March 25, 2004 :: AFPC :: News
When Russia conducted its massive February war exercises, simulating the use of nuclear-armed ballistic missiles, it was disclaimed as having nothing to do with the United States. Rather, it was officially billed as an anti-terrorism exercise. At the time, we noted here that this was preposterous, and that the true target of the largest strategic exercise in 20 years was, of course, the United States.
Now the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta appears to confirm this assessment, reporting that the (failed) ICBM test launches planned for February 15 and 16 were a Soviet-style demonstration of power aimed at Russia’s “military-strategic opposite number,” the United States. “In Soviet times everything was clear: the military-industrial complex and an army of many millions existed because of oil exports…Now it appears that history is repeating itself: The country’s gold and foreign-currency reserves are in excess of $80 billion and continue to grow because of high world oil prices. So the ‘Soviet syndrome’…has come into operation.”
The strategic interests of a revitalized Russia should be conceived to be similar to those of its predecessor, the Soviet Union. It is for precisely this reason that missile defense efforts keep as their ultimate object the strategic defense of the United States, that is, the defense against not only rogue nations but potential missile attack from Russia.
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