NATO to Declare Interim European Missile Defense Capability


During the NATO meeting in Chicago, the alliance will declare that it has an interim operational capability to defend itself against ballistic missile attacks. This is a major step forward for NATO and U.S. leadership within the alliance.

The declaration marks the achievement of the first phase in the Obama Administration’s European Phased Adaptive Approach missile defense plan. This interim capability is based on the Aegis missile defense system and its accompanying Standard missile defense interceptor called the Block IA, which is deployed on U.S. Navy cruisers and destroyers. This is a system that has demonstrated its capability in numerous intercept tests.

As the term “interim operational capability” implies, however, this system is very limited in scope and needs to be expanded both qualitatively and quantitatively. The major shortcoming is that the capability does not extend to defendingU.S.territory against long-range missile attack. An earlier architecture, proposed by the George W. Bush Administration, would have provided for a defense of U.S. as well as European territory by fielding ground-based midcourse defense interceptors inPolandand an accompanying radar in the Czech Republic.

This option, which also included the Aegis system, was canceled by President Obama in 2009 in order to appease Russian objections to it. This interim capability leaves U.S. allies more vulnerable to missile attacks than the technology would otherwise permit, because the Aegis missile defense system could have been made more capable than the one in place today by providing it the ability to counter long-range missiles in the late midcourse phase of flight.

Despite this decision, the Russians continue to object to U.S. and NATO missile defense capabilities. The Obama Administration in particular has responded to Russian objections by attempting to persuadeRussiathatU.S.and NATO missile defense will not pose a threat to Russian missile-based nuclear forces. This approach to diplomacy toward Russia is misguided for at least the following four reasons:

  1. The purpose of any missile defense system is to counter an offensive missiles only after they have been have been fired. They are inherently defensive and do not pose a threat to anyone.
  2. The U.S. in particular has described its diplomacy toward Russia regarding missile defense as an attempt to find a cooperative arrangement where Russia will participate in a broader missile defense system. Genuine missile defense cooperation withRussiawould be desirable, but the current approach is about cooperating to limit the overall capabilities of the missile defense system. The Russians have made it clear that this is how they view it, and U.S. diplomacy has only served to reinforce this view.
  3. Missile defense itself is not at the crux of the impasse withRussia; it really stems from Russia’s view that its national security depends on its ability to threaten the U.S. and its NATO partners with nuclear-armed ballistic missiles—and most particularly those NATO countries that reside within its asserted zone of privileged interests. This Russian view should be unacceptable to all NATO countries under any circumstances, and the alliance should not be shy about stating this to the Russians.
  4. This diplomatic approach fails to recognize that the proper way out of the current impasse is to persuade Russia that fundamentally defensive strategic postures are in everybody’s interest. The U.S. and NATO should have no objections toRussiamaintaining a capability to defend itself, even in the context of an unjustified perception byRussiathat the U.S. and other NATO countries are intent on committing acts of aggression. This is because the U.S. and NATO have no such intention and do not build their forces for such a purpose. The success of this diplomatic approach depends on Russia renouncing any aggressive intent toward the U.S. and NATO.

Given present circumstances, NATO leaders should use the Chicago meeting to affirm that alliance members, both individually and collectively, intend to defend themselves against missile attack by pursuing the most capable missile defense system technology permits. They should also challenge the Russians to join them in adopting fundamentally defensive strategic postures, where genuine cooperation in the field of missile defense will naturally be a central component.

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The Wall Street Journal’s Limited-Government Readers

By David Boaz

The Wall Street Journal editorial page, usually a strong voice for limited government, was rapped by readers Thursday for positions that didn’t seem to meet that standard.

After the Journal urged President Obama to support the Defense of Marriage Act in order to allow the gay marriage issue “to be resolved democratically by the states,” Michael Weisberg wrote to point out that DOMA “overrides the laws and desires of the states, which have traditionally had jurisdiction in matters of marriage, as one would expect under the federal Constitution.” That’s a point we’ve also made here, and one that seems to confuse many of DOMA’s advocates.

Meanwhile, many readers objected to the Journal‘s support for the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (also a point we’ve made in this space). Adam Marcus and Berin Szoka of TechFreedom noted that Census data aren’t as private as we’re promised:

Our government has abused census data to awful effect, most notably in the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II, as documented in a Scientific American article in 2007. More recently, the feds violated their express privacy policy by publishing all individual responses to the 1940 Census’s similarly extensive questions—not just aggregated results.

