U.S. Plan For Nuclear First Strike Attack On Russia And China

RT: US revives plans for a nuclear first strike on Russia. Coming up.

Announcer: “Soft assassinations” of anti-NATO leaders.

Star Wars tested for Eastern Europe.

And US space weapons quote an “unofficial declaration of war.”

RT: Secret clauses of NATO membership state, the US can and will depose Europe’s governments on the orders of the White House.

Giuseppe De Lutiis, NATO author: Even if the electorate were to show a different inclination, secret protocols guarantee alignment by any means.

RT: “By any means” means exactly that. Early NATO whistleblower Hans Otto exposed ‘”kill lists” of leading European politicians that defied investigators’ belief, but were subsequently confirmed by police.

Officers found 15 pages of members of the German Communist Party to be assassinated, and 80 pages on Germany’s Social Democrats, one of the two major parties in the country.

The documents state these assassinations would take place “in case of X”. X may refer, writes NATO scholar Dr. Daniele Ganser, to mass protests against a US-backed government, or an election victory of a genuinely left-wing party.

Instructions for such operations were kept at NATO military headquarters south of Brussels.

Der Spiegel reveals a quote “a strictly secured wing of the building. A grey, steel bank vault door prohibits trespassing to the unauthorized.” Papers on NATO operations in Europe are marked “American eyes only.”

When the EU Parliament officially demanded NATO stop these operations, which have become known by the codename Gladio, the US simply ignored it.

Richard Cottrell is a former Member of the European Parliament. NATO tried to ban his investigation Gladio, NATO’s Dagger at the Heart of Europe, which reports both so-called “soft assassinations” – smearing non-aligned EU politicians through mainstream media to make them unelectable – and real assassinations of politicians that still got elected.

Richard joins us, really great to see you, what’s going on?

Richard Cottrell, author of Gladio, NATO’s Dagger at the Heart of Europe: The United States is not prepared to tolerate governments which are unfavorable to the regime. Let’s give the example of Syriza in Greece at the moment, which has just won, come top of the list in the European elections. This is an example of a government which is not going to be tolerated by the United States of America.

RT: You write a prototype “soft assassination”, British Prime Minister Harold Wilson, whose “blasphemy in American eyes” was to “flirt with nuclear disarmament”.

Cottrell: Yes, it’s become a little bit more difficult to, shall we say, use violent means, than it was in the past. So now you’re going to see more of the Harold Wilson tactics. And they will now increase and I will tell you why – because this weekend the European elections were held. And this has resulted in a very large bloc of anti-Europeans, led by the “Penista”, the National Front of France, which has come out on top in the European elections. Nigel Farage, leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party in the UK, who has come from virtually nowhere to become the leader of the third largest party. This will not be allowed to happen, so there will have to be Harold Wilson-type moves now to remove those leaderships, and those parties in those various countries.

RT: NATO is attempting to supersede and actually replace the United Nations, reveals former Assistant General Hans Sponeck.

Its revised doctrine refuses the UN monopoly on the use of force, reports Global Research News.NATO now promotes itself as the military wing of the UN itself.

The doctrine reserves the right to intervene anywhere in the world where there’s “movements of large numbers of persons.” Its newly formed Partners Across The Globe program’s already incorporated Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Pakistan, and Iraq, and leads the occupation of Afghanistan.

With the expected addition of states like Colombia and El Salvador, NATO will be on all six inhabited continents.

Obama’s foreign policy guru, Zbigniew Brzezinski, calls people in countries under US control “vassals,” a medieval term for slaves.

American armed forces are now in over 150 countries. The unofficial figure, including clandestine US forces, is thought to be much higher.

The Pentagon recently formed the United States Africa Command. Since then, NATO’s dispatched the continent’s most developed nation to a “Hobbesian anarchy”, overthrew the Ivory Coast, and chopped Sudan’s oil-rich southern half into a new state, leaving just two and a half countries still outside its military grid.

Leading military analyst, editor of the newslist Stop NATO Rick Rozoff joins us, great to see you. What’ll happen to people when the last countries fall to US control?

