Global Security Newswire

The United States and Russia need to work out technical details before a dispute over a European missile shield can be resolved, the Associated Press quoted acting U.S. Undersecretary of State Rose Gottemoeller saying on Friday (see GSN, March 29).

The veteran arms control specialist addressed a budding controversy over comments President Obama made this week to his Russian counterpart.

Obama, not knowing he was speaking in range of a live microphone, told President Dmitry Medvedev he would have more "flexibility" to resolve the matter after November presidential and congressional elections. Republican lawmakers have jumped on the remarks, suggesting Obama might be willing to accept troubling compromises when he no does not have to worry about being elected again.

Gottemoeller, though, said Obama "wasn't talking about any secret deals or anything like that. He was stating the political realities of 2012."

"In terms of big national initiatives, policy initiatives it's just the reality of the situation that in an election year it's more difficult to accomplish that," she said. "But I see the possibility for homework, as I call it, not only in missile defense cooperation, but in preparing the groundwork for new nuclear reduction negotiations as well" (Vladimir Isachenkov, Associated Press/ABC News, March 30).

The Obama administration's "phased adaptive approach" calls for deploying increasingly advanced land- and sea-based interceptors at several locations around the continent as a stated defense against ballistic missile threats from the Middle East, particularly Iran. It forms the core of a broader NATO initiative to link and augment member nations' antimissile capabilities.

Moscow, though, has said it fears the weapons would be aimed at its long-range nuclear forces. It has unsuccessfully called for a binding pledge that NATO has no such intention and has threatened an arms buildup if the matter cannot be resolved.

Discussions between technological specialists would demonstrate the potential for U.S.-Russian collaboration in establishing the shield and "that the technical capabilities of the system are simply not those that would undermine Russian strategic offensive forces," Gottemoeller said in Moscow.

"The more we can be talking about that among technical experts, the greater predictability for the Russian Federation, the greater confidence in what the system can and can't do," she said.

Meanwhile, NATO and Ukraine are discussing involving the former Soviet republic in the European missile shield, Russia Today reported.

NATO leaders at the 2010 summit in Portugal, where they agreed to pursue the joined antimissile system, supported participation by states outside the alliance, said Marchin Koziel, who leads the NATO liaison office in Ukraine (Russia Today, March 30).