Obscured by the Iraq crisis, Bush administration plans to deploy a full range of advanced defensive missile systems around the globe are rapidly gathering pace. Speaking in London this week, John Bolton, George Bush's point man on international security, said "son of star wars" programs - initially conceived as national missile defense (NMD) for the US mainland alone - would go ahead "as soon as possible" to "protect the US, our deployed forces, as well as friends and allies against the growing missile threat".

Britain's likely involvement was highlighted yesterday by a visit to the early-warning station at Fylingdales, North Yorkshire, by US general Ronald Kadish, the man in charge of testing and development. The US has yet to request British facilities. But last week the defense secretary, Geoff Hoon, effectively said "yes" in advance.

After initial mishaps, prototype development is moving ahead. The US Missile Defense Agency's latest "mid-course interceptor flight test" is due next month, now entirely free of the constraints of the US-abrogated anti-ballistic missile treaty. Today's Nato summit in Prague is expected to order feasibility studies for "protecting alliance territory and population centers against a full range of missile threats".

In short, having initially proposed a "home alone" anti-missile system, the US is now trying, with apparent success, to sell the idea (and spread the cost) of a wide variety of interlinked theatre and longer-range missile defenses for all. Washington's "Missiles R Us" pitch, enthusiastically backed by its defense manufacturers, will include non-Nato states such as Russia and Israel and maybe the likes of India and Taiwan, with all the security implications that entails.

All the questions raised by the initial NMD proposal apply with greater force now. It is still unclear whether strategic interceptor missiles will work. Countries such as China, despite what Bolton says, will try to develop new counter-weaponry. Missile defense is useless against the most prevalent forms of terrorism. The cost to participating states such as Britain may run into billions - but nobody yet has a clear idea what they may be signing up for.

Most important by far are questions about the potency of the threat the systems are designed to obviate. The US has a list of "rogue" states it says might attack. But US threat assessments are not universally shared. Iraq is hardly in a position to attack anybody at present. Iran, which denies developing nuclear weapons, is as frightened of the US as everybody else. North Korea's recent nuclear mea culpa was more cry for help than battle cry.

Bearing in mind stated US willingness to attack, or otherwise intimidate and isolate, countries it links to terrorism and WMD activity, it is entirely possible that the US will soon run out of "rogue states". Where will its missiles point then? At Cuba perhaps? There's deja vu for you.

But there is a more fundamental objection to this unhealthy US missile obsession. It undermines non-military initiatives to curb the overall problem of WMD-terrorism threats. While Bolton says that the US will spend up to $1bn this year on counter-proliferation, $7.4bn will go to missile defense And that is just the beginning.

Like Britain, the US backed last summer's G8 10-year "global partnership" plan for cooperative threat reduction. But as Sam Nunn, the former US senator and proliferation expert, points out, more urgent action is needed to win the current "race between cooperation and catastrophe".

With senator Richard Lugar, Nunn launched a successful initiative 10 years ago to fund and oversee safe disposal of Russia's redundant strategic nuclear arsenal and prevent terrorists obtaining its weapons. He now proposes that this approach be expanded to cover all WMD-related capability and extended worldwide.

A global watchdog system should be created, Nunn says. He focuses specifically on securing fissile material and tactical nuclear weapons, safe disposal or storage of biological and chemical weapons materials, higher international standards, increased funding and a robust global inspection system under the UN's International Atomic Energy Agency. Every government, Nunn urges, should appoint a "very senior official" responsible for these top priority programs to combat "catastrophic terrorism".

It is a bold, ambitious project. But as Nunn and Lugar say, it is desperately needed and, with determination and goodwill, is entirely doable. It is also an infinitely better use of money and resources than the reckless proliferation of missile defenses

Hawking such systems around the planet may serve US geopolitical and commercial interests but will not banish the 21st century's Brechtian nightmare - the resistible, Arturo Ui-style rise of the specter of mass annihilation.

© Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002

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