-Cavet Lector- <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> -Cui Bono- WJPBR Email News List [EMAIL PROTECTED] Peace at any cost is a prelude to war! <A HREF="http://www.smh.com.au/news/0001/11/world/world3.html">Moscow blind to N-missiles - smh.com.au - World</A> http://www.smh.com.au/news/0001/11/world/world3.html Moscow blind to N-missiles By JONATHAN LANDAY in Washington Russia's early-warning system is so decayed that Moscow is unable to detect United States intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launches for at least seven hours a day, US officials and experts say. Russia also could no longer spot missiles fired from US submarines at all, they said. At most, only four of Russia's 21 early-warning satellites were still working, observers of Moscow's space program said. That would mean Russian commanders have no more than 17 hours - and perhaps as little as 12 hours - of daily coverage of the 550 nuclear-tipped ICBM silos in Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota and Wyoming. "Against submarines, they basically have no warning," said Professor Theodore Postol of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. But because the logic of nuclear deterrence requires both sides to launch their missiles before a surprise attack obliterates them, Russia's problems are just as dangerous for the US. The fear is that in the heat of a serious crisis Russian military and civilian leaders could misread a non-threatening rocket launch or ambiguous data as a nuclear first strike and launch a salvo at the US and Western Europe. An August 1999 report by the Congressional Budget Office said that if Russia's early-warning system "cannot reassure Russian leaders that false alarms are indeed benign events, the danger for both countries could be significant". Mr James Goodby, a former ambassador who negotiated the US-funded destruction of Russian nuclear weapons, said: "I think the chances [of a nuclear mistake] are rising ... from what I felt was a very, very low level." US officials, while acknowledging that Russia's early-warning system had deteriorated badly, said Russia retained considerable early- warning capabilities and control of its nuclear forces. In addition, the US and Russia now notified each other of rocket launches in advance. Although US officials insisted there was little chance of an inadvertent nuclear war, the US finds itself in the unusual position of offering to help the Russians detect a US missile attack. One proposal calls for a joint early-warning centre to be set up in Moscow, and another for help to finance the rebuilding of Russia's early-warning system. Early-warning radars and satellites remain important because, while the US and Russia have agreed to "de-target" each other, both can re-program their missiles in minutes. Russia still keeps an estimated 2,000 nuclear warheads on high alert, most of them atop silo-based SS-18 missiles. Experts say the US has as many as 2,500 warheads on high alert. The Kremlin cannot afford to put into orbit the six replacement satellites it needs to resume 24-hour surveillance of US missile silos, experts say. Nor can it pay to activate replacements for two land-based early-warning radars. As a result, Russian radars are blind in the northern areas of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans where US ballistic missile submarines operate. However, a US official said, the Russians were "committed to ensuring that their part of command-and-control works". "It is hard for me to imagine that this degradation is making them more hair-triggered; it's making them more cautious." 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