August 18, 2007	Saturday	Sha’aban 4, 1428

HUNTSVILLE (Alabama): A Russian radar site in Azerbaijan is too close to Iran to serve as a replacement for a planned US missile defence site in eastern Europe, the chief of the US missile defence agency said on Thursday.

Lieutenant-General Henry Obering said the Russian proposal was worth pursuing but only as a complement to the radar and interceptor missiles the United States wants to put in the Czech Republic and Poland.

“It would be too close to serve as a mid-course radar,” Obering told reporters, referring to the Gabala early warning radar in Azerbaijan.

Russian President Vladimir Putin unexpectedly proposed swapping the European site for the site in Azerbaijan at a summit in June, and then followed up with a proposal for greater Russian-Nato cooperation on European missile defence.

Details of the Russian proposal have been sketchy but they have been seen variously as a bid to scuttle US missile defence plans in Europe or as an important opportunity for closer military cooperation.

“I can’t judge whether they are serious or not,” said Obering. “I can tell you they are engaged with us. We’ve had at least two sets of meetings. We have others planned leading up to the fall.

“All I can say is we are in discussions. We are trying to get into technical details about our proposals and our capabilities, but I can’t judge the sincerity of it, frankly.”Obering said the Russian early warning radar in Azerbaijan could be used to acquire and track a missile out of Iran early in its trajectory.But once a missile moved out of range of the radar, it would become increasingly difficult to pick it up again and intercept it without a more powerful targeting radar in the Czech Republic, he said.

“It’s like having a car coming at you on the (highway). By the time you see it, you wouldn’t be able to react to it,” he said.

But he said having a combination of a US radar and a Russian radar “would be very useful in terms of how we could cooperate.”

“I believe that the Russian proposals are things we certainly should pursue. And we are doing that. The ideal future for us would be that we have US capabilities, we have Nato capabilities that marry up to that, and we have Russian capabilities that can marry up to as well. So that we can build effective missile defences against these countries,” he said.

US intelligence believes the Iran will have ballistic missiles capable of striking the United States by 2015. US officials believe it is working on a longer range version of its medium range Shahab-3 missile that could strike south-eastern Europe.

Obering spoke to reporters at the end of a military-sponsored conference here in which various speakers emphasized that the United States needs allies and partners to expand US missile defences into a global system.

In that light, missile defence cooperation with Russia would be a major breakthrough.

Writing in the Washington Post last week, former secretary of State Henry Kissinger called Putin’s idea of linking Russia and Nato’s early warning systems “an intriguing proposal of potentially profound, long-range significance.”

“It is one of those schemes easy to disparage on technical grounds but, perhaps like Reagan’s Star Wars vision, a harbinger of a future posing new creative opportunities,” he said.

On the other hand, Robert Joseph, a former assistant secretary of state for arms control, said here on Tuesday that his contacts with Russian officials gave him little reason to believe they will change their view that US missile defences in Europe is a threat Russia’s nuclear forces.

“On missile defence, especially a third site in Europe, I don’t believe we do share the same mutual interest as Russia,” said Joseph, who stepped down last week as a special envoy for counter-proliferation.

“We need the site to protect the United States and our allies from Iranian missiles, a threat Russia continues to deny,” he said.—AFP