It would, if this Administration has its way. Fortunately, there are members
of Congress in both parties who feel differently. Charlie Bolden keeps
getting asked whenever he goes to the Hill to testify about lunar return-and
the answers he gives don't satisfy the members of the relevant congressional
committees.
> If a magic genie were to appear and give us the choice to bring back
> Apollo, Concorde, Shuttle AND nukes on a hair trigger to Armageddon or
> chose to simply leave things as they are (all or none), I would hope
> our vote would be unanimous to seal that near-gruesome chapter of
> history and work out our future from where we stand today.
Although certain aspects of the cold war were unsettling at the time, I have
to say that in retrospect it all actually worked pretty well. At the time I
thought M.A.D really was insane, but now I can see that having *two*
superpowers provides the benefit that each needs to be on its best behaviour
and not do anything too extreme. When there's only one superpower, that
superpower can stomp around pretty much as it likes, and even do things that
it used to accuse the other superpower of doing.
I certainly wouldn't ask the magic genie to 'make it so'; but in many ways
multiple superpowers served as a governor, as well as an incentive.
> Although certain aspects of the cold war were unsettling at the time, I have
> to say that in retrospect it all actually worked pretty well. At the time I
> thought M.A.D really was insane, but now I can see that having *two*
> superpowers provides the benefit that each needs to be on its best behaviour
> and not do anything too extreme. When there's only one superpower, that
> superpower can stomp around pretty much as it likes, and even do things that
> it used to accuse the other superpower of doing.
MAD was pure genius; the big problem with it was trying to talk the
military of the US or USSR into the concept, which was entirely
antithetical to standard military philosophy of the time, which fully
embraced the concept of ideally being able to completely destroy your
opponent while suffering zero harm yourself.
Reagan never could figure this out with his drive for a ABM system that
could defend the whole US from a Soviet attack.
Pat