Some House Democrats are saying the United States should hold off on plans to build a missile site in Poland until the defense system can be proven reliable. The Bush administration wants to spend more than $700 million next year to dig silos at an abandoned military base in Poland. But several Democratic lawmakers want to wait until the interceptor missiles are put through more testing.
The missile defense system is supposed to protect Europe from attacks by "rogue states", which usually translates to Iran. Of course why Iran would choose to launch a missile against someplace in Europe is never fully explained by its backers. And currently Iran doesn't even have a missile capable of flying far enough to even be shot down by an interceptor based in Poland. Then there's the matter of no one in Europe really wanting the system in the first place. The Poles finally accepted the system after Russia invaded Georgia (causing some fear in Warsaw), and after the United States sweetened the deal with a plan to upgrade the Polish military (including giving them a battery of Patriot missiles).
There already is a missile defense system in place for the United States with bases located in California and Alaska. Whether it could actually intercept anything a "rogue state" might throw at us is debatable. In testing the interceptors only have a success rate of just over 50%, and that's on tests that were stacked in the system's favor. The European version will use a different rocket to carry the "kill vehicle" (as the actual interceptor is called by the Air Force), one that hasn't been tested, meaning the likelihood of the whole shebang working is even less than the American one.
And then, of course, there's the whole matter of Russia being dead set against it. But that is the main reason why the Poles finally agreed to host it and the Bush administration has been so eager to get it in place. $700 million - it's an awful lot to pay to flip someone the bird.
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