From Defence Talk

 

Russian Bombers Could Suppress US Missile Shield

RIA Novosti | Mar 6, 2007

 

Moscow: Russia's strategic aviation has sufficient potential to suppress elements of a U.S. missile defense shield should it be deployed in Central Europe, the commander of the Strategic Air Force said Monday. "Missile shield elements, which are located in silos, are very vulnerable and have weak defenses," Lieutenant-General Igor Khvorov said. "Therefore, all aircraft deployed by [Russian] strategic aviation can either apply electronic counter-measures against them or physically destroy them."

 

Russia, which has been anxious about NATO bases that have appeared in former Communist-bloc countries and ex-Soviet republics, has blasted U.S. plans to deploy anti-missile systems in Central Europe as a national security threat and a destabilizing factor for Europe.

 

Washington said the defenses would be designed to counter possible strikes from North Korea and Iran, which are involved in long-running disputes with the international community over their nuclear programs.

 

General Pyotr Deinekin, a former Commander-in-Chief of the Russian Air Force, said the deployment of U.S. missile shield elements in Eastern Europe "enables Americans to considerably expand their possibilities from the point of view of reconnaissance and the elimination of Russian missiles in the initial stage of their flight trajectory."

 

"We should now expect the deployment of their intermediate and short-range missiles in the former countries of the Warsaw Pact, including in the Baltic States," Deinekin said.

 

In that situation, Deinekin said, the Russian General Staff should calmly take adequate measures not only to contain, but to actively eliminate those facilities as well, including with the use of Strategic Air Force aviation assets.

U.S. Says Open to NATO Solution for Missile Shield

By REUTERS, BERLIN

DefenseNews

 

The U.S. is open to European demands that a missile shield system it plans to deploy in Poland and the Czech Republic be brought under NATO, the top U.S. missile defense official said on Thursday.

 

“I wouldn’t be averse to that,” U.S. Lieutenant General Henry Obering, director of the Missile Defense Agency, told reporters in Berlin when asked whether Washington could integrate the shield into NATO’s defensive capabilities.

 

“We will continue to consult with our NATO allies,” he said.

 

His comments appeared aimed at reassuring European countries, like Germany, who have expressed concern the plan could splinter NATO states and urged more consultations with Moscow, who sees the shield as an encroachment on its former sphere of influence.

 

Obering said such talks could help convince the Russians to accept the plan, which the U.S. says is meant to protect Europe and U.S. forces here from missiles fired by what Washington calls “rogue states,” such Iran and North Korea.

 

It would be a mistake for European states to underestimate the threat posed by Iran’s missile programs, Obering said.

 

Senior European officials, including German Chancellor Angela Merkel and NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, have called for the missile defense issue to be debated within the Alliance rather than on a bilateral basis.

 

Merkel has vowed to make this point to Polish leaders when she visits Warsaw on Friday.

 

Last week Polish officials said Warsaw needed a bilateral security pact with the U.S. because it was concerned NATO lacked the resolve to counter any serious threats.

 

European diplomats say Merkel, who is presiding over Germany’s European Union presidency, is also eager to keep the debate from becoming an EU issue, which could interfere with her plans to revive the bloc’s constitution.

 

Obering said Washington was perplexed by the negative reaction from Moscow, which views the shield as an attempt to shift the post-Cold War balance of power.

 

He said discussions with Russia and NATO on the shield have been underway for over a year.

 

“The difficulties with the Russians primarily center around the locations,” he said, adding that Moscow found the idea of Czech and Polish sites too close for comfort.

 

ARMS RACE WITH IRAN

 

Obering is in Berlin to explain the plan to install a missile battery in Poland and radar in the Czech Republic to German officials and lawmakers. On Wednesday Obering was in Ukraine and he heads to Paris next.

 

German Deputy Foreign Minister Gernot Erler, in an interview on German radio on Thursday, suggested the missile shield could spark a new arms race — an idea Obering rejected.

 

“That’s not the arms race we’re worried about,” he said. “The arms race we’re worried about is the one in Iran.”

 

Erler also criticized decisions by nuclear powers Britain, France and the U.S. to modernize their atomic arsenals, which he said would complicate nonproliferation efforts.