attracted a lot of attention because it seeks to rebut claims that the administration has made about the technical effectiveness of the SM-3 based Aegis BMD system. Even arms control advocates, such as the ArmsControlWonk, have at times looked favourably upon Aegis BMD.
If Postol and Lewis are right then the ACW analysis of Obama's Euro BMD policy is way off base.
I have a new designation that I will now use for centrist Democrat analysts; FOO Fighters, after the band. FOO is shorthand for Friends Of Obama. I notice that most attention in the recent primaries in the US focused on how successful the Tea Party would be in the GOP primaries, but the FOO Fighters are facing a grassroots insurgency in the Democratic Party too. Hopefully labor unionists and grass roots activists will take back their party from the establishment, whom Obama serves. But that, alas, is another issue.
I think it is important that we first focus on a few remarks made by Butt. I say this because I think he has made a major mistake. I'll introduce my remarks by retelling something I once read about the Battle of Berlin. The Soviets (now Russians) have always had a liking for overwhelming firepower, especially the laying down of mass artillery fire. Wehrmacht General Heinrici was noted for his defensive skills. He was, naturally, well aware of the Soviet fondness for massive artillery preparation. He therefore developed two distinct trench lines, aft and rear for the Battle of the Seelow Heights. Here Marshal Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front was to open up the road to Berlin. Just prior to the Soviet artillery assault Heinrici moved his forces to the rear line of trenches. In this way the Soviet artillery preparation fell on empty trenches.
I think that Butt's analysis is impressive, but it's hitting empty trenches. It's clear that his conceptual critique focuses on the question of deterrence
...Setting aside the fact that there haven't been any realistic testsindicating "major improvements in missile defenses," such logic is questionable on three levels...
The "logic" in the above citation refers to the logic of deterrence. One of those three levels is of especial interest
...Second, even if reducing the U.S. stockpile did affect U.S. deterrent posture, missile defense couldn't replace any lost deterrent value because missile defense doesn't deter nuclear attacks. The purpose of missile defense is to defend--or, more accurately, attempt to defend. An adversary wouldn't be deterred from launching a nuclear attack because of the existence of missile defense; rather, it's the credible threat of overwhelming nuclear retaliation that deters an adversary. If the enemy is irrational and suicidal enough to discount the threat of massive nuclear retaliation, then a missile defense system that can theoretically intercept only some of the attacking missiles most certainly isn't going to be a deterrent. In wonk parlance, the NPR conveniently conflates reprisal deterrence with denial deterrence. Reprisal deterrence is the 800-pound gorilla, and denial deterrence is the flea. If our adversaries are thinking twice about using nuclear weapons it's because they're scared of reprisal deterrence. And if they aren't sufficiently scared of reprisal, fractional denial certainly isn't going to stop them. To borrow an analogy used by Thomas Schelling, a Nobel laureate with a deep knowledge of arms control and game theory: Denial deterrence adds to reprisal deterrence like tying an extra cotton string adds to the strength of an aircraft carrier's anchor chain...
This is a major error. BMD does not function strategically as either a deterrent or a defence. The best explanation for the strategic rationale behind BMD can be found in the work of the conservative strategic analyst Colin Gray. Now Gray has the habit of really calling things as he seems them. You can disagree with his calls, as I most certainly do, but one thing is clear. You'll get no BS from Gray. In his book (which I got at Canberra airport) Another Bloody Century: Future Warfare he states, p125, that BMD is a "defensive counterforce" strategic capability, meant to work in conjunction with offensive counterforce.
That is correct.
The purpose of BMD is not deterrence nor defence but is a back up for offensive counterforce capabilities, to the extent that we can discern any strategic rationale. You can see the importance of this when you take on board Butt's comment in the above, namely, that "a missile defense system that can theoretically intercept only some of the attacking missiles most certainly isn't going to be a deterrent." A defensive counterforce capability that is meant to back up an offensive counterforce capability is, strategically speaking, designed to "theoretically intercept only some of the attacking missiles."
