Lots of talk recently about enhancing the missile defense posture of the Gulf States. According to this blogger, former US Ambassador to the UN John Bolton thinks this is the leading edge of an Obama Administration capitulation to Iranian nuclear ambitions. This is nonsense. Enhanced missile defenses in the region would be required with or without an Iranian nuclear program, and the fielding of one does not represent surrender in the other.
The US should actively encourage its Gulf Partners to field COORDINATED and COOPERATIVE multiple use Air/Missile Defense systems. Reaction times and fight profiles to some Gulf States from Iran indicate systems optimized for endo-atmospheric engagement. The further north one goes in an architecture sufficient to provide Gulf security AND contribute to European/North American defense, the more necessary land-based exo-atmospheric systems become.
An architecture of land-based missile defense systems stretching from Southwest Turkey, through Iraq, and then down through the Gulf States--netted to provide information sharing among the Gulf States (and the US)--would be a difficult political/military nut to crack. But it is a worthwhile idea to get behind, and it won't happen without US catalysis.
Bryan McGrath
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