Betrayal...or New Reality?

I wonder: If we are the world's sole superpower and Eastern Europe is host to some of our "key allies," why, as the Associated Press reports in "Poles, Czechs: US Missile Defense Shift a Betrayal", did the U.S. apparently sell the region down the river to appease our Cold War rival Russia?

WARSAW, Poland – Poles and Czechs voiced deep concern Friday at President Barack Obama's decision to scrap a Bush-era missile defense shield planned for their countries.

"Betrayal! The U.S. sold us to Russia and stabbed us in the back," the Polish tabloid Fakt declared on its front page.

Polish President Lech Kaczynski said he was concerned that Obama's new strategy leaves Poland in a dangerous "gray zone" between Western Europe and the old Soviet sphere.

Recent events in the region have rattled nerves throughout central and eastern Europe, a region controlled by Moscow during the Cold War, including the war last summer between Russia and Georgia and ongoing efforts by Russia to regain influence in Ukraine. A Russian cutoff of gas to Ukraine last winter left many Europeans without heat.

The Bush administration's plan would have been "a major step in preventing various disturbing trends in our region of the world," Kaczynski said in a guest editorial in the daily Fakt and also carried on his presidential Web site.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said he still sees a chance for Poles and Czechs to participate in the redesigned missile defense system. But that did not appear to calm nerves in Warsaw or Prague.

Kaczynski expressed hopes that the U.S. will now offer Poland other forms of "strategic partnership."

In Prague, Czech Foreign Minister Jan Kohout said he made two concrete proposal to U.S. officials on Thursday in hopes of keeping the U.S.-Czech alliance strong: for the U.S. to establish a branch of West Point for NATO members in Central Europe and to "send a Czech scientist on the U.S. space shuttle to the international space station."

An editorial in Hospodarske Novine, a respected pro-business Czech newspaper, said: "an ally we rely on has betrayed us, and exchanged us for its own, better relations with Russia, of which we are rightly afraid."

The move has raised fears in the two nations they are being marginalized by Washington even as a resurgent Russia leaves them longing for added American protection.

The Bush administration always said that the planned system — with a radar near Prague and interceptors in northern Poland — was meant as defense against Iran. But Poles and Czechs saw it as protection against Russia, and Moscow too considered a military installation in its backyard to be a threat.

"No Radar. Russia won," the largest Czech daily, Mlada Fronta Dnes, declared in a front-page headline.

Obama said the old plan was scrapped in part because the U.S. has concluded that Iran is less focused on developing the kind of long-range missiles for which the system was originally developed, making the building of an expensive new shield unnecessary.

The replacement system is to link smaller radar systems with a network of sensors and missiles that could be deployed at sea or on land. Some of the weaponry and sensors are ready now, and the rest would be developed over the next 10 years.

The Pentagon contemplates a system of perhaps 40 missiles by 2015, at two or three sites across Europe.

One cynical answer could be that we have focused our attentions on more vital national interests, as some might surmise after reading the following Times report, "Russian President Hints at U-Turn Over Iran Sanctions," (which, perhaps not coincidentally, also surfaced this week):

President Medvedev gave the first hint [Tuesday] that Russia was prepared to perform a significant policy U-turn and support US moves for sanctions against Iran.

Speaking in Moscow, the Russian leader went out of his way to be more conciliatory with the West before his visit this month to the US where he will attend the United Nations General Assembly meeting in New York and the G20 summit of economic powers in Pittsburgh. A key issue on the agenda will be efforts by America, Britain and France to impose economic sanctions against Tehran if the regime does not agree to curb its nuclear programme.

It is widely expected that President Ahmadinejad of Iran, who will also be in New York, will reject any pressure from the international community. Russia has previously refused to support the imposition of sanctions on Iran, not least because it enjoys strong trade relations with the country.

But yesterday Mr Medvedev said: “Sanctions are not very effective on the whole, but sometimes you have to embark on sanctions and they can be right.”

His remarks contradicted his Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, who last week ruled out sanctions. The possibility of a U-turn will come as a huge relief to Western diplomats who had largely given up on Russia supporting them. Trade sanctions against Iran would need the support of all five permanent members of the UN Security Council — the US, Britain, China, France and Russia. If Russia joined the Western nations, Beijing would be expected to drop its objections.

Reaching an international consensus on Iran is seen by many as the only way to force the regime into serious negotiations and avoid the threat of a unilateral military strike by Israel against Iranian nuclear facilities before the country can build its first atomic bomb.

Mr Medvedev appeared relaxed and more confident about his leadership when he met journalists and academics of the Valdai Discussion Club at the GUM department store in Moscow next to the Kremlin. At the same meeting last year, in the aftermath of Russia’s war with Georgia, he seemed far more edgy, particularly when asked who was really running Russia, him or Vladimir Putin, the Prime Minister.

Last week Mr Medvedev set out an ambitious programme of reforms through which he hopes to stamp out corruption, break Russia’s dependency on energy exports and modernise a country still overshadowed by the legacy of Soviet rule.

The Russian leader said that other reformers before him had tried and failed but that he was confident that the country was ready to be dragged into the 21st century. He said: “I don’t think we can achieve tangible results in one or two years. We could get results in 15 years.”

He went on to liken the campaign to the eradication of illiteracy in Russia, one of the great achievements of Communist rule.

The reference to such a long project suggested strongly that Mr Medvedev would like to stay on as president for another term when his mandate expires in 2012.

However that could bring him into direct conflict with Mr Putin who hinted only last week that he would like to return to the Kremlin as president possibly for two terms of six years until 2024.

The relationship between the two leaders is a constant source of debate for modern Kremlinologists. It is widely accepted that Mr Putin remains in charge of the day-to-day running of Russia even though he holds the number two job.

Yesterday Mr Medvedev tried to play down talk of differences in the partnership. “We are a good team. We speak the same language. That is what matters. We have our differences but that is normal,” he said.

Then again, maybe this confluence of events means something else. Maybe it simply reflects the fact that our ability to dictate the global agenda is not what it was.

Comments

[Independent Accountant]

MP:
Will wonders never cease. I agree with Obama here. I have long advocated maintaining a "neutral" zone of about 200 miles around Russia's borders. I oppose having Poland, the Ukraine and Georgia in NATO. That said, I think we should build anti-missile defenses immediately.

[M. Drake]

I agree also that the Joint Chiefs and the president are doing the right thing.The Czechs did NOT want the Radar and more importantly The Aegis System the Navy uses can do the job w the most likely threat of short/medium range missiles. The other system would have wasted billions fighting with technolgy best used in the old Cold war, That is if it would even work.....