• Speech was delayed to coincide with poll result
* Ian Traynor, Europe editor
* guardian.co.uk, Friday November 7 2008
An honour guard stands to attention as missile carriers rumble through Red Square, Moscow, in a return of the Victory Day parade
An honour guard stands to attention as missile carriers rumble through Red Square, Moscow, in a return of the Victory Day parade. Photograph: Yuri Kochetkov/EPA
Dmitri Medvedev is to go to Washington next week for the first time as Russian president, with the chances of a meeting with president-elect Barack Obama clouded by his decision to station missiles in the heart of Europe.
Medvedev's military announcement, in a speech delayed by a month in order to coincide with the election of the new White House occupant, sent a hostile message towards an Obama administration, aimed to sow friction between European capitals and a new-look Washington, and sought to intimidate the Poles and the Czechs, who are to host the bases for the Pentagon's missile defence project.
Iskander-M short-range missiles will be deployed in Kaliningrad, Russia's westernmost garrison, an isolated enclave sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania.
The Russian announcement was the sole menacing message amid a wave of global optimism that accompanied the Democratic triumph in the US. Just as western diplomats and analysts were suggesting relations between Russia and the west, at their worst since the end of the cold war, could improve, the Russian leader's salvo was seen as an unnecessary challenge to Obama, who will be wary of appearing weak on national security.
"It's pretty amazing stuff," said a European diplomat. "The timing is gobsmacking. It will impact on the debate [on relations with Russia]."
Russian president: 'A bellicose and increasingly angry Kremlin'
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In Washington, Sean McCormack, a state department spokesman for the Bush administration, said: "The steps that the Russian government announced today are disappointing. But again [the missile defence project] is not directed at them. Hopefully one day they'll realise that."
Frank-Walter Steinmeier, Germany's foreign minister and a candidate for chancellor next year, said the Medvedev message was badly timed, while Lithuania's president, Valdas Adamkus, described it as "beyond comprehension".
Lithuania is leading a losing battle within the EU to keep negotiations with Moscow frozen, and is furious at what it sees as a British U-turn in favour of resuming talks on a new strategic pact between the EU and Russia. British officials confirmed yesterday that the government favoured resuming talks with Moscow, which were suspended in September after the UK strongly criticised Russia over the Georgia crisis. "The UK view is that we want to get back to a position to pursue these negotiations," said a diplomat.
Medvedev, below, is also to travel to Nice next week, where President Nicolas Sarkozy of France will host an EU-Russia summit which is expected to restart the stalled negotiations on the Russia-Europe pact. The UK diplomat added that the Medvedev statement could strengthen support for Lithuania's anti-Russian line at an EU summit today and at a meeting of foreign ministers on Monday in Brussels.
The Czechs, Poles and others will be more inclined to oppose talks with Russia, while the French, Germans, and Italians are keen to restore relations with the Russians without conditions.
Coming on top of last August's invasion and partition of Georgia by Russia, and Medvedev's statement that he was not afraid of a new cold war, his state-of-the-nation speech in the Kremlin appeared calculated to inflame tensions with America at a time when much of the rest of the world is relieved at the demise of the neoconservatives in Washington and anticipating a more benign US administration.
The speech was intended to scare Europeans into opposing the US missile defence bases in Europe - silos for 10 ballistic missile interceptor rockets in northern Poland, and a radar base south of Prague in the Czech Republic.
The Russian tactic looks unlikely to impress the Americans nor intimidate the Poles, who have bargained hard for security guarantees from the Americans.
But Steinmeier indirectly criticised the US project, warning against a new arms race in Europe, and the Czechs are in a much more precarious position.
The Czech government is keen to host the missile base. But two thirds of Czechs are against it and the government has just been trounced in local elections that have shifted the balance of power in the Czech upper house. The scheme is strongly opposed by the social democratic opposition and may not survive the necessary parliamentary ratification process, which has been indefinitely shelved.
Washington's worries about the fate of the radar base were evident this week when General Henry Obering, the outgoing chief of the Pentagon's missile defence agency, made a farewell visit to Prague and told Czech journalists that the US had a plan B for locating the base outside the republic, but was reluctant to turn to another country.
The optimistic view among diplomats is that Medvedev delivered his threat to clear the air while the Bush administration is still in office, and that he is keen to pursue more ambitious nuclear arms cuts with the incoming Obama team. Yesterday, after his speech, the Kremlin announced that Medvedev had congratulated Obama for winning the US presidency, saying by telegram he was "counting on a constructive dialogue with you on the basis of trust and taking each other's interests into account".
Medvedev is to make his first presidential trip to Washington next week to take part in the G20 summit on the global economic crisis. The Russian foreign ministry said he could meet Obama on the margins of the summit.
Rocket men
March 1983 The American president, Ronald Reagan, launches the Strategic Defence Initiative. Dubbed Star Wars, the SDI was to develop a missile shield that would shelter the US from attack by intercontinental nuclear ballistic missiles.
1991 End of the cold war leaves the initiative redundant.
1990s The SDI is superseded by the National Missile Defence system, with silos and facilities eventually sited in Alaska and California and aimed across the Pacific Ocean, specifically to protect against a potential attack by North Korea.
2002 The Pentagon explores support in Poland and Czech Republic for first missile defence sites outside the US - a radar tracking station south of Prague and the stationing of 10 interceptor rockets in Poland, said to counter possible ballistic missile attack by Iran.
July 2008 US and Czech governments sign agreement on radar station.
August 2008 US and Polish governments sign pact on interceptor rockets.
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