Like Robert L. Umbarger, they also point out that “the Constitution authorizes a census only to apportion congressional representatives,” so the government exceeds its authority when it requires Americans to answer questions on, as the Journal put it, “everything from demographics to income to commuting times.” Lisa Greenman reflects a traditional American suspicion of government:

At worst it is the federal government collecting private, personal data that can be used against its citizens. How ironic this piece was published under the one titled “The President’s Hit List.”

Van Bussmann notes, “Here comes yet another program to solidify government control over our lives. Information begets power.” He unconsciously echoed Sir John Cowperthwaite, the former administrator of the British colony Hong Kong during its rapid rise from poverty, about whom the Journal editorial page wrote in 2006, “One of the better known stories about the undeservedly obscure Cowperthwaite was his refusal to collect economic statistics about Hong Kong during his tenure as Financial Secretary, lest they produce an impulse toward central planning among the bureaucrats.”

It’s good to know that even when the Journal editorial writers are tempted by unwarranted federal programs, their readers are on the case.

The Wall Street Journal’s Limited-Government Readers is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

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Chen Guangcheng: The Value of One Voice


Activist Chen Guangcheng and his immediate family are out of China. This is a good thing, and the Obama Administration deserves credit for making it happen.

There will be plenty of opportunity for the American political system to assess the Administration’s initial handling of the matter and what it says about its foreign policy priorities. There are certainly lessons there to be learned.

Today, however, is not an occasion for a policy debate. It is a time for Americans to welcome Chen and his family to freedom in America, to pray for the safety of his extended family and friends back in China, and rededicate themselves to a foreign policy focused on liberty.

It is also time to see the People’s Republic of China for what it is. China is a place that economic development has materially transformed over the last 30 years, a real player in the global economy, and a force to be reckoned with in international politics. China is America’s rival for influence in East and South Asia; it is also occasionally a collaborator in containing the impact of the rivalry.

China is also, however, a place that has not changed since the Tiananmen Square Massacre in 1989 when it comes to respect for the fundamental rights of its people. This is sometimes hard for the diplomats, scholars, businessmen, and tourists who spend time there to believe. Likewise, there are many privileged, worldly Chinese who fail to see it.

Chen Guangcheng, blind since childhood, sees the truth. The cause he has risked his life for—ending state-enforced abortions pursuant to China’s one-child policy—is one of its most horrid manifestations of China’s debasement of individual liberty.

The People’s Republic of China is an authoritarian, yes, “communist” nation. This China is Chen’s day-to-day reality. And it is a brutal reality for many hundreds of millions more. U.S.–China relations will never be normal as long as the Chinese regime is what it is.

But there is another truth involved here. It is America’s. The reality is that, contrary to officials’ assertions, Americans’ love of liberty means that the gears of U.S.–China relations—or relations with any other country, for that matter—can and should be shut down over concern for the plight of one man. And if at any point it is not clear that the United States still remains the world’s greatest hope for the oppressed, both our friends and rivals should know that it is only a temporary state of affairs.

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Liberals Say Public Broadcasting’s $445 Million Federal Subsidy Is ‘Tiny’


NPR, PBS and other public broadcasting outlets are asking taxpayers to fork over $445 million in funding for the next fiscal year. But not if Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC) and Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO) have anything to say about it.

The conservative lawmakers want to defund the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the steward of the federal government’s “investment” in public radio and TV. Congress created CPB in 1967, and DeMint and Lamborn think it’s time to cut it off from the federal trough. Their move comes as the agency prepares to report to Congress how it could operate without a federal subsidy.

“While so many Americans are making sacrifices around the country to make ends meet, CPB appears unwilling to do the same,” DeMint and Lamborn wrote in a letter to Senate and House appropriators. “Now is the appropriate and necessary time for the government to end taxpayer subsidies for CPB.”

Liberals are fighting back to keep the money flowing. The special-interest group Free Press, which advocates for greater government control over media and the Internet, claims the federal subsidy is necessary to save public-broadcasting jobs.

This tiny federal investment is vital to helping support programming that commercial media won’t showcase and provides an important foundation for stations around the country to build on.

DeMint and Lamborn don’t consider it such a “tiny federal investment,” particularly given the rapid growth of public broadcasting’s federal subsidy in the past decade. Writing on DeMint’s new Pickpocket blog, Amanda Carpenter noted:

Even though media has become more accessible than ever, funding for CPB has exploded. Between 2001 and 2012, the CPB’s appropriated funding escalated by nearly 31 percent, from $340 million to $444.1 million.