Rick Rozoff, Stop NATO newslist: Global enslavement is the answer to that, and we see it manifested for example in ways that may not be immediately obvious, but after certain amount of analysis we can see for example votes that’ve come up in the United Nations General Assembly in the last year and a half, two years, particularly I’m thinking on the question of Syria. We see that the US through a number of factors – economic bribery, diplomatic blackmail, subversion but also through bilateral, multilateral military programs, has been able to secure the overwhelming compliance or servility of other nations. And that’s one of the reasons why there’s no diplomatic and political independence in nations, because they are beholden to the United States and, frankly speaking, they’re fearful of US economic and ultimately military retaliation should they not go along with the US diktat.

Barack Obama: So today, I state clearly, and with conviction, America’s commitment to seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons. I’m not naive.

RT: Obama’s duplicity is perhaps historically unparalleled. As soon as he envisioned a planet without nuclear weapons, he mushroomed nuclear weapons spending to levels above the height of the Cold War.

He has expanded the infamous Bush Doctrine of a nuclear strike against any country, regardless of international law.

“Full spectrum dominance” is the official term used by his administration, meaning “control everything, everywhere on sea, land, air, space, and outer space.” US Space Command documents plan to even “deny other nations the use of space.”

The “one remaining power” with the capacity to stop what the Pentagon calls full spectrum dominance, writes intelligence analyst William Engdahl, is Russia.

By design or coincidence, crisis in Ukraine provided the perfect excuse for US military control of the region.

Ten days ago the administration tested its Star Wars system for Eastern Europe, which will now be rolled out starting in Romania. Obama brands his system the “stronger, smarter and swifter” version of Ronald Reagan’s initial Star Wars program.

Under the plan, the US attacks Russia with nuclear weapons, while NATO missile defense in Eastern Europe mops up any attempted response.

NSNBC News writes “it is most likely and understandable” Russia interprets NATO’s Star Wars deployment on its border as an “unofficial declaration of war.”

Aerospace analysts told Global Research that US Space Command is planning a nuclear first strike on Russia, as well as one on China in 2016.

Bruce Gagnon of the Global Network Against Weapons in Space joins us, thank you very much for coming on, what do we know about the first strike plans?

Bruce Gagnon, Global Network Against Weapons in Space: This is in the planning process today. The US Space Command practicing engaging in a first strike attack and this is the key element here. These are first strike attack planning, these so-called missile defense systems are key elements in US first strike attack planning. The idea is to hit China or Russia first with a first strike, and then when they try to fire their nuclear retaliatory capability, it is then that the so-called missile “defense” systems would be used to pick off any retaliatory strike, so after a first strike sword is thrust into the heart of China or Russia, then the missile defense shield would be used to pick off any retaliation giving the US the a “successful” first strike attack.

It has nothing at all to do with defense, it has nothing to do with freedom or democracy, or any of those words that are used all the time to disguise the true intentions; it’s all about full spectrum dominance.

RT: Several decades ago the first Star Wars initiative faced intense public and industry debate.

Today the US is controlled by just six mainstream media, all totally suborned to the White House. The result is an Orwellian silence on perhaps the most dangerous issue today.

Europeans may decide they want their leaders chosen by NATO, or even that they support nuclear strikes on China and Russia.

Since the US-controlled mainstream’s never even informed the public these apocalyptic plans are on the agenda, the first people may hear of it, would be this. Seek truth from facts. This is The Truthseeker.

Russia, Afghanistan and Star Wars

By Eric Walberg
July 30, 2010
Courtesy Of "Global Research"

Russia's accommodation of the US and NATO continues apace, with new support of the Afghan war and even missile defence, notes Eric Walberg 　 The Atlantists are on the ascendant these days in Moscow. Russian President Dmitri Medvedev's hamburger lunch with United States President Barack Obama during his visit to Silicon Valley last month apparently left a pleasant taste in his mouth. Now relations with NATO are on the mend, as Russia plans to send 27 Mi-17 helicopters to Afghanistan, NATO Military Committee Chairman Giampaolo di Paola said after a meeting with Chief of Staff of the Russian Armed Forces Nikolai Makarov last Friday. Rosoboronexport has even offered to throw in the first three helicopters for free.

Makarov went further, telling di Paola that Russia was now ready to work with NATO "to pool efforts to find solutions to contemporary challenges and threats to international security". Di Paola welcomed the Russian general's offer, assuring him that NATO views Moscow as a "strong strategic partner, not as a threat or an enemy". He spoke vaguely about new members having to "meet NATO standards", avoiding the U(kraine) and G(eorgia) words during their press conference. Russian and NATO experts will draft a joint action plan for 2011 within the next few months, he said.