Of course that's not how the White House and the FOO Fighters strategically justify BMD. But that's because they don't have the same intellectual honesty as Gray. Any purely strategic critique of BMD, no matter how impressive, that focuses on deterrence and/or defence I am afraid is just hitting empty trenches. The real trenches to be hit are in the rear.
The defensive counterforce rationale makes perfect sense. The US has been the strategic enforcer of a certain conception of world order since the end of World War Two. As the global order's enforcing power a defensive counterforce capability makes perfect sense and is without reproach, so long as you accept that underlying operating assumption. By sticking to the operating assumption there can be no purely strategic critique of BMD. The critique of BMD can be made by both technical and normative arguments. The technical arguments need not bring the underlying assumption to relief; if a strategic capability simply cannot work under any feasible operational conditions then it won't work, period. The same can't be said for normative arguments that focus on the type of world order that is most appropriate.
Of course, Butt does not limit himself to questions of strategy. He also has a technical critique. But let us bring in Postol and Lewis at this point. What is interesting about Postol and Lewis's paper is that it also goes after a BMD strategic rationale, but uses purely a technical argument. Now the great thing here is that Postol and Lewis are going after dissuasion (one of those Bush era concepts that is now "don't ask, don't tell" under Obama)
...According to the report, the technologies now in hand will make it possible for the United States to build a global missile defense system that is so capable, flexible, and reliable that potential adversaries will see that they have no choice but to de-emphasize their efforts to use ballistic missiles as a way to obtain their political goals...
The policy that Postol and Lewis describe is, basically, precisely what Team Bush called "dissuasion."
Postol and Lewis take issue with the Obama claim that the current deployment of GMD interceptors protect the US from "rogue state" ICBMs. But their real beef is with the SM-3 and claims made by the FOO Fighters that Aegis based BMD, and future land based SM-3 systems, are able to provide a mid-course defence against IRBMs. They state
...However, the Defense Department’s own test data show that, in combat, the vast majority of “successful” SM-3 experiments would have failed to destroy attacking warheads. The data also show potential adversaries how to defeat both the SM-3 and the GMD systems, which share the same serious flaws that can be readily exploited by adversaries. The long record of tests of the GMD system, and the most recent test in January of this year, shows that it has only been tested in carefully orchestrated scenarios that have been designed to hide fundamental flaws and produce appearances of success...
Their analysis is divided into two parts. The first deals with sensors external to the Aegis warship. They argue that the forward based X-Band radars to be used by the Aegis system will not be able to distinguish between all the objects that are deployed by a ballistic missile at the end of its flight. That means that the forward X-Band radars would not be able to discern warheads from decoys, even though they would be able detect missiles deploying their payload. This is because they would not be able to track warheads after separation from the bus, Postol and Lewis argue. They also point out that if enemy missiles should fly into the line of sight of any high powered early warning radar then enemy warheads could be tracked, but alas they would not be able distinguish the radar reflections from warheads and decoys. They assert that early warning radar would not be able to distinguish between warheads and two foot long wire.
They then focus on the sensors on the SM-3 hit-to-kill vehicle itself. Postol and Lewis further argue that if an Aegis warship has adequate tracking information of an enemy missile, i.e. from external sensors, then an SM-3 blind launched into space would not be able to destroy the enemy warhead. The idea would be for the SM-3 hit-to-kill vehicle to use on board sensors to locate and destroy the warhead in the vacuum of space. They state
...At this range, the objects in the search volume look like points of light to the infrared sensor on the kill vehicle, so it is not possible for the kill vehicle to obtain information about the shape or size of different objects ahead of it. These substantial limits on what the SM-3 kill vehicle can see makes distinguishing the warhead from other objects a considerable challenge....
