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Full cost of European missile defence could run to billions

The Telegraph
By Praveen Swami
November 24, 2010

European states will have to spend billions of pounds over the next 10 years to build a ballistic missile defence shield designed to protect the region from nuclear attack, according to Nato officials.

European and US leaders agreed, at last week’s Nato summit in Lisbon, to spend around £ 170 million on the system.

But that sum, a Nato background document says, will only meet the cost of command-and-control networks which will link future national interceptor missile and radar sites to a separate Europe-based US system designed to protect its troops.

The Pentagon’s April, 2010 acquisitions report placed the cost of a similar US system at $58.01 billion (£36 billion) – after budget constraints forced the killing-off of futuristic components like Boeing 747-mounted lasers. …

Read in full at: www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/defence/8157772/Full-cost-of-European-missile-defence-could-run-to-billions.html

Keep U.S. Military Bases off L. America: Bolivia

CRIENGLISH.com
November 25, 2010

Bolivia on Wednesday urged fellow Latin American countries to keep U.S. military bases off their soil. Otherwise, it said, peace and democracy in the region will be at risk.

Defense Minister Ruben Saavedra made the remarks at the 9th Conference of Defense Ministers of the Americas in Santa Cruz, Bolivia, which is also attended by U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert Gates.

“Bolivia’s position is in the context of a clear governmental policy to defend the sovereignty of the people and the noninterference of other nations, including world powers, in internal policies,” he said.

The Bolivian government is convinced that U.S. or foreign military bases in Latin America and the Caribbean put peace in the region at risk, and endanger democratic order, the minister added.

About 30 countries took part in the conference.

http://english.cri.cn/6966/2010/11/25/2021s606985.htm

South Korea Might Seek Return of U.S. Nukes

NTI: Global Security Newswire
November 22, 2010

South Korea might request to again host U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, the Financial Times reported today (see GSN, April 21).

Defense Minister Kim Tae-young discussed the matter today with South Korean lawmakers following reports that Pyongyang had allowed a U.S. scientist to view a previously secret uranium enrichment facility (see related GSN story, today).

Lawmakers questioned Kim on the possible return of U.S. nuclear weapon to South Korea. He responded, “I will review what you said in consultation with members of the [U.S.-South Korean] Extended Deterrence Policy Committee.”

Washington is believed to have pulled its tactical nuclear weapons from South Korea in 1991. Kim’s statement is sure to aggravate the neighboring regime and to worry China and Japan — two members of the six-party talks aimed at North Korean denuclearization, according to the Times.

Former South Korean Foreign Minister Yu Myung-hwan said in April that Seoul had no intention of again hosting U.S. nonstrategic nuclear arms. However, there is support for such a move among harder-line elements in the country.

“Even though relocating nuclear weapons to South Korea could provoke China or Russia, it could be an effective tool to press the North,” said analyst Cheon Seong-whun (Christian Oliver, Financial Times, Nov. 22).

The United States keeps 28,500 military personnel in South Korea as defense against the North and says its ally remains under the protection of the U.S. nuclear umbrella (Xinhua News Agency, Nov. 22).

Russia ready to join Europe’s anti-missile defence as an equal – Medvedev

The Voice of Russia
By Vyacheslav Solovyov
November 21, 2010

Russia has accepted NATO`s offer to develop a joint anti-missile defence in Europe. Many experts view this as a main achievement of the Russia-NATO Council meeting in Lisbon.

Speaking at a press-briefing after the summit, the Russian leader Dmitry Medvedev said that he had suggested his partners in NATO to consider the idea of the European anti-missile defence divided into sectors:

“I do understand that this issue requires a very thorough analysis, and we do not expect a prompt reaction. We know that different countries have their own view of the problem. But Russia would be ready to develop a joint anti-missile defense system only on equality basis.”

Mr. Medvedev did not go into detail but stressed that no matter what kind of anti-missile defense system Europe had, Russia would support only true partnership relied on equality. The Voice of Russia asked the deputy head of the Institute of the US and Canada of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Pavel Zolotarev, to comment on Russia’s proposal:

“The case in point is that each country or alliance has its own missile defense facilities to protect its airspace. As for long-range ballistic missiles, their warheads cross several aerial zones, and each country is supposed to be responsible for its own zone, which seems to be the only logical way of doing it because a country, for example the United States, cannot be responsible for Russian airspace, in other words, it cannot shoot down someone else’s missiles over Russia and let the fragments fall on Russian territory. Cooperation implies coordinated actions. Russia and the Untied States have some experience in the field, and so does NATO. Together with Americans, we have been conducting research in organizing theater missile defense. So you see that the Russian proposals are well-grounded and quite logical. Here, political factors move to the background – that’s a reasonable way of building this system.” …

http://english.ruvr.ru/2010/11/21/35369980.html

Japan: Okinawans Protest New US Marine Base

Political Affairs Magazine
by: Akahata
November 14, 2009

About 21,000 Okinawans held a rally on November 8 in Ginowan City demanding the immediate closure of the dangerous U.S. Marine Corps Futenma Air Station and opposing the plan to move it to Henoko to provide a state-of-the-art air base in Okinawa.”

