The Trial Balloons are up. (Marine Gen. James Cartwright is the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.)
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/op...0gates.html?em
A Better Missile Defense for a Safer Europe
Op-Ed Contributor
By ROBERT M. GATES
Published: September 19, 2009
Washington
....Moreover, a fixed radar site like the one previously envisioned for the Czech Republic would be far less adaptable than the airborne, space- and ground-based sensors we now plan to use. These systems provide much more accurate data, offer more early warning and tracking options, and have stronger networking capacity — a key factor in any system that relies on partner countries. This system can also better use radars that are already operating across the globe, like updated cold war-era installations, our newer arrays based on high-powered X-band radar, allied systems
and possibly even Russian radars....
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http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2009...ght-look-like/
What a Revamped U.S. Missile Shield Might Look Like
By Nathan Hodge
September 18, 2009
....Intriguingly, the new plan might include deploying an X-band radar to the Caucasus — the region sandwiched between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea — to keep an eye out for missile launches from Iran. Vice Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. James Cartwright said stationing a radar in the Caucasus might reassure Russia, which was vehemently opposed to the Bush administration’s plan to place assets in Eastern Europe....
....The idea of stationing an X-band radar in the Caucasus, however, is not new. Back in 2006, the Missile Defense Agency (MDA) published a fact sheet that said mobile sensors for ballistic missile defense might be placed in an unnamed country in the Caucasus. The agency subsequently scrubbed the fact sheet to remove any mention of possible locales, although MDA spokesman Rick Lehner told me at the time that the region would be a “good location for a small X-band radar to provide tracking and discrimination of missiles launched from Iran.”
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http://www.navytimes.com/news/2009/0...fense_091809w/
Move comes as Obama cancels land-based plans
By Philip Ewing and William H. McMichael - Staff writers
Posted : Sunday Sep 20, 2009 12:39:43 EDT
....A second phase of the U.S. missile-defense regime will be in place by 2015, Cartwright said, and will include land-based sensors and SM-3s, but it was not clear whether that would mean an end to the standing Aegis BMD presence in Europe.
Worldwide, the system eventually will integrate the Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense missile, or THAAD, slated for operational deployment to Europe this year, and the Ground-Based Interceptor missile based at Fort Greely, Alaska, and at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., Cartwright said.
It also would include construction of a directional X-band radar somewhere in Europe,
most likely in the Caucasus region, Cartwright said.
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Background from June:
http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/...anovosti01.htm
South Russia missile radar to be fully operational in October
RIA Novosti
17:40 06/08/2009
BALASHIKHA (Moscow Region), August, 6 (RIA Novosti) - A radar station in the southern Russian town of Armavir will become fully operational in October-November as part of the country's missile warning system, a military official said on Thursday.
....Russia has offered the U.S. use of radar stations at Armavir and Gabala in Azerbaijan as alternatives to a planned U.S. missile shield deployment in Central Europe, which Moscow has fiercely opposed as a security threat.
Washington has since shown little interest in the Russian proposal, but with the arrival of a new administration, led by President Barack Obama, has frozen its plans to open a missile interceptor base in Poland and a radar station in the Czech Republic.
During his visit to Moscow in July, Obama pledged to consider Russia's concerns and review the U.S.'s European shield plans.
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