And remembering it, McPherson suddenly sees the larger picture, the meaning of the event. It’s as if he just stood back from a video screen, after months of examining each dot. Now the image is revealed. This system, this RPV with its Stormbee eyes, its armament of smart missiles, its speed, its radar invisibility, its cheapness and lack of a human pilot put at risk—this system is the kind of pinpoint weapon that can really and truly change the nature of warfare. If the Soviets roll out of Eastern Europe with their giant Warsaw Pact army—for that matter, if any army starts an invasion anywhere—then these pilotless drones can drop out of space and fire their missiles before any defensive system can find them or respond, and for each run a half dozen tanks or vehicles are gone. And quick as you can say wow the invading force is gone with it.

The net result of that, given that this technology is pretty much out there for anyone to develop—LSR is not a superinventor after all, nobody is—the net result is that when every country has systems like this one, then no one will be able to invade another country. It just won’t be possible.

Oh, of course there will still be wars—he is not so idealistic as to think that pinpoint weapons systems will end war as an institution—but any major invasion force is doomed to a swift surgical destruction. So really, large-scale invasions become out of the question, which severely curtails how big a war can get.

And all this without having to use the threat of nuclear weapons. For a hundred years now, almost, NATO has used nuclear weapons as the ultimate stopper to any Warsaw Pact invasion. Battlefield nukes in artillery shells, nuclear submarines in the Baltic and Med, the illegal intermediate-range “messenger missiles” hidden in West Germany, ready to make a demonstration pop if the tanks roll.… It’s one of the most dangerous situations in the world, because if one nuke goes off, there’s no telling where it will stop. Most likely it won’t stop until everyone’s dead. And even if it does stop, Europe’s cities will be wiped out. And all to resist tanks!