Are Iran's missiles a threat to Europe?

Kaveh L. Afrasiabi, Monday, May 7, 2007

The Bush administration's plan to station interceptor missiles in Poland and a corresponding X-band radar system in the Czech Republic has triggered a major controversy. Russia's president, Vladimir Putin, has warned that Moscow may pull out of an arms agreement with Europe if the United States doesn't scrap this plan.

The U.S. government has justified this move primarily as a response to an Iranian missile threat to Europe, claiming, in the words of Robert Joseph, the U.S. Special Envoy For Nuclear Non-Proliferation, that Iran is capable of developing long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles by 2015.

Certainly, Iran has an active missile program and its military leaders have been publicly boasting of steady progress in the range, precision and sophistication of their missiles. Iran's missile arsenal consists of artillery rockets and short-and medium-range missiles with a range of up to 1,300 kilometers, too short to reach middle Europe.

This does not mean, however, as the United States claims, that Europe is at risk of a missile attack from Iran. Here is why:

First, Iran's missile program began during the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88), in response to the horrific onslaught of Saddam Hussein's missiles raining down on Tehran and other cities; a U.N. study indicates that Iraq fired some 516 Scud-B missiles against Iran, which had a limited inventory and retaliated with 88 to 100 missiles during the course of the war. Since then, in light of a regional arms race, with the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states' acquisition of sophisticated jet fighters from the United States and Europe, Iran has relied on the relatively cheap alternative of missiles. These missiles offer an important deterrent in the event of a showdown with Uncle Sam because they are capable of hitting the nearby U.S. targets in Iraq and other parts of the Persian Gulf.

Second, Iran's medium-range Shahab-3 missiles are modeled after the North Korean Nodong missiles which are, in turn, based on an early Soviet model. Most experts agree that the Iranian missile system has reached its maximum potential and cannot be stretched into developing longer range missiles. Iran would need to master the extremely complex "multistage" missile technology in order to build them. So far, only a few countries have been able to reach this advanced stage of missile development and some of them, i.e., India and Israel, reportedly have had significant difficulty manufacturing reliable long-range missiles.

Third, Iran's other option of importing the long-range missiles from abroad, e.g., North Korea, is limited and unlikely in light of the U.N. sanctions against Iran and North Korea, which prohibit the export of missile technology to Iran. There is no evidence of missile cooperation between Iran and India or Pakistan, either.

Fourth, Iranian missiles are not serious threats until they carry nuclear warheads. But, so far there is no "smoking gun" to confirm the United States' allegations that Iran is working toward deployable nuclear weapons. In the words of the IAEA chief, Mohammad El Baradei, the "jury is still out" on this question. The United States' move to install the anti-missile system in parts of Europe is seemingly predicated, rather prematurely, on the failure of European-led efforts to steer Iran away from the proliferation path by means of sanctions and carrots. Iran may, after all, follow the "Japan model," that is, mastering the nuclear fuel cycle and thus become potentially nuclear-ready, i.e., turning into a quasi-nuclear weapon state without actually proliferating the weapons (due to their regional destabilization).

Fifth, assuming that Iran manages to defy the sanctions and assemble a few nuclear bombs, that does not mean that it would have the advanced capability to develop nuclear warheads. Simple nuclear explosives are generally far too heavy and large for such purposes.

Sixth, the net of economic, trade and energy relations that bind together Iran and Europe, reflected in the multibillion dollar gas deal Austria signed with Tehran last month, undermines the United States' projection of a Europe-unfriendly Iran.

Finally, in addition to alternative countermeasures, such as strengthening the global export control measures, the United States must consider Europe's own deterrent capability, e.g., France and England's nuclear arsenal, that would likely exact a heavy toll on Iran if it ever attacked any part of the European Union. Together, these make Iran's missile threat to Europe a remote possibility and the Bush administration's defense shield in Eastern Europe an unnecessary overreaction.

Kaveh L. Afrasiabi is a political scientist and the author of books on Iran's foreign and nuclear policies.

