Vol. 71/No. 12      March 26, 2007

"It would be smart to integrate this whole system into NATO," German defense minister Franz Josef Jung told reporters following a March 2 meeting of European Union defense ministers in Wiesbaden, Germany.

German Defense Ministry spokesman Thomas Raabe added, "The question of a threat from long-range missiles exists and this threat must be addressed." Raabe said any missile shield should ultimately be brought under NATO.

Washington has requested to install a radar base in the Czech Republic and interceptor batteries in Poland. The U.S. government recently signed an agreement with these two states to expand military intelligence collaboration. The governments of these former Soviet bloc countries have responded favorably to discussing the proposals.

For several years NATO officials have been discussing the prospect of developing a missile defense system to give first-strike nuclear capacity to the U.S.-dominated military alliance and its member states. However, NATO has not decided to commit the necessary resources to such a project.

The Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency chief, Lt. Gen. Henry Obering, laid out Washington's plans to its NATO allies at a March 1 meeting in Brussels. Obering said Washington will press ahead with the missile shield in Eastern Europe with or without NATO's approval.

Obering added that having a radar base in the Caucasus would also be useful, although no requests have yet been made to either Georgia or Azerbaijan. Armenia, the other former Soviet republic in the region, has close military ties with Russia.

Washington says the planned anti-missile system is designed to counter potential threats from Iran and north Korea and is not targeting Russia.

Moscow, however, sees the move, as well as the construction by Washington of "forward operating" military bases in Romania and Bulgaria, as threatening to Russia.

"We have everything needed to adequately respond to all these deployments," said Russia's air force commander, Gen. Vladimir Mikhailov, in a statement full with bravado on the U.S. missile shield plans, according to Russian news agencies.

In a February 10 speech, Russian president Vladimir Putin described NATO's expansion into Eastern Europe and the Baltic region as a serious provocation. "It turns out that NATO has put its frontline forces on our borders," Putin said. "And we have the right to ask: against whom is that expansion directed?"  
 
 
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