They stipulate that no actual test of the SM-3 hit-to-kill vehicle has successfully demonstrated such a capability under realistic combat conditions. They go on and make an additional point. They state that even if the hit-to-kill vehicle
...hits the body of the rocket, the kill vehicle will tend to shatter and pass through the rocket body much like a bullet hitting a thin-walled drinking glass or an empty soda can, leaving the warhead undamaged and still falling on a nearly unchanged trajectory toward its target...
In sum, Postol and Lewis present a pretty devastating critique. Now the MDA has issued a rejoinder and the two and fro is well covered by an article in The New York Times. It matters here whether the warheads used in tests are not dummies and what MDA means precisely by "conclusively proven." The metric for this should be set by, say, the GAO.
Because of these technical difficulties Ballistic Missile Defense, Postol and Lewis thereby argue, cannot act as a dissuasion capability. That is, it would not dissuade potential regional adversaries of the US, i.e. Iran and North Korea, from investing in ballistic missile defence capabilities in hope of deterring the US. They don't put in those terms (they speak of "aggression"), but I'm afraid that is how it is.
Now Postol does have an alternative. He alludes to it in footnote 15. He speaks here of drones to hit liquid fueled ICBMs in boost-phase. Notice that in making this suggestion that Postol does not subject the underlying strategic rationale to critique, unlike Butt. Postol and Lewis, at least in this article, accept the rationale but point to technical hurdles, and offer an alternative approach. Butt, however, at least attempts to go further.
I have an even better suggestion. If you accept my defensive counterforce rationale, that is.
Offer meaningful bilateral and multilateral diplomatic talks with no preconditions with Iran and North Korea in hope of reaching comprehensive regional political settlements.
The US can insist in such talks that any deal is conditional upon abandoning long range missile programs.
That is a type of dissuasion, is it not? Why should dissuasion be looked on purely in military terms?
One more point. These critiques are limited in another sense. If BMD doesn't have a proper strategic rationale, if it won't work, then what is going on? Let us assume rationality, as we must; strategic planners in the US are highly capable and very intelligent. Why is the policy pursued despite the difficulties that critics point out?
Notice that the critics usually don't attempt to answer this question. Because I am not a FOO Fighter i'll give you my suggestion.
It's a boondoggle for the aerospace industry, pure and simple.
The US aerospace industry has always been "too big to fail." If the insurgents in the Democratic Party win then I suspect many will be starting to question whether such military Keynesianism is justified given the challenges faced by the urban working-poor in the US, no thanks to Obama's pals in Wall Street.
Will Improvements in the SM3 Interceptor Turn New Start into a False Start?
I think maybe I am blogging a bit too much since the Nuclear Posture Review came out, but alas I cannot help myself. I refer to my post below on New Start. Russia has released a unilateral statement on Ballistic Missile Defence and strategic arms control. It is worth reflecting upon. According to the following AFP report Russia has declared that
..."The treaty... can only function and be capable of life in conditions where there is no qualitative and quantitative expansion of a possible US missile defence system," the Kremlin said.
One of the "exceptional circumstances" that would undermine the treaty would be "an expansion of the possible US missile defence system that would threaten the potential of Russia's strategic nuclear forces," it said...
New Start contains a liberal withdrawal provision.
The emphasis on qualitative expansion of BMD is what is of interest here. We might recall the Obama administration's phased approach to European BMD. This is how this policy was described in the BMD posture review report
...In Phase 2 (2015 time frame) our capabilities will be enhanced by the fielding of a more advanced interceptor (the SM-3 Block IB) and additional sensors. Phase 2 will include land based SM-3s in southern Europe, in addition to their sea-based locations, expanding coverage to additional NATO allies. In Phase 3 (2018 time frame) coverage against medium- and intermediate-range threats will be improved with a second land-based SM-3 site, located in northern Europe, as well as an upgraded Standard Missile 3 (the SM-3 Block IIA, which is already under development) at sea and land-based sites. These changes will extend coverage to all NATO allies in Europe. In Phase 4 (2020 time frame) an additional capability against a potential ICBM launched from the Middle East against the United States will be available. This phase will take advantage of yet another upgrade to the Standard Missile 3, the Block IIB. All four phases will include upgrades to the missile defense command and control system...
