Strategic Defense: Catastrophic Loss of Control

Abstract

What if space-based strategic defense, as proposed by the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), eventually works reasonably well and is deployed on both sides? This paper examines the properties of the global defensive system that could result from the interactions between the two opposing defensive systems. It is reasoned that this global defensive system could have the capacity to unintentionally and rapidly amplify relatively minor events to global catastrophe. At high states of alert, the global technological system would be difficult or impossible to control and this system could fail in a way that unintentionally initiates a catastrophic nuclear exchange. These dangers have not been adequately examined. This paper presents a framework for analyzing the catastrophic loss of control in such gllobal technological systems.