When the EU starts to panic, it reaches out in a feral manner for bigger ideas. The EU army, although an idea which has been flogged to death, is still buzzing around like a fly looking for a turd to land on. But one other idea which eurocrats cling to when a real political calamity starts to cast a shadow over Brussels is expansion. During October there was much talk about ushering in a new wave of candidate countries from the Balkans, as the European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, personally promises to help these countries enter the EU club.

Yet there can never be anything in Brussels more idiotic and disingenuous than this idea that the more members that the EU has, the taller it stands around the world. In 2004, the EU expanded from 15 member states to 25 as Eastern European countries, as well as Cyprus and Malta, joined – a move which Romano Prodi, the EU Commission president personally took the credit for as the crowning moment of his five-year term in office. He explained to me in an interview then how important it was, but in reality what I sensed was that EU expansion was all about keeping senior EU officials happy, as it calmed there tormented brows and gave them new tasks, objectives and a whole new ‘raison d’être’.

Yet expansion is really just self-indulgent nonsense. In 2004, when a wave of Eastern European, former Soviet bloc countries joined, some EU mandarins confided to journalists like me that it was also a very good way to rebalancing the EU, so that the old ‘Franco-German axis’ could be dissolved. In fact, nothing of the sort ever happened as the power struggle between these two EU giants and founding members of the EU has been resolved by Germany simply taking all the power and letting France believe that it is a much respected deputy in the decision making process and big thinking.

Macron himself welcomes the idea of Balkan countries joining as it will swell the ranks and make him look bigger as he plays the role of unpaid EU President.

But the reality of poorer, backward eastern countries joining the EU is that a darker ‘edge of Europe’ syndrome actually threatens the EU project with corruption, organised crime and the Muslim contingent all playing a role in giving far right groups a larger slice of the electoral cake.

The hypocrisy is outstanding. Especially from MEPs who have a voice and can talk about the problems in countries which are more or less ruled by the mob.

Romania and Bulgaria are both countries which have broken the mould on corruption, particularly in their judiciary systems. In Romania’s case, its elite promised to do something about graft to appease some EU officials’ worries. The result was simply the farcical creation of waves of anti-corruption agencies leading one top journalist in Bucharest to tell me that “we have so much anti-corruption activities now that we can more or less bottle this shit and sell it to the rest of the world, thanks to the EU”.

Balkan countries joining the EU will be the final blow for the EU, in reality. What we have learnt about Romania and Bulgaria joining is that the old idea banded about in Brussels that “we need to get them here in Brussels as members, then we can work on their governance deficit” which was a narrative I heard over and over again when I was based in the Belgian capital, is folly.

The idea that Albania is going to embrace the EU’s model of democracy and adopt literally thousands of EU directives on everything from workers’ rights to the length of car windscreen wipers is of course far-fetched. Or environmental legislation. Or women’s rights. The list is endless. Or that North Macedonia is going to become an EU utopia and tell those naughty mafia gangs to stop raking in billions from nice EU taxpayers who want to save money and buy fake cigarettes from a business which eclipses the national debt.

Like so many of the European Commission president’s ideas, this one is really crackers but it’s one which MEPs and member states will allow her to cradle. In the meantime, just as Turkey’s membership bid to join the EU was shot down by France and Germany, whose political elites didn’t like the immigration implications, the EU commission itself will work its dark magic internally to remind the German EU boss that if these Balkan countries are let in, then for the first time ever in the history of the EU, the institutions in Brussels would have to welcome and integrate thousands of Muslims in the EU bodies themselves and begin to look at the Muslim element in almost everything the EU does. The grey-haired, obscure, middle-aged Masons who really run the EU, will put their foot down at some point and no doubt use the criminal argument and the need for the “accession process” to be taken on board first. But this idea by VDL herself gives an indication about just how much of a crisis the EU is in, if it can stoop this low just for a few press releases and video handout footage to the call centre journalists in Brussels. With Poland grabbing the headlines in recent weeks about the very real possibility of following Britain in leaving the EU, it’s hardly surprising that this sort of PR stunts are presented to the media. In Brussels, they are, after all, practically on the payroll.

Besides counter intelligence activities, the ACCI Bucharest Detachment – BuDET is also intended to train and educate personnel to investigate and counteract reported threats. Romania’s parliament is set to approve the NATO request at its next plenary session, after it passed through the defence commissions of both chambers. This new unit will be deployed in addition to NATO Force Integration Unit (NFIU) and the Headquarters of the Multinational Division set up recently.

The request comes amid intense preparations for the largest NATO exercise on Romania’s soil. The country will host 25,000 troops from 11 countries in June.

In late 2015, NATO activated the Multinational Division Southeast (MND-SE) headquarters in Bucharest to provide a high readiness capability to the forces deployed within the Southeast region of the bloc’s border nations. The MND-SE executes command and control over the NATO Force Integration Units in Romania and Bulgaria for a range of missions, which includes Article V operations based on NATO advance planning, when authorized by the North Atlantic Council and directed by the Supreme Allied Commander Europe.

In February, NATO agreed on two additional measures: an increased NATO naval presence in the Black Sea and a coordination function for the Standing Naval Forces operating with other allied forces in the Black Sea region.

A battalion of 500 US soldiers with Abrams tanks arrived in Romania in January. The American troops are stationed at the Mihail Kogalniceanu military base near Constanta and participate in military drills together with Romanian and NATO forces.

NATO will begin basing fighter jets in Romania in May to further expand its reach into Russia’s southern flank. The UK will be the first NATO member-state to provide aircraft and personnel for NATO’s Southern Air Policing (SAP) mission. Four RAF Typhoons from 3^rd Fighter Squadron based at RAF Coningsby would be the first unit to begin flying operations from Romanian territory. The RAF Typhoons and future NATO aircraft will operate from Mihail Kogalniceanu Air Base in southeastern Romania, 16 miles from the port city of Constanța, and only a few minutes flying time from the Black Sea and the areas where Russian aircraft fly on patrol missions daily from Crimea. The mission will last till September, when the Royal Canadian Air Force takes over, bringing in four CF-18 Hornets to Romania for a four-month stint.

