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.We no longer needed to rely onthe good sense of dictators.But the politicians didn t see it that way.In 1972 the U.S.and the SovietUnion signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty pledging that neithercountry would build a missile defense.101For the sources of this information, see the footnote on page 141. An Effective National Defense 159They said a missile defense would be destabilizing. A countryinvulnerable to incoming missiles could attack another country without fear ofretaliation.This would frighten the undefended nation into striking first.And sowe have continued to live under the cloud of Mutually Assured Destruction aquarter century after it became possible to remove it.History of No Missile DefenseIn 1983 Ronald Reagan decided to ignore the ABM treaty, and heannounced the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) a plan to build a system tointercept and destroy incoming missiles.Part of the defensive system would bebased on the ground and part in orbit.Unfortunately, he turned the project over to the Department of Defense agovernment agency.After a dozen years and tens of billions of dollars, we stilldon t have a missile defense.Meanwhile, in 1987 the Soviet leaders acknowledged that they had brokenthe ABM treaty years before and were developing their own anti-missile system.Where that program stands now, I don t know.But it s obvious that the breakup of the Soviet Union wipes out anyargument for honoring the treaty.Can It Be Done?Many politicians and pundits have ridiculed the very concept of a missiledefense calling it Star Wars and saying it can t be built.They claim SDI isjust an expensive boondoggle.Is a missile defense possible? Definitely.It is possible now to detect thelaunching of a missile anywhere in the world; it s possible to track its course;and it s possible to intercept one missile with another one.The task is tocombine the three capabilities into one operation.The only important question is how much it would cost.Most estimates for a working defense made by both friends and foes ofthe idea range between $200 billion and $1 trillion.Many people might think the system would be worthwhile even if it did cost$1 trillion but many others wouldn t agree.Fortunately, we don t have to speculate on the cost of building a reliablesystem or throw tax money up in the air and hope it lands somewhere useful.Someone else can be persuaded to risk the money to find out. 160 Harry Browne / Why Government Doesn t WorkHow to Get Things DoneBefore I explain how, let me pose a hypothetical problem.Suppose in 1980 the Defense Department determined that an importantweapon needed to be improved dramatically.So the Department ordered a taskforce to make the weapon 100 times more powerful within ten years whilecutting its cost by 90%.I m not aware of any government program achieving such success.But in fact similar achievements occur all the time outside ofgovernment.They are so commonplace that we usually don t even notice them.Perhaps the best example is the personal computer (PC).The PC of 1995was at least 100 times as fast, generally could hold 100 times as much data, andcould perform 100 times as many functions as its 1985 counterpart, which wasclumsy by comparison.And the 1995 model sold for a fraction of the 1985 PC.What caused computers to progress so rapidly while weapons systemsimproved only marginally?The hope for profit.People needed and wanted the computers and wouldreward those who produced faster, more powerful machines.Firms likeMicrosoft, Lotus, Adobe, Dell, Intel, and others grew spectacularly during the1980s and 1990s by responding to public needs making their founders andshareholders fabulously wealthy.Hundreds of other companies tried and failed.Some people risked their lifesavings but couldn t turn out a product that enough people would pay for.But itwas their own savings they risked not yours.And many who failed on the firsttry succeeded on the second.Today the Department of Defense uses tens of thousands of fast, powerfulpersonal computers.But it wouldn t have them if it had tried to develop themitself.How to Build a Missile DefenseThe only way to build a missile defense quickly, inexpensively, andeffectively is to harness the same thirst for profit.No, I m not suggesting as some people do that government should berun like a business.It can t be done.A business operates efficiently by gainingthe willing cooperation of everyone involved financial backers, managers,employees, customers, and suppliers and thus it can survive only by providingwhat people want. An Effective National Defense 161But government runs on coercion.Inefficiency can continue indefinitelybecause no one can choose to stop supporting it no matter how poorly aprogram operates.And a government program has no fear of competition.Nor am I suggesting that the government award a contract to the lowestprivate bidder.That has its own problems underbidding, cost overruns, and soon.And if the company that wins the bid fails to deliver, a great deal of time hasbeen lost.Instead, the government should post a reward of $50 billion (or some suchsum) for the first company that produces a working missile defense.Not an idea,not a plan but an actual demonstration that meets the performance and coststandards the government has set.This way we might have a working system within three or four years rather than the dozen years the government has already spent without success.Drawbacks?Objections might be raised to this plan questions of national security,politicizing the rules of the contest, oversight of the systems operation bygovernment employees, and so on.But these aren t problems with this system.They re problems with anydefense system whether designed by the government or a private company.A missile defense won t stop terrorists or foreign agents from smuggling abomb into the U.S.But Stealth bombers or aircraft carriers or tanks don t protectagainst those things either.A missile defense can t make you a tuna sandwich,but that s no reason to leave the country defenseless against the principal threat nuclear missiles launched from outside America
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