Russian NATO Ambassadoor Dmitri Rogozin recently boasted that "Russian helicopters will ideally fit Afghan conditions: they are easy to operate, reliable, efficient and known by Afghan pilots." He offered to train Afghan pilots in addition to the Afghan police Russia is now helping train. Makarov even offered "consultancy in military and combat training based on our Afghan experience, including our mistakes". The deal is estimated at $300m though Rogozin hinted that a discount beyond the three free copters was possible and that Russia could kick in another 19 in 2012. So, if I understand this correctly, Russia's Afghan communist allies from the days of Soviet occupation are now going to man the same old Russian helicopters to kill yet more Afghan patriots, the only difference being the language the occupiers speak and their capitalist pedigree.

Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko is also feeling the chilly wind of Russia-US detente these days. The Russian state-owned NTV, watched by millions of Belorussians, broadcast a scathing two-part documentary "The Belarusian Godfather" last week as the Kremlin was hosting leading Belarusian opposition figures, in a campaign to unseat their troublesome ally in the presidential elections next February. The Russian ire peaked last month over unpaid gas bills, disagreements over the proposed new customs union with Kazakhstan, and Lukashenko's refusal to recognise South Ossetia and Abkhazia, as it, like Russia, seeks to curry favour in Brussels. Upping the ante, a sympathetic interview with Russian nemesis Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili was broadcast on Belarusian TV and Lukashenko is currently hosting deposed Kyrgyz president Kurmanbek Bakiyev. Bakiyev's overthrow was approved if not abetted by Moscow, and the comparison of Lukashenko and Bakiyev in "The Godfather-II" is a stark warning to Lukashenko that his days are numbered.

What accounts for this sudden effusion of East-West friendship, after years of complaining about NATO encirclement and missile bases in Poland?

Obama's more accommodating tone and NATO's pause in its eastward march has clearly mollified the Russians. It also looks like disagreements over Ukrainian/ Georgian membership in NATO and South Ossetian/ Abkhazian independence are all on the backburner now as the US sinks deeper and deeper into its Afghan quagmire. Russia backs the losing war there because it is very worried about the prospects of a Taliban victory. Better a pro-US dictatorship than another Islamic neighbour. Besides, the helicopter deal (and who knows what else?) will replace its $1 billion loss on Iranian missile sales.

But Afghanistan is not Belarus, and rather than moving forward and trying to reach an accommodation with Afghanistan's popular resistance movement, Russia is ignoring the lesson it learned with such pain two decades ago, gambling that the US can produce a miracle where it failed. It is also gambling that the US and NATO are too preoccupied -- and grateful to a newly nice Russia -- to try to pull off another colour revolution in Belarus, where Russia is counting on a largely pro-Russian nation finding a replacement to Lukashenko who will not cause the headaches that he, the orange, rose and tulip revolutionaries have caused.

Whatever happens in Afghanistan and Belarus, Medvedev's two greatest wishes now are to get SALT through the US senate and to pave the way for Russia to join Europe. To clinch this westward reorientation, there are now signs that Russia will do the unthinkable: work with the US on missile defence. In a New York Times oped, ex-Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov and ex-German US ambassador Wolfgang Ischinger, co-chairmen of the Euro-Atlantic Security Initiative Commission, joined former senator Sam Nunn in calling for "North America, Europe and Russia to make defence of the entire Euro-Atlantic region against potential ballistic missile attack a joint priority". They propose the creation of a "more inclusive and better-defended Euro-Atlantic community ... what national leaders in their moment of hope at the Cold War’s close spoke of as a 'Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals whole and free for the first time in 300 years'."

Acceding to US plans for missile defence will kill Medvedev's two birds with one stone. The NYT oped panders to Russian self-image by calling for the US, EU and Russia to "undertake as equal parties to design from the ground up a common architecture to deal with the threat". It soothingly assures us that a joint Starwars will "aid progress in bolstering the nuclear nonproliferation regime". Left out of the equation is the glaring fact that a world encircled by hair-trigger missiles is more likely to be a trigger for war than peace, that the whole point of Starwars is to create facts-on-the-ground for the US empire which will allow it to dictate just what kind of world order is acceptable. As for boosting the NPT, the only way to discourage countries from emulating the nuclear powers is for them to give up their deadly weapons and stop threatening the world with them. It is naive of Russia to think it will be able to veto, say, a war on Iran or some other "offender" of what the US deems to be OK, or that countries threatened by US invasion will stop trying to acquire weapons that will make the US think twice.