The NATO deployments in Romania, the alliance country closest to Crimea, come after Bucharest lobbied for increased security in the Black Sea region. In its turn, Romania contributes into the US-led NATO mission in Poland. It has sent 120 air defense troops to join 900 US soldiers and around 150 British personnel in Poland, where one of four multinational detachments across the Baltic region is located.

In May 2016, the US military activated a missile-interceptor site in Romania – a key element of the missile shield, which is due to be fully operational in 2018. The deployment weakens Russia’s nuclear deterrent, upsetting the balance of power. Aegis Ashore uses the naval Mk-41 launching system, which is capable of firing long-range cruise missile. The launcher can be retrofitted to fire Tomahawk cruise missiles instead of interceptors. This is a blatant violation of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty). 

According to Russian President Vladimir Putin, «This is not a defense system. This is part of US nuclear strategic potential brought onto a periphery. In this case, Eastern Europe is such periphery». «Until now, those taking such decisions have lived in calm, fairly well-off and in safety. Now, as these elements of ballistic missile defense are deployed, we are forced to think how to neutralize emerging threats to the Russian Federation», the president noted. Coupled with deployment in the Mediterranean of US ships carrying Aegis missiles and other missile shield elements in Poland, the site in Romania is «yet another step to rock international security and start a new arms race», Putin emphasized.

«Romania's stance and the stance of its leadership, which has turned the country into an outpost, is a clear threat for us», said Aleksander Botsan-Kharchenko, the head of the Fourth European Department of the Russian Foreign Ministry. According to the diplomat, Romania has taken other actions directed against Russia, including the implementation of sanctions imposed by the EU. «We saw from Bucharest a definitely anti-Russian, even Russophobic line during their inspired implementation of the sanctions or in their anti-Russian rhetoric», the official pointed out.

In response to NATO growing presence, Russian has deployed S-400 long-range air-defense systems and Bastion long-range shore-based anti-ship missiles in Crimea. The NATO deployments in the vicinity of Russia’s Black Sea shoreline automatically makes Romania a target.

The Romania-based missile defense system as well as NATO air bases and headquarters will be targeted by Russian Kalibr sea- and air-based medium-range cruise missiles successfully tested in Syria some time ago. The Sukhoi Su-34 strike fighters are quite capable of hitting the specified objects from airfields in Crimea. The active phase array antenna-based radar, located in Romania, can be countered by Russian ground and air-based electronic warfare systems.

Before the 1987 INF Treaty was signed in 1987, mass protests hit European NATO member states. The reason? There is no quiet life for those who know they are in the crosshairs. Perhaps, the time is right for Romania’s government to remember the events that took place only 30 years ago. The bilateral relations with Moscow could hardly be improved against the background of Romania’s zeal to become a springboard for an aggression against its neighbor.

Nothing justifies the whipping up of tensions by NATO in the Black Sea region. The NATO plans are doomed to be counterproductive bringing more escalatory than deterrent value. They will inevitably provoke Russia into taking measures in response. The Black Sea will become a region of uncontrollable arms race. While the Islamic State poses a threat to the very existence of NATO members, the alliance is engaged in provocations to intimidate Russia – its natural ally in the fight against the common enemy.

The comments come as Russia hit out at the recent deployment of NATO forces to Eastern Europe, including the Baltic States. «This deployment is of course a threat for us», said Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Meshkov.

According to Botsan-Kharchenko, Romania has taken other actions directed against Russia, including the implementation of sanctions on Russia imposed by the EU. «We saw from Bucharest a definitely anti-Russian, even Russophopic line during their inspired implementation of the sanctions or in their anti-Russian rhetoric», he said.

The statement does not mention the recent US BMD test that at first glance does not have immediate relation to the Russia-Romanian relations. In reality it does. The US Missile Defense Agency, the Japan Ministry of Defense and US Navy successfully used a ship-launched Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) Block IIA to intercept a medium-range ballistic missile target for the first time on February 3 in Hawaii. USS John Paul Jones (DDG-53) detected and tracked the target missile with its AN/SPY-1D(V) radar and Aegis Combat System Baseline 9.C2 system. The ship fired a SM-3 Block IIA – being jointly developed by the US and Japan – and intercepted the target.

At present, the Romanian deployment uses the SM-3 Block 1B missile to be equipped with the enhanced version later. The SM-3 Block IIA missile is a larger version of the SM-3 IB in terms of boosters and the kinetic warhead, which allows for increased operating time. The second and third stage boosters on the SM-IIA are 21» in diameter, allowing for longer flight times and engagements of threats higher in the exo-atmosphere.

A BMD site on Romania’s territory was activated in May 2016. This key element of the missile shield is due to be fully operational in 2018 – the year another Aegis Ashore will be installed in Poland. NATO says the system is deployed against Iran, not Russia. Moscow believes the real aim is to weaken its strategic nuclear deterrent to upset the balance of power into US favor. The BMD in Europe reduces its chances of a successful retaliation in the event of being attacked by another country's nuclear missiles. 

Aegis Ashore uses the naval Mk-41 launching system, which is capable of firing long-range cruise missile. The can be can be retrofitted to fire Tomahawk cruise missiles instead of interceptors. This is a blatant violation of the INF Treaty. 

Last May, Russian President Vladimir Putin made some remarks about the Romanian BMD facility, explaining the gist of the problem. Speaking to top defense and military industry officials, Putin said the system was aimed at blunting Russia's nuclear arsenal. «This is not a defense system. This is part of U.S. nuclear strategic potential brought onto a periphery. In this case, Eastern Europe is such periphery», the president said. «Until now, those taking such decisions have lived in calm, fairly well-off and in safety. Now, as these elements of ballistic missile defense are deployed, we are forced to think how to neutralize emerging threats to the Russian Federation», Putin noted.

