>
>STOP NATO: NO PASARAN! - HTTP://WWW.STOPNATO.HOME-PAGE.ORG
>
>http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,211780,00.html
>
>"...the prospect of lucrative contracts for Boeing,
>Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and other corporations in
>America's military-technology complex....'Frankly, in
>Moscow and Beijing they do nor believe a word of it.
>They see NMD as the strat of a much bigger
>programme.'"
>
>
>Son of star wars
>British ministers are going along meekly with
>Washington's grandiose and dangerous plans
>
>Richard Norton-Taylor
>Wednesday April 19, 2000
>The Guardian
>
>The government now concedes that if - or rather when -
>it allows the US to use bases here for its proposed
>national missile defence system, Britain will
>inevitably be a target of the "rogue" states the
>project is designed to protect America from.
>
>The US plan, the "son of star wars", threatens to
>unleash a new arms race, scuppering international
>treaties on the way and leading ultimately to the
>prospect of military conflict in space with nuclear
>weapons knocking out satellites armed with lasers.
>
>For the first phase in its national missile defence
>(NMD) project, Washington wants to upgrade its
>anti-Soviet early-warning radar station at Fylingdales
>on the north Yorkshire moors to identify missiles
>launched at the US from North Korea.
>
>The British government has already agreed to upgrade
>the US base at Menwith Hill in north Yorkshire, giving
>it a crucial role in America's plans for a space-based
>infra-red missile-launch-detection system.
>
>Plans are afoot in Washington for a second phase - to
>intercept missiles fired by other "rogue" states such
>as Iran, Iraq and Libya, which will involve the
>construction elsewhere in Britain of a new US radar
>system, the size of a 15-storey building.
>
>Jim Hoagland, of the Washington Post, wrote earlier
>this week after a meeting with Tony Blair that the
>prime minister is "certain to grant immediate
>approval" of the Fylingdales upgrading.
>
>All Geoffrey Hoon, the defence secretary, will say is
>that "the position remains that unless and until the
>Americans take a decision to deploy NMD, we are not
>required to take a decision as to what assistance we
>might give".
>
>Asked if Britain would be a target, he says that is
>"one of the implications we would have to think
>through".
>
>The government suggests that we should go along with
>the initial phase of the US project because we would
>then be in a position to influence its future
>development. Yet Britain would be in a hopelessly weak
>bargaining position, not least because it is dependent
>on the US for its Trident nuclear missile system and
>its successor.
>
>In any case, the Pentagon is also drawing up plans for
>sea or land-based missile defence systems around the
>world, followed by airborne and finally space-based
>laser systems, all carrying the prospect of lucrative
>contracts for Boeing, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, and
>other corporations in America's military-technology
>complex.
>
>There is no better way to bring the debate down to
>earth than by looking at evidence given recently to
>the Commons foreign affairs committee. Referring to US
>claims that a limited national missile defence
>programme would provide some kind of protection
>against strikes from "rogue" states, Paul Rogers of
>Bradford University, commented:
>
>"Frankly, in Moscow and Beijing they do not believe a
>word of it. They see a limited NMD as the start of a
>much bigger programme." It reflected a growing
>American mood of what he called "aggressive
>isolationism" fed by "pork-barrel politics".
>
>Rebecca Johnson, director of the Acronym Institute, a
>respected defence and disarmament thinktank, warned of
>perceptions - particularly in China, which has barely
>20 missiles capable of reaching the US - that a
>limited NMD project "is really the very thin end of
>the wedge which is about doing the research and
>development now that will, in 10 or 15 years' time,
>allow the [US government] to go back to Congress and
>say, 'We can control space' ".
>
>The NMD plan would require amending the 1972
>anti-ballistic missile treaty between Washington and
>Moscow, which enshrines the principle of "strategic
>deterrence" between the two superpowers.
>
>Washington is trying to persuade Moscow and its
>European allies that they need their own national or
>"theatre" missile protective shields because of a
>growing threat posed by these "rogue" states. Yet why
>would North Korea, now reopening talks with South
>Korea, want to fire a missile at the US and risk
>obliteration?
>
>Satellite imagery last year revealed a Taepo Dong
>long-range missile launch site in North Korea looking,
>in the words of Jane's Defence Weekly, "more like an
>abandoned oil derrick than the nerve centre for
>annihilating the 'running dogs of capitalism' ".
>Jane's is not noted for its scepticism when it comes
>to military threats.
>
>If North Korea, or any other "rogue" state, wanted to
>attack US interests, there are cheaper and easier ways
>of going about it. And there are other ways of
>bringing so-called rogue states into the fold -
>democratic and economic pressures in Iran and Libya
>are already encouraging those countries to return -
>rather than constructing hugely expensive and
>destabilising anti-missile shields which threaten to
>unravel arms-control agreements that have taken years
>to negotiate.
>
>John Pike, of the Federation of American Scientists,
>noted recently: "It doesn't matter how much money we
>spend on missile defence, all we're going to wind up
>with is more missiles pointed at America." And, at
>this rate, at Britain as well. If the government
>really wants a proper debate about this central issue,
>it is time ministers put their heads above the
>parapet.
>
>richard.norton-taylor @guardian.co.uk
>
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