|
The Missile-Defense Flap
Vladimir Belous
RIA
Novosti
Thursday April 12, 2007
The U.S. intention to locate advanced elements of its missile-defense
system in Eastern Europe is alarming Russian experts. Claims that
10 anti-missiles are a small number and pose no threat to Russia,
which they say boasts thousands of nuclear warheads, and that "these
missiles will protect Europe from rogue nations" -- meaning
Iran and North Korea -- are tongue-in-cheek and directed at ignorant
people.
It all sounds like the speech made by Colin Powell during his tenure
as U.S. Secretary of State at a meeting of the U.N. General Assembly.
In it, he argued Iraq had weapons of mass destruction and the world
community was obliged to stop their proliferation and use. The upshot
of all that is well known: Such weapons were never found anywhere
in Mesopotamia.
The same fate may befall an American defense shield in Poland and
the Czech Republic. The references to threats from Iran and North
Korea don't have a leg to stand on.
The first reason is that neither Tehran nor Pyongyang has or will
have in the near future intercontinental missiles able to fly more
than 3,400 miles. The ones they have are unable to go farther than
1,900 miles. To overstep this boundary requires other design solutions
and more advanced electronic hardware and software for keeping missiles
on course.
But Iran and North Korea, as missile tests in the two countries
have shown, have big problems here, and 10 years will not be enough
to solve them. They need scientific and technical expertise of a
different sort, and more developed defense industry and defense
technology.
The second reason is that a look at a map or a globe will show
you beyond a shadow of a doubt that ballistic missiles on their
way from Iran or North Korea to the United States do not need to
cross Poland or the Czech Republic. Pyongyang has no need to go
over Europe in order to reach U.S. territory.
And Iranian missiles would find it more convenient to travel to
the Western Hemisphere via Turkey, Greece, Italy and Spain. When
you realize this, it becomes clear that U.S. anti-missiles in Poland
are meant to intercept Russian, rather than Iranian, missiles, because
one of their possible trajectories to the United States would go
over and across Europe.
But the snag for the United States is that the strategic missiles
deployed in European Russia -- mobile and silo-based Topol-M (NATO
reporting name SS-27) missiles and Stilet missiles -- make too quick
a getaway to be intercepted by U.S. anti-missiles. Solid-fueled
Topols (SS-25 Sickle) have a launch speed of 5 km/sec, and liquid-fueled
Stilets, 4.5 km/sec, compared with the 3.5 km/sec of ground-based
interceptors. GBIs cannot catch up with Russian strategic missiles
because they are too slow and too far from where the missiles would
be launched. And the trick could never be pulled off outside the
atmosphere, because Topol and Stilet warheads have even faster speeds
there.
Why, then, should Russia worry about 10 GBIs in Poland if they
are no match for Topol and Stilet missiles, especially considering
that even today, with GBI tests still going on, their interception
success rate is one in two?
The reason is that the GBIs are at a disadvantage only today, while
tomorrow the tables may be turned. Rocketry keeps improving all
the time, and military experts know that what is playing up now
can clean up its act in a year or two. Ground-based interceptors
belong to this class of developments. What is more, they are supposed
to have nuclear warheads in the future, which only adds to complications.
Experts know that a solo strategic missile is hard but not impossible
to intercept. The Soviet Union did that in 1961, and the United
States 30 years later. But an attack by a bevy of missiles and warheads
escorted by decoys -- clouds of metal chaff and small balls and
masking objects released by the missile to camouflage its munitions
-- is almost impossible to deal with using ordinary techniques.
It is fiendishly difficult to identify or separate false and actual
targets and to steer the missile down the "right," rather
than the deliberately distorted, path, all in a matter of seconds.
In order not to miss, an extra-atmospheric counter nuclear explosion
must be used. This, incidentally, is the principle at work in Moscow's
A-135 missile defense system.
The United States has long been working on small nuclear warheads,
both to hit deeply buried targets, such as command and control centers,
and to be used in counter-missiles. Unlike Russia, the United States
has still not ratified the comprehensive nuclear test-ban treaty
and it may well be that it wants to test its "nuclear plans"
in practice.
The explosion of such nuclear warheads over Europe, even beyond
the atmosphere, could do irreparable damage to the natural environment
of a country and its population by dropping radioactive rain on
it. In that way, the United States, while trying to protect itself,
exposes its NATO allies and even other, neutral, countries to the
effects of a nuclear strike.
Gen. Yury Baluyevsky, chief of the general staff of Russia's armed
forces, commenting on Poland's wish to have U.S. anti-missiles on
its territory, said: "Let them do it, but they should not complain
if something drops on their heads. What could drop on them does
not need to be explained, I think."
There is one more question. How is Russia going to react to the
prospect of U.S. missile defenses appearing on its borders? President
Vladimir Putin said that the reply would be asymmetrical and low-cost.
He did not explain the details. Col. Gen. Nikolai Solovtsov, commander
of the Strategic Missile Force, supplied the answer.
"We can resume the production of intermediate- and shorter-range
missiles," he said, "and target them at the countries
hosting an American missile defense system." But I do not think
this will ever be done. We need not be drawn into a ruinous arms
race even if the deployment of U.S. counter-missiles in Eastern
Europe also pursues this goal.
Russia has enough strategic missiles to fear nothing either from
current or future U.S. missile defenses. Even though now, as stipulated
by an agreement between the United States and Russia, the missiles
are not programmed with target coordinates. This "drawback"
could be easily and effectively remedied without any big financial
injections. Russian missiles might be re-targeted at facilities
in Eastern European countries as well.
The responsibility will rest not on Moscow, but on Washington and
governments that, without even asking for the permission of their
people, have extended an invitation to others' anti-missile defense
systems -- systems that spell trouble, not safety, for Europe.
INFOWARS:
BECAUSE THERE'S A WAR ON FOR YOUR MIND
|
