by Rick Rozoff, Global Research, August 22, 2009
From August 17-20 the annual U.S. Space and Missile Defense Conference was conducted in Huntsville, Alabama, which hosts the headquarters of the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency (MDA).
Among the over 2,000 participants were the Missile Defense Agency's new director, Army Lt. Gen. Patrick O'Reilly, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Marine Gen. James Cartwright, commander of the Space and Missile Defense Command/Army Forces Strategic Command Army Lt. Gen. Kevin Campbell and NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) Administrator Charles Bolden Jr.
There were also 230 exhibitors present, among them the nation's major arms manufacturers with an emphasis on those weapons companies specializing in global missile shield and space war projects. The presence of the head of NASA indicated that the distinction between the military and civilian uses of space is rapidly disappearing. As the Bloomberg news agency reported on the second day of this year, "President-elect Barack Obama will probably tear down long-standing barriers between the U.S.’s civilian and military space programs to speed up a mission to the moon amid the prospect of a new space race with China" and "Obama’s transition team is considering a collaboration between the Defense Department and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration...." [1] The recently appointed NASA chief, Bolden, is a retired Marine Corps general.
47,500-Pound Missile Launcher Headed To NATO Bases In Europe?
A Reuters dispatch of August 20 on the Huntsville Space and Missile Defense Conference reported that the Boeing Company's vice president and general manager for missile defense, Greg Hyslop, announced to the conference that his company "is eyeing a 47,500-pound interceptor that could be flown to NATO bases as needed on Boeing-built C-17 cargo planes, erected quickly on a 60-foot trailer stand and taken home when judged safe to do so."
Boeing displayed a scale-model version of a mobile "two-stage interceptor designed to be globally deployable within 24 hours...." [2]
The company executive made an allusion to the fixed-site ground-based interceptor deployment planned for Poland as being politically risky - the majority of Poles oppose it if their government doesn't and Russian officials have persistently pledged to take countermeasures if the U.S. goes ahead with the project - and the above-cited Reuters report endorses the mobile interceptor proposal by claiming it could "blunt Russian fears of possible U.S. fixed missile-defense sites in Europe." [3]
How substituting a mobile missile launcher "globally deployable within 24 hours" for ten missiles permanently stationed in Poland at a location known to Russia would assuage the latter's concerns over its deterrent and retaliation capabilities being neutralized in the event of a U.S. and NATO first strike was not explained by either the Boeing official or Reuters.
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