Tuesday, Jun 12, 2007
Opinion
Russian President calls Bush's bluff http://www.hindu.com/2007/06/12/stories/2007061203051100.htm
Vladimir Radyuhin
The U.S.' response to Vladimir Putin's offer of cooperation on missile defence will be a litmus test of its true goals.
Russia offers to share the Soviet-built Gabala radar in the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan It can detect missiles launched from as far as Diego Garcia and Australia
RUSSIAN PRESIDENT Vladimir Putin's offer of cooperation with the United States in defending Europe against missile threats last week has called Washington's bluff.
Barely two days earlier, U.S. President George W. Bush had urged Russia not to see the proposed U.S. anti-missile base in Eastern Europe as a threat and consider sharing the technology and participating. "You shouldn't fear a missile defence system," he said during a visit to the Czech Republic last Tuesday, addressing Russian concerns. "As a matter of fact why don't you cooperate with us on a missile defence system, why don't you participate with the United States?"
He clearly did not expect Mr. Putin's counter-offer. On the sidelines of the G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, Mr. Putin offered to share a Soviet-built radar in the former Soviet republic of Azerbaijan, instead of a new radar in the Czech Republic to monitor hypothetical missile threats from Iran.
The Gabala radar, which Russia rents from Azerbaijan, is one of the biggest in the world. It scans the whole of the Indian Ocean, the Middle East, and most of North Africa, and can detect missiles launched from as far as the U.S. military base on Diego Garcia and Australia.
It could also be upgraded if needed, Mr. Putin said. Later, he said the proposal went far beyond the joint use of the Gabala radar, and involved building a European missile defence system jointly with the U.S. and European nations.
"We propose forming a pool of interested nations, including European states. They should identify credible threats till 2020 and agree on measured to be taken to ward off these threats," he told a press conference in Heiligendamm.
He stressed that a European missile defence should not be a "unilateral or even bilateral" project, and that all participants should have "equal, democratic and acceptable access to the control of the system."
In case Iran is deemed a potential threat, missile interceptors should be placed closer to its borders, for example in Turkey or Iraq, or on sea platforms, Mr. Putin said. A missile shield built near the Iranian borders would cover all of Europe, rather than just a part of it as would be the case with missiles deployed in Poland under the U.S. plan. The wreckage of missiles intercepted in the early stages after launch from Iran would fall into the sea, rather than on the heads of Europeans.
Mr. Putin's proposal is, in fact, forcing the U.S. hand. You said your goal is to protect Europe against Iranian missiles attacks and you want us to join in? We agree, let's do it together. But it should not be the kind of cooperation you offered us the last time we raised the issue.
Under a Russian-U.S. Joint Declaration on Strategic Relations signed in 2002, the sides agreed "to look into possible areas of cooperation in the sphere of anti-missile defences."
Nothing has come out of it, because, as Mr. Putin revealed in a recent interview, the American "cooperation" proposal had boiled down to a request that "we should give them our missiles as targets" for U.S. missile interceptors.
This time Mr. Putin made it clear his proposal did not signal Russia's approval of a U.S. missile base in Eastern Europe. He told Mr. Bush that the coming talks on the Russian plan should not be used as a "cover" for pushing ahead with the deployment of anti-missile facilities in Poland and the Czech Republic. Russia's Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called for a freeze on the U.S. plans for a period of negotiations.
Mr. Bush described the proposal as "interesting" and agreed to engage in "strategic dialogue" with Moscow to "share ideas" over missile defence. Washington's response will be a litmus test of its true goals.
If the U.S. rejects the Russian plan it will confirm Moscow's fears that the proposed missile base, which will be part of a global missile shield, is targeting Russian nuclear arsenals rather than the non-existent Iranian long-range missiles.
The Gabala radar Mr. Putin has offered to share with the U.S., has one critical advantage from Moscow's point of view - it cannot scan territories to the north of it, whereas the radar the Pentagon plans to build in the Czech Republic will be able to monitor Russian missile launches as far as Siberia.
If the U.S. went ahead with deploying radar and missile interceptors near Russian borders, Mr. Putin said Russia would in turn deploy its attack missiles near its Western borders and train them on U.S. military facilities in Europe.
Copyright © 2007, The Hindu.