Double-Talk from Moscow on Iran (Max Boot)

Commentary mag. ^ | Sept. 27, 2010 | Max Boot

[nuconvert]

The White House has been crowing that Russia’s decision last week not to sell advanced S-300 anti-aircraft missiles to Iran represents a big triumph of its attempt to “reset” relationships with Moscow. The reality is somewhat more complicated — and less to our liking.

The fact is that Russia has flirted with selling the S-300 to Iran for years without ever actually going through with the deal, thus suggesting that the Russians were not truly planning to transfer the technology after all — they were simply hoping to get a good payoff from the U.S., Saudi Arabia, and other countries alarmed by rising Iranian power. It’s impossible to know exactly what the Russians have gotten in return (such deals tend to be secret), but at a very minimum they managed to convince the Obama administration to scrap plans to put missile interceptors into Poland and the Czech Republic — a move that alarmed those stalwart allies. How much more can we expect from the Russians? Not that much, as indicated by this L.A. Times article:

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks nuconvert for both.

Russia’s Weapons Deal: Not Dead (still dealing w/Iran)
Weekly Standard | Sept. 30, 2010
Posted on 10/01/2010 5:00:36 AM PDT by nuconvert
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2599623/posts