From en.rian.ru:The U.S. State DepartmentÂ’s top arms control official has said the Obama administration will not give Russia any legally binding guarantees that U.S. missile defenses in Europe will not impact RussiaÂ’s strategic deterrent, Foreign Policy magazine reported.
At least we don't make promises we don't intend to keep. Until lately, that is.
“We will never do a legally binding agreement because I can’t do one. I can’t get anything ratified. Even if I wanted to I’m not sure I would… ’Legally binding’ doesn’t mean what it did before,” Under Secretary of State for Arms Control Ellen Tauscher said during a meeting of the Defense Writers Group on Thursday.
Sure it does. With Russia, it was always some kind of hudna. Until they ran out of money, anyway.
“What they (Russia) are looking for really is a sense that future administrations are going to live by [Obama's commitments]. And you can’t really do that,” she said.
Gee. I wonder why.
Tauscher said that almost every issue regarding European security was “settled” and that the United States will conclude a missile defense agreement for cooperation with Russia later this year.
Except they still trade in injecting instability and the tools of war, which makes it tough.
“The only thing that’s new where you can bring the Russians in is missile defense,” Tauscher said. “This is the place where we can begin to put aside the Cold War and ‘mutually assured destruction’ and move toward ‘mutually assured stability.’”
Riiight. That's why they support Iran and like vermin.
In a televised statement in November, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned that Russia would deploy missiles and may opt out of the New START nuclear reductions agreement if Russia, the United States and NATO failed to find a way to work together on European missile defenses.
Oops, another threat that may have teeth compliments of an unsustainable national debt. Notice a pattern here?
Russia is worried the U.S.-led anti-missile shield in Europe may target its nuclear forces.
And their precious bodily fluids, too.
Tauscher dismissed the threats as “part of the Russian campaign season” and said there would be more headway after presidential elections in Russia this March.
Just ignore their fundamental character and wait until after the presidential elections? No problem, except I didn't believe Obean the instant he opened his mouth, either.
“We want to get back to the table with the Russians both on strategic and non-strategic, deployed and non-deployed. That means everything,” she said. “We need the elections [to] pass so that both sides can get back to the table.”
And they unilaterally disarm, and stop supporting communist regimes, and anything that costs the US blood and treasure, or monkeys shooting bottle rockets fly out of my @$$.