NATO endorses U.S. missile defense plan: Provocative or essential?

The Associated Press

Missile away!

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NATO endorses U.S. missile defense plan: Provocative or essential?

President Bush advanced his plans this week to build a controversial missile defense system in Eastern Europe by winning the unanimous backing of NATO allies and sealing a deal with the Czech Republic to build a radar facility for the system on its soil. Bush's success in winning over European governments bolsters his position heading into talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has denounced the shield as the start of a new arms race. The alliance said the system should be expanded, with the participation of NATO countries and Russia, to protect all of Europe.

Missile defense represented Bush's biggest achievement at the three-day summit and a striking turnabout from the ambivalence Europeans harbored not long ago. Bush wants to build a sophisticated radar facility in the Czech Republic and station 10 interceptor missiles in Poland as a hedge against Iran, which is developing ballistic missiles and enriching uranium that Western officials worry could eventually be used to build nuclear weapons.

Is missile defense a good idea, or a needless provocation of the Russians? Should the United States be researching and developing new anti-missile technology, or working to eradicate nuclear weapons and halt proliferation? Is a missile shield past due, or an idea whose time will never come?

Ben likes: 'Nyet' To NATO

Investor's Business Daily

NATO endorses President Bush's plan for missile defense in Europe despite Russia's objections. A nervous Europe goes along. For Moscow, this is a case of deja vu all over again. If you saw the headline, "Russia to U.S.: Drop Missile Defense," you'd be forgiven if you thought someone had left a 1986 newspaper laying around. That's what former Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev said to President Ronald Reagan when they met in Reykjavik, Iceland in October 1986. Gorbachev, like Putin today, demanded we drop SDI. Reagan refused.

Bush, even hampered by a Democratic Congress, is making missile defense a reality. We shudder at the prospect of a President Obama scrapping Reagan's dream in favor of his "aggressive personal diplomacy" with Tehran and Moscow. A President Obama would have supported the nuclear freeze and lost the Cold War.

A President McCain, however, would carry on Reagan's grand strategy in dealing with America's enemies -- we win, they lose.

Joel likes: Shooting for the stars

Center for American Progress

These programs have grown increasingly obsolete since the end of the Cold War. Why? Because there is no imminent, new ballistic missile threat.

The threat from a North Korean or Iranian long-range missile is still largely hypothetical. These missiles still garner a large share of the attention from policy makers, even though they constitute only one -- and the most difficult -- way to deliver nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.