Ginowan is the city that hosts the U.S. Futenma base, but an overwhelming majority of the residents are demanding that the base site be returned to the city so that they can live free of sonic booms from U.S. military aircraft and the danger of plane crashes.

Participants in the rally demonstrated their firm opposition to a new U.S. base being constructed anywhere in Okinawa.

Speaking on behalf of the organizers of the rally, Ginowan Mayor Iha Yoichi urged Prime Minister Hatoyama Yukio to take a decisive step to free Okinawans from the unbearable burdens of U.S. bases, the source of their anguish and sufferings, which has continued to exist for more than sixty years.

Mayor Onaga Masatoshi of Naha City stated, “Although I am a conservative, I am sure the majority of Okinawans are united in calling for U.S. bases to be reduced.”

Mayor Noguni Masaharu of Chatan Town, north of Ginowan City, warned that residents nearby the Futenma base can no longer put up with the heavy burden of hosting the base. We also oppose the idea of moving the U.S. Marine Corps operations at Futenma to the U.S. Kadena Air Force Base.” …

www.politicalaffairs.net/japan-okinawans-protest-new-us-marine-base/

Air Force Command Brings Focus to Nuclear Enterprise

U.S. Department of Defense
By Cheryl Pellerin
November 9, 2010

Over the past 15 months, the Air Force has built from scratch a model new command that will sustain and modernize U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile wings and the nuclear-capable bomber fleet, the general who leads the new command said today.

“Some people have likened that to trying to build an airplane while actually having to fly it,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Frank G. Klotz told a group of defense reporters here. “And at times, it has seemed like that to us.”

Global Strike Command is the Air Force’s first new major command in 27 years. It’s also part of a larger strategy that Air Force Secretary Michael B. Donley and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton A. Schwartz drafted “to bring focus and attention back to the nuclear enterprise,” Klotz said.

The command, activated in August 2009 with headquarters at Barksdale Air Force Base, La., has gone from 47 permanent staff and an equal number of temporary-duty staff to a staff of 800, plus 100 contractors.

“We had to publish the guidance, the instructions and the checklists that govern activities inside the bomber and the ICBM worlds,” Klotz said. “As it turned out, we had to write nearly 200 of these documents that were several hundred pages long and ensure that they got trained and implemented in the field. It’s a pretty daunting task.”

The command is responsible for three ICBM wings, two B-52 Stratofortress wings and the only B-2 Spirit wing. About 23,000 people assigned to the command work in locations around the world.

For the first time since the end of the Cold War, Klotz said, the Air Force legs of the nuclear triad — which is composed of land-based ICBMs, strategic missiles and ballistic-missile submarines — are back under one command.

During the Cold War, Strategic Air Command was responsible for the Air Force segments of the triad.

“At the end of the Cold War, … those responsibilities were divested,” Klotz said. “The bombers went to Air Combat Command and the ICBMs went to … Air Force Space Command.”

That meant two different commands with two different commanders and two different organizations with different priorities and different resources were focusing on the Air Force nuclear enterprise, Klotz said.

“Our thought was that there was some fraying in the nuclear enterprise as a result,” he added, “and to bring focus back to the enterprise, a number of steps were taken, including creation of the Air Force Global Strike Command.”

In April 2009, President Barack Obama told a large audience in Hradčany Square in Prague in the Czech Republic that the United States would take concrete steps toward helping to create a world without nuclear weapons.

“We will reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy and urge others to do the same,” Obama said, adding that as long as such weapons exist, the United States “will maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal to deter any adversary, and guarantee that defense to our allies.”

That position is manifest in the Defense Department’s April 2010 Nuclear Posture Review Report, Klotz said, “and in the attention to our enterprise provided by senior leadership from [Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates] on down, as well as the resourcing that goes with it.”

Still, the number of U.S. nuclear weapons is declining, from nine operational bases and 1,054 missiles to three bases today and 450 missiles, he said. During the Cold War, Strategic Air Command had more than 1,000 bombers. Today, 76 B-52s and 20 B-2s make up the bomber inventory.

“But I still think there is a compelling need for a balance across the bomber, the ICBM and the sea-launched ballistic legs,” Klotz said.

Klotz said he also supports ratification of a new strategic arms reduction treaty between the United States and Russia, which together are stewards of more than 90 percent of the world’s nuclear weapons. The old START treaty lapsed Dec. 5, and the Senate has not yet voted on the new treaty.

“The secretary of defense, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the commander of [U.S.] Strategic Command and virtually every former commander of Strategic Command have very cogent and compelling arguments in favor of ratifying the treaty,” he said.

Klotz, who has been working in arms control and arms control policy since the mid-1970s, said such a treaty facilitates important communication between the two largest nuclear powers.

“It’s critically important that the United States and Russia … have a continuous dialog on issues related to nuclear policy, including such areas as security, safety and command and control,” he said.

“This type of interaction in which the arms control treaties are the centerpiece, the nexus around which all that takes place, are critically important for understanding, for transparency and for openness between the two largest nuclear powers,” the general added.

www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=61633

U.S. Deficit Panel Proposes Steep Military Cuts

Defense News
By William Matthews
November 8, 2010

Promising to “cut spending we simply can’t afford, wherever we find it,” the co-chairmen of a U.S. presidential commission propose to:

  • Reduce military weapon buying by 15 percent.
  • Cut spending on weapon research by 10 percent.
  • Close a third of U.S. military bases overseas.
  • Freeze military pay.

A 15 percent cut in current $107 billion procurement spending would be about $16 billion. And a 10 percent cut in the current $79 billion research budget would be $7.9 billion. …

The proposed cuts to procurement might be the hardest for the U.S. military, said Todd Harrison, a defense budget expert at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments in Washington.

While procurement spending has increased dramatically over the past decade, the extra money has not resulted in dramatic increases in military hardware. Instead, prices have increased substantially, Harrison said. …

www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=5026887&c=AME&s=TOP

Air Force Command Brings Focus to Nuclear Enterprise

U.S Department of Defense
American Forces News Service
By Cheryl Pellerin
November 9, 2010

Over the past 15 months, the Air Force has built from scratch a model new command that will sustain and modernize U.S. intercontinental ballistic missile wings and the nuclear-capable bomber fleet, the general who leads the new command said today.

“Some people have likened that to trying to build an airplane while actually having to fly it,” Air Force Lt. Gen. Frank G. Klotz told a group of defense reporters here. “And at times, it has seemed like that to us.”

Global Strike Command is the Air Force’s first new major command in 27 years. It’s also part of a larger strategy that Air Force Secretary Michael B. Donley and Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Norton A. Schwartz drafted “to bring focus and attention back to the nuclear enterprise,” Klotz said.

The command, activated in August 2009 with headquarters at Barksdale Air Force Base, La., has gone from 47 permanent staff and an equal number of temporary-duty staff to a staff of 800, plus 100 contractors. …

The command is responsible for three ICBM wings, two B-52 Stratofortress wings and the only B-2 Spirit wing. About 23,000 people assigned to the command work in locations around the world. …

In April 2009, President Barack Obama told a large audience in Hradčany Square in Prague in the Czech Republic that the United States would take concrete steps toward helping to create a world without nuclear weapons.

“We will reduce the role of nuclear weapons in our national security strategy and urge others to do the same,” Obama said, adding that as long as such weapons exist, the United States “will maintain a safe, secure and effective arsenal to deter any adversary, and guarantee that defense to our allies.”

That position is manifest in the Defense Department’s April 2010 Nuclear Posture Review Report, Klotz said, “and in the attention to our enterprise provided by senior leadership from [Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates] on down, as well as the resourcing that goes with it.”

Still, the number of U.S. nuclear weapons is declining, from nine operational bases and 1,054 missiles to three bases today and 450 missiles, he said. During the Cold War, Strategic Air Command had more than 1,000 bombers. Today, 76 B-52s and 20 B-2s make up the bomber inventory. …

www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=61633

US Predator UAVs arrive at secret Yemen base to hunt Al Awakli down

DEBKAfile
November 9, 2010

In the first week of November, directly after the discovery of two explosive parcels mailed from Yemen to the United States, Washington moved a squadron of Predator drones to a secret base at the Yemeni Red Sea port of Al Hodaydah …

Until now, the covert facility – finished in April on a site CIA director Leon Panetta has selected last January – was allotted to US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) units for mounting clandestine raids against Al Qaeda cells deep inside Yemen.

The new deployment of drones elevates American military intervention in Yemen by another notch.

Monday night, Nov. 9, Awlaki himself aired a 25-minute videotape on extremist websites. It was devoted to an unbridled attack on America. Muslims around the world were called upon to kill Americans…

http://www.debka.com/article/9135/

Experts Urge Replacement of U.S. Missile Defense Plan

Global Security Newswire
November 1, 2010

The United States should replace its Ground-based Midcourse Defense and Standard Missile 3 systems with unmanned aerial vehicles capable of downing long-range nuclear-tipped missiles in their powered phase of flight, two analysts said in an article due for publication today in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

The defensive strategy outlined in the Obama administration’s April 2010 Nuclear Posture Review relies on the “technical myth” that the GMD and SM-3 systems are tested and accurate …

Each system, though, is marred by irreparable technological issues that place in question their ability to strike the necessary component of an enemy ballistic missile incorporating specific countermeasures …

The situation is urgent, as Iran is already demonstrating countermeasures in flight tests that would render both the GMD and SM-3 long-range missile defense systems ineffective …

www.globalsecuritynewswire.org/gsn/nw_20101101_7057.php