Rebeccah Heinrichs @ The Foundry:
This week, Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski accused the Obama Administration of betrayal, saying, “Our mistake was that by accepting the American offer of a [missile defense] shield we failed to take into account the political risk associated with a change of president.… We paid a high political price. We do not want to make the same mistake again. We must have a missile system as an element of our defences.”
In 2009, President Obama cancelled the deal the U.S. had with Poland and the Czech Republic to build an interceptor site and radar that would provide protection of the U.S. homeland and allies from rogue ballistic missiles. Polish and Czech leaders took on the task of educating their populations of the necessity of defending their populations from Iranian missiles, of collaborating with the U.S. to do this, of having American soldiers on their territory, and—the hardest of all—that the blowback from Russia over the sites was worth it.
It is an American tradition—and not a uniquely Republican or Democratic one—to resolutely stand with America’s friends and confront, if necessary, those who threaten them. It was President John F. Kennedy who said, “Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”
The last several years, starting with the abandonment of the missile defense site, President Obama has taken the U.S. down a path that takes a sudden departure from this policy.
Would we have preferred spending billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars to install an anti-ballistic missile system that doesn’t work?
As noted above, Yousaf Butt is not an expert in national security or defense systems. Civilians such as Butt who are not directly involved with the development of military radar systems would not have access to classified system information of said systems, and would not know the actual capabilities of the AEGIS radar systems that the missile shield radar systems would be “based on.” “Based on” being the operative word. The largest factors in the range capabilities of a radar system is the physical height of the installation (to avoid “line-of-sight” problems and ground clutter,) and the ratio between power output and detection sensitivity. The military never releases the actual operational capabilities of it systems, but if they believe the range of a radar system is “sufficient” you can count on it.
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency dismissed those concerns.
Incidentally, the Russians have had a missile defense shield for decades. They just don’t want anyone else to have one. Democrats are willing to cede this advantage to the Russians.
If Mitt Romney wants to give up his corporate and high end personal tax cuts to pay billions for an ineffective ABM system , it’s fine by me.