This new accommodating Russia is very much in the US global interest and Obama is sure to keep courting Medvedev, despite attempts by Cold Warriors to undermine the budding friendship, as witnessed in the mock spy scandal last month. Given the new westerly wind blowing out of the Kremlin, geopolitical logic could mean an end to Brzezinski-like plans to encircle Russia. Much better to leave the problems of a remote Kyrgyzstan to a friend. Let it deal with complex ethnic and economic problems which Americans can't hope to understand or solve, using a Russian (NATO?) military base as the occasion demands rather than maintaining an unpopular US one. Ukraine? Georgia? Bela-who? Afghanistan is what's important, if it can be secured in the Western fold, with Russia in tow. And Starwars.

The goal of Obama's imperial team is to rally Russia to the US (oops, I mean NATO) flag and push on. Ivanov et al explain that if all goes well, soon along with China, we "can explore cooperation on the role and place of missile defense in a multipolar nuclear world." It looks like Medvedev has opted for US empire even as it implodes. Will Hu get the hint? ***

Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/ You can reach him at http://ericwalberg.com  

References:

Atlantists http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=210

hamburger lunch http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=266 

Soviet occupation http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=126 

Lukashenko http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=87 

new accommodating Russia http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=255 

problems of a remote Kyrgyzstan http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=264 

unpopular US one http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=262 

Ukraine http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=221  

Georgia http://ericwalberg.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=231

Eric Walberg is a frequent contributor to Global Research.

