Go For It

Russian President Medvedev has threatened to deploy missiles to Kaliningrad and other parts of Russia with the mission of destroying NATO missile defense sites in the event of war.  Russia objects to the sites in principle, and seems to be peeved at the fact that NATO won't agree jointly running the sites with the Russians.

I'm not going to get into the usefulness of the anti-missile effort, or what its effectiveness would be in the event that Iran decides to launch missiles at Europe or North America.  That's a debate for another time.  And I think we all agree that the anti-missile program wouldn't be very useful in the event that Russia launches everything but the kitchen sink against the West.  By the way, I see that situation as being less and less likely the more that Russia and the West integrate politically and economically.

If Russia wants to station missiles of any kind on their soil, so be it.  Far be it from me to tell a sovereign nation what to do with their openly declared weapons.  But the Russians should remember that the policy of Mutually Assured Destruction still applies.  A fusillade of Iskander missiles launched against Poland will be treated as if they were launched against Wisconsin.  Rattle your saber all you want, but unsheath it, and we will have a problem.

Oh, and someone needs to remind the Russians that pointing missiles at the people who are making Russia rich buying their petroleum and natural gas isn't the smartest thing in the world to do.  Something tells me the Poles won't have any second thoughts about buying their energy from the Scandinavians if the Russians make aggressive moves against them.