ARTICLE: "Pentagon Invites Kremlin to Link Missile Systems: A Package of Incentives; U.S. Offer Cooperation on a Defense Project Based in Europe," by Thom Shanker, New York Times, 21 April 2007, p. A1.

First off, strategic missile defense has never worked and shows no signs of working.

Second, this is just an attempt to keep that Cold War program chugging along, sucking up billions, by spreading the wealth.

Third, this is about pork barrel for East Central Europe to bind them to our strategic stance.

Fourth, how can I talk about integrating the Middle East to the world while simultaneously trying to wall it off? Why does rejecting bin Laden's offer of civilizational apartheid somehow translate into offering strategic apartheid in the meantime?

Fifth, Russia doesn't need any protection from Iranian missiles any more than Poland or the Czech Republic do.

This is nothing more than the Defense Department's biggest case of Waste, Fraud and Abuse masquerading as a diplomatic initiative. This has nothing to do with bringing peace to the Middle East or shrinking the Gap and everything to do with keeping defense contractors happy along with their Hill sponsors.

No one is going to strike anybody else with a missile in this day and age, because it's traceable and will lead to massive retaliation. Anyone who wants to blow off a nuke will smuggle it in, not loft it all obvious-like over the borders of several states.

This Reagan-era myth persists only because so much money is to be made on it.

Tell me, who's more likely to nuke Poland based on past history? Israel or Iran? How many millions of Persians were exterminated in Poland?

This is just cynical teet-sucking of the past, instead of serious dealings with the future. Shame on everybody for peddling this.