Global Research Articles by Eric Walberg

Dangerous Missile Battle In Space

Fifth Act In U.S. Missile Shield Drama

By Rick Rozoff
Source:Stop NATO
September 30, 2009
Courtesy Of Global Research

Wars have brought untold horrors upon Europe over the centuries, especially the two world wars of the last one. Until now, though, the continent has been spared the ultimate cataclysm of a missile war. Though twenty years after the end of the Cold War recent news articles contain reports that would have been shocking even during the depths of the East-West conflict in Europe that followed World War II. A dispatch quoting a Finnish defense official two days ago bore the title "US could launch missiles from the Baltic Sea" and a U.S. armed forces website yesterday spoke in reference to proposed missile shield plans of "a big, complex, dangerous battle in the space over Europe." On September 28 a feature called "BMD fleet plans Europe defense mission" appeared in the Navy Times which reported that "Ballistic-missile defense warships have become the keystone in a new national strategy....Rather than field sensors and missiles on the ground in Poland and the Czech Republic, the U.S. will first maintain a presence of at least two or three Aegis BMD ships in the waters around Europe, starting in 2011." [1] This development is in keeping with U.S Pentagon chief Robert Gates' presentation of September 17 in which, confirming President Obama's announcement to replace and supplement his predecessor's project of placing ten ground-based interceptor missiles in Poland and a complementary radar installation in the Czech Republic, he laid out a three-step strategy to enhance (his word) U.S. missile shield plans in Europe. In a Defense Department briefing with Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General James Cartwright, Gates explained the logic behind the shift. "Over the last few years, we have made great strides with missile defense, particularly in our ability to counter short-and-medium-range missiles. We now have proven capabilities to intercept these ballistic missiles with land-and-sea-based interceptors supported by much-improved sensors. "These capabilities offer a variety of options to detect, track and shoot down enemy missiles. This allows us to deploy a distributive sensor network rather than a single fixed site, like the kind slated for the Czech Republic, enabling greater survivability and adaptability." [2] That is, as Russian officials have over the past two years openly stated that the stationary missile radar facility intended for the Czech Republic and silo-based missiles planned for Poland would be targeted by their own missiles if the U.S. went ahead with the deployments, mobile and rapidly deployable alternatives would have, in Gates' terms, "greater survivability and adaptability." Land-based facilities are easy to monitor and, if the suspicion arose that they would be part of an imminent first strike attack, neutralize. Sea-based, air-based and spaced-based surveillance and missile deployments would be harder - if not impossible - to track and to take out. Referring to the hitherto exclusively ship-based Standard Missile-3 (SM-3), which nineteen months ago proved capable of shooting down a satellite in space, Gates offered further details: "We have...improved the Standard Missile 3, the SM-3, which has had eight successful flight tests since 2007. These tests have amply demonstrated the SM-3's capability and have given us greater confidence in the system and its future....In the initial stage, we will deploy Aegis ships equipped with SM-3 interceptors, which provide the flexibility to move interceptors from one region to another if needed." The second stage of the Pentagon's updated European missile shield program will entail the basing of "upgraded, land-based SM-3s." "Consultations have begun with allies, starting with Poland and the Czech Republic, about hosting a land-based version of the SM-3 and other components of the system," Gates revealed. In language that progressively reflected what sounds like plans to withstand a first - or second strike - in Europe's first missile war, Gates added, "Over time, this architecture is designed to continually incorporate new and more effective technologies, as well as more interceptors, expanding the range of coverage, improving our ability to knock down multiple targets and increasing the survivability of the overall system. "This approach also provides us with greater flexibility to adapt to developing threats and evolving technologies...." The threat repeatedly invoked by the Pentagon chief was, of course, Iran. The inverted logic of the earlier George W. Bush administration program, of which Gates himself was a major architect, ran something like this: Missiles in Poland and an X-band long-range radar installation in the Czech Republic would protect the continental United States from Iranian intercontinental ballistic missiles, which the nation neither possesses nor, as both Gates and Obama themselves conceded on September 17, was likely to in the foreseeable future. But once the U.S. went ahead with the deployments Iran could target both sites with medium-range missiles, the argument continued. So America pledged to station 96 Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missiles in batteries manned by U.S. soldiers who would be based in Poland for the first time. Thus Poland and the Czech Republic were transformed from sites for missile shield deployments to allegedly protect the U.S. to potential targets that needed to be protected by...the U.S. The Patriot missiles in Poland, which are still slated to be sent and activated there, can no longer be presented as protecting American ground-based interceptor missiles in that nation, as that plan was officially scrapped twelve days ago. So why are they going to be deployed in spite of that? The Patriot deployment was never intended to defend Poland against Iranian attacks, but to counter Russian plans to station mobile short-range missiles in its non-contiguous territory of Kaliningrad, which borders Poland, in response to what Russia necessarily viewed as a threat to its strategic missile forces. Bluntly put, U.S. ground-based missiles in Poland could be part of a system to destroy whatever long-range missiles Russia had left after a U.S. and NATO first