Coupled with deployment in the Mediterranean of US ships carrying Aegis missiles and other missile shield elements in Poland, the site in Romania was «yet another step to rock international security and start a new arms race», the Russian president emphasized.

Russia has put forward a number of proposals related to cooperation with NATO in the field of missile defense making conditional the right of joint decision over the configuration and parameters of the system, as well as international legal guarantees that the system will not undermine Russia’s nuclear potential. It has also come up with the initiative on introduction of sectoral missile defense, in which the Russian armed forces would take responsibility for the defence of NATO’s eastern region. All these and other proposals have been rejected.

The NATO plans to beef up its Black Sea presence on land around a Romanian-led multinational framework brigade to be formed thus year. At least seven states will contribute with troops and equipment to the NATO army in Romania, while Romanian military will be sent to Poland. The unit will ensure the deployment of reinforcements, with non-NATO countries – Georgia and Ukraine – fully involved in the plans.

Romania has put forward a proposal for a regular trilateral format of joint naval exercises in the Black Sea, along with Turkey and Bulgaria, with the eventual participation of non-littoral NATO members.

Romania is to host NATO aircraft to increase naval and air patrols. US and Bulgaria launched joint regular patrols in the Black Sea last September. In response, Russian to deploy S-400 long-range systems in Crimea.

The steps to increase the alliance’s military presence in the Black Sea will be discussed at the upcoming defense chiefs meeting on February 15-16 as well as mini-summits that will take place during the first semester of this year.

One thing leads to another. It should be clear that the countries that host BMD sites automatically become targets for Russia’s retaliatory strikes. The decision to host a BMD site automatically makes Romania a target.

With the Russia-NATO relations at the lowest ebb, Romania appears to be its best to further deteriorate the Russia-NATO and Russia-Romania relations. Bucharest negatively affects the fragile regional security balance by inviting foreign troops and inciting tensions in the Black Sea.

The two countries have a long history of friendship and cooperation. Today the relationship is in jeopardy. There is each and every reason to doubt the wisdom of such policy fraught with negative, or even dire, consequences. Russia did not start it. The Romanian government has been warned.

In Ankara, Waszczykowski and Comănescu declared their countries’ support for Ankara’s commitment to EU integration and their hope for the speedy implementation of the March agreement between Turkey and Brussels (the agreement stipulates that the EU will give €6 billion to Turkey and liberalise the visa regime if Turkey agrees to receive illegal migrants from Europe in exchange for Europe accepting legal refugees from Syria on a ‘one in, one out’ principle). 

Polish Foreign Minister Waszczykowski’s comments on relations between Brussels and Ankara were interesting: «The dialogue [between Turkey and the EU – V.G.] should be more intense to maintain Turkey’s path to EU membership… Turkey deserves EU membership and there is no reason to doubt that. We are in favour of continuing talks with Turkey». The only way to understand this statement is that it has nothing to do with the accession of Turkey and its population of 80 million to the European Union (Europe is unable to absorb the ‘addition’ of Turkey), but it is important to keep Turkey on the «path to EU membership» – to keep it on a tight leash of endless negotiations regarding its possible integration into the EU, in other words.

Waszczykowski used more or less the same concerned tone when talking about Turkey staying in NATO: «Turkey is a reliable NATO member that fulfils every obligation. We do not see any deviation from NATO’s policy in Ankara’s actions».

It seems that the tone of these statements, along with the appearance of Waszczykowski and Comănescu in Ankara shortly after Erdoğan and Putin met in St. Petersburg, is not accidental. 

The Turkish Minister of European Union Affairs, Ömer Çelik, has stated that Turkey may unilaterally break the March agreement with the EU on migrants if Brussels does not provide a clear date to grant visa-free travel to Turkish citizens. Çelik has previously said that EU membership is not Ankara’s only option. 

Concern over the possibilities that have arisen as a result of improved Russian-Turkish relations was not the only reason that the heads of the Polish and Romanian foreign ministries visited Erdoğan, however. 

In view of Britain’s forthcoming exit from the EU, Poland and Romania are concerned that the European Union will end up under the complete control of Berlin. Following the meeting between German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President François Hollande and Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi that took place on 22 August 2016 on the Italian island of Ventotene, one can assume that Germany has managed to bring together a triumvirate of the major continental powers of Old Europe that will also determine the future of the EU in the short term. 

As for Poland and Romania, they have a strategic partnership agreement until 2019 that stipulates they will coordinate their foreign policies. In 2009 and 2011, Poland and Romania signed strategic partnership agreements with Turkey. So some semblance of a triumvirate has also appeared on NATO’s eastern flank.

Fearing a huge rise in German influence, meanwhile, Warsaw and Bucharest are also working together to strengthen America’s presence in Europe. Elements of the US missile defence system are being deployed in the Romanian village of Deveselu and close to the Polish towns of Redzikowo and Morąg. Polish and Romanian lobbyists have helped to strengthen NATO in the Baltic States and have also assisted in the establishment of warehouses there for military equipment and military contingents from the US and Britain. 

One of the issues raised at the talks between Waszczykowski and Comănescu in Ankara, therefore, concerned the transfer of US nuclear weapons from Turkey to Romania (50 units of US tactical nuclear weapons have been placed at the Incirlik air base in Turkey since the Cold War). 

Geographically, Turkey completes the territory between the Baltics and the Black Sea. Traditionally, Romania would like to see this region as its sphere of influence. To this end, Bucharest is pushing the ‘Greater Romania’ project, which involves the successive absorption of Moldova, Transnistria and parts of Ukraine by Romanian patriots. Poland, for its part, is strenuously promoting the Adriatic – Baltic – Black Sea (ABB), or ‘Three Seas’, Initiative (the creation of an anti-Russian bloc of states in the Adriatic-Baltic-Black Sea triangle). Polish President Andrzej Duda and Lithuanian President Dalia Grybauskaitė held bilateral talks on the subject at the end of August as part of the Three Seas Initiative Forum in Dubrovnik.

