Development
According to the United States administration, the system was intended to protect against future missiles from Iran, such as the alleged Shahab-6, although in November 2007 the U.S. National Intelligence Estimate reported that Iran's nuclear weapons program had been halted since late 2003. It has also been pointed out that Central Europe is beyond the range of any missile that Iran currently has.
Russia strongly opposed the system. As an alternative, it proposed sharing the Qabala Radar in Azerbaijan, which Russia leases, but at the time this was not seen as an acceptable substitute for the US.
The missile shield received opposition from certain groups within Poland and the Czech Republic, including numerous protests and a relay hunger strike by two Czech activists which started in May 2