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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: puborectalis who wrote (174211)	8/24/2001 5:56:46 PM
From: Thomas A Watson	Respond to of 769670

Thank the Lord that there are now adults in charge. Russia Still a Threat, Says Defense Intelligence Agency The Pentagon's official line portrays America's Cold War enemy as just another friendly nation. However, its own intelligence agency says Russia remains a nuclear threat. President Bush's administration is endeavoring to sell Russian leaders, European allies, members of Congress and the American people on replacing the half-century-old strategy of mutual assured destruction with an anti-missile defensive shield. Top administration officials from the president to Vice President Dick Cheney to Secretary of State Colin Powell to Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld to National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice are characterizing Russia not as a foe to be feared but as a peaceful partner to be welcomed. While that is taking place in the spotlight of the world stage, back at home the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency is looking down the road 20 years and seeing something considerably different - and menacing. Russia's Crumbling Conventional Forces What has furrowed the brows of DIA intelligence experts is a good-news, bad-news combination. The good news, from the Pentagon perspective, is that Russia's conventional weapons - heavy artillery, tanks and highly mobile assault troops that under the old Soviet Union threatened to overrun all of Western Europe - are fast becoming relics of the past. That outdated land-warfare equipment, and accompanying air support, are deteriorating in a hurry. Remnants of the once-vaunted Red Army are now underpaid, wretchedly housed and deeply demoralized. The bad news is - because of that same good news, from where the Pentagon sits - Russia is clinging doggedly to, and betting its long-term military strategy upon, its still-enormous arsenal of nuclear-tipped intercontinental ballistic missiles. There is only one conceivable target for those thousands of holocaust weapons of mass destruction - the cities of America. The Old Doomsday Horror One of the nightmares of U.S. strategists is the possibility that one or more embittered, frustrated, leftover militarists from the Soviet era will manage to launch a flight of ICBMs at the United States. That was at the core of concerns expressed by a designated long-range worrier at the DIA during the fourth annual Space and Missile Defense conference conducted at Huntsville, Ala., on Aug. 21. Looking ahead to the major strategic threats facing the United States over the coming two decades was Ken Knight, deputy for global projections at the DIA. As reported by the authoritative DefenseNews.com, which tracks developments in the military scene worldwide, Knight gave this overview of existing and emerging serious threats: An Unrelenting Missile Menace Although it is not easy to predict with pinpoint certainty how those threats will be expressed, there is no question that the strategic nuclear threat once posed by the Soviet Union still endures, and will on into the future. Nor is the treat confined to the aging ICBMs that can be retargeted on a moment's notice at U.S. cities. Cruise missiles designed to blast ships at sea now compose more than one-fifth of all the nations' combined inventories of cruise missiles. Within 19 years, there will be an entirely different orientation, with nearly half of the world inventory of cruise missiles being designed to strike targets on land. Newer Threats Emerging By no means will all the threats be in the form of missiles. The United States is in serious danger of strategic threats to its banking system, financial structure and electric power grids. Does the American military have any clear-cut counter-strategies for dealing with those newer threats? None at this time. Not only is the United States without specific defenses for those vulnerabilities, but, what could be even worse, "The role of the U.S. military in deterring such threats is in flux," Knight said. This American flux is not the only one operative. Russia has its own set of uncertainties. A Hard Heritage to Kick In a recent article in the Washington Times, the ambiguities surrounding the new Russia were addressed by Ariel Cohen, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation: "Russia has not completely rid itself of its communist heritage ? . "Russia seeks security, prestige and prosperity. It is still trying to decide what it wants to be - an empire, a republic or a Slavic Union. "One thing is certain: It cannot be all of these things. And other post-Soviet countries cannot become prosperous democracies if they insist on being authoritarian." Tight Budgets, Tighter Risks Russia's struggles are taking place within an economy that is close to being in chaos. America is debating its military priorities and strategic realignment in the context of a stringent budget in a declining economy. In each country, there is precious little room for wasteful expenditures - and no room for strategic blunders. newsmax.com tom watson tosiwmee