Vol. 73/No. 43      November 9, 2009

The Russian government had condemned Washington’s plan to place a ground-based system in Poland as a threat to Moscow’s security. The new system is aimed at countering short- and medium-range missiles that could be fired by Iran toward Europe. It would place SM-3 interceptor missiles on ships by 2011 and then afterward on land sites in Europe. In Poland the SM-3 interceptors would be put at a former air base in the town of Redzikowo near the Baltic Sea by 2018. This is the same site where U.S. missile interceptors in underground silos would have been placed.

Washington will also provide Warsaw with ground-to-air Patriot missiles, as the George W. Bush administration had previously promised to do, Mariusz Handzlik, chief foreign policy adviser to Polish president Lech Kaczynski, told the New York Times.

The U.S. rulers’ drive to establish a missile “shield” in Europe is part of achieving nuclear first-strike capacity. The U.S. government has 30 ground-based interceptors located on sites in Alaska and California. There are 21 Aegis-type warships capable of long-range surveillance, tracking, and missile interception deployed in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

The previous plan in Eastern Europe that the White House halted in September was to place 10 interceptor missiles in underground silos in Poland and a radar base in the Czech Republic.

Biden visited the Czech Republic October 23, where government leaders announced they will participate in the revamped missile “shield” program. Neither the U.S. vice president nor Czech prime minister Jan Fischer gave any further details about this.

The vice president also visited Romania, where a small U.S. base and training facility is located. The Romanian government has deployed 1,045 troops to Afghanistan.
 
 
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