PRAGUE, Czech Republic, Feb. 26 (UPI) -- On Friday evening, the Prague Society held an event for all the deputy ambassadors in this intensely diplomatic capital that was halfway between a debate and a seminar. One current Czech cabinet minister spoke, along with a veteran foreign minister from another central European country. Both men were intimately involved in the events that brought the Czech Republic and the rest of central and Eastern Europe into the NATO alliance and into the European Union.
No names, no direct quotations were allowed from the off-the-record event, under the prevailing rules that allowed this correspondent to take part. But in the wake of Russian President Vladimir Putin's bullying use of his energy weapon and the latest Russian threats to target Czech bases if they installed radars that could hold the U.S. anti-missile defense system, there was no doubt that the Czechs had the prospect of a new cold war high on their agenda. The Czech foreign minister has already complained of Russian "blackmail."
The American, Canadian, Israeli and Arab diplomats present were similarly focused on the Russian issue, and on the latest news that Britain's Tony Blair was pushing for some of the American interceptor missiles to be located in his own country. The big Fylingdales radar complex on the Yorkshire moors in northern England has already been upgraded to be a key part of the U.S. missile defense system.
The American diplomat, moreover, was about to leave for Warsaw to join a delegation of U.S. officials who were to hold talks with the Polish president and prime minister on the proposed deployment of interceptor missiles on their country.
So this was a hot topic. But that was not how the European diplomats saw it. They wanted to talk about something else altogether: The prospect of re-launching the new constitution for the EU, widely seen as politically moribund since the French and the Dutch had rejected the scheme in two separate referendums nearly two years ago.
The non-EU members present blinked their eyes in something close to disbelief at this ostrich-like display of European introspection. It was not, one of them observed at the later reception, quite like Nero fiddling while Rome burned. But it was certainly a case of Nero focusing on the wrong music while the Russian front was ominously getting a great deal hotter.
The U.S. anti-missile system is becoming a serious political issue in Poland, the Czech Republic and probably in Britain, and it carries important implications for the NATO alliance and for the future of transatlantic relations long after the Bush administration has left Washington. Locking the European allies into this anti-missile system is not just a symbol of the continued importance of the strategic relationship between Europe and the U.S. but also a practical manifestation of the common transatlantic interests being able to neutralize threats of missile attacks from rogue states.
The system is not, obviously, aimed against Russia. The Russian strategic arsenal is far too big to be stopped or even deterred by the small-scale system -- fewer than a dozen interceptors -- that the U.S. proposes to install. The interceptors do not even carry explosive warheads; they are supposed to destroy the missiles while in flight with purely kinetic energy.
This anti-missile system, like the one being installed in Alaska, is designed to defend against a far less impressive and well-equipped attacker than Russia. The Alaskan system is to defend against North Korea and the European one against Iran, or some other future threat from the Middle East or Central and Southern Asia. And Russia not only has more than enough missiles to swamp the available interceptors, but has also developed a new generation of missiles that are designed to defeat the U.S. defense system. Some spin while in their launch phase, so that a laser cannot burn though a single spot. Others have tiny motors for in-flight course changes so that a U.S. radar system cannot predict where the missile will be when the interceptor arrives to hit it.
So why are the Russians so adamantly and so belligerently against it? It is apparent that they see the deployment of an anti-missile system as a red line that cannot be crossed, as the thin end of a wedge hat leads to the nullification of their own strategic arsenal, the last relic of the superpower status of the Cold War. And despite their recent bonanza of oil wealth, Russia cannot afford a serious arms race in anti-missile systems and space weaponry.
It also seems likely that the Kremlin does not want to see the deployment of even this symbol of the European-American strategic alliance, hoping for the day when the Europeans break loose from their decades of U.S. tutelage, which would allow Russia to become the dominance strategic presence on the continent.
That has been Europe's defining issue ever since the Cold War ended, and some EU statesmen like French President Jacques Chirac and Germany's Gerhard Schroeder began to see the prospect of Europe emerging as an independent strategic player, no longer dependent on the U.S for protection once the Russian bear had lost his teeth. This dream of Europe as a great power depended on two assumptions: that the Russian threat was really dead, and that Europe had the political will, as well as the resources, to play such a role.
Well, the Russia bear has come out of hibernation and is looking to its remaining strategic assets, from its missile system to its energy supplies. Another great power is visibly emerging in China, and another in India; with all that, such developments imply for strategic rivalries in Asia.
But the Europeans so far seem short of the political will to play much of a global role, beyond diplomacy and humanitarian aid and peace-keeping. And even for that, they seek for the moment to prefer to focus rather more on the arcane issue of their constitution.