Warsaw and Bucharest will only be able to achieve any kind of significant role in the Eastern European geopolitical space with the support of Washington, which, in turn, regards Romania and Poland as agents of US policy – a policy to boost NATO’s presence in the east on a broad front from the Baltic States to the Black Sea.

How this will benefit Turkey and what form the inevitable US presence in the Polish-Turkish-Romanian triumvirate will take, Ankara has yet to decide.

In April 1970, at what was roughly the halfway point in the 40-year Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, Richard Nixon’s Nation Security Adviser Henry Kissinger thought he smelled a rat. Kissinger told an incredulous Nixon that the Soviets were stirring up trouble in the Middle East, attempting to provoke a war between the Israelis, Syrians and Jordanians in order to distract the United States from what it was really up to: building a naval base at Cienfuegos Bay in Cuba.

Nixon’s Chief of Staff, H.R. “Bob” Haldeman, recounts in his diaries that: “On September 18 we had received word that the Soviets were building a submarine base in Cienfuegos Bay, Cuba.” By Sept. 24 word had leaked to the press and that same day Nixon and Kissinger, according to Haldeman, “gave [Soviet Ambassador Anatoly] Dobrynin an ultimatum and over the next few weeks…the Soviets backed down and abandoned the base.”

If various accounts of the Nixon era – by among others, Haldeman, Grandin, Robert Dallek and Richard Reeves – are anything to go by, Kissinger was more than a touch unsound. But the basic premise behind his imaginary Cienfuegos threat was not altogether baseless (even if there never was to be a Soviet base): the U.S. did have definable security interests in preventing the Soviets from developing a military base 90 miles from U.S. shores..

Today, as NATO places troops and missile defense installations in Eastern Europe, we might ask ourselves if the Russian Federation has similar definable security interests in its own backyard. Since the end of the Cold War, the American foreign policy establishment seems to have done a complete 180-degree turn and now, of late, has decided that countries, above all Russia (and as regards the South China Sea, China), do not.

American officials now commonly express their belief that “spheres of influence” are passé, and that the rest of the world best get with the (revised) program. We see this all too clearly in the row that has been unfolding these past weeks over the new NATO missile defense installation in Romania.

Does the U.S. have a clear and definable national security interest in placing a missile-defense shield in Romania? This would be news to most Americans who – unless their grasp of geography has miraculously improved since a 2014 poll revealed that only 16 percent of them could find Ukraine on a map –  would be hard pressed to place Romania on the right continent, much less is exact location.

The Generals and Pentagon policy wonks, of course, realize this and so they cling to the old chestnut that the missile-defense installations are meant to prevent an attack by Iran, with whom the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council (plus Germany) just signed a far-reaching agreement on nuclear proliferation. According to Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work, “As long as Iran continues to develop and deploy ballistic missiles, the United States will work with its allies to defend NATO.”

What would Iran’s interest in firing ballistic missiles into Europe be? What exactly is America’s interest in setting these installations up? On these points the wonks are silent.

Oh, but never mind. Having abandoned any pretense that other great powers have definable (and eminently defensible) security interests of their own, American-led NATO is blithely plunging the Western world into fighting Cold War 2.0.

Yet, given the wide support candidates Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump have been receiving this election cycle, it is just possible that the heretofore somnolent American public may be waking up to the long post-Cold War con perpetuated by the country’s governing elites over the need for global American hegemony.

But I wouldn’t count on it.

consortiumnews.com

The ground-based missile defense site is an element of a larger European shield and US global ballistic missile defense effort. Frank A. Rose, the US State Department's assistant secretary for arms control, said missile defense systems will be expanded to cover Europe, Turkey, Poland, the Middle-East, Japan and South Korea.

On May 13, another phase of the project was launched in Poland with a groundbreaking ceremony for a US-led missile defense site at Redzikowo, near the Baltic Sea. Local residents and anti-war activists protested against the plans.

The European Interceptor Site (EIS) in Poland will consist of 24 SM-3Block IIA middle range missile interceptors. Warsaw has declared its intention to create a national missile defence system to defend the country from short-range and mid-range missiles

The missile defense system in Europe also includes a radar in Turkey, a command center in Ramstein, Germany and interceptor ships. An early warning radar station in Malatya, Turkey, went into service in January 2012. The operational center became active the same year. Four missile defense capable Arleigh Burke-class guided-missile destroyers were deployed to Rota, Spain, in 2015 for rotational patrols in the Mediterranean.

The land-based missile defense installation dubbed Aegis Ashore is designed to detect, track, engage, and destroy ballistic missiles in flight outside the atmosphere. The Aegis Ashore structures are equipped with the same phased-array SPY-1 radars and Aegis Combat Systems as are installed on many of the Navy’s guided-missile destroyers. The SM-3 Block IB missile has a range of up to 1,200 km. It has a robust capability against short-, medium-, and intermediate-range ballistic missiles.

There is another aspect of the problem to be emphasized here. Aegis Ashore uses the naval Mk-41 launching system, which is capable of firing long-range cruise missile. This is a blatant violation of the INF Treaty. 

This fact has been emphasized by Russia’s officials.

It should be noted that the US BMD plans go much farther than just deploying Aegis systems in Europe and elsewhere as mentioned above. In August 2015, nearly a month after the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran was reached, the US Defense Department awarded a contract to Boeing to "define a concept" for a multiple-kill vehicle or multiple-object kill vehicle (MKV).

The MKV will be able to engage multiple targets at once, useful if an enemy deploys missiles that can release multiple warheads as well as decoys. The vehicle fills a gap in US missile defense capabilities able to destroy both the decoy and the actual warhead. The Pentagon aims for the MKV to go online by 2020.

This force is added by Patriot missile defense capabilities and THAAD missile defense capabilities that are primarily in the Army and Air Force realm.

