Word: destroyer
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Excimer lasers, which use a different kind of chemical reaction, produce beams of short wavelengths that could destroy a missile by focusing on it for only a second or so. But the generating apparatus is so bulky that it could not be lifted into orbit; the laser stations would have to be placed on mountaintops to put them above the densest layers of the atmosphere. Even the thin upper layers would cause the beams to shimmer, however, owing to the same phenomenon that makes the light from stars appear to twinkle. The excimer laser beams would have to be bounced...
...difficult, even assuming the submarines, held in fixed locations, had not been found and sunk by the Soviets in advance of a nuclear assault. If the subs survived and launched their laser-generating bombs, a greater difficulty would arise. All laser beams have trouble cutting through the atmosphere to destroy missiles at the start of their flight, but X-ray lasers are among the least penetrating. They could hit missiles only at the top of the boost phase, and probably would be best used for post-boost or mid-course interception. But that is when the warheads (no longer missiles...
KINETIC-ENERGY WEAPONS. They are simply objects like rockets, homing vehicles or even pellets fired at a missile, bus or warhead to destroy it by sheer impact. They are potentially effective at any stage from boost to re-entry, and can be fired either from the ground or from space. Their technology is well enough developed to make them available by the 1990s, much earlier than any of the beam weapons. Indeed, a terminal defense of sorts could be put into place right now. Main drawbacks: the range of kinetic-energy weapons is measured in hundreds rather than thousands...
Finally, the Soviets could attack a Star Wars system directly. Orbiting satellites are vastly easier than missiles or warheads to track and draw a bead on. Just two possibilities: the Soviets could orbit a "space mine" that would blow up near an American satellite and destroy it, or a countersatellite that would discharge a cloud of pellets, capable at orbital speeds of piercing steel, or even beach sand, which could pit and disable laser mirrors. American satellites might be defended against such attacks. But once that kind of cycle begins, says William Shuler, coordinator of S.D.I. research at Livermore...
...around 1995, during which both sides would still have their offensive nuclear missiles. Those weapons would be protected by a latter-day version of ABMs called ballistic missile defense, or BMD. If American missiles and command centers were effectively guarded with radar-guided interceptors and death rays that could destroy incoming warheads, the Soviet Union would never be tempted to think that it could disarm and decapitate the U.S. with a pre-emptive strike. In principle, the Soviets could have a similar system...