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Strategic Defense: A new report says the United States must develop robust missile and space defenses to counter China. If you think the current economic crisis is something, imagine the effects of a nuke over Iowa.Imagine a world in which you can't get money from your bank or can't get a loan. You can't get money from your ATM even if it's within walking distance. You can't drive to one because your car won't work. No, it's not what would happen if the Congress doesn't pass a bailout bill. This is a small snapshot of what would happen if a...

In the wake of Obama’s controversial missile shield decision, it is important to consider the big picture. America spends a lot of money on military expenditures and both the Right and the Left feel strongly about this figure. As of 2008, America is spending a quarter of it’s expenditures on Defense and about 9% on welfare (this number is important) out of roughly 2.5 Trillion. Missile defense is the single most expensive DoD project costing over 8 billion dollars annually, twice as much as the F-22 Raptor procurement. (Source: Page 5) with a significant portion of the costs going overseas....

Russian leaders never liked the idea that the United States, Poland and the Czech Republic were cooperating on missile defense to confront an emerging Iranian threat. The notion that two former Warsaw Pact states that Moscow used to control would be hosting 10 interceptor missiles in Poland and a corresponding radar facility in the Czech Republic was unacceptable. Kremlin leaders alleged that the system was meant to target Russia, not counter Iran, and they had threatened to scuttle unrelated arms control negotiations with the United States unless Washington backed down.

# 19% of respondents in Poland support McCain while 65% support Obama. ~snip So Poland... How's that 'Hope & Change' working out for you now?

SOCHI, Russia (Reuters) - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Friday a decision by the United States to scrap plans for a missile defense shield in Europe was positive. Putin, speaking to investors in the Black Sea resort of Sochi, said he now expected the United States to back a bid by Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan to join the World Trade Organisation. "I expect that after this correct and brave decision, others will follow, including the complete removal of all restrictions on the transfer of high technology to Russia and activity to widen the membership of the World Trade...

(Former Indy Mind blog) “Speak softly and carry a big stick." Except when dealing with the Russians. My veins pump with Russian blood and today was an inferior foreign policy strategist bending under the might of the Russian hammer. There are two very distinct approaches to today's move and both have to be considered. If you think scrapping Bush's missile shield was anything other than a gift to the Russians, think again. This is a country whose population and leadership crave power and control, always have and always will. With their economy reeling and their influence marginalized they will do...

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama abruptly canceled a long-planned missile shield for Eastern Europe on Thursday, replacing a Bush-era project that was bitterly opposed by Russia with a plan he contended would better defend against a growing threat of Iranian missiles. The United States will no longer seek to erect a missile base and radar site in Poland and the Czech Republic, poised at Russia's hemline. That change is bound to please the Russians, who had never accepted U.S. arguments, made by both the Bush and Obama administrations, that the shield was intended strictly as a defense against Iran and...

President Bush was often criticized by his detractors for alienating America's allies. Yet Obama seems to be getting a pass for doing the same thing. In an earlier post, I mentioned Obama's poor treatment of the UK's Gordon Brown. Apparently, the UK is not the only ally that the president has chosen to snub. Today, on the anniversary of the soviet's attack on Poland, Obama announced his intention to scrap plans to build a missile shield based in Poland and the Czech Republic. According to Reuters writer Gabriela Baczynska, Obama means to shelve the plans in order to improve ties...

Strategic Defense: With Iran on the verge of a deliverable nuke, the administration tells our allies in the dead of night that we will scuttle missile defense plans in Eastern Europe to please the Russians.Czechs are used to betrayal by their Western allies. It was at Munich in 1938 that British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain sealed their doom in exchange for a piece of paper promising "peace in our time." The fact that this further gutting of missile defense came on the 70th anniversary of the Soviet invasion of Poland on Sept. 17, 1939, is an eerie coincidence. "Just after...

Defense: On the same day a plot to supply Iran with nuclear materials is revealed, Israel conducts a missile defense test. Nothing concentrates the mind quite so wonderfully as the threat of imminent extinction.On Tuesday, word came that the Manhattan district attorney's office had smashed a plot to smuggle nuclear weapons materials to Iran through unwitting New York banks. A 118-count indictment accuses Chinese financier Lei Feng Wei of setting up fake companies to hide that he was selling millions of dollars in potential nuclear materials to Tehran. As the New York Daily News reports, among the materials involved were...