Russia has put forward a number of proposals related to cooperation with NATO in the field of missile defense making conditional the right of joint decision over the configuration and parameters of the system, as well as international legal guarantees that the system will not undermine Russia’s nuclear potential. It has also come up with the initiative on introduction of sectoral missile defense, in which the Russian armed forces would take responsibility for the defence of NATO’s eastern region.

All these proposals have been rejected.

The decision to continue with BMD plans is fraught with very serious consequences. Russia is taking retaliatory measures.

The deployment of the shore-based Aegis sites in Romania and Poland is turning these countries into platforms of aggression against Russia, said the leader of the National-European Communitarian Party Luc Michel.   

The countries which host BMD sites automatically become targets for Russia’s Iskander surface-to-surface missiles and aviation. 

The ballistic missile defense shield which the United States has activated in Europe is a step to a new arms race, Russian President Vladimir Putin stated  on May 13, vowing to adjust budget spending to neutralize «emerging threats» to Russia.

«Until now, those taking such decisions have lived in calm, fairly well-off and in safety. Now, as these elements of ballistic missile defense are deployed, we are forced to think how to neutralize emerging threats to the Russian Federation», he noted. The President emphasized that Russia would not be drawn into an arms race, but would continue re-arming its army and navy and spend the approved funds in a way that would uphold the current strategic balance of forces.

The US ongoing efforts at creating a global ballistic missile defense system, developing the Prompt Global Strike (PGS) precision conventional weapon program along with the sanctions imposed to weaken Russia’s military potential have a continued destabilizing effect on the situation in Europe and the world. The BMD deployment is dashing the hopes for achieving progress in nuclear disarmament talks. Russian officials say there is no «political logic and common sense in proposals 'to disarm' in conditions when the current US administration has been making concerted effort to undermine the defense and the military-industrial potential of Russia through its sanctions policy for a long time».

It was one of the reasons President Putin skipped the Washington Nuclear Summit in March. Virtually all negotiating tracks on arms control have been stalled.

There is still time to change the tide at the round table. The BMD issue could be tackled within the framework of Russia-NATO Council meetings. Europeans can exert pressure on their respective governments to suspend the implementation of the plans. The continuation of NATO’s missile defense efforts in Europe is the way to get Europe mired into the quagmire of uncontrolled arms race. 

According to the US Naval Institute report, the entire Aegis program is taking a step forward with the finalization of all Aegis Baseline 9 fielding activities. 

Baseline 9 – with its Integrated Air and Missile Defense (IAMD) capability that allows ballistic missile defense and anti-air warfare simultaneously, and its connection to the Naval Integrated Fire Control-Counter Air (NIFC-CA) architecture – was certified earlier this year.

The Deveselu Aegis-Ashore site in Romania will be declared operational (able to down a missile) in 2016, after the successful completion of training exercises. When fully active, the Deveselu facility will be operated by more than 200 U.S. sailors and civilians plus Romanian military personnel.

Within NATO, the discussions on making maritime ballistic missile defense (BMD) training a routine event in Europe are on the way.

The naval exercise included the first launch of a Standard Missile-3 in Europe, and securing the region for the ballistic missile target launch. USS Ross (DDG-71) tracked and intercepted the ballistic missile, while USS The Sullivans (DDG-68) tracked and intercepted a cruise missile. Other NATO ships tracked the missiles and sent their data to a U.S.-based lab for analysis on the accuracy and timeliness of the tracking capability.

Totally, the U.S. Navy now has four Aegis missile defense capable guided missile destroyers homeported in Naval Station Rota, Spain, the Aegis Ashore site in Romania set to come online on Dec. 31 and the second in Poland expected to be completed in 2018. This force is added by Patriot missile defense capabilities, THAAD missile defense capabilities that are primarily in the Army and Air Force realm. 

The US has recently restarted a missile defense program that's especially well-suited to countering an emerging Iranian capability. 

The program was suspended in 2009 to be revived by the 2015 National Defense Authorization Act. 

In August, nearly a month after the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) with Iran was reached, the US Defense Department awarded a contract to Boeing to "define a concept" for a multiple-kill vehicle or multiple-object kill vehicle (MKV). 

The MKV will be able to engage multiple targets at once, useful if an enemy missile deploys missiles that can release multiple warheads as well as decoys.

According to Space News, the MKV fills a gap in US missile defense capabilities able to destroy both the decoy and the actual warhead.

The outlet reports that the Pentagon aims for the MKV to go online by 2020.

Not everyone is thrilled at the revival of interest in missile defense. Yousaf Butt, a professor at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, offered an interesting view on the matter in 2010 after the program was suspended. 

He wrote, «The purpose of missile defense is to defend, or, more accurately, attempt to defend. An adversary wouldn't be deterred from launching a nuclear attack because of the existence of missile defense; rather, it's the credible threat of overwhelming nuclear retaliation that deters an adversary. If the enemy is irrational and suicidal enough to discount the threat of massive nuclear retaliation».

This April, Chief of Russian General Staff Army General Valery Gerasimov said Moscow would target NATO’s new missile interceptor bases in Romania and Poland. «Non-nuclear powers where missile-defense installations are being installed have become the objects of priority response», Gerasimov said, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Col. Gen. Sergei Karakayev, the Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces' commander, said Wednesday, Dec.16, 2015, in remarks carried by Russian news agencies that the nation's military planners have taken into account the emerging potential of NATO's U.S.-led missile defenses.

Karakayev said that while the existing U.S. missile defense isn't capable of deflecting a missile attack Russia is capable of launching, the US missile shield will become more advanced in the future. He added that Russia already has taken steps that would "guarantee neutralizing" any prospective missile defense.

* * *

The recent Iranian ballistic missiles tests are used as a pretext for all the activities conducted the United States individually or within the framework of NATO. The UK, France, Germany and the United States had asked a UN Security Council sanctions committee to investigate the launch of the Iranian Emad missile on October 10, three months after the historic nuclear deal was reached. «On the basis of its analysis and findings, the panel concludes that Emad launch is a violation by Iran of paragraph 9 of Security Council resolution 1929», said the report presented to the Council last week and obtained by AFP on Tuesday, Dec. 15. 