strike. As adviser to Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Slawomir Nowak, was quoted on September 24 as admitting, "We were never really threatened by a long-range missile attack from Iran." [3] Six days afterward Poland's Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski confirmed that 96 Patriot missiles will be deployed in his nation as scheduled and, moreover, will be armed. As their deployment can no longer exploit the pretext of defending U.S. long-range missile sites from imaginary Iranian "preemptive" attacks, its purpose is demonstrated to be the what missile shield opponents have always asserted it was: To "protect" Poland from Russia. The Polish newspaper that first revealed the shift in U.S. missile designs in Europe weeks before the event, the Gazeta Wyborcza, reported on September 25 some details of the new system as it will affect Poland: "The concept would include a stationary rocket battery and possibly a number of mobile interceptor launchers. This might be a supplement to the envisaged American system of SM-3 naval based anti-rockets. Polish military experts say that equally important would be US military presence in Poland, which would provide an additional security guarantee." [4] What mobile missile launchers ready for practically overnight deployment to Russia's neighbor might look like was indicated at last month's annual Space and Missile Defense Conference held by the Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency in Huntsville, Alabama where the prototype of a nearly 50,000-pound "two-stage interceptor designed to be globally deployable within 24 hours" [5] to be stationed as needed at NATO bases throughout Europe was presented by the arms manufacturer eager to produce it, Chicago-based Boeing Company. In his September 17th briefing at the Pentagon, Defense Secretary Gates also announced plans to "deploy new sensors and interceptors, in northern and southern Europe." He tactfully did not specify where in the north and south of the continent the "capabilities...to detect, track and shoot down enemy missiles" would be placed, but their likely destinations are not hard to determine. The former head of the Russian Strategic Missile Force, General Viktor Yesin, commented last week on one probability: "Now we only need to be sure that the U.S. plans with regard to strengthening the ABM capability will not create a situation where warships armed with such systems will be moved from the North and Mediterranean seas to the Black Sea, which would pose a threat to Russia's strategic nuclear forces." [6] An analyst from the same country, Sergei Roy, gave vent to similar apprehensions in a roundtable discussion in Russia Profile on September 25: "If anything, that episode [projected U.S. radar in the Czech Republic to be aimed at Russia and not Iran], like so many others in recent history, should teach Russians to view any U.S. move in ABM defense (as in any other 'defense' area) with sober caution rather than credulous enthusiasm. My first idea on hearing of Obama opting for sea-based Standard-3 anti-missiles instead of those in Poland was: 'hey, which sea?' If it’s the Mediterranean and the North Sea, that’s OK, but what about the Black Sea or, God forbid, the Baltic? Those missiles will be much closer to Russia, while still in international waters or those of Ukraine or Georgia (why not Estonia’s, then?), and who will give a written guarantee that they are strictly anti-missile missiles? What about those early warning radar stations? Will they be based in Israel and Turkey – or in Georgia and/or Ukraine?" [7] The Gazeta Wyborcza last month broke the news that the Pentagon intended to shift major missile shield emphasis to the Balkans, Israel and Turkey. Subsequent reports have focused on the South Caucasus nations of Georgia and Azerbaijan as locations for the extension of missile interception networks closer to Iran and to Russia's southern border. The Navy Times report cited at the beginning of this piece discussed the transfer of missile shield hardware and priority to the Balkans, the Black Sea region and the Middle East and mentioned as an example the USS Stout, an Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer. Last summer the ship had been deployed for naval maneuvers in the Eastern Mediterranean with Israel and Turkey [Operation Reliant Mermaid] and then moved into the Black Sea in its first deployment as part of the Pentagon's Aegis sea-based interceptor missile system. The USS Stout visited NATO members Bulgaria and Romania and NATO candidate nation Georgia while on the Black Sea mission. While visiting the third country it participated in a joint military exercise with its host's navy directly south of Abkhazia, which could be the site of a fresh Caucasus war at any moment. At least as far back as February of 2008, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency director of the time, Lieutenant General Henry Obering, spoke of adding a third interceptor missile component to those intended for Poland and the Czech Republic, saying that "The powerful, 'forward based' radar system would go in southeastern Europe, possibly in Turkey, the Caucasus or the Caspian Sea region...." [8] So the expansion of the American and NATO missile interception system along a new trajectory that starts in the Balkans and progresses along Russia's southern border and eastward towards China's is nothing new. The implementation of it currently being witnessed is new. And dangerous. Innovations in the interceptor missile system devised by the Pentagon will place greater emphasis on "ballistic-missile defense warships" to be deployed and moved around "in the waters around Europe." [9] "Europe there will be a need for more, modernized cruisers capable of firing the SM-3 and more advanced missiles to come. This might have an effect on the ultimate Navy build program." [10] As one American missile expert phrased it, the commanders of such vessels have been put "on a par with [ballistic-missile submarine] commanders." The Pentagon's project of stationing as many as 100 SM-s, initially, on ships off the coasts of European nations and on their territory could lead to a situation in which "a BMD captain could be responsible for a big, complex, dangerous battle in the space over Europe, needing to fire dozens of missiles to try to destroy