Moscow has drawn attention to a statement by Romanian President Traian Basescu that his country had agreed to host American missile defence sites as part of the Washington Administration’s plan to deploy the U.S. missile defence shield in Europe. Commenting on the developments, the Russian Foreign Ministry said Russia would seriously analyze the issue.
Romania is the first European country that has agreed to be involved in the Barack Obama Administrations’ plans to reshape the missile defence system. In view of this, it’s worth mentioning that the Administration led by former President George Bush planed to deploy ten missile interceptors in Poland and a radar system in the Czech Republic by 2013 under pretence that Iran poses a threat to Europe. On the 17th of September, incumbent President Barack Obama, however, announced that he would reject the idea.
This is how Washington officials explain the new move. The previous missile defence system plan was aimed at protecting Europe and the U.S. from possible attacks by the Iranian long-range missiles. However, it has become clear that Iran has not succeeded in developing such weapons yet. At the same time it has made significant progress in developing medium-range missiles. The new American missile defence system proposed by Barack Obama’s Administration is targeted at these Iranian missiles. There is another argument too. The U.S. has developed a cheaper and highly technological missile defence system.
The American mass media have focused on this and have affirmed that the new missile defence system has three stages. An American naval group, Aegis, equipped with SM-3 missile-interceptors will be deployed in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea by 2011. The modernized land-based version of SM-3 missiles will be deployed in Eastern European countries by 2015. The third stage that starts in 2018 provides for the deployment of larger and more effective missile-interceptors. In short, the U.S. is placing a stake on more dynamic and mobile missile defence system that consists of land-based and sea based missiles.
Certainly, all this worries Russia, which hopes to get a detailed explanation from the U.S. The Russian Foreign Ministry commentary says that Russia will raise the issue at the meetings with its American and European partners. It emphasizes that Russia’s approach towards the complex of issues is in principle based on the fact that there is a need to assess the missile threats jointly. This should lead to working out methods to avert the growth of such challenges to real missile threats. In case of a real threat, the countries can examine joint military and technical methods of responding. There is a need to take carefully weighed collective actions based on the principle of equal and indivisible security for each and all countries in order to maintain peace and stability in Europe, says the Russian Foreign Ministry statement. Notably, this is in essence Russia’s official respond to the statement by Romanian President Traian Basescu.
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