Word: aims
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...designed to "enhance deterrence"? President Reagan and High Frontier's Graham seem to suggest that Star Wars can render nuclear missiles obsolete by providing a foolproof shield. Rather than continuing to base security on the doctrine of mutual assured destruction, Reagan likes to say, why not aim for a world in which neither side has the capacity to destroy the other? When pressed, most proponents of SDI acknowledge that perfection is probably a pipe dream, and show no intention of scrapping the nuclear stockpile. Rather, they conceive of a system that will greatly increase the Soviets' uncertainty about whether...
...situation was fraught with danger, not least for the 1,500 U.S. citizens who still live in Libya despite repeated warnings by Washington to leave. But perhaps the most serious risk was to the Middle East peace process, an ultimate aim of which is a resolution of the Palestinian problem that underlies the current epidemic of terrorism. As the U.S. aircraft carrier Coral Sea left Naples with its support vessels to begin what U.S. officials called "routine operations in the central Mediterranean," the widespread assumption was that the Navy was getting into position in case President Reagan gave the order...
...report was a joint U.S.-Canadian effort, but its barely diguised aim was to persuade Ronald Reagan that acid rain is a serious problem that requires immediate action, not merely more research. Reagan's repeated refusal to take any steps to curb sulfur-dioxide emissions from U.S. coal-burning factories has been a persistent source of friction between the two nations. The President and Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney agreed last winter that Drew Lewis, former U.S. Transportation Secretary, and William Davis, former premier of Ontario, should suggest a course of action before the next U.S.-Canada summit, scheduled...
...flawed rocket booster and replacing the shuttle's cargo, a tracking satellite, will cost some $440 million. If a new orbiter is built to replace Challenger, it would cost at least $2.3 billion and take three or four years to complete. When NASA does resume shuttle operations, its overambitious aim of launching 24 flights a year by 1988 will be scaled down to no more than nine the first year, 14 the next, 18 the following year. Even that schedule may be unrealistic: NASA has never managed to launch more than nine shuttle flights in a twelve month period...
...novel about a man who has lost his will to write novels is always in danger of trying the reader's patience. His repeated assertions that uncertainty is the only certainty are a bit modish, as is his belief that literature is not in the enlightening business, but should aim to create "disturbances." Nevertheless, Ford accomplishes the first requirement of fiction: the making of a convincing illusion. Frank Bascombe inhabits an all too believable dreamworld. --By R.Z. Sheppard