Word: mx
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...argument holds that it does little good to use counter-force weapons in a defensive situation, for if the U.S. were launching a response to a Soviet first-strike, missiles would simply be destroying empty silos. More recently, though, the doctrine of "limited counter-force" has emerged, and the MX is designed to satisfy the needs of this doctrine...
Limited counter-force targets Soviet missiles to give the U.S. a limited response to a limited Soviet first-strike against our missiles causing only minor American casualties. Under such circumstances, MX proponents fear that the Soviets would doubt our willingness to launch counter-value weapons, inviting a Soviet retaliation and assuring mutual destruction. According to the argument, a limited Soviet attack could only be deterred by U.S. readiness and capability to retaliate against the missiles remaining in the Soviet arsenal and against once-used silos to prevent reloading. Backers of the MX say the missile is needed for such...
...equally so for the Russians. Soviet mobile missile technology has progressed even further than its American counterpart, and if the U.S. developed accurate silo-busting missiles, the Soviets would likely respond by putting their land-based missiles on tracks, affording them greater protection. This predictable Soviet response to the MX would seem to negate whatever value it has as a weapon for effective limited counter-force; if the MX is invulnerable, it would be unable to wipe out similarly mobile Soviet missiles and therefore be useless to develop. If, on the other hand, Soviet mobile missiles could be destroyed...
...these arguments do not even consider the enormous cost involved. With a price tag of $30-$40 billion, the MX would be the most expensive U.S. strategic weapons system ever. For the same caust we could produce literally thousands of cruise missiles; for slightly more than half that sum we could manufacture 13 trident submarines equipped with over 300 ballistic missiles...
...COST AND QUESTIONABLE value of the MX, however, do not describe all that is irksome about the missile. While the MX would be clothed in the rhetoric of limited counter-force and deterrence, it would bring the U.S. capabilities closer to launching a first-strike against the Soviet Union than they have ever been. At least in part, current Soviet programs of escalation constitute a reaction to American development of new multiple, independently-targeted re-entry vehicles, to breakthroughs in missile accuracy, and to the development of the cruise missile. Adding the MX to our arsenal could only heighten Soviet...