Phase 3 is when things will start to get tricky. Here we will have SM3 Block IIA's based in north Europe. The Block IIA has a greater advertised ability to discern decoys. Some accounts of the Block IIA claim an ability to engage some ICBM's. Again these are claims. However, the SM3 IIB according to the BMD policy review will have noteworthy, again advertised, features
...Toward the end of the decade, more capable interceptors and sensors will become available. The SM-3 Block IIA will have a higher burnout velocity and a more advanced seeker. These features will make it much more capable than the SM-3 Block IA or IB and will provide greater regional coverage. A follow-on missile, the SM-3 Block IIB, is in the initial phase of technology assessment and development. It is expected to be even more capable than the IIA. With a higher burnout velocity and greater divert capability, the SM-3 Block IIB will have some early-intercept capability against a long-range missile. Matched against regional medium-range and intermediate-range ballistic missiles, the SM-3 IIB will defend a greater area than the SM-3 IIA.
Investments are also being made to develop an “engage on remote” technology that includes not only launching on data from a remote sensor track but also the ability to uplink data from assets other than the Aegis radar. This will allow the interceptor to engage the threat missile at greater ranges. A further long-term effort seeks to develop persistent overhead sensors to detect and track large raid sizes of ballistic missiles over their entire trajectories from space. Such an ability would greatly reduce the need for terrestrial sensors and the size of deployable missile defense systems. This Precision Tracking and Space System” (PTSS) is an important funding priority in the President’s Budget for FY 2011 and the Future Years Defense Program...
Take that Moscow! The SM3 IIB, and improved sensors and battle management systems, will enable the KV to "engage the threat missile at greater ranges." Moreover, it will be able to "detect and track large sizes of ballistic missiles over their entire trajectories from space."
Notice that Phase 3 kicks in during the projected lifetime of New Start and Phase 4 kicks in when New Start is supposed to expire.
I submit that if Russia abides by its policy then expanding qualitative improvements in the SM3 might turn New Start into a False Start.
Further strategic arms control is not consistent, politically speaking, with the Obama administration's policy on Ballistic Missile Defence.
Oops, that doesn't fit the narrative too now does it?
Will China Boost its Nuclear Deterrent in Response to a US Ballistic Missile Defence “Ring of Fire” in the Pacific?
When the GOP swept to power in Congress under Newt Gingrich Ballistic Missile Defence got a new lease on life. One prediction that was often made by critics of BMD was that China would respond to a continental scale US BMD system by augmenting its offensive nuclear forces both qualitatively and quantitatively.
There were always an important issue to be mindful of here. A too overt focus on force posture tended to obscure a much basic doctrinal issue. That is to say, any Chinese buildup in response to US BMD would not necessarily reflect a move away from minimum deterrence. A modest buildup in response could reflect a desire to maintain the credibility of minimum deterrence in the presence of a US BMD system.
Now the NTI Global Security Newswire has a potentially most significant small report on the matter
...The United States' expanding missile defense activities might lead China to boost its nuclear arsenal, a former senior Russian military official said yesterday.
"At present, China has a very limited nuclear potential, but my recent contacts with Chinese military representatives indicate that if the United States deploys a global missile defense system, in particular in the Far East, China will build up its offensive capability," said former Russian Defense Ministry deputy chief Lt. Gen. Yevgeny Buzhinsky in a RIA Novosti report...
These comments follow reports that Beijing feels as if the US is extending a Ballistic Missile Defence "ring of fire" across the Pacific.
A number of comments by Chinese strategic analysts, cited by China Daily, caught my eye
...Washington appears determined to surround China with US-built anti-missile systems, military scholars have observed.
