Article: Iran vs. Poland?

In the January 27 Mideast edition of Stars and Stripes, there was a report entitled, "Pentagon to build intercept missile systems in Poland, Czech Republic." It began: "The Pentagon is moving rapidly to build new missile defenses in Poland and the Czech Republic to counter the threat posed by Iranian long-range missiles." "The immediate threat in terms of emerging threats that we see is obviously the Iranians, and they're putting a lot of energy into that [long-range missile] program," Air Force Lt. Gen. Henry "Trey" Obering, head of the Missile Defense Agency, told the Washington Times. Plans call for deploying 10 long-range missile interceptors in Poland at a cost of about $3.5 billion. Iran vs. Poland, huh? Who knew? As far as I know, they haven't faced off since the 1992 World Cup when the Iranians blanked the Poles 2-0. How could things between these two nations have deteriorated to a point where long-range missiles and interceptors and billions of American taxpayer dollars are involved? Could it be that whole "Coalition of the Willing" thing? You might recall the first Bush-Kerry presidential debate (September 30, 2004), when the senator from Massachusetts said: "The United Nations, Kofi Annan offered help after Baghdad fell. And we never picked him up on that and did what was necessary to transfer authority and to transfer reconstruction. It was always American-run. Secondly, when we went in, there were three countries: Great Britain, Australia and the United States. That's not a grand coalition. We can do better." To which, Dubya famously replied: "Well, actually, he forgot Poland." Apparently, Iran hasn't forgotten... Mickey Z. can be found on the Web at http://www.mickeyz.net.