gest opponents of this pro-gram were, obviously, the Soviets. According to Teller, Soviet General Secretary An-dropov criticized the Strategic Defense Initiative as an effort to militarize space. (Teller 1987, 7) By the end of Reagans presidency, support and enthusiasm for SDI had almost completely faded away, and Americans were ambivalent about Reagans vision, and political support began to decline. (Winker 1999, 207) It was also much later discovered that Edward Teller had misled President Reagan and the rest of the country into believing his idea, that an X-ray laser could be an anti-missile weapon, was even possible. (Winkler 1999, 207) When President George H. W. Bush took office in 1989, SDI was all but just a memory. The Americans and the Soviets were close to striking a deal on nuclear missile reduction, and President Bush began scaling down funding for SDI research. Additionally, the Cold War was coming to an end, and Americans and Soviets no longer felt as threatened by each others military capabilities as they had before. However, support for a new type of defense program returned with the Clinton administration. There was a new fear of possible nuclear attacks from rouge states or terrorist groups. In 1999, Congress and the President passed and signed the National Missile Defense Act of 1999. Unlike Reagans futuristic plan to have lasers or x-rays intercepting incoming weapons, Clintons National Missile Defense program (NMD) would consist of a number of satellites, high-tech computer systems, and a complex se-ries of missile launching sites in Hawaii, Alaska, and North Dakota. (Hitchens and Samuels, 2000) When George W. Bush took office after President Clinton completed his second term, he decided to push forward with the NMD program. This has many NATO and other European states worried. This is because both Bush appointees De-fense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell have suggested tha...
