SDI II: Attack of the Clones

Curious. Very curious. Back in the 1980s, Ronald Reagan was derided for proposing strategic defense iniative, which would essentially create a ballistic missile defense system for defending the US against incoming Soviet ICBMs. Much of the derision came from Europe, which thought that the SDI, aka Star Wars, would promote not only a new arms race, but actually spur a nuclear war.

So, it is with great interest that I now read that the US is proposing a missile defense system for Europe.

The Bush administration is moving to establish a new antimissile site in Europe that would be designed to stop attacks by Iran against the United States and its European allies.

The administration's proposal, which comes amid rising concerns about Iran's suspected program to develop nuclear weapons, calls for installing 10 antimissile interceptors at a European site by 2011. Poland and the Czech Republic are among the nations under consideration.

A recommendation on a European site is expected to be made this summer to Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, Pentagon officials say. The Pentagon has asked Congress for $56 million to begin initial work on the long-envisioned antimissile site, a request that has run into some opposition in Congress. The final cost, including the interceptors themselves, is estimated at $1.6 billion.

The establishment of an antimissile base in Eastern Europe would have enormous political implications. The deployment of interceptors in Poland, for example, would create the first permanent American military presence on that nation's soil and further solidify the close ties between the defense establishments of the two nations.

While the plan has been described in Congressional testimony and in published reports, it has received relatively little attention in the United States. But it is a subject of lively discussion in Poland and has also prompted Russian charges that Washington's hidden agenda is to expand the American presence in the former Warsaw Pact nation.

Gen. Yuri N. Baluyevsky, the chief of the Russian military's general staff, has sought to stir up Polish opposition to the plan.

"What can we do?" General Baluyevsky told the Polish newspaper Gazeta Wyborcza in December. "Go ahead and build that shield. You have to think, though, what will fall on your heads afterward. I do not foresee a nuclear conflict between Russia and the West. We do not have such plans. However, it is understandable that countries that are part of such a shield increase their risk."

And those countries that do not come under the umbrella of the missile defense system open themselves up to nuclear attack from Iran. That sounds like such a wonderful idea.

It's also interesting to note that the missile defense system would be installed in Eastern Europe. Poland and the Czech republic are being considered for siting the systems. Not only are these countries within potential range of the Iranian missile systems, but those countries have been strong supporters of the US efforts in Iraq.