US anti-missile plans shelving a positive step – NATO

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen hails the US decision, calling it a positive step. Mikhail Troitsky from Moscow State University of International Relations named some of the reasons for such a reaction.

“What Secretary General Rasmussen is concerned with is, first of all, NATO cohesion and NATO’s ability to live up to all sorts of expectations, and, secondly, he is concerned with NATO-Russia relations,” Troitsky said.

According to the analyst, Rasmussen realizes that, once this controversial issue in US-Russia relations is dropped, the latter is going to be more helpful in whatever NATO wants to involve Russia in, which is, first of all, dealing with Afghanistan, and also a possible coordination of actions on the Iranian nuclear program.

“From this point of view, Anders Fogh Rasmussen can really be satisfied with the removal of this stumbling block in US-Russia relations,” Troitsky noted.

“Secondly, this missile deployment issue has sparked controversy between the US and some European allies, and this news comes as a good sign for NATO headquarters now that there’s not such a difficult issue any longer between Washington and some European capitals that were unhappy with America becoming more secure than themselves,” he said.