The World - News from June 8, 1988

The Soviet Union could launch nuclear-tipped missiles that might knock out the proposed early-stage version of President Reagan’s “Star Wars” defense system, a study by the congressional Office of Technology Assessment said. The U.S. system also could be threatened by the possibility that the enormously complex software needed to run its computers might fail the first and only time it would be used, the study added. The conclusions are part of a two-year-long study by the agency that raises new questions about Reagan’s program, known formally as the Strategic Defense Initiative.