President Barack Obama’s decision to abandon a big, fixed-installation missile defense shield in Eastern Europe is drawing some angry reaction abroad.

Conservatives in Poland, where the Bush administration planned to base interceptor rockets, and the Czech Republic, where a radar installation was planned, accused Washington of buckling to Russian pressure.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates meets Friday afternoon with his Czech counterpart, Martin Bartak, as the administration works to explain its new thinking. It may be a hard sell.

“Betrayal! The USA has sold us to the Russians and stabbed us in the back,” said the Polish tabloid Fakt.

The Czech daily Lidowe Noviny took a similar line. “Obama gave in to the Kremlin,” it said.

Some military experts viewed the decision as a sign of weakness by Obama that Moscow hardliners would try to exploit further.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin described it as “correct and brave,” and followed up Friday with a speech calling for Obama to agree to concessions on trade and technology transfer.

The Bush administration had proposed the shield to counter concerns Iran was developing a long-range missile capability that could strike at the United States.

The Obama administration said Iranian short- and medium-range missiles were a more immediate concern. It said it would scrap the antiballistic missile shield in favor of a more mobile, versatile system targeting shorter-range missiles.

U.S. newspapers were more receptive to that rationale. The New York Times called it “a sound strategic decision” and USA today said it marked the first big break in foreign policy with the former administration.

Republicans charged that it amounted to a big security concession to Russia, even as the administration said the decision was all about Iran and not Moscow.

The announcement came ahead of the U.N. General Assembly meeting in New York next week and the start of direct talks in October between Iran and major powers concerned about its nuclear enrichment program.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad did little Friday to allay those worries.

Speaking to worshipers at Tehran University, Ahmadinejad said the Holocaust was a “lie based on an unprovable and mythical claim.”

He said it was a pretext to create a Jewish state and that Iranians had a “national and religious duty” to confront it.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in a speech looking at her aims for the U.N. General Assembly, said the missile decision was a reaction to Iran, not Russia.

“We would never, never walk away from our allies,” she said.

Obama meets today with Susan Rice, his ambassador to the United Nations, ahead of the General Assembly session.

And the religious right begins its annual Washington gathering — the Value Voters Summit — looking for ways to rally conservative Christians against Obama’s agenda, including healthcare reform.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Larry Downing (Obama discusses missile defense Thursday); Reuters/Yuri Gripas (Gates discussing missile defense Thursday)

President Barack Obama used “new approach” a couple of times to describe a shift in U.S. missile defense policy, but his statement was so steeped in diplo-speak that it led to much initial head-scratching over what was actually new and different.

It was left to Defense Secretary Robert Gates to shoot down as “misinformed” raging speculation that the United States was scrapping missile defense in Europe. He said the United States would initially deploy ships equipped with missile interceptors to Europe.

Keep in mind that Gates was also defense secretary under President George W. Bush who had pushed for the agreements to build missile interceptors and radar in Poland and the Czech Republic — a move that had royally angered Russia.

Obama appeared to be trying to stay a step ahead of the expected onslaught of Republican criticism that he was going soft on national security.

He started off by reminding everyone that he was commander-in-chief (something his predecessor did quite frequently), and in the next breath said “I’m committed to doing everything in my power to advance our national security.”

It didn’t take long for the Republican floodgates to open up. Senator Richard Shelby said Obama’s decision “to appease Russia is misguided at best and dangerous at worst.”

Bush stood firm against Russia’s irritation at the missile defense plan. Obama must see greater benefit to removing that thorn from U.S.-Russian relations.

What do you think are the benefits or dangers of the “new approach” ?

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Photo Credit: Reuters/Larry Downing (Obama talks about missile defense)

President Barack Obama is abandoning a Bush administration plan to build a big, fixed U.S. missile defense in Eastern Europe.

The president announced the decision Thursday amid reports from Poland and the Czech Republic overnight that officials there had been informed about the final decision.

Instead of a fixed missile shield, the administration plans a more mobile defense aimed at short- and medium-range rockets.

The missile shield plan had angered Moscow and caused a chill in U.S.-Russian relations despite Washington’s insistence the program was aimed at Iran.

The Bush administration, which had been working on the plan for some time, officially signed the deal with Poland last year in a slap at Moscow for its war with Georgia.

Obama’s Republican rival for the White House, Senator John McCain, criticized the decision, saying it called into question the “security and diplomatic commitments the United States has made to Poland and the Czech Republic.”

House Republican Leader John Boehner said the decision “does little more than empower Russia and Iran at the expense of our allies in Europe.”

U.S. officials portrayed the decision as a shift based on new intelligence showing Iran is more focused on short- and medium-term rockets rather than intercontinental ballistic weapons capable of striking at the United States with nuclear warheads.

The decision would abandon the idea for big fixed installations in Poland for interceptor missiles and in the Czech Republic for a radar system, officials said. They would be replaced by systems the officials described as more versatile.

The missile defense announcement may overshadow developments on the healthcare front. Obama is pushing healthcare reform — his top domestic agenda — at a rally in Maryland later.

The push comes a day after Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus unveiled a healthcare overhaul bill after months of negotiations with Democratic and Republican colleagues — the so-called Gang of Six.

The 10-year, $856 billion plan did not include a public insurance alternative favored by Obama and many other Democrats. It was unclear whether it would win much Republican or Democratic support.

But Baucus portrayed it as a measure that could pass the Senate and would meet Obama’s goal of not adding to the the federal deficit.

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office put the cost of the bill even lower — at $774 billion — and said it would shave $49 billion from the deficit over 10 years and cut the number of uninsured people by about 29 million.

Baucus meets with the congressional Democratic caucus to pitch his plan Thursday.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Francois Lenoir (Protesters in Czech Republic demonstrate against U.S. missile defense shield plans in April)

ST. LOUIS  - Republican presidential candidate John McCain, who prides himself on his national security expertise, has twice in two days referred to recent Russian activities against Czechoslovakia, a country that no longer exists.
 
“I was concerned about a couple of steps that the Russian government took in the last several days. One was reducing the energy supplies to Czechoslovakia,” McCain told reporters on Monday in Phoenix.
 
He went on to repeat similar language on Tuesday at a town hall meeting in Albuquerque.
 
He was clearly referring to the Czech Republic, citing that government’s agreement with the United States over missile defense, an action he said prompted Moscow’s retaliation.

Czechoslovakia split into two parts, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, in 1993 after the breakup of the Soviet Union.
 
McCain’s campaign headquarters in suburban Washington D.C. got the distinction correct, issuing a written statement under McCain’s name late on Monday saying that “Russia’s 50 percent cut in oil deliveries to the Czech Republic” was deeply disturbing.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Fredy Builes (McCain and wife Cindy arrive in Colombia on a recent visit)