In the years he's studied the subject, Mr Blair has been preoccupied with the danger of an accidental war, resulting from a hair- trigger launch in response to mistaken signals from the other side. Though the numbers of warheads have been reduced by treaty, further cuts are being resisted by the Senate, and the expanded range of targeting, in defiance of all political reality, sustains the gravity of the risk, as well as a level of mistrust totally at odds with Washington's entreaties to Moscow for a new relationship. As Mr Blair remarks, no thoughtful general or politician accepts the analysis that lies behind the focus on Russian nuclear deterrence. They do not believe that a cold-blooded, deliberate nuclear strike by either Russia or the US is remotely plausible. Though both Clinton and George W Bush have spoken for fewer nuclear warheads, the war plan, based on a 1997 presidential directive, still invokes so many targets that further reductions, as long as it obtains, are impossible.
Old concepts rule the new world, irrespective of the danger.
A second glimpse, of similar discomfort, looks to the future. Another expert comes forward from the inside to challenge the politicians. Theodore A Postol, a professor at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, worked on anti-missile defence in the Reagan administration. He knows his stuff, and surely bears no taint of the liberal elite. The technical feasibility of NMD is being subjected to a series of tests.