by Mark Dykstra

Created on: October 27, 2007   Last Updated: May 18, 2011

THE UNITED STATES ABM POLICY IN EUROPE.

We all know that the United States is pushing the option of placing 10 interceptor missiles in Poland along with an associated long range radar system to drive the missile base in the Czech Republic. We have seen a super power stand off, the greatest ever since the end of the cold war and maybe many of us are wondering what the big deal is to the Russians over installing just 10 interceptors a few miles over the border in Poland. I mean they will never be a significant threat to the former Soviet Union, with those numbers, and besides the US wants to protect Europe from Iran and North Korea, in case Iran gets a case of jittery fingers and lob their home made missiles into Europe as a means of retaliation over Israel or a US led attack into bombing Iran's Nuclear Processing sites.

What is interesting is if the US only wants to place 10 interceptors in Europe when clearly Iran has a lot more long range Shahab-3 missiles to throw at Europe as a retaliatory stance for an attack on its territory, you would have to think twice on why only 10 interceptors. Firstly we have to admit that the US working alongside the Russians with their ABM radar site in southern Russia is fraught with a political can of worms, and the potential for crisis management issues could end up being this political tug of war as to the interpretation of what is a target and what is not, and the last thing the United States wants is the Russians turning the system off in the critical seconds. So this option really holds a lot of negative potential issues for the United States as it doesn't want to even consider investing millions of dollars upgrading the Russian facilities and find the Russians running away with US Military Technology.

However, there are some compelling questions that need to be asked in respect to the Russians putting up such stiff opposition to the Missile base in Poland and we need to figure out whether the Polish base has the potential to become much more than what the United States is leading us to believe. Here are some things to think about.

1- Why can't the United States avoid a political show down with the Russians by arranging putting the base and radar elsewhere?

2- Are the Russians justified that the Missile Base could be turned into an extension of the US Intelligence gathering network, such as the NSA, and spy on the former Soviet Union?

3- Are the Russians justified in believing the United States is only putting a limited

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