1mo ago

Senior Canadian diplomat compares Trump's Golden Dome missile program to a 'protection racket'

apnews.com Senior Canadian diplomat compares Trump's Golden Dome missile program to a 'protection racket'

Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations has compared U.S. President Donald Trump’s Golden Dome missile defense program to a “protection racket” after Trump said his northern neighbor can pay $61 billion to join the program or it could be free if the country agrees to annexation.

32 comments

Do people still think defense in space is a dumb idea? Why?
- I think it's because the threat model against which a Golden Dome defends is just not that plausible any longer. Given the distances, a space-based ground defense can only protect from long-range attacks, like ICBMs. Unlike in the 80s, the technology to intercept and destroy ICBMs safely is now probably there, but the threat of all out nuclear war is much reduced.
  
  You don’t think we’ll ever need some form of space defense?

Not to mention, it's never going to happen.
- Because it’s cost prohibitive?
  
  Extremely so.

“Ever since nuclear-armed intercontinental-range missiles were deployed in the 1950s, the United States (and its potential adversaries) have been vulnerable to nuclear attack. This is very unnerving, and has caused our leaders to search for some kind of technical fix that would change this situation by making it possible for us to defend ourselves against such an attack. Fixing this situation is also very appealing to the public. As a consequence, new systems for defending against ICBMs have been proposed again and again, and about half a dozen have been built, costing large amounts of money, in the hope that a technical fix could be found that would make us safe. But none of these efforts have been successful, because the difficulty of defending against nuclear-armed ICBMs is so great.”
https://www.404media.co/scientists-explain-why-trumps-175-billion-golden-dome-is-a-fantasy/

There’s no need for Canada to entertain this nonsense. Use the money on something important.

Does anyone remember when canada was building one of the world's most advanced fighter jets and cancelled it because the americans said they would build a missile defense shield that would protect us instead?
Make the avro arrow great again!!!!

The current President of the Divided states... a racketeer? A swindler?
ORLY.bmp
- Throwing out the ".bmp" like it's 2003, let's go

32 comments