This, of course, isn’t the first time public broadcasting faced a fight over its federal subsidy. Previous attempts to cut off funding came in the wake of Juan Williams’ firing from NPRand James O’Keefe’s exposé of an NPR executive’s disparaging remarks about conservatives and Tea Party activists. The funding cut was also part of House Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s YouCut initiative.

The O’Keefe exposé also revealed that NRP’s own senior vice president for fundraising admitted that NPR “would be better off in the long run without federal funding.” More than a year later, the American people are still on the hook.

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Daniel in the Looter’s Den: My Adventures at the UN

By Daniel J. Mitchell

I was at the United Nations yesterday for something called “The High Level Thematic Debate on the State of the World Economy.”

Most speakers, including the secretary general of the United Nations, the president of the European Commission, Paul Volcker, and Joseph Stiglitz, to varying degrees blamed private markets for the fiscal and financial problems of the world. Not surprisingly, there also was a consensus for more government—usually wrapped up in buzzwords such as “sustainable development” and “equitable growth” and ”coolective action”

I spoke in the afternoon as part of a roundtable on the economic crisis (see full schedule here). There were five speakers on my panel, including yours truly. Here are my thoughts on what the others said.

Dr. Supachai Panitchpakdi, secretary-general of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, must have been part of the buzz-word contest I mentioned yesterday. Lots of rhetoric that theoretically was inoffensive, but I had the feeling that it translated into a call for more government. But maybe I’m paranoid, so who knows.

Professor Dato’ Dr. Zaleha Kamaruddin, rector of the International Islamic University of Malaysia, was an interesting mix. At some points, she sounded like Ron Paul, saying nice things about the gold standard and low tax rates. But she also called for debt forgiveness and other forms of intervention. She explicitly said she was providing Islamic insights, so perhaps the strange mix makes sense from that perspective.

Former U.S. senator Alan K. Simpson also was a mixed bag. Simpson was co-chair of President Obama’s fiscal commission, which I thought was a disappointment because it endorsed higher taxes and urged subpar entitlement changes rather than much-needed structural reforms. He also went after Grover Norquist because of the no-tax pledge, which I think is a valuable tool to keep Republicans from selling out for bigger government. All that being said, Senator Simpson is a promoter of smaller government and he wants lower tax rates. So while I disagree with some of his tactical decisions, he was an ally on the panel and would probably do a pretty good job if he was economic czar.

Last but not least, Professor Jeffrey Sachs of Columbia University was a statist, as one would expect based on what I wrote about him last year. We clashed the most, arguing about everything from tax havens to the size of government. Interestingly, we both said nice things about Sweden, but I was focusing on policies such as school choice and pension reform, while he admired the large public sector. But I will admit he was a nice guy. We sat next to each other and did find a bit of common ground in that we both were sympathetic to the way Sweden dealt with its financial crisis about 20 years ago (a version of the FDIC-resolution approach rather than the corrupt TARP bailout approach).

My message, by the way, was very simple: Higher taxes won’t work. The “growth” vs. “austerity” debate in Europe is really a no-win fight between those who want higher spending vs. those who want higher taxes. The only good answer is to restrain spending with—you guessed it—Mitchell’s Golden Rule.

The good news is that I wasn’t tarred and feathered. Indeed, I even got a modest amount of positive feedback. The bad news is that I doubt I moved the needle.

But at least the United Nations was willing to have contrary voices, unlike the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, which once threatened to cancel a Global Tax Forum because of my short-lived participation.

Daniel in the Looter’s Den: My Adventures at the UN is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

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NATO and Missile Defense: Words in a Summit Declaration Will Not Be Enough


When NATO leaders meet this weekend in Chicago, they are expected to announce an Interim Missile Defense Capability in Europe.

This announcement might read well in the summit’s declaration, but a lot more will need to be done before the members of the alliance will be protected from the ever-increasing missile threat.

According to NATO’s strategic concept, “The greatest responsibility of the Alliance is to protect and defend our territory and our populations against attack, as set out in Article 5 of the Washington Treaty.” This core tenant is what has made NATO the most successful military alliance in history. As global threats change, NATO must adapt too. As ballistic missile technologies proliferate, ballistic missile defense (BMD) is not a luxury for NATO but a necessity.

NATO has made some progress, but it still has a long way to go. It has expanded its Active Layered Theater Ballistic Missile Defense program, a command-and-control backbone of the alliance’s theater missile defense system and future layered missile defense system.

At the Chicago summit, the U.S. and its allies plan to declare that NATO has achieved an interim capability in ballistic missile defense. The first steps in implementing the Phased Adaptive Approach, President Obama’s missile defense plan for Europe, will be part of this capability.

In the past year, Turkey agreed to host the X-band radar on its territory, and the radar is already operational. Romania and Poland agreed to host land-based interceptor sites in the future, and Spain will host U.S. BMD-capable ships.

Missile defense is an area where NATO’s Smart Defense initiative could actually produce benefits for the alliance as a whole. France, Germany, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, and Spain have their own short-range missile defense systems. The Netherlands, Germany, and France are also exploring options to contribute sensor capabilities and early warning. With relatively modest investment and adaptation, these platforms could eventually form part of NATO missile defense capability.

NATO should continue to advance its missile defense program. This could include jointly developing missile defense systems, establishing interoperable command-and-control systems, resolving political and military issues associated with command-and-control, and preparing operational plans in case the alliance is attacked. NATO will need to further define key missile defense capability requirements and the assets required to achieve them.

In addition, NATO will need to explore options to field a variety of land-, air-, sea-, and space-based systems capable of intercepting ballistic missiles in all three stages of flight: boost, midcourse, and terminal.

While the announcement of NATO’s Interim Missile Defense Capability in Europe is welcome, this is only the first step in a longer process. NATO leaders need to stay committed to missile defense for the long haul. The security of the alliance depends on it.

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NATO Summit 2012: Without New Investment by Europeans, NATO’s Future Is in Doubt


At the NATO Summit in Chicago this weekend, leaders will gather to discuss a number of issues facing the alliance. Top of the agenda will be Afghanistan, improving NATO’s military capabilities, and extending NATO’s partnerships with regional and global partners. However, nothing agreed at the summit will matter if America’s European allies do not start spending what is required on defense.

Defense spending inside NATO is increasingly declining. As Libya and other NATO campaigns have demonstrated time and again, Europe relies too much on the U.S. to pick up the slack during alliance operations. This is mainly the result of reduced defense investments by NATO members since the end of the Cold War and the lack of political will to use military capability when and where it is needed.

Since 2008, the 16 European members of NATO have reduced their military spending. Reductions in many NATO countries have exceeded 10 percent. In 2011, just three of the 28 NATO members—the United States, Britain, and Greece—spent the required 2 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. As expected, France fell below the 2 percent mark in 2011. Even Spain, with the world’s 12th largest economy, spent only 0.9 percent of GDP on defense in 2011.

To put this problem into perspective, New York City spends more on policing ($4.46 billion in fiscal year 2011) than 13 NATO members each spend on their defense.

However, on a positive note, Estonia claims it might reach the 2 percent requirement this year.

At the summit, NATO is expected to unveil a number of “Smart Defense” initiatives to help solve this problem. Smart Defense aims to encourage allies to cooperate in developing, acquiring, and maintaining military capabilities in a more economically efficient manner in an age of defense cuts.

While the aims of Smart Defense are noble, there is a concern that the initiative is likely to amount to little beyond a list of aspirations if Europeans invest no new money in defense. The language describing Smart Defense may read well in a summit declaration, but until real money is invested and delivers real capabilities to the modern-day battlefield, it will be meaningless to the men and women on the front lines. To work, Smart Defense requires real military capability and real money. No clever nomenclature can evade this problem.

Many leaders in Europe say that the first duty of government is the defense of the realm, but few leaders actually implement this view in practice. Spending is about setting national priorities, and Europeans have become complacent about their own defense and overly dependent on the U.S. security umbrella. Sadly, with President Obama’s defense cuts, the U.S. is not leading by example.

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Iran’s Queasiness with Western Values Continues


In case anyone was unconvinced about Iran’s hostility toward everything associated with Western values, recent provocations leave no doubt.

After blocking the Olympics website, refusing to admit a Davis Cup tennis player, and slandering the Olympic logo for being “racist,” Iran’s latest flaunt is its threat to sue Google. Why? Because Google maps has no label for the Persian Gulf.

According to Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast:

Toying with modern technologies in political issues is among the new measures by the enemies against Iran, (and) in this regard, Google has been treated as a plaything. Omitting the name Persian Gulf is (like) playing with the feelings and realities of the Iranian nation.

This from Iran is not surprising. It sees Western values as inimical to its own. Consider Dipu Lal, a tennis player from Bangladesh who has been denied access to Iran for reasons unstated. Yet many believe the real reason is that Lal’s brother is a U.S. citizen.

Or take the outrage at the Olympic 2012 logo (which can be seen here), which Iran alleges spells the word Zion, a term referring to the city of Jerusalem. This comes from the same country whose president has called for the destruction of Israel and has denied the holocaust.

Meanwhile, Iran continues to slip and slide on its nuclear programs, pressing forward despite five U.N. Security Council resolutions to the contrary. Its anti-Western stance, longstanding support for terrorism, and genocidal threats against Israel are precisely why it should not be allowed to acquire nuclear weapons.

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Pawlenty and Boehner Agree: Stop Taxmageddon Now


Former Governor Tim Pawlenty (R–MN), national co-chair of the Romney for President campaign, appeared on CNBC yesterday and chastised President Obama for failing to lead on stopping Taxmageddon before the November election.

Pawlenty is right: Washington should stop Taxmageddon now. Heritage has been saying just that for weeks.

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R–OH) understands that Taxmageddon must be stopped soon.

In a speech this week before the Peter G. Peterson 2012 Fiscal Summit, Speaker made clear the House will vote to stop Taxmageddon before the November election:

We shouldn’t wait until New Year’s Eve to give American job creators the confidence that they aren’t going to get hit with a tax hike on New Year’s Day. Any sudden tax hike would hurt our economy, so this fall—before the election—the House of Representatives will vote to stop the largest tax increase in American history. This will give Congress time to work on broad-based tax reform that lowers rates for individuals and businesses while closing deductions, credits, and special carveouts.

The Speaker is right to have the House vote to stop Taxmageddon before the election. In fact, he shouldn’t wait until the fall. Stopping Taxmageddon should be Congress’s summer job.

There is no reason to wait and all the reasons in the world to stop Taxmageddon now. As Mohammad El-Erian, CEO of Pimco, the world’s largest bond fund, told Washington last week, the uncertainty caused by Taxmageddon lingering ominously in the not-too-distant future is hurting economic growth today.

The Speaker is also right that tax reform should follow preventing Taxmageddon. The country badly needs tax reform, but completely re-ordering the tax code isn’t going to happen before the end of the year. The right thing to do is stop Taxmageddon, which runs contrary to the purpose of tax reform, and then undertake tax reform next year.

The list of influential people going on the record in favor of stopping Taxmageddon is growing longer by the day. That’s why the conventional wisdom that Congress would deal with Taxmageddon after the election is dead wrong.

 

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HSAs Could Bring Health Costs Down; Too Bad Obamacare Destroys Them


Consumer-directed health plans have become increasing popular because of their ability to save consumers money. Breaking research published by Health Affairs shows that if consumer-directed health plans increased as a share of employer-sponsored plans from 12.4 percent to 50 percent, it could save $57.1 billion annually in national health expenditures. The report states, “Savings of this magnitude would account for 7 percent of all health care spending for the population with employer-sponsored insurance and 4 percent for the nonelderly population as a whole.”

The study uses two types of consumer-directed plans to comprise the increased market share: half health reimbursement arrangements (HRAs) and half health savings accounts (HSAs). The study shows that if the ever-popular HSAs were to take up the entire 50 percent of market share, savings could reach $73.6 billion, or 9.1 percent of employee health care spending. This is because employees save more money in the high-deductible HSAs than in HRAs. HSAs are funded by both the employer and employee, while HRAs are funded solely by the employer. Thus, any money not spent in a HSA rolls over for the employee to keep, while in an HRA, it is just money the employer did not have to spend.

HSAs prove that having more control over health care decisions goes a long way toward creating savings.

Instead of building on this successful cost-saving model, Obamacare all but obliterates it. Many provisions of the law affect HSAs. For example, the medical loss ratio (MLR), which requires insurers to spend at least 80 percent (85 percent for group plans) of premiums on medical claims or quality improvement, weakens HSAs. Obamacare’s MLR does not take contributions to HSAs into account when determining if a plan meets the 80 percent threshold. One research report concluded, “For high-deductible and HSA plans to be viable, both from a consumer and carrier perspective under [Obamacare], an adjustment to the MLR formula for the impact of HSAs may be necessary.”

Also, Obamacare’s “unreasonable rate increase” provision undercuts HSAs. As Heritage has explained before, “[H]igh-deductible plans require larger annual rate increases, because medical inflation has a greater impact on claim levels with higher-deductible plans. The larger rate increase might disqualify [high-deductible health plans] in general if the increase qualifies as an ‘unreasonable rate increase.’”

Obamacare is government-directed health policy that poses a threat to successful consumer-directed health care.

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