Most in the civilized world are blissfully unaware that
we are marching ineluctably towards an increasingly likely pre-emptive
nuclear war. No, it's not at all about Iran and Israel. It's about the
decision of Washington and the Pentagon to push Moscow up against the wall
with what is euphemistically called Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD).
On November 23, a normally low-keyed Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev told the world in clear terms that Russia was prepared
to deploy its missiles on the border to the EU between Poland and Lithuania,
and possibly in the south near Georgia and NATO member Turkey to counter
the advanced construction process of the US ballistic missile defense shield:
"The Russian Federation will deploy in the west and the south of the
country modern weapons systems that could be used to destroy the European
component of the US missile defense," he announced on Russian television.
"One of these steps could be the deployment of the Iskander missile
systems in Kaliningrad." Those would be theatre ballistic missile
systems. The latest version of Iskander, the Iskander-K, whose details
remain top secret, reportedly has a range up to 2000 km and carries cruise
missiles and a target accuracy to 7 meters or less.
Medvedev declared he has ordered the Russian defense
ministry to "immediately" put radar systems in Kaliningrad that
warn of incoming missile attacks on a state of combat readiness. He called
for extending the targeting range of Russia's strategic nuclear missile
forces and re-equipping Russia's nuclear arsenal with new warheads capable
of piercing the US/NATO defense shield due to become operational in six
years, by 2018. Medvedev also threatened to pull Russia out of the New
START missile reduction treaty if the United States moves as announced.