Commercial Observation Satellites And International Security
As commercial satellites get better and better, the pictures from their military counterparts will no longer be the last argument of kings, as they were in the Cuban missile crisis. Photo interpreters will assume places as pundits on the network news. More pictures will also mean more interpretations because so much depends on the eye of the beholder, as anyone who has ever seen a spy-satellite photo will attest. This Carnegie Endowment volume is a rich, if richly priced, introduction to these emerging issues.
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The Cold War induced caution in nations that feared uncontrollable escalation. Now that confrontations are less likely to careen out of control, a new season of bellicosity is here. The U.S. military, trapped in a Cold War mindset, has failed to realize this. It is spending far too much on casualty-prone units in all the services, in an age when political opposition to casualties effectively makes these units unavailable for combat. The military should recalibrate its priorities and shift funds to weapons such as high-tech lasers, stealth aircraft, and cruise missiles that can make warfare less lethal for Americans.
More destructive cyberweapons are being created every day, and an increasingly sophisticated technology black market virtually guarantees that they will eventually land in the hands of the United States' enemies. Robust defenses are no longer a luxury, they are a necessity.
The tools and techniques for waging war never stand still, but these are the early days of a revolution in military affairs as momentous as those wrought by the railroad and the airplane. This newest transformation is a consequence of developments in civilian society including the information revolution and postindustrial capitalism. Its satellite imagery and smart bombs will change the forms of combat and armies. Personnel and politics, as always, will be as crucial as technology.

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