According to US-based Defense News, Taiwan became the fifth global buyer of the Patriot missile defense system last year following Japan, the Republic of Korea, the United Arab Emirates and Germany.
Quite a few military experts have noted that Washington's latest proposed weapon deal with Taiwan is the key part of a US strategic encirclement of China in the East Asian region, and that the missiles could soon have a footprint that extends from Japan to the Republic of Korea and Taiwan.
Air force colonel Dai Xu, a renowned military strategist, wrote in an article released this month that "China is in a crescent-shaped ring of encirclement. The ring begins in Japan, stretches through nations in the South China Sea to India, and ends in Afghanistan. Washington's deployment of anti-missile systems around China's periphery forms a crescent-shaped encirclement".
Ni Lexiong, an expert on military affairs with the Shanghai Institute of Political Science and Law, told the Guanghzou Daily yesterday, "The US anti-missile system in China's neighborhood is a replica of its strategy in Eastern Europe against Russia. The Obama administration began to plan for such a system around China after its project in Eastern Europe got suspended"...
The headline of the NTI GSN report is; "China Might Boost Nuclear Deterrent, Russian Expert Says". We must be careful to keep the above distinction in mind. Boosting nuclear deterrence implies moving a step beyond minimum deterrence, but that does not necessarily follow.
China's angry response to the Taiwan arms deal, which included a PAC3 deal, should be seen in this wider context.
Now Patriots and the like are not the same as the other more strategic components of BMD. But these comments from the China Daily report are worth citing
...Tang Xiaosong, director of the Center of International Security and Strategy Studies with Guangdong University of Foreign Studies noted that the ring encircling China can also be expanded at any time in other directions. He said that Washington is hoping to sell India and other Southeast Asian countries the Patriot Advanced Capability (PAC)-3 missile defense system...
Tang Xiaosong makes a very important point. He is referring to the open architecture provisions of US BMD policy, first enunciated by the Bush administration and now accepted by the Obama administration. He is right of course.
Notice that under the framework of "dissuasion" Beijing should now be dissuaded from investing in further enhancing its MRBM and SRBM potential. Somehow I doubt whether this will come to pass.
The thing to worry about here is that any US boost, both to the qualitative capacity of its offensive and defensive strategic potential, I think is not necessarily qualitative Chinese modernisation or even a boost in its deterrence construct, but rather a shift towards a strategic posture consistent with Launch on Warning. The interesting link here is growing Chinese space capability.
As Beijing develops a mature space program this will give PLA strategic planners the option of creating a space based early warning system, enabling the adoption of something akin to Launch on Warning.
That would be bad for strategic stability, and would have the affect of decreasing US national security. Notice that this is the opposite of the pronounced objective of Ballistic Missile Defence.
Obama’s Nuclear Posture Review Delayed Yet Again. A post START Arms Control Connection?
Many in the US arms control community often display an, I admit its very infectious, over the top fascination with the technical details of arms control. I love reading about the third stage boosters of an ICBM too, but let's not forget that arms control is an inherently political process.
Both the post START arms control treaty and the US Nuclear Posture Review continue to be delayed. In fact the NPR is now delayed yet again.
...The Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), originally scheduled to be released with the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) and FY11 Budget on February 1, has been further delayed.
Now, the NPR is expected in early March, but a week or two after the previously announced March 1 deadline.
Josh Rogin the delay a couple days ago, citing a speech by Ellen Tauscher:
"Under Secretary of State for Arms Control Ellen Tauscher said in a speech Wednesday that the NPR is expected to come out in early March, a little later than the March 1 deadline previously announced and much later than the original Dec. 1 deadline."
Whether a "little later" means later in the first week of March or into the second or third week is unclear....
The delays in these two processes have tended to track each other.
This invites conjecture, even though, of course, correlation does not imply causation. Given that this is a blog, let us nonetheless conjecture.
