There are many dimensions along which to analyze the multiple programs which claim to offer a defense against long-range missiles. But surely one of the key elements is the sheer cost. When a program requires many years of development, production, installation, and operation, the costs incurred at the beginning will be misleadingly low as to the ultimate cost of the system. As weapons systems have become more sophisticated and more complicated, this disparity between ultimate and immediate costs has grown. But few, if any, military or other systems match the long-run nature of the commitments involved in ballistic missile defense. In a government budget system dominated by annual cycles, the tendency to underestimate the future cost implications of current commitments is very strong.

In the interests of achieving a better understanding of the true long-run cost implications of missile defense, Economists Allied for Arms Control (ECAAR) has conducted a careful study led by Richard F. Kaufman, with chapters by Rodney W. Jones, William A. Cox, and David Gold. We are privileged to have had such a thorough analysis, which we now lay before the public. After a careful study of the costs themselves, which could mount to the neighborhood of one trillion dollars, the implications for the Federal Budget and for the economy as a whole are analyzed. The results are indeed sobering and should (and, I hope, will) be central in the debate as to whether or to what extent the nation should embark on this huge commitment.

The word, “costs,” may conjure visions of bookkeepers with green eye-shades and elicit reactions such as, “when it comes to national security, costs don’t matter.” But, of course, what economists tell us is that costs always matter. Something else has to be given up, and when the magnitudes are those found in this study, a lot has to be given up. It may be in terms of alternative military systems which possibly could yield more security; it may be in terms of economic strength or health, both potent sources of security of our system in military and non-military terms; it may be in terms of increased dependence on the rest of the world and on our foreign trade, which may also increase our vulnerability.

The conservative and well-documented approach to the estimation of the costs and the care with which the links to other implications are brought out will insure that this study will, or at least should, play a major role in a needed public debate on a policy which is developing in a piecemeal fashion with little attention to longterm consequences. We must make wise and balanced decisions today, lest we find ourselves in the future with severely limited choices.