more on STUPID .US Defines Plans to Shut Dow n GPS in C

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

_______________ Forward Header _______________
Subject:        Re: [IP] more on STUPID .US Defines Plans to Shut Down GPS in C
Author: Ross Stapleton-Gray <ross () stapleton-gray com>
Date:           16th December 2004 2:36:31 pm

At 01:56 PM 12/16/2004, Bob Frankston <Bob2-0406 () bobf frankston com> wrote:
> Am I going too far in comparing it with an anti-evolutionary view -- a
> static world is zero-sum and either you have it or your enemy does.
> Knowledge increases with participation and those who horde and fear others
> wind up with less for themselves.
>
> Yet another reminder that Roosevelt was right -- fear is our real enemy.

That, I think, is the real story: irrational fear is producing irrational 
decisions, and particularly skewing toward incredibly poor balancing of 
risks/reward, almost always toward the near term at the expense of the 
long, and fixated on a rather amorphous "Terror" as the rationale.  And the 
current Administration is writing checks that are going to be drawn against 
our children's dwindling accounts of both treasure, and international good 
will.

In the GPS case, I'd like to challenge the Administration to detail the 
circumstances where diddling with GPS makes sense. One can concoct 
particular scenarios (a la the "would you torture someone who knows the 
recall code for the missiles just launched at 100 US cities?" dreams that 
seem to underlie US general policy re "interrogation"), but we've elected 
our leaders to maximize the nation's security, our wealth and well being... 
this will never do that.  In attempting to prevent a hypothetical 
"terrorist" who's done just the right sort of things (and is caught at just 
the right time) to make flicking the lights on GPS a handy trick (including 
speculating on taking down *others'* GPS-equivalent systems), we've sown 
fear and distrust of us internationally, perhaps abrogated a memorandum of 
understanding with ICAO, caused all sorts of prospective GPS-based apps to 
seem a bit less desirable, etc.

And floating out this sort of GPS-disrupting policy isn't the first such 
stunt.  The news of this week that "unnamed government officials" have 
leaked that the Administration is having IAIE chief ElBaradei's phones 
tapped (FBI operation? NSA collection?) suggests that they're willing to 
burn all sorts of resources in the pursuit of short-term goals.  It's no 
secret (Richelson, Bamford, many others) that the US collects COMINT, but 
to flaunt our extra-legal means to tilt diplomatic playing fields is 
inviting trouble.  (For starters, the UN might get around to thinking about 
mandating secure comms with all of its correspondents, including, in this 
case, the Iranians.)

GPS policy, ElBaradei, Gitmo, rules-of-convenience re torture, unilateral 
abrogration of useful treaties, Pentagon plans for "perceptions 
management," etc., etc., are collectively digging a deep, deep hole in our 
global relations that the next Administration, of whatever party, is going 
to have a hard, hard time climbing out of.

Ross





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