It has generally been supposed that the delays to post START have been due to such technical details as verification and the sharing of telemetry data (in relation to missile tests). Personally I have never really bought that. It's true that the latest round of talks, so various public comments inform us, have been devoted to ironing out these issues.
However, if there are niggles in arms control talks between Russia and the US then we should attribute this to niggles in the political relationship between Moscow and Washington. I have always felt that the real issue here is Ballistic Missile Defence and Prompt Global Strike.
A Russian official has been cited as claiming as much in a very recent AP report
...A Russian official said Friday that U.S. plans for a revamped missile defense system in Romania are stalling talks on a new nuclear arms reduction treaty. Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told the Interfax news agency that Washington's plans "in the most immediate sense" are "influencing" Russian-U.S. negotiations on a replacement to a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty that expired in 2009...
Haggling on verification and telemetry does not necessarily mean that verification is behind any go slow during negotiations.
According to the Obama-Medvedev parameters a statement on the link between BMD and arms control, but also Prompt Global Strike, should be an outcome of the whole process. Noises about extending BMD into Romania and Bulgaria I am sure aren't going down well in Moscow.
On Prompt Global Strike, we are not in a position to say much. This has tended to slip under our radar. But I did notice a reference to it in Joe Biden's speech at the National Defense University. The speech was pretty light on. He did state, though
...Capabilities like an adaptive missile defense shield, conventional warheads with worldwide reach, and others that we are developing enable us to reduce the role of nuclear weapons, as other nuclear powers join us in drawing down. With these modern capabilities, even with deep nuclear reductions, we will remain undeniably strong...
Prompt Global Strike is another Bush era strategic development that you can pencil in for the Obama administration.
Now you would notice in the speech the line that Brand Obama seems to be developing. It seems that the tangible evidence to be offered for Obama's "going to zero" rhetoric is going to be strategic arms control and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Nothing new there. That's how Clinton got indefinite extension of the NPT up. Recall that the CTBT was used to deflect calls from the non-aligned movement for the nuclear weapon states to make good on their abolition obligations under the NPT.
Perhaps Moscow calculates that this gives it leverage. Perhaps Obama would like the NPR to explicitly point to a completed post START arms control accord as tangible evidence for "going to zero". This Moscow figures might be important for Obama, especially given the growing mismatch between his rhetoric and his actions. He needs a successful, especially after Copenhagen, NPT Rev Con.
Given this Moscow probably is playing hard ball to try and extract concessions on BMD,hence the delay in the post START accord which then feeds into a delay in the NPR.
As I have stated previously Obama has adopted the open architecture provision of Bush's BMD policy. That's the problem.
Under this approach the damn thing can be extended into Romania one day, Bulgaria the next and God knows where else after that.
Of course, Iran might also be an issue. Moscow likes arms control because it enables Russia to maintain strategic parity on the cheap. Washington knows this, and Obama is hell bent on going hard against Tehran. Multilateral sanctions require Russia's support. Perhaps Iran should be thrown into the mix too.
Or, maybe, Russia's new military doctrine caught Pentagon hardliners on the hop, requiring last minute revisions?
Obama Retains Bush Era Open Architecture Ballistic Missile Defense
Oh, and by the way, just a small note on the BMD Review.
I note that it keeps one of the big innovations to BMD policy that was introduced by the Bush administration. The Clinton administration had advocated a BMD architecture that was to be fixed. Recall the C1, C2 and C3 phases of the Clinton approach.
The Obama BMD policy states,
...Fifth, U.S. BMD capabilities must be adaptable to future threats and flexible to adjust as the threats change. Hedging against potential changes in the threat is essential given the uncertaint associated with the missile capabilities of potential adversaries...
As I had stated long ago, Obama looked all but set to retain Bush's open architecture approach to BMD.
I was right.
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Marko is also interested in philosophy, especially the theory of knowledge, and science, especially physics, and considers himself to work within the naturalist and enlightenment tradition. He is writing a book on nuclear terrorism.