Special Seminar

In person: 370 Cahill. To Join via Zoom: 864 8902 5566

ABSTRACT: During the past 70 years, the United States has invested about $400 billion in ballistic missile defense, mostly on systems intended to intercept long-range, nuclear-armed missiles that might be launched against the United States. But would these systems be reliable and effective against such an attack? This question is addressed by a report that has just been released by the American Physical Society. As I will describe, the report finds that creating a reliable and effective defense against the threat posed by even the small number of relatively unsophisticated nuclear-armed ICBMs that it considers remains a daunting challenge. The difficulties are numerous, ranging from the unresolved countermeasures problem for midcourse-intercept to the severe reach-versus-time challenge of boost-phase intercept. Few of the main challenges have been solved, and many of the hard problems are likely to remain formidable over the 15-year time horizon the study considered. The costs and benefits of such an effort therefore need to be weighed carefully.