Putin Suspends Arms Pact Over Missile Dispute

MOSCOW, April 26 — President Vladimir V. Putin said today that Russia would suspend its compliance with a treaty on conventional arms in Europe that was forged at the end of the cold war.

Instead, Mr. Putin said, the Kremlin would use its future compliance with the treaty as a bargaining point in the dispute with United States over American proposals to install missile defenses in Europe.

Mr. Putin’s announcement, made in his annual address to Parliament, underscored the Kremlin’s anger at the United States for proposing a new missile-defense system, which the Bush administration insists is meant to counter potential threats from North Korea and Iran.

It also demonstrated Russia’s lingering frustrations with the treaties negotiated by the Kremlin in the 1990s, when Russia, still staggering through its post-Soviet woes, was much weaker and less assertive on the world stage than today.

Though the step by Mr. Putin was an incremental one, it was highly symbolic. The agreement in question, the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, known by the initials C.F.E., was signed in 1990 by the N.A.T.O. nations and the nations of the former Warsaw Pact, including Russia. It required the reduction and relocation of much of the main battle equipment then located along the former east-west dividing line, including tanks, artillery pieces, armored vehicles and attack aircraft. It also established an inspection regime.

Under the treaty, more than 50,000 pieces of military equipment were converted or destroyed by 1995. With its initial ambitions largely achieved, it was renegotiated in 1999, adding a requirement that Russia withdraw its forces from Georgia and Moldova, two former Soviet republics where tensions and intrigue with Moscow run high.

Russia has not withdrawn its troops, and the revised treaty has not been ratified by most of the signatory nations, including the United States, which has withheld ratification until the Kremlin complies with the troop-withdrawal commitments.

Though in many ways the treaty had already stalled, it remained a powerful diplomatic marker, a central element in the group of agreements that defused the threat of war in Europe as communism collapsed.

Mr. Putin abruptly called into question the treaty’s future today, announcing a moratorium on compliance and seizing two contentious issues, the proposed American missile-defense system and the West’s reluctance to ratify the latest treaty. Mr. Putin pointedly did not use any of the conciliatory language he sometimes inserts in his speeches to leaven his criticisms of the United States.

He did not define specifically what he meant by a moratorium. But he suggested that Russia might withdraw completely from the treaty if he is not satisfied with the results of negotiations with the N.A.T.O.-Russia Council, an organization created in 2002 to increase cooperation between the former enemies.

“I propose discussing this problem,” he said, “and should there be no progress in the negotiations, to look at the possibility of ceasing our commitments under the C.F.E. treaty.”

That remark drew the loudest applause of the day from Russia’s largely compliant parliament, which for the most part sat quietly during Mr. Putin’s 70-minute speech. It also drew a swift reaction from N.A.T.O.

Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, the organization’s secretary-general, expressed continued support for the treaty, and demanded clarification from Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister.

“I expect Foreign Minister Lavrov to explain the words of his President,” Mr. de Hoop Scheffer told news agencies.

The Russian president’s remarks coincided with the latest effort by the Bush administration to promote its missile-defense proposal, which would include building an interceptor rocket base in Poland and a radar system in the Czech Republic.

Russia has said that the missile defense plans could upset the balance of forces in Europe, and represent an escalation that could lead to a new cold war.

Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice dismissed those Russian concerns in an appearance today in Oslo, calling them “purely ludicrous.”

But even as she spoke, Mr. Putin was stepping up the dispute, part of a day in which he also chided the West for what he called meddling in Russia’s domestic affairs in the guise of democracy-promotion efforts.

Mr. Putin also restated to the Parliament his intention to leave office next year, at the end of his second four-year term. The Russian constitution limits each president to a maximum of two terms, but there have been calls by politicians loyal to Mr. Putin to set the rule aside and remain in office, and speculation has never fully subsided that he might.

But Mr. Putin was clear about his intentions today, saying that the annual address was his last. “In the spring of next year, my duties end, and the next state-of-the-nation speech will be delivered by a different head of state,” he said.