Vladimor Putin does not like President Bush’s proposal to locate ABM’s or BMD’s in the former Warsaw Pact, but he has fewer reservations about a location in the former USSR itself. Stratfor

Technically, an Azerbaijan-focused system would be far superior to a Poland-focused system. It is far easier to shoot down a ballistic missile in its boost phase; any interceptor based in Poland would have to strike an Iranian missile once it had already ditched its lower stages, and likely after it had already left the atmosphere — meaning that, among other things, it would be much smaller and moving much faster than during its boost phase. Speeding matters along could be possible cooperation with the Americans on a pre-existing Soviet-era radar already in Azerbaijan that is still Russian-operated.

Most critically, since BMD radars need to be closer to the target than any interceptors, any BMD system based in Azerbaijan would be pointed away from Russia. In theory, a Polish/Czech system could counter a limited Russian strike against Europe.

So, from a purely technical and military stance, Putin’s proposal is both logical and constructive. And if the United States truly wants an effective anti-Iranian system in place, there is no better place in the world than southern Azerbaijan. Geopolitically, it is a shot out of the blue.

The Russian government has long fought U.S. efforts to encroach into what the Russians think of as their near abroad: the former Soviet states themselves. Giving the Americans a green light to build interceptor and radar facilities deep in the Caucasus — complete with U.S. military personnel — could result in the ceding of that entire region to the West. Sure, a Russian attack against any such facilities would be child’s play, but the mere thought of having hard NATO military assets in Azerbaijan is a geopolitical sea change.

It soothes frayed nerves over a possible confrontation within NATO, it eases Western-Russian relations — which have not been this cold since before Mikhail Gorbachev — and it lights the way to the most functional missile defense possible. By any measure, this is a deal that is far too good for the United States to even consider passing up. Except, perhaps, at the current moment.

Russian approval of such a deployment — even if it never happens — burns one of the most effective geopolitical bridges that the Russians have had in the post-Cold War era: its relations with Iran. Any BMD system in Azerbaijan could only be about the Iranians…

“Any BMD system in Azerbaijan could only be about the Iranians.” That’s an interesting conclusion, if correct.

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