Brilliant Pebbles, the most important Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) concept developed by President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), was canceled by the Clinton Administration for ideological reasons and has been ignored ever since. If resurrected by President Trump’s Space Force and supported by Congress, it could begin deployment in space within five years and operate for 20 years for a total cost of $20 billion or less. Read Full Story
“George H.W. Bush was America’s closer. Called in to pitch the final innings of the Cold War, Bush 41 presided masterfully over the fall of the Berlin Wall, the unification of Germany, the liberation of 100 million Eastern Europeans and the dissolution of the Soviet Union into 15 independent nations. History’s assignment complete, Bush 41 was retired. And what happened to the world he left behind?” ~Patrick Buchannan, December 6, 2018 Read Full Story
Few if any of those recalling the important contributions of former President George H.W. Bush over the past few days have mentioned his memorable, at least to me, contribution to enabling the ballistic missile defense (BMD) capabilities we have today. Read Full Story
Pause to give thanks for all our blessings, and the lessons learned from those who came before us, and recommit to keeping this land free and prosperous for those who follow us. Memories give us a context for seeing and meeting our opportunities to leave this land better than we found it — and with the help of the Sovereign of the Universe, so may it be . . . Read Full Story
National Security Advisor John Bolton’s trip to Moscow received much public fanfare following President Trump’s announced plan to withdraw from the INF Treaty that Russia has been violating for years, with little or no U.S. response — hopefully he has reset the entire arms control agenda from recent administrations and we are returning to Ronald Reagan’s Peace Through Strength agenda in dealing not only with Russia but also China and others. Read Full Story
“Gorbachev said he could not do it. If they could agree to ban research in space, he would sign in two minutes. They should add to the text ‘The testing in space of all space components of missile defense is prohibited, except research and testing conducting in laboratories’ . . .” Authoritative Memcon from Reykjavik Summit, October 12, 1986 Read Full Story
“ . . . If the allied military targets had been spread out, there wouldn’t have been enough Patriots in the world to defend them all. In 15-20 years, when very accurate missiles with mass destruction warheads are available to third world nations, the U.S. will need a regional wide area defense force to duplicate on a grand scale the Patriot’s pivotal role of defanging the Scud.” Lt. Gen. Charles A. Horner, Commander US Central Command, Tactical Air Forces, in Aviation Week, 11 February 1991 Read Full Story
The September 19, 2018 Washington Times published an article, entitled “Toward a Cost-Effective Ballistic Missile Defense,” by Rowland H. (Rhip) Worrell and me, which reviewed facts to back-up Undersecretary of Defense Michael Griffin’s claim that a space-based defense could be deployed for less than $20-billion. Read Full Story
“So far, the only promising [boost phase] defense system concept has been a space based or satellite borne interceptor. Such a system requires many thousands of interceptors in space, but at a given instant only a small fraction will be in a position to attack. The economic feasibility of such systems is heavily dependent upon equipment reliability and upon enemy countermeasures.” ~ Harold N. Beveridge in his 1960 Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) ‘Project Defender” report to the Director of Research and Engineering Read Full Story
“Glory belongs to the act of being constant to something greater than yourself, to a cause, to your principals, to the people on whom you rely and who rely on you.” ~ John S. McCain, III — Sailor, Representative, Senator, American . . . Read Full Story
We will be adding key policy briefs as we progress.