69 lines
3.6 KiB
Plaintext
69 lines
3.6 KiB
Plaintext
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KA-BLOOEY
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By M.L.Verb
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As we try to understand the MX missile system, we first need to move ahead in
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our minds to Doomsday. This is the day when the guys with their fingers on the
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buttons finally can't stand restraint any longer and push them.
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Well, not guys, exactly. Or at least not yet. We have to assume that it
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won't be our guy at that moment -- whose name, let's say, is President Harold
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Jordan -- who punches the button first, but rather their guy. So let's picture
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just one guy -- the one over there in Moscow -- letting all hell break loose.
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We'll have to make up a reason for him doing this. Any reason will do.
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Perhaps he misread a joyous Washington-to-Moscow hotline holiday message that
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was supposed to say, in abbreviated form, "M. Xmas, Sing Halj." Only it got
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glitched up in transit and came out "MX massing. Signed Hal J." So the nervous
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Soviet boss, in the name of national security, orders the Russian missiles to
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wipe out those massing American MX missiles.
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Ka-blooey.
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No, let's hold off on our ka-blooey for a minute. First, let's get the Soviet
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missiles. How many? I don't know; let's say 100 -- on their way. OK. They're
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on their way. Except for 33 of them. If you always build in a 33 percent error
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factor in any human endeavor, you'll be a lot closer to predicting what's really
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going to happen. So: Only 67 Soviet missiles are ever going to get off the
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steppes.
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Those 67 missiles now are heading for the MX Dense pack silos just outside of
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Cheyenne, Wyoming, because everyone in the world knows that that's where we've
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put them--100 of them. But since 33 percent of ours won't work either, we don't
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have 100 missiles against 100 but, rather, 67 on 67.
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How many of those 67 Soviet missiles will be aimed at our 33 duds? Why, 33
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percent of them, of course, or 22.3 of them. Let's call it 23. So we've really
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only got 44 (67 minus 23) Soviet missiles to worry about. The others, if they
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work, will hit duds and we won't lose much.
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How many of those 44 will actually get to Cheyenne? This is rank speculation,
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of course, but you've got to figure that 33 percent of them will end up
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somewhere else--Greenland, maybe, or Miami Beach or Wake Island. My guess is
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that a few will wind up in Gdansk, Poland. The Kremlin later will call this an
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'accident.' So we can scratch off another 14.67 missiles -- make it 15 -- and
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have just 29 to worry about.
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By now you should realize that 33 percent of those remaining 29 missiles
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simply won't go off when they get to Wyoming. They will be duds -- or worse.
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Rounded off, that removes another 10 from our worry, bringing us to 19. Back
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there a sentence or two ago, when I said they'd be duds 'or worse,' what I meant
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was that the duds not only wouldn't go off, but 33 percent of them -- 3, say --
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will wipe out about 33 percent of the incoming functioning missiles. That will,
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in rounded figures, leave us with 13 Soviet missiles to fret over.
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Next, consider tht the 'fratricide' plan -- as the Pentagon calls it --
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postulates that the incoming Soviet missiles will be coming in so close together
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that they'll end up knocking themselves out. Almost certainly the Pentagon's
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hopes are 33 percent too optimistic. But let's grant a 67 percent missilecide
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rate attributable to fratricide. That leaves only 4.33 -- make it 4 -- Soviet
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missiles to be concerned about.
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So, when we shake this whole thing out, the American plan is to spend $26
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billion to fend off maybe 4 Soviet missiles.
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Which may be a real bargain, but personally I'd rather spend it on government
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waste, fraud and abuse.
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