Page 2 of 4 In the trenches of the new
cold war By M K Bhadrakumar
Europe into a playground for
someone. We do not want to play these games."
Clearly, the Russians are also not taken
in by the US plea that the proposed deployments in
Central Europe are modest. As prominent Russian
commentator Viktor Litovkin (editor of the Russian
publication Independent Military Review) put it,
"It would be naive to think that Washington will
limit its appetites to Poland
and
the Czech Republic, or to the modest potential
that it is now talking about."
He
continued, "Nobody can guarantee that there will
not 20, then 100, or even more of them
[interceptor missiles] or that they will not be
replaced with their upgraded versions that are
being developed in the US." Besides, Russian
experts have assessed that the US may expand this
system in future to include sea-based elements and
space-based monitoring equipment.
In the
words of the chief of the Russian Air Force Staff,
General Boris Cheltsov, the proposed US
deployments have "the potential to destroy Russian
strategic nuclear forces at the most vulnerable
stage: the initial, ascending leg of the
trajectory".
The "asymmetrical"
countermeasures being debated by Russian experts
in recent weeks include shortening the boost phase
of Russian missiles by converting liquid-fueled
missiles to solid-propellant ones; enhancing the
maneuvering capacity of the missiles both in the
vertical and horizontal planes; using depressed
trajectories that practically never rise above the
dense layers of the atmosphere; and so on.
Gates, who met
with Putin on Tuesday, invited Moscow to cooperate on a
host of issues related to the missile-defense
system. In his public comments, Gates gave a
positive spin to his discussions at the Kremlin.
He said he was ending his visit on a "very
positive tone ... We made some real headway in
clearing up some misunderstanding about the
technical characteristics of the system that are
of concern to the Russians."
But Russia's
top brass reacted swiftly to Gates' upbeat tone,
maintaining that the proposed US deployments in
Central Europe are aimed at Russia and that there
is hardly any scope for cooperation. The chief of
the Russian General Staff, General Yury
Baluyevsky, said: "The real goal [of the US
deployment] is to protect [the US] from Russian
and Chinese nuclear-missile potential and to
create exclusive conditions for the
invulnerability of the United States."
He
warned that Moscow will monitor the US deployments
closely, and "if we see that these installations
pose a threat to Russia's national security, they
will be targeted by our forces. What measures we
are going to use - strategic, nuclear or other -
is a technical issue."
All the same, the
Russian reaction has been restrained. The Kremlin
seems to have a pragmatic diplomatic strategy in
mind. As Putin has said, the Russian reaction may
be "asymmetrical" but highly effective. Evidently,
Putin is averse to getting on to a collision
course with Washington. His priorities at the
moment are that he remain focused on the
development of Russia's economy and on the acute
social problems affecting Russia's progress. In
the final year of his presidency, Putin is
conscious of his political legacy.
Russian
politics are increasingly revolving around the
change of leadership at the Kremlin next March.
Meanwhile, the US presidential campaign has begun.
As Moscow would see it, traditionally, a
"hardline" policy toward Russia wins more support
for the US Republican Party.
Objectively
speaking, Russian-US relations have no reason to
deteriorate the way they were during the Cold War.
The two countries are not hostile toward each
other. On the contrary, they need to cooperate on
a variety of issues of common concern, such as
terrorism and nuclear proliferation, including the
Iran and North Korea nuclear issues. Their
economic ties are also increasing.
All the
same, significant rifts exist in Russian-US
relations and the missile-defense controversy has
"plunged relations with Russia to their lowest
since the end of the Cold War", to quote British
newspaper The Guardian. Behind the facade of the
conciliatory noises during Gates' visit to Moscow,
unnamed US officials accompanying the defense
secretary are quoted as saying, "We're going to
continue to make this effort with Russia, but
we're also very clear, whether Russia cooperates
with us or not is really up to Russia." The
feeling in Moscow is that the US has reneged on an
agreement after the collapse of the Soviet Union
to abandon Cold War politics.
US
rallies European support
Moscow feels disheartened to note that
US diplomacy has largely succeeded in getting
NATO on board. After a special meeting in
Brussels on April 19 at NATO headquarters with
high-level representatives from Washington, which
was followed by a meeting of the NATO-Russia
Council, it was announced that NATO has a united
missile-defense approach; that the territory of
all member countries must be protected from
missile threats; that the threat of missile
attacks is real; and that the US deployments in
Central Europe "would not affect the strategic
balance with Russia".
Of course, beneath
the veneer of unity, it appears there are
differences. German Deputy Foreign Minister Gernot
Erler told the Berliner Zeitung newspaper on
Wednesday that at least six NATO allies, including
Germany, had raised doubts about the project at
the NATO meeting on April 19.
But the
discussion among NATO allies is no longer between
the "new" and the "old" Europeans, as Russian
commentators would have us believe. The German
daily Handelsblatt pointed out that the issue now
is whether the planned US system can protect all
of Europe or not. It added, "So far it can't ...
But if the US can offer a working missile shield
for a viable price that would also include
southern Europe, the resistance in most European
countries will fall away."
Indeed, there
is a considerable body of skeptics who feel, like
Philip Coyle, a weapons testing and evaluation
specialist who served in the administration of US
president Bill Clinton, the US missile-defense
system is "like trying to hit a hole in one in
golf ... [when] the hole is going 15,000 miles an
hour [24,000 km/h] ... as if the hole and the
green were both going 15,000 mph, the green
covered with black circles, and you do not know
what to aim for". Yet, Coyle admits, "If Russia
were installing missile-defense
Head
Office: Unit B, 16/F, Li Dong Building, No. 9 Li Yuen Street East,
Central, Hong Kong Thailand Bureau:
11/13 Petchkasem Road, Hua Hin, Prachuab Kirikhan, Thailand 77110
