On a beautiful summer day in the heart of Bohemia, Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg and U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice signed a historic Missile Defense framework agreement that includes the basing of the U.S. European Mid-course Radar (EMR) in the Czech Republic.
“Freedom is our core value, Freedom has powerful enemies, one has to have the mindset to defend Freedom.” stated Prime Minster of the Czech Republic Mirek Topolánek. “Missile Defense is the state of the art technology and it is the response to high technology including WMD in the hands of terrorists and enemies of our freedom. Missile Defense defends our freedom against technology.”
The agreement includes 24 areas of cooperation between the two countries but its focus is on the large X-band radar that will be moved from a small community of 4,000 people in the Kwajalein Islands of the South Pacific, where it has been in use for 9 years by the United States military. The radar will be moved to a remote forested area located on a high hill in the Brdy Region, southwest of Prague. The EMR when deployed will be turned on rarely for testing and if cued by Defense Support Program (DSP) satellites or other sensors that a ballistic missile is heading towards and over Europe from the Middle East. The EMR radar tracks and discriminates very small objects in space and sends that information to an integrated command and control center as well as to the actual current and future missile defense interceptors that are placed in and around the European region including both land and sea based interceptors.
Today marks a significant international achievement for the global coverage against all ranges of ballistic missiles that threaten mankind. This 26 nation NATO endorsed bi-lateral agreement between the United States and the Czech Republic validates peace through technology and devalues those that proliferate ballistic missiles, specifically those in the country of Iran.
History plays a role in Central Europe and the Czech Republic, where President Reagan is acknowledged for ending the Cold War and his use of the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), though never deployed or used was viewed as significant in the breakage of the Soviet Union and the freedom that exists today in the Czech Republic. Prime Minster Topolánek stated earlier in the day that “The most powerful benefit for the Czech Republic is that Reagan’s Star Wars ended the Cold War.”
It is also of historic note that the region where the EMR Radar is being installed to protect against ballistic missiles was also used by the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact from the late 60s through the 80s to install and deploy a radar site as well as 6 Scud type offensive missiles equipped with nuclear warheads.
