"STAR WARS": THE POLITICS OF DEFENSE
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WASSILY LEONTIEF: I'm an economist. I study armaments from
the economic point of view-who spends what and on what basis.
There was an article published recently in
Science
Magazine, in which
two physicists try to analyze the cost of producing and maintaining
this type of defense, for us and for the Communists. They specify
that it will cost much less to produce missiles, which are destroyed,
and replace them, than it will cost to destroy them. So if you spend a
hundred million dollars to destroy a missile, you can replace it for 80
million dollars. I am against this Strategic Defense Initiative because
it violates President Reagan's criterion that it must be cost-effective.
The competition is not simply technological. The competition is be–
tween two economies, each with a certain amount of resources, a cer–
tain amount of capabilities. The Russian economy at the present
time is about half as large as that of the United States. But, accord–
ing to estimates of the CIA, the Russian growth is a little faster than
ours. Its industrial output grew at about 3.6 percent per year; ours
at about one half percent. Still it will be a long time before Rus–
sian total economic potenial will equal ours. Now, one can defend
and justify antiballistic missile defense systems even if they are, ac–
cording to this definition, not cost-effective, provided the Russians
have less resources than we. In other words, let us assume that the
real objective of our administration - I don't say it is - is not parity
but superiority. In this case the thing to do is outspend the Russians.
The situation now is different from that which existed when the idea
of assured mutual destruction, which apparently we want, simply
dominated the picture. Because if you have only attacking weapons,
no defenses, I think you can conclude that both sides can build so
many destructive weapons which can destroy each other with a lot to
spare, without exhausting their entire resources. Producing ballistic
missiles is very cheap. I don't think anybody doubts that the Russians
will produce more weapons, and they can produce them like Model
A cars. And you can always increase your power. It doesn't matter if
it's defensive or offensive, because you can still gain superiority. For
example, you can defend yourself but still have a superior attacking
force. So there is no limit. It will be the beginning of an infinite race.
Since one party, admittedly, has fewer economic resources, a point
might come when the weaker party cannot maintain the competition.
The Russians will transfer resources from peaceful purposes to mili–
tary purposes until they can't anymore. In other words, they will
tighten the belt. They know very well how to do it. I have not the
slightest doubt that on a secret ballot it would have one hundred per-