Resolution 1929 prohibits Tehran from conducting launches of ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons.

«The panel assesses that the launch of the Emad has a range of no less than 1,000 kilometers with a payload of at least 1,000 kilograms and that Emad was a launch ‘using ballistic missile technology'«, the report said. The experts said a rocket must be capable of delivering at least a 500 kilogram payload to a range of at least 300 kilometers to be deemed capable of firing a nuclear weapon. The United States is also looking at reports of a new ballistic missile test on November 24.

The International Atomic Energy Agency on Dec.15 closed its long-running probe of Iran’s efforts to develop nuclear weapons, removing an important obstacle to implementing the deal, as the Security Council was preparing to lift sanctions on Iran, possibly in January. Iran had denied that the missile launch was in violation of the resolution, with Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif saying that it was not designed to carry nuclear warheads. Iran will not accept any limitations on its missile program, Defence Minister Hossein Dehghan said on Dec.16, after UN experts accused Tehran of violating a Security Council resolution.

At the international level, the decision to keep the sanctions in force needs the approval of Russia, China and other members of six world powers group. One more burning issue appears to be added to the Russia-US bilateral agenda to make all the talks about «Russia’s isolation» become irrelevant. The interaction is indispensable under the circumstances.

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The trend to rev up the efforts aimed at boosting the US-led global missile defense capability is obvious and alarming. Russia and some other states, in particular China, express their concern over the plans ready to respond with steps to counter the US missile defense capability.

It may spark a dangerous arms race at the time of heightened tensions over other problems. The time has come for Russia and the US to go beyond the Middle East and address the whole range of controversial issues dividing the both states. 

The vehicles and weapons were first transported to Bremerhaven, Germany, from North Carolina. The heavy equipment was then loaded onto trains and sent about 1,100 miles to the Novo Selo Training Area in Bulgaria, where about 160 US Marines are deployed on six-month rotations. They fall under the Romania-based Black Sea Rotational Force, a semi-annual rotation of Marines and Sailors able to respond to a broad range of military operations in the US European Command area of responsibility. The Force is based at the Mihail Koglinceanu Air Base in Romania.

While Marines visit Novo Selo every year to work with their NATO allies, the new Combined Arms Company will be stationed there on a semi-permanent basis. Marines can now expect to rotate through regular deployments to the facility.

The new contingent will increase the overall size of the existing task force by around 150 percent. As of February 2015, there were some 260 Marines with the Black Sea Rotational Force in Romania. Two months later, the Marine Corps sent another 200 troops from its Africa-focused unit in Spain to help out.

While deployed, the Marines will train alongside Romanian and Bulgarian troops. There are also plans in the works for the company to train with forces from the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, as well as Georgia, among others. The US Army stood up similar company-sized rotations in the Baltic states and Poland.

This June the Pentagon came up with the plans to deploy heavy military equipment enough for 5,000 American military in several Baltic and Eastern European states allegedly «to deter» Russia. A company’s worth of equipment — enough for about 150 soldiers – are to be stored in each of the three Baltic nations: Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia. Enough for a company or possibly a battalion — about 750 soldiers — will be located in Poland, Romania, Bulgaria and, possibly, Hungary.

In September, an exercise called Operation Brave Warrior will demonstrate mobility from Germany across the Danube river into Hungary. It will be followed by Trident Juncture, one of the Alliance’s largest exercises in recent history, with over 25,000 troops from more than 30 nations. The training event will take place from 3 October until 6 November 2015. It will culminate with the certification of the Headquarters Staff from Joint Force Command Brunssum to lead the NATO Response Force (NRF), if activated, throughout 2016. The NRF is a high readiness and technologically advanced force comprising of land, air, maritime and special forces units capable of being deployed quickly on operations wherever needed.

Since the beginning of Ukrainian crisis NATO uses it as a pretext to increase consistently its military presence close to the Russian borders.

Up to 30 military aircrafts from NATO member states, no less than 300 armored vehicles and more than 1500 servicemen of the US land forces and marines are currently stationed in Eastern European states on the so-called «persistent rotational» (in fact permanent) basis. NATO navy groups permanently patrol the Baltic (First Standing Mine Counter-Measures Group) and the Mediterranean (First Standing Naval Force). The intensity of reconnaissance flights by the US Air Force and Alliance members over the territory of the Baltic countries, the Baltic and Barents Seas, has risen remarkably accounting for up to 8-12 sorties per week. Strategic reconnaissance flights by the US Air Force RC-135 are conducted almost on a daily basis. Since January 2015 regular flights of US reconnaissance Global Hawk drones have been routine in this area.

The 5000-strong spearhead Very High Readiness Joint Task Force (with land, air and sea components) is to become fully operational in 2016 as an element of NRF. It springs to mind that initially the NRF mainly targeted terrorist organizations. Now its prime mission has become to counter the «aggression of an eastern neighbor» implying Russia.

NATO is establishing a network of six advanced command centers in the Baltic countries, Poland, Bulgaria and Romania to coordinate the deployment of troops in the vicinity of Russian borders.

In addition, a Host Nation Support agreement was signed with Finland and Sweden, which in fact legitimizes the possibility of NATO troops to stay on the territories of these countries and to use their infrastructure to support the lift of coalition forces to the north of Europe.

All these facts testify to an unprecedented increase in the activities of NATO near the borders of the Russian Federation.

The NATO deployment started on August 16 is in violation of 1997 agreement (the Founding Act) between NATO and Russia which bans any substantial permanent deployment.

When NATO and Russia signed a historic cooperation deal in 1997, officials hailed the accord as a «victory of reason», a «definitive» end to the Cold War, and the dawn of collaboration in «a new Europe of unlimited opportunity». In that agreement, NATO pledged that, «in the current and foreseeable security environment», it would not seek «additional permanent stationing of substantial ground combat forces» in the nations closer to Russia.