As Defense Secretary Gates tours our missile defense site at Fort Greely, Alaska, Gov. Sarah Palin calls for restoration of the missile defense cuts. Meanwhile, North Korea points another missile at the U.S. Robert Gates' visit to our missile defense facility at Fort Greely on Monday was a pointed reminder to the North Koreans that while we have been talking softly, we still have a few big sticks in the ground ready to turn the North Korean missile program into so much scrap metal.

National Security: The proposed missile defense system for Europe may be used as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Russia. Is Ronald Reagan's "We win, they lose" now "Let's make a deal"?When President Reagan began the Strategic Defense Initiative in 1983, the only ones who took it seriously were the Soviets. Their global ambitions depended on an America inhibited and even intimidated by the threat of nuclear war. They still do. Just ask Georgia. When Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev met Reagan in Reykjavik, Iceland, in October 1986, he hoped Reagan would be willing to trade SDI away in exchange for...

SDI: If you missed the news, which isn't hard given how poorly these things are covered, our "unproven" missile defense proved itself again last week, when a U.S. warship downed a simulated North Korean missile in flight.The test, conducted in Hawaiian waters by the Navy and the Department of Defense's Missile Defense Agency (MDA), was the 23rd firing by ships equipped with the Aegis ballistic missile defense system. It was the 19th success, including the shoot-down of a dead U.S. spy satellite last year. A short-range ballistic missile simulating a missile like North Korea's Nodongs or Scuds was fired from...

Reports that US President Barack Obama is to scrap plans to deploy a missile defence shield in Poland and the Czech Republic have provoked anger in Europe. The Wall Street Journal reported that the US is to shelve the plan, which was first mooted by the Bush administration and has been a source of friction with Russia ever since. The move would be a cause of celebration in Moscow but of real concern to Eastern European countries which have looked to Washington for support against their former imperial master Russia. The US has said the shield is to guard against...

WASHINGTON -- The White House will shelve Bush administration plans to build a missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic, according to people familiar with the matter, a move likely to cheer Moscow and roil the security debate in Europe. The U.S. will base its decision on a determination that Iran's long-range missile program has not progressed as rapidly as previously estimated, reducing the threat to the continental U.S. and major European capitals, according to current and former U.S. officials. The findings, expected to be completed as early as next week following a 60-day review ordered by President Barack...

L'AQUILA, Italy (Reuters) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned the United States Friday that if it did not reach agreement with Russia on plans for missile defense systems, Moscow would deploy rockets in an enclave near Poland. In sharp contrast to his positive words during President Barack Obama's visit to Moscow earlier this week when the two reached broad agreement on nuclear arms cuts, Medvedev used a news conference at the G8 summit to return to Russia's earlier tough rhetoric on arms control. Medvedev also appeared to change his tone on the missile defense shield itself. During Obama's visit he...

Senate Republicans see a new agreement forged between President Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev as an opportunity to force Democrats’ hand on a major security issue: missile defense. Sixty-seven senators, or two-thirds of those present, must agree to ratify any deal seeking to reduce nuclear weapons between the two nations, giving Senate Republicans, who only control 40 seats, rare leverage. The high bar for ratifying treaties will put pressure on Obama to finish construction of a missile shield in Eastern Europe. At the very least, it will make it very difficult for the president to limit that shield in...

Defense: As we prepare to celebrate our independence, North Korea wants to remind us of Pearl Harbor. Fortunately, we can make use of assets dreamed of by Reagan and deployed by Bush to defend our 50th state. Japan's Yomiuri newspaper reported Thursday that North Korea would launch a long-range Taepodong-2 missile at Hawaii on or about July 4. This would be the anniversary of the first Taepodong-2 test on July 4, 2006. It would also mark the 15th anniversary of North Korean President Kim Il Sung's death.Those who know have stopped laughing at North Korea's increasingly credible nuclear and global...

A missile defense system yet to be tested in battle could be thrust to the forefront to protect US soil amid concerns that North Korea may be preparing a missile strike that could hit Hawaii. *snip* As a precaution, Mr. Gates has ordered a portable missile defense system called the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense System, or THAAD, to be redeployed on Hawaii. A sea-based sensor system known as SBX, which is designed to alert defense systems to an airstrike within seconds, is also part of the deployment. The THAAD system is now positioned at what's called the Pacific Missile...

MOSCOW, May 10 (RIA Novosti) - Russia will link U.S. plans for a missile shield in Europe with the issues of strategic offensive armaments in relations with the United States, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Sunday. "One needn't be an expert to understand: if one party wants or would have an umbrella against all kinds of threats, this party would develop an illusion that it is allowed to do anything and then the aggressiveness of its actions will increase numerously, and the threat of global confrontation will reach a very dangerous level," Putin said in an interview with Japanese...