dozens of attackers." [11] The immediate reference was to Iran, again, but with implications for Russia as missile killer ship deployments in the Baltic and Black Seas would not be limited to or even primarily directed at Iran. In a September 27 news article from an Icelandic source called "US could launch missiles from the Baltic Sea" spokesperson for the Department of Strategic and Defence Studies at Finland's National Defence University, Commander Juha-Antero Puistola, stated "If the idea is to create this type of mobile platform, then some of the ships can well be placed in the Baltic. The Aegis cruisers have always been moved wherever needed." [12] On the following day Russian ambassador to NATO Dmitry Rogozin stated that the U.S. "missile defense program is becoming less predictable with missile shield elements deployed in the Arctic as the worst-case scenario...." [13] An earlier article in this series - U.S. Missile Shield Plans: Retreat Or Advance? - pointed out that "The major drawback [for the U.S.] of ground-based missiles in Poland is that they would be fixed-site deployments. For several years now Russia has warned that it was prepared to base Iskander theater ballistic missiles in its Kaliningrad region, which borders Poland, should Washington deploy its missiles to that nation." [14] Rogozin shared that perspective in acknowledging "We knew for sure that there would be ten interceptor missiles in Poland and a radar in Czech Republic, and that we wpuld have our Iskander [missiles] in the Kaliningrad Region...now the U.S. missile elements are to be based on U.S. cruisers, and you can never tell where they will be tomorrow." [15] Why he has been so tardy in realizing the threat of U.S. ship- and submarine-based missile and anti-missile plans in the Arctic Ocean is puzzling, as the National Security Presidential Directive of January 9, 2009 made no attempt to disguise the White House's and the Pentagon's intentions in that respect. Toward the beginning of the document it is stated: "The United States has broad and fundamental national security interests in the Arctic region and is prepared to operate either independently or in conjunction with other states to safeguard these interests. These interests include such matters as missile defense and early warning; deployment of sea and air systems for strategic sealift, strategic deterrence, maritime presence, and maritime security operations; and ensuring freedom of navigation and overflight." [16] NATO held its first-ever top-level meeting - attended by its secretary general, its two top military commanders and the chairman of its Military Committee - on the Arctic seventeen days after the U.S. National Security Directive was released and also broadcast in no equivocal terms interest in expanding its presence into what it called the High North. A plan that was outlined yesterday by Rogozin as follows: "The ice would retreat, it would melt, which means that NATO would definitely be present in the Arctic. They have been planning it for a long time, and under very bad circumstances the U.S. strategic missile defense would arrive there on board these ships." [17] An insightful and penetrating commentary appeared in The Nation of Pakistan on September 26 which linked U.S. President Obama's speech to the United Nations General Assembly on September 23 with his statements on missile defense six days earlier. The author, Shireen M. Mazari, wrote that "many of us have been living with these periodic highs at the declaratory level on the issue of nuclear arms control and disarmament - till we realize they are merely a rhetorical facade to hide away the growing nuclear arsenals of the nuclear weapon states." And if White House pledges to reduce or even eliminate nuclear weapons sound something less than sincere - Ronald Reagan's 1983 Star Wars speech included a proclaimed commitment "to lower the level of all arms, and particularly nuclear arms" - than so do American pronouncements that the nation's global missile interception system will eliminate or even diminish the threat of dangerous and perhaps catastrophic confrontations. The Pakistani writer added: "So there will be no BMD [Ballistic Missile Defense] placements in Poland and the Czech Republic but there will be BMD systems placed on highly mobile sea platforms to counter a largely imagined threat to Europe and the US from Iran. "Of course, these ships can be moved easily from the Mediterranean to the Gulf or Indian Ocean so Pakistan would also come into this BMD target loop - again with India being helped in the development and acquisition of BMD as part of its strategic military alliance with the US. "BMD has also undermined deterrence which was sustained through mutual vulnerabilities. "Now BMD has focused attention on nuclear war fighting, thereby increasing the danger of nuclear weapons being used in war. "Unfortunately, while Obama may call for nuclear disarmament, his policy on BMD betrays this rhetoric." [18] The preceding paragraphs are as terse yet comprehensive a summation as can be found of the threat the U.S.'s new flexible, mobile and technologically advanced international missile shield strategy presents for raising rather than lowering world tensions, for dropping the threshold of a U.S. and allied missile war being launched because of the perceived invulnerability of the aggressor and, the ultimate worst-case scenario, for nuclear war whether intended or not. A nuclear war which would transform Europe and much of the rest of the world into a gigantic necropolis. Notes 1) Navy Times, September 28, 2009 2) U.S. Department of Defense, September 17, 2009 3) Reuters, September 24, 2009 4) Polish Radio, September 25, 2009 5) Reuters, August 20, 2009 6) Izvestia, September 22, 2009 7) Russia Profile, September 25, 2009 8) Reuters, February 12, 2008 9) Navy Times, September 28, 2009 10) Defense Procurement News, September 18, 2009 11) Navy Times, September 28, 2009 12) Ice News, September 27, 2009 13) Russian Information Agency Novosti, September 28, 2009 14) Stop NATO, September 17, 2009 15) Russian Information Agency Novosti, September 28, 2009 16) http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nspd/nspd-66.htm 17) Russian Information Agency Novosti, September 28, 2009 18) Shireen M Mazari, The facade of nuclear disarmament The Nation, September 26, 2009

