Nuclear security

 

A Successful U.S. Missile Intercept Ends the Era of Nuclear Stability

This month, an intercontinental ballistic missile was fired in the general direction of the Hawaiian islands. During its descent a few minutes later, still outside the earth’s atmosphere, it was struck by another missile that destroyed it.

With that detonation, the world’s tenuous nuclear balance suddenly threatened to come out of kilter. The danger of atom bombs being used again was already increasing. Now it’s grown once more.

The ICBM flying over the Pacific was an American dummy designed to test a new kind of interceptor technology. As it flew, satellites spotted it and alerted an Air Force base in Colorado, which in turn communicated with a Navy destroyer positioned northeast of Hawaii. This ship, the USS John Finn, fired its own missile which, in the jargon, hit and killed the incoming one.

At first glimpse, this sort of technological wizardry would seem to be a cause for not only awe but also joy, for it promises to protect the U.S. from missile attacks by North Korea, for example. But in the weird logic of nuclear strategy, a breakthrough intended to make us safer could end up making us less safe.