In what can only be characterized as a major change in foreign policy, the Obama administration has decided to pull out of plans to build a strategic missile defense system in Europe – specifically Poland and/or the Czech Republic (Czechoslovakia). The policy change has left several key NATO allies dangling in the wind as they have given support to the plan even under immense pressure from Russia to oppose the plan that began with the Bush administration and the dreams of Ronald Reagan and George Herbert Walker Bush. The pull-out is being viewed as a major concession and an attempt to improve relations with the Russian government.
The White House and the Secretary of Defense are expected to address this issue thoroughly today with press conferences on the docket.
Jan Fischer, the prime minister of the Czech Republic, one of two countries where the system was to be built, told reporters that Obama phoned him overnight to say “his government is pulling out of plans to build a missile defense radar on Czech territory.”
Without giving specifics, Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said, “We have made a major adjustment and enhancement to our European missile defense system that will better protect our forces deployed in Europe and our allies there from Iranian short- and medium-range missiles.”
He said the change comes 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.
“While the Iranian threat has developed, so too has our technology,” Morrell said. Details were expected to be announced later Thursday.
Obama’s top military adviser, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that the administration was “very close” to the end of a seven-month review of a missile defense shield proposal, an idea that was promoted by the George W. Bush administration. Mullen would not divulge its results.
Obama faced the dilemma of either setting back the gradual progress toward repairing relations with Russia or disappointing two key NATO allies, the Czech Republic and Poland, that agreed to host components of the planned system.
Morrell said Thursday, “This improvement to the system has nothing to do with Russia and everything to do with Iran.”
NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen called the U.S. decision “a positive step.”
This is yet another move by an administration that seems hell-bent on trying to rewrite the rules for American diplomacy and to undo any and everything left behind by the previous administration. This when added to the decision to accept Iran’s terms for discussing disarmament and non-proliferation ”after” the UN Security Council meets next week to discuss those very topics, makes the Obama administration appear to be taking a posture of appeasement. While it is still early in his foreign affairs agenda, all that we have seen from this president to date is a pattern of apologies and concessions.
In typical Obama fashion, he chose to make this move on the same night that the Baucus healthcare plan was presented (if you can call it that) to the American people. The defense shield move will take a back seat to healthcare and will likely be forgotten by most by the end of the week. This administration is quite good at these things. Remember they announced the Van Jones resignation late on a Friday night just weeks ago. Keeping our attention focused on one hand will prevent us from seeing whats going on in the other one – or at least that seems to be the plan. It appears to be working pretty well on this one.
I watched the president earlier talking about this. he has no plan accept to do the opposite of everything that president bush did and hope for hte best. he is an appeaser and cares more about being loved in Europe than here at home. His legacy will be like Jimmy Carter’s loved in Europe and nothing here in the US.