One hundred U.S. troops will be making Poland their home soon. They will be stationed at a Patriot missile base the U.S. military is to build on Polish soil.
Ellen Tauscher, U.S. under-secretary of state for arms control and international security, a liberal's liberal, according to Wikipedia, says the U.S. is eager to get the soldiers in Poland as soon as possible.
Quid pro quo? The deal came a week after Poland announced it would send 600 of its sons and daughters to fight in Afghanistan, despite most Poles objecting to this.
Polish elite, very loyal to Washington, are elated with more military ties with the U.S. For Warsaw, the stationing of U.S. troops in Poland is a security guarantee.
"This (deal) is a kind of symbol because in the past there were forces which were not welcome, stationed on Polish soil without our invitation. I'm talking about Germans or Russians," military analyst Roman Kuzniar told Reuters Television, referring to World War Two and postwar Soviet domination.
In particular, Poland was nervous after thousands of Russian and Belarus troops played military games recently not far from their border. Here's Russia Today's report on those military maneuvers.
Some foreign policy followers might be a bit confused.
Didn't U.S. President Barack Obama announce earlier this year annouce it was scrapping plans to place missiles in Poland and a radar in the Czech Republic?
Moscow was angered over the so-called missile defense shield, and Obama critics said scrapping the shield -- negotiated by George W. Bush -- was a cave in to the Kremlin.
So, what happened?
After Obama's 'appeasement', Defense Secretary Robert Gates -- a holdover from the Bush administration -- tweaked the announcement a bit.
No, missile defense was not being shelved. Instead it was being slimmed down a bit, and made more mobile.
Joe Biden visited Prague and Warsaw in October to 'reassure' allies the U.S. was not "abondoning" them for a new love affair with Moscow.
The "No Bases" movement in the Czech Republic with public opinion on their side, was out to greet Biden.
Now, Washington want to deploy SM-3 missiles in Poland by 2015. But not only there. Washington wants them in the Czech Republic, too.
So, in essence, the dove Obama is wratching up the U.S. military presence in the former Warsaw Pact states, this amidst the press din of Obama's 'appeasement' of Moscow.
The shifting of U.S. forces further and further into eastern Europe is a long-term U.S. strategy.
The ever-quotable Donald Rumsfeld called it "New Europe." This is territory where fear of Russia is great, and admiration of the U.S. among elites borders on embarrassing.
As the Informant has written, the U.S. has military facilities in Bulgaria and Romania. It was announced recently that millions would be spent on upgrading these facilities.
Stars and Stripes gives you the details.
Then, there is humongous Camp Bondsteel and its Burger King and other mall outlet stores in Kosovo.
Two military camps used by NATO and the U.S. in Bosnia.
Poland, Romania, and Lithuania allegedly housed some of the CIA's 'black sites' to torture terrorist suspects.
NATO has swallowed all of Moscow's former satellite states, and many ex-Soviet republics. Now Washington is pushing military ties with Armenia and has long campaigned for Ukraine and Georgia to be admitted to NATO, despite serious misgivings among western Europeans elite.
The prize is the Caspian Sea riches of oil and gas. These 'forward bases' project U.S. power closer to these fossil fuel goodies and encroaches on what Moscow sees as its sphere of influence.
Catherine Lutz, an anthropologist at Brown University, has written: “Officially, over 190,000 troops and 115,000 civilian employees are massed in 909 military facilities in 46 countries and territories.”
That is not only an incredible military force, but bureaucracy as well. Even if he wanted to, Obama could never dismantle that.
However a threat does exist, and it's not going to come out of the barrel of a gun, or missile silo, but rather the trade floors of the world's bourses.
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