Nearly two decades later, that agreement, appears to be mired in mistrust amid Ukraine fallout. The document of paramount importance is on the verge of being tossed onto the scrap heap.

On June 15, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a warning against deployment of heavy weapons on its western border. «The emergence of such information confirms that the U.S., in cooperation with its allies, apparently has serious sights on ultimately undermining key provisions in the ‘NATO Russia Founding Act’ of 1997, in which the alliance pledged not to deploy substantial combat forces on the territory of the countries mentioned in the permanent basis», the Ministry’s statement reads.

«We hope, however, that reason will prevail and that the situation in Europe will be able to keep from sliding to a new military confrontation that could have dangerous consequences», the statement stressed. Looks like this hope has failed to materialize.

I believe it expedient to mention another relevant fact here which reflects Russia’s approach to European security problems.

In June 2008 Russia made another effort to get rid of the legacy of the Cold War. It came up with the draft European Security Treaty intended to build a common security space in the Euro-Atlantic area. The document was based on the principle that no state can strengthen its security at the expense of others. The draft document was sent to the heads of states and international organizations, including NATO and the EU. Unfortunately, this initiative was simply swept under the rag.

In order to strengthen one of the pillars of the European security Russia submitted for consideration the Draft Agreement on Principles of Relations between NATO and Russia in December 2009. This initiative also met no response.

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The ongoing reinforcement of the NATO «Eastern flank» fuels additional tensions and undermines military security in Europe. Moreover, an increased military activity raises risks of unintended dangerous incidents. Many years of hard work and solid results achieved to enhance European security appear to go down the drain as US tanks are being moved to Bulgaria.

The Romanian-based site in Deveselu is to become operational by the end of this year to host land-based interceptors, namely Standard Missile 3 (SM-3) interceptor missiles Block 1 B. Romania's participation involves the deployment of terrestrial interceptors and a radar system to guide them. The target searching finding radar systems are to be hosted in other countries. The US and Romania signed a Ballistic Missile Defense agreement in 2011 enabling the US to build, maintain and operate a land-based base.

Moscow has many times warned Bucharest that the deployment will not go unanswered. The Russian Russia's state defence council said Poland and Romania have turned themselves into Russian targets in a potential conflict by stationing the elements of NATO missile defence systems on their territories. Yevgeny Lukyanov, Deputy Secretary of Russia's Security Council, announced that the countries where anti-missile defense systems are based will «automatically become our targets».

For the first time since the 1990s the bombers were temporarily deployed to Crimea in March during a large – scale exercise. Back then the war games involved up to 38,000 troops, 3,360 weapon systems and armor vehicles, 110 aircraft and 55 warships, auxiliary vessels and submarines. It was kind of the last warning. Poland was also warned as the aircraft deployed to the Kaliningrad region along with Iskander tactical surface-to-surface missiles.

The Tu-22M (also known as Backfire) is a long-range strategic and maritime strike bomber developed by Tupolev for the Soviet Air Force. The aircraft is currently in service with the Russian Air Force and Russian Naval Aviation. It has a length of 42.4m, maximum wing span of 34.2m, and a height of 11.05m. The empty weight and maximum takeoff weights of the aircraft are 53,500kg and 126,400kg respectively. The plane is provided with hard points to carry Kh-22 stand-off missiles, Kh-15 nuclear or Kh-15P anti-radar missiles and FAB-250 or FAB-1500 free fall bombs. The wing and fuselage pylons and internal weapons bay are provided with a capacity to carry 24,000kg of weapons payload. The aircraft is also armed with a double-barreled GSH-23 (23mm) gun in remotely controlled tail turret.

The numbers of aircraft to be deployed could be increased. The open sources report Russia possesses around 40 TU-22M3s with around a hundred of the aircraft in reserve. One squadron is enough to knock out a missile site.

This May the Russia’s envoy to the NATO alliance Alexander Grushko said that Moscow is not banned from deploying nuclear arms in Crimea. «Everything that we do in Crimea fully complies with all obligations of the Russian Federation under international treaties. We do not violate anything, there are no prohibitions on us deploying certain weapons systems», said Grushko.

On March 26, the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that Moscow warns the countries intending to permit deployment of the US missile shield elements on their territories that Russia had all the necessary means to counter the threat, said Alexander Lukashevich, a spokesman for the Ministry. According to him, «Russia has been for years drawing attention to the fact that the missile defense architecture built by the United States with the involvement of its NATO allies may in perspective pose a threat to Russian strategic deterrence forces and eventually result in parity disruption, which in turn would require responsive measures aimed at the restoration of the strategic balance».

The Russian diplomat also said that NATO recently «blatantly suspended a dialogue on the missile defense issues in a move that does not yield improvements to the situation».

Russia viewed the deployment of the missile shield near its borders as a threat to its national security. The measures it has taken so far particularly included the construction of new air-defense radar systems and deployment of Iskander missiles in Russia’s Kaliningrad Region, which borders on Europe.

The Iskander (NATO: SS-26 Stone) is a mobile tactical ballistic missile system capable of engaging ground targets such as command and communications infrastructure, concentrations of troops, air defense facilities and fixed and rotary-wing aircraft landed on airstrips. Iskander-M is an extended range missile for the Russian Army. The range exceeds 400 km, enhanced accuracy is provided by inertial and optical guidance systems. Satellites, aircraft or cavalry on spot could be used for detection, identification and guidance.   

Having received the images of the target, the onboard computer locks on and directs the warhead towards the objective at supersonic speed. The system is equipped with two independently targeted short-range ballistic missiles capable of re-targeting during flight to engage moving targets. A missile can hit the target with a 500 kg high-explosive fragmentation, submunition, penetration, fuel-air explosive and electro-magnetic pulse conventional warhead. Iskander provides the capability to overcome enemy missile defenses with high degree of immunity to electronic countermeasures. Iskander-K is the latest enhanced version to launch the R-500 cruise missile.

Thus 2015 is to become the year of deepening military confrontation to benefit no one. The US will no longer have a reason to build the missile defense shield in Europe, if Iran fulfills its obligations in accordance with the recently-signed nuclear program deal. This is the best way out of the situation. Previously NATO used to say that the system was installed to counter the threat coming from Iran. Now it has corrected its stance saying the missile defense to be a deterrent against any threats to Europe, not just one coming from one country.

US officials have repeatedly assured Russia that the deployment of ballistic missile defense (BMD) systems in Poland and Romania is intended to target Iran and North Korea, not Russia.

Now in response to Russian concerns, the US State Department said that the deal with Iran does not eliminate the need for European BMD systems.

Washington believes that there is no link that between the Iran deal and missile defense in Europe, no matter it appears to contradict a speech made by Obama in Prague on April 5, 2009, in which he said that the U.S. would «go forward» with the missile defense system «as long as the threat from Iran persists», but that if the «Iranian threat» were eliminated, «the driving force for missile defense construction in Europe will be removed».

Alexander Grushko, meanwhile, said he was surprised at «how easily Washington was renouncing its earlier approaches.» According to Russian analysts, the U.S. statements show that its interceptor missiles in Europe are targeted not against Iran but against other countries, primarily Russia.

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The deal with Iran is a good chance to do away with the European elements of missile defense – a bone of contention between Russia and NATO. Doing away with this problem paves the way for changing the bilateral relationship for the better and keeping away from dangerous brinkmanship. It’s sad that the chance is being wasted and all the efforts of so many years to improve the relations will go down the drain.

So, that’s what we have – a joint (allegedly peacekeeping) battalion to include the military of Romania, Moldova, Poland and Ukraine will be formed to conduct operations on the shores of the Dniester River. The peacekeeping mission has been carried out in the region by Russian peacekeeping forces for more than 20 years. The Ukrainian Parliament on May 21 voted to unilaterally scrap the military cooperation agreements with Russia. In particular, it backed Ukraine’s withdrawal from the accords that regulate military transportation between Ukraine and Russia.

Romania's government plans to increase its defense budget over possible tensions on its eastern borders with Ukraine. Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced plans for defense expenditure, which are to grow from 1.36% of GDP (2014) to reach 1, 7% in 2015 and 2% by 2017. Supported by the United States and the European Union Romania is trying to form an anti-Russia alliance to include Poland, a NATO member, Moldova and Ukraine. 

In 2009 Poland and Romania signed the Strategic Partnership agreement which envisioned rendering support to Ukraine and Moldova in their efforts aimed at European integration.

Poland’s and Romania’s top diplomats Grzegorz Schetyna and Bogdan Aurescu met in Warsaw on April 29. The both officials emphasized they had a common view on the conflict in Ukraine. Mr. Schetyna noted that the parties discussed new prospects for military cooperation with plans to involve Turkey, Ukraine, Georgia, Moldova and some Balkans states into the process. 

Poland, Lithuania and Ukraine announced their intention to form a joint brigade last September. Troops assigned to the formation will be housed at its headquarters in Lublin, Poland. The Polish-Lithuanian-Ukrainian unit will consist of 4500 troops (3500 thousand men from Poland, 600 from Ukraine and 400 from Lithuania). Plans call for the force to be fully operational by 2017 with preliminary joint drills scheduled for later this year. An anti-Russian military alliance is being formed to stretch from the Black Sea to the Baltics. 

The Russian peacekeeping troops in Transnistria are an obstacle to hinder the implementation of the plans. The territory is a kind of enclave inside the south-eastern part of North Atlantic Alliance’s zone of responsibility. The independent Transnistria is like a bone in the throat of Romanian unionists. The Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic Transnistria has three official languages: Russian, Moldovan (in the Cyrillic alphabet) and Ukrainian. Moldova switched to the Latin script in the political, social, economic and cultural life of the republic in 1989-1993. There are differences in the vision of the contemporary situation and the past. Chisinau believes that Marshal Antonescu, a Hitler’s ally, was not a military criminal, but a national hero struggling for reunification of Moldova with Romania. Streets in the cities are called after him. 

The supporters of re-unification (the idea espoused by Antonescu which envisions the accession of Moldova) in the Romanian parliament have formed a 41 strong group called the Friends of the Union. It includes 41 MPs. Meanwhile only between 7.5 to 15 percent of Moldovans favor unity with Romania – a figure which has remained the same for the past decade. For comparison, a union is supported by 76 percent of Romanians, according to an IRES poll in 2013 – and no major candidate in Romania’s presidential elections last year risked ruling it out. But historical precedents become tricky when it comes to which pieces of land could join Romania. The Friends of the Union cherish the plans to also accede Bessarabia – the region which includes areas north and south of today’s Moldova, which are now in Ukraine. They don’t say it out loud for the time being not to scare Ukrainians. The issue of returning Bessarabia is gradually coming to the fore. Meanwhile Romania keeps on assuring Kiev that it will join in fighting Russia and attack the Russian Black Sea Fleet.

The plan to push Russian peacekeepers out from Transnistria is being implemented. An information war has been unleashed against Tiraspol. The government of Transnistria is accused of violating democratic freedoms and pursuing independent non-government organizations on the territory of the republic. Some of the NGOs operate in Moldova getting funds from Romania. They maintain close ties with Romanian special services. Western media outlets have a list of issues to make come to the fore: the persecution of non-government organizations in Transnistria, the presence of Russian peacekeepers there, the economic failure of Transnistria and the «influence of the Kremlin». The Chisinau regime is painted as a force able to rectify the situation and restore democracy. Dozens of NGOs have already approached Chisinau asking to step in and use diplomatic pressure. 

In pursuit of its geopolitical aspirations the West uses to its advantage the conflict still smothering in Ukraine. The cease-fire agreement is far from bringing enduring peace. The attempts are undertaken to increased pressure on Moscow and incite tensions in Transnistria. The decision to form a Moldova-Romania «peacekeeping» battalion is another step on the way to reach the goal.