The increasing tempo of the debate and discussion of plans to erect ballistic missile defences (BMD) in Europe in recent weeks stands in stark contrast with the current lower-key treatment of comparable plans in Asia following similar debates there in the previous decade.

While the initial European phase of the debate has been escalating in early 2007, the Asia chapter unfolded from the mid-1990s, but has been reaching a key stage with the recent deployment of early elements of the antimissile system in Japan.  Recent reports have also emerged suggesting Japan would ask the US to speed up deliveries of additional elements.

In both Europe and Asia, concern has been raised about the strategic impact and long-term intent of such limited BMD systems, and in the two regions there have been some signs that their installation could lead states to consider increasing the number of missiles or warheads in order maintain a survivable offensive or second-strike retaliatory capability. The basic underlying concern is that while the anti-missile systems are in the initial stages said to be designed to defend against potential limited attacks from countries such as North Korea or Iran, or terrorists, there is a perception that they can also be the first building blocks of broader defences against Russian or Chinese capability. 

But currently in Europe, the Russian President and Moscow’s official state policy has been vocal in opposition and for prior consultation between the US, NATO and Russia, while reactions in Asia, apart from North Korean opposition, has recently been muted and limited to few unofficial concerns in recent months. 

The dispute in Europe has escalated from the initial concerns expressed by Russian President Vladimir Putin in the annual Munich Security Conference in January to his announcement April 27 that the country was suspending its observance of the unratified Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE). He told the Russian Duma that NATO was not observing the treaty conditions by installing military bases closer to Russia.  The war of words also escalated with US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice qualifying the Russian concern as “purely ludicrous”, adding “it just doesn’t make sense” during a meeting of NATO Foreign Ministers in Oslo the same day. 

The discussions in Europe were triggered by announcement of US plans to deploy parts of its general BMD system in Poland and the Czech Republic and the outspoken criticism in January by Russian President Vladimir Putin. This was followed by more intense debate within European countries and media and on April 20 by a meeting of experts and ambassadors at NATO headquarters, which included the Russian envoy to the Alliance. It continued to be a main topic at a meeting of NATO Foreign Ministers the following week in Oslo.

The discussion also included a tour of several European countries, including Russia, by US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in mid-April in an attempt to reassure the doubtful and suspicious.  Contacts in Moscow, Warsaw and Berlin included offers to share data with Moscow and to negotiate limits on the system between the two. Nevertheless, a senior Russia military leader, General Yuri Baluyevsky, the chief of the general staff, said his country might designate parts of the proposed system as military targets “if we see that the facilities pose a threat to Russia’s security.” 

First Vice Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov, for six years Russia’s Defence Minister, also remarked that “Since there won’t be (Iranian or North Korean) ICBMs, then against whom is this system directed? Only against us.” He also noted that five years earlier, Russia had proposed a joint missile defence using Russian S-300 and American Patriot defensive missiles to counter Iranian medium-range missiles. 

Although there have been declarations suggesting that Russia might withdraw from the joint INF missile limitation treaty if the US system is erected, others have suggesting that it might in fact wish to broaden such an accord with negotiations that included countries such as Iran and North Korea. US NATO allies in Europe appear somewhat divided over the BMD deployment, but mostly over whether the proposed system should defend all of Europe and should be discussed with the Western Alliance as a whole rather than bilaterally between the US and the hosts in Poland and the Czech Republic. 

During one recent unofficial conference on such systems in Brussels, NATO official and industry participants generally indicated that the debate about possible threats from Iran had already been conducted and accepted as justification for some type of defensive system. One also pointed to a similar assessment in Asia, where Japan had also accepted the need for protection against potential North Korean threat. 

While the missile shield issue, the threat and consequences may be more important Asia than in Europe, there appears to have been significantly less debate in general recently and within individual countries affected. A major reason, is that no state, other than perhaps North Korea, has publicly taken offence or reacted vehemently.

There have been extensive remarks by Chinese experts that the missile defences being erected by a number of other countries in the region could be seen as having a direct bearing on the survivability of its limited nuclear deterrent arsenal and could in the foreseeable future lead to an offsetting Chinese buildup. But such positions do not appear to have been elevated to an official state position or priority. 

Much of the Asian debate took place beginning in 1995 and 1996 and was marked by Chinese missile tests in the Taiwan Straits and test of a Taepodong 1 missile by North Korea in August 1998. The latter came as if to underscore as report in July 1998 by a panel headed by former Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld laying out the case for limited Threatre Missile Defences (TMD). 

At the height of the Asian debate, a top Chinese general warned the US cities, such as Los Angeles might become targets, but such reactions have disappeared from a Chinese foreign policy more inclined to minimise any dispute with the US in the quest for “harmonious relations.”

But as Marco Overhaus noted in Deutsche Aussen-politik.de, Foreign Policy in Focus No. 319, 4.26.07: “As for official nuclear weapons states, missile defences must be of concern not so much for Russia, but for China, which has a smaller nuclear and missiles arsenal. Should Beijing decide to deploy more sophisticated nuclear weapons as a reaction to U.S. missile defence technology, this could trigger an arms race in East (Japan, Taiwan) as well as South Asia (India, Pakistan).” 

A former Deputy Assistant Secretary of State during the Clinton administration, Susan L. Shirk, who is now professor at the University of California San Diego School of International Studies, believes deployment of a U.S. theatre missile defence system in the region is primarily to protect Taiwan, from the Chinese point of view. This potential deployment, she says in her recent book “China: Fragile Superpower,” was worrying to leaders in China because it might embolden Taiwan "to act provocatively." 

More recent reports also emerged from Japan that the new Defence Minister Fumio Kyuma would seek to persuade American counterparts and other leaders during consultations in Washington May 3-4  to accelerate delivery of additional interceptor missiles to Japan. 

It is yet unclear what messages, if any, China or other Asian countries are drawing from the growing European debate to consider launching a new debate on anti-missile systems in Asia, or specifically whether there might be exchanges between the US, Russia and China on the subject of ballistic missile defences. 

DF/May 4, 2007