Rick Rozoff is a frequent contributor to Global Research. Global Research Articles by Rick Rozoff

Theories Of War Drive U.S. Procurement Policies

By MARTIN SIEFF,
UPI Senior News Analyst
Published: April 3, 2009 at 12:42 PM
Courtesy Of United Press International

WASHINGTON, April 3 (UPI) -- There are several intellectual fashions about the patterns of war in the 21st century -- and all of them drive different procurement patterns for buying weapons and structuring defense industries.

The first theory is that in war, as Los Angeles Times columnist Max Boot argued in his book "War Made New," breakthroughs in military technology -- especially by the United States and especially in the fields of "smart" precision guided munitions, command, communications and control, information technology and intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance -- have become irresistible force multipliers.

This theory has been eagerly adopted by nations as diverse as Britain and Israel. French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was a great admirer of U.S. President George W. Bush, wants to streamline the French military along those lines too.

There is no doubt that '"smart" high-tech weapons systems and cybernetic capabilities are also taken very seriously by Russia and China. However, the pattern of development in these fields in Russia and China is very different from that in the United States.

The prime focus of the lavishly funded Chinese program and the very serious Russian effort is to develop asymmetrical capabilities that will negate or neutralize U.S. systems in the event of war.

Also, although the U.S. military was lavishly equipped with such so-called wonder weapons in its conquest and occupation of Iraq, it proved unable to subdue the relatively small number of Sunni Muslim insurgents there from 2003 through 2006.

That failure has since then been addressed in part by a traditional, low-tech counterinsurgency strategy skillfully implemented by U.S. Gen. David Petraeus.

Petraeus' success has done much to discredit the "war made new" concepts so beloved of former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his top deputies Paul Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith.

There are other reasons why the "war made new" strategy is running out of steam and out of fashion. The enormous financial crisis now rising in the skillful and traditional counterinsurgency United States looks certain to force major cutbacks in the most expensive of these programs, the long-troubled Future Combat Systems that were Rumsfeld's pride and joy.

As we have often noted before in these columns, some individual components of the FCS are delivering major high-tech and tactical advantages to the U.S. armed forces. But the overall program is way behind schedule, with no end in sight and gigantic cost overruns.

The Democratic-controlled 110th Congress already slashed one-third of the funds the Bush administration sought to advance the program, and President Barack Obama and his military advisers are highly skeptical about it. Add to that the fact Defense Secretary Robert Gates is well aware of the major problems with the program and is under heavy pressure to slash Pentagon costs. All these factors make the FCS a goner.

Also, the current wars that the United States is fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan have made counterinsurgency war, and theories of Fourth Generation war, far more credible and fashionable than the idea that the United States can magically remain the undisputed hyperpower through the use of high-tech, space-based communications and control, surveillance and weapons systems.

However, the second fashionable theory of war is that it will all become guerrilla, insurgency, or Fourth Generation war seeking to undermine and hollow out the effectiveness and legitimacy of state structures. This is a much more valuable and accurate model in assessing current global trends in war than the high-tech theories, but it is not comprehensive either.

U.S. Takes Defense To Outer and CyberSpace

Published: March 3, 2008 at 11:08 AM
Courtesy Of United Press International

WASHINGTON, March 3 (UPI) -- Top U.S. military officials told a congressional committee that outer and cyberspace are the next war-fighting frontiers, The Washington Post (NYSE:WPO) said.

U.S. Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton, head of U.S. Strategic Command, told the U.S. House of Representatives Armed Services Committee that "we must be ready" to defend "our space infrastructure" and categorized cyberspace as an "emerging war-fighting domain," the Post said Monday.

Chilton said enemies of the United States "constantly" try to hack into government computer networks and Pentagon officials are trying to develop strategies to protect the databases as well as launch counterattacks against hackers.

The House committee also heard testimony from Pentagon officials who said they wanted "prompt" intercontinental capabilities to counter missile and other threats "now."