Gates beat

US Defense Secretary does not rule out war with Russia

America needs a powerful military to be prepared for future threats, including those from Russia . This was stated by US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates at a hearing in the Armed Services Committee of the US House of Representatives. “In addition to waging the war on global terrorism, we must confront the threats that the United States faces from the nuclear ambitions of Iran and North Korea, the unclear positions of countries such as Russia and China, which are also engaged in a military buildup,” the chief said. Pentagon.

The head of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, Peter Pace, who participated in the hearings with the minister, expanded on this idea: “I think that we should have a full range of military capabilities. We have to be able to engage in a traditional type of war, where one force is pitted against another, because we don't know what might happen in places like Russia or China, North Korea or Iran."

Back in January 2002, in a speech before Congress, US President George W. Bush branded Iran, Iraq and North Korea as an “axis of evil” dangerous to the whole world. Five years have passed, the Iraqi regime has been defeated, but America still fears external enemies. Moreover, Moscow and Beijing are among the potentially unpredictable rivals, placed on a par with Pyongyang and Tehran. And unlike previous potential opponents, the new ones have large armies.

Does this mean that the United States is indeed preparing for a showdown with Russia and China, two huge countries with nuclear weapons? Retired Colonel General Eduard Vorobyov told Vremya Novostey: “Having identified America’s potential adversaries, Gates openly called for confrontation. It is alarming that the speech of the US Secretary of Defense was most likely coordinated with the White House and reflects the official position of the American administration.”

The prospect of a new arms race between nuclear powers is increasingly visible. The Pentagon does not limit itself to verbal attacks against Russia and is moving radar stations involved in the American missile defense system to its borders. Amid the growing controversy surrounding the US intention to deploy missile defense facilities in the Czech Republic and Poland, information has emerged that American radars are creeping up on Russia’s eastern borders.

The head of the US Missile Defense Agency, Lieutenant General Henry Obering, recently announced the transfer of the largest floating radar from the Hawaiian Islands to Adak Island, located in the Aleutian ridge, that is, in close proximity to Kamchatka. The floating radar, created on the basis of an offshore drilling platform in 2005, is about 100 meters long and 65 meters wide, the radar rises 25 meters above the platform. General Obering explained that "the mobility of the floating radar allows it to be moved in the ocean to support real-world combat operations and protect the United States and its allies from ballistic missile attacks."

From the point of view of protecting US interests, everything looks simple - installations in Eastern Europe will intercept Iranian missiles, and systems in the Pacific Ocean will deprive North Korean leader Kim Jong Il of even a ghostly hope of a successful strike on the United States. However, Russia and China, classified by the Pentagon as part of the new “axis of evil,” have reason to believe that American systems are aimed specifically at their nuclear missile potential. Eduard Vorobyov told Vremya Novostey that “the field of view of the floating radar connected to interceptor missiles in Alaska includes a huge territory of Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East and China, which cannot but cause concern for the Russian leadership.”

At the same time, the United States is not going to stop there. Deputy head of the US Missile Defense Agency Patrick O'Reilly announced plans to bring the system to full combat readiness during 2007. The United States currently has 14 missile defense systems in Alaska and two more in California. This year the number of complexes is planned to be increased to 21 and 4, respectively, and by 2011 there should be 40 of them in Alaska. In the north of Great Britain, at the Fylingdale base, a radar has been modernized, which will go into operation this year as a component of the American missile defense system. With the consent of Denmark, the modernization of the radar at the base in Greenland continues. And against this background, hints from Robert Gates and Peter Pace that the North Korean or Iranian threat is not much different from the Russian or Chinese one are unlikely to set Moscow and Beijing up for peaceful cooperation with Washington.

Vice-President of the College of Military Experts, Major General Alexander Vladimirov, said in an interview with Vremya Novostey that Gates’ statement, coupled with Russia’s encirclement of missile defense bases, “resembles preparations for war.” According to the newspaper's interlocutor, "the escalation of tension is caused by the failures of American troops in Iraq and the unstable position of the Republican administration."

This point of view is shared by the director of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies Ruslan Pukhov. In a conversation with Vremya Novostey, he noted that the declarative classification of Russia as a rogue state is an attempt to justify huge military spending and the ineffective policy of the White House in Iraq and Afghanistan. “The United States is tightly stuck in Iraq and does not yet see a way out of the current situation. Robert Gates' statement and the deployment of missile defense bases around Russian borders are links in the same chain. They are unpleasant for Russia, but should not give rise to the country being drawn into a new arms race. In the words of President Putin, everything that has a direct bearing on us will be given an asymmetrical, but highly effective response,” says Mr. Pukhov.

Late yesterday evening, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov was able to personally ask Robert Gates about what threats and tricks the American military establishment expects from Moscow. They met in Spain, in Seville, where Sergei Ivanov arrived to participate in an informal meeting of the Russia-NATO Council at the level of defense ministers. This was the first meeting of the heads of defense departments of the two countries since the confirmation by the US Senate of Robert Gates as Secretary of Defense in December 2006. Today they will be able to continue communication at an international security conference in Munich. An important guest of the Munich forum will be Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Victor VOLODIN, Alexander TIMOFEEV