A few weeks ago the American Physical Society, the world's largest group of physicists, representing more than 42,000 physicists, called for postponement of the decision to deploy. The study also showed that the planned NMD testing program will not be able to determine if the system would be effective against these countermeasures. After a test in January failed, the Pentagon delayed a third test until late June. Tests against realistic targets will not be conducted before the first phase of deployment in 2005, if at all. If the NMD system would be defeated by realistic countermeasures, it makes no sense to begin deployment.
Technical flaws are only part of the problem.
More generally, the NMD suffers from being the wrong defense of the wrong enemy at the wrong price. A state such as North Korea or Iran that wanted to attack the United States with a nuclear weapon or other weapons of mass destruction would probably choose a more certain and reliable means of delivery than one of its scarce, primitive, unreliable ballistic missiles. Such means include smuggled bombs, a truck, a ship in a harbor, or even cruise missiles. Most importantly, deployment of an anti-missile system will have severe negative political consequences. The Russian nuclear arsenal, with its 6250 warheads, remains the most serious threat to the United States, not the future four or five missiles of a small unfriendly state.