Bush weighs missile defense tradeoff with Russia
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SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Tuesday, October 23, 2001
WASHINGTON ÑThe Bush administration is considering a deal that
would delay the establishment of a missile defense umbrella in exchange for
Russian cooperation in the U.S.-led war against terrorism and a halt in
Moscow's aid to Iranian and Iraqi weapons programs.
U.S. officials said a proposal being studied by the administration would
delay or shelve plans to cancel the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. The
treaty prevents the testing and deployment of a national missile defense
system.
President George Bush has not made such a decision, the officials said.
The State Department is pressing for a gesture to Moscow on the ABM treaty
that would ensure Russian cooperation on other issues. Such a U.S. offer
could be presented to Russian President Vladimir Putin when he meets Bush in
a summit in Crawford, Texas in mid-November.
Bush met Putin over the weekend at the Asian summit in the Chinese city
of Shanghai. Officials said Bush discussed the ABM treaty with Putin as part
of a larger initiative to improve cooperation between Moscow and Washington.
"We really do need a basic strategic framework that involves a number of
pieces," U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said.
The proposal to maintain the ABM treaty is being supported by the
Democratic-controlled Senate. Senate Armed Services Committee chairman Carl
Levin said a U.S. offer to maintain the ABM treaty could win Russian
agreement to end its missile and nuclear aid to Teheran as well as a
cessation of military support to Iraq.
"We want Russia to clamp down on arms sales to Iran, to Iraq," Levin
told the American Jewish Congress on Monday. "We want Russia to move our way
and to stop what we consider to be behavior which is threatening to us and
to Israel. We have a much greater opportunity of Russia moving our way if we
don't threaten Russia, if we can work out something with Russia, if we
realize that our security to some extent is dependent upon her being secure;
that there is an
importance to there being agreements among nations to provide security for
each other, at least for decent nations, that we cannot go it alone, whether
we're talking terrorism or whether we're talking nuclear weapons."
Levin, a member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, said the
Pentagon and intelligence community have not dismissed the threat of a
nuclear attack from North Korea. But he said North Korea is unlikely to use
a missile to deliver such a weapon in the coming years.
Pentagon officials have urged the administration to continue missile
defense programs. But the Sept. 11 suicide attacks on New York and
Washington have delayed all major programs until a series of reviews
commissioned by Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld is completed in March
2002.
Congressional leaders who support the continuation of the ABM treaty
have assured pro-Israeli lobbyists that a delay in a U.S. missile defense
system will not affect Israel. They said Congress would continue to fund
joint anti-missile programs such as the Arrow-2.
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