The High Price of Harmony

President Vladimir V. Putin appears to have decided since Sept. 11 that Russia’s place is with the West. The fortunate result is that a number of important agreements will probably be signed during his three-day summit meeting, starting today, with President Bush. The less fortunate result is that Bush may also clear the way for his useless and budget-breaking national missile defense system.

Russian intelligence services have been supplying the United States with vital information about Afghanistan and the Al Qaeda network’s activities. Also, Moscow has posed no objections to U.S. use of Central Asian states that were part of the Soviet Union as bases for operations in Afghanistan.

More developments are likely when the meeting at the Bush ranch in Crawford, Texas, ends Thursday. There have been hints of an agreement to slash bloated Russian and U.S. nuclear arsenals, which currently number more than 6,000 missiles each. Moscow is pushing for a decision-making role in NATO and has signaled that it might accept NATO expansion into the Baltic states. The U.S. will also press Russia to curb the transfer of civilian nuclear technology to countries like Iran.

So far, so good. But Bush’s real goal has been to get Putin to sign off on an agreement to alter the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which restricts the testing and deployment of missile defense systems. The obsession of the American right has been to deploy a system as quickly as possible. Putin appears likely to accede to a sweeping change in the treaty that would allow the U.S. to accelerate testing dramatically. His calculation appears to be that the administration was going to test anyway, so he might as well score points by conceding in advance. The cost of missile defense research, currently more than $5 billion a year, could soar with intense testing.

Most of the tests for a national missile defense have flopped, even though they’ve been rigged for success. And few one believe that the threat of a missile attack is the biggest danger facing America or that the proposed system is anything more than a boondoggle for defense contractors. The U.S. should be preparing to battle real threats, not costly illusions.