Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative (Star Wars)
On March 23, 1983, President Reagan delivered a televised address announcing the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI) — a research programme to develop a system capable of intercepting and destroying incoming Soviet ballistic missiles, potentially rendering nuclear weapons 'impotent and obsolete.' Critics immediately dubbed it 'Star Wars,' after the science fiction film, questioning whether the technology was feasible. The concept involved space-based lasers, particle beam weapons, and kinetic interceptors — all technologies that did not yet exist. SDI alarmed Soviet military planners far more than it was taken seriously by most Western scientists. The USSR could not afford to dismiss the possibility that American technological ingenuity might actually develop a functional missile defence system, which would completely undermine Soviet deterrence — their entire nuclear strategy rested on the threat of retaliation. The Soviets faced an agonising choice: attempt to match SDI with their own programme (enormously expensive), increase offensive forces to overwhelm any possible defence (also expensive), or accept American strategic superiority. All options strained an already-stressed Soviet economy. Gorbachev's insistence at the 1986 Reykjavik Summit that SDI be abandoned was the most dramatic indicator of how seriously Moscow took the threat.
- Year: 1983 CE
- Category: Political
