The Strategic Defense Initiative was initiated on March 23,
1983 under President Reagan with the purpose to accomplish defense against
ballistic missiles. The testing and utilizing of various types of weapons for
this purpose led many domestic and international critics to claim that the SDI
initiative was a serious violation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty of
1972, a treaty that committed the two world powers of the time to not develop a
missile defense system. Especially the utilization of nuclear weapons for this
purpose was a breach of most international space and defense treaties,
including the Outer Space Treaty of 1967. One of the main reasons for the SDI
initiative was the fact that the utilization of space for military conflicts
became a serious threat. Russian directed-energy weapons deployed in space were
the primarily source of worry at that time. [1]
Among the reasons behind the Strategic Defense Initiative
were the critiques against the high level of defense spending underwent by the
Reagan administration. Having such a developed defense program functional would
have meant that nuclear threats could be completely eliminated, making the SDI
beneficial to everyone, and hence becoming a peace initiative. Besides this, a
strong Strategic Defense Initiative meant the Soviet Union
could not be the one to initiate a strike anymore, which in turn could put an
end to the Cold War. [2]
The Strategic Defense Initiative stirred up some
emotionality mainly because it was strongly contravening important
international treaties. Because of its farfetched ideas such as the utilization
of lasers, the program was nicknamed “Star Wars”. The “science-fiction” technology
was meant to be a whole new and better method of intercepting the enemy weapons
while still in space in order to minimize their impact and effect. Thirty
billion dollars were invested in SDI, but sophisticated technology such as
laser was never used, and in the end the program focused more on kinetic energy
weapons rather than space-based sophisticated weapons. [3]
SDI was worrisome for the Soviet Union mainly because the
Soviets felt the development of such a program by the U.S. meant no future bilateral
negotiations in regard of weaponization. The former Soviet Union feared that
the United States would
deploy a large scale defense systems and this would force the Soviet Union to
initiate an attack, a fact that actually contributed to the U.S. insecurity
rather than assuring a strong national security. President Mikhail Gorbachev
asked that the United States
renounced the Strategic Defense Initiative, and President’s Reagan refusal to
stop the development of this program was the main issue of the time that
prevented the two powers to agree on any means and methods of weapons control.
[4]
Star Wars ended up being abandoned, one of the reasons for
the abandonment being that the development of such a defense program would
generate worries in the international community, as well as tensions between
the United States and the former Soviet Union, a tension that could
involuntarily lead to a possible conflict. [5]
________________________________________
Notes:
[1] Preston , Bob, Johnson, Dana J., Edwards, Sean J.A.,
Miller, Michael, Shipbaugh Calvin. Space Weapons Earth Wars. RAND
Project Air Force.
http://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/2011/RAND_MR1209.pdf
(accessed January 29, 2013), 14.
[2] U.S.
[3] Crowley Cold War Museum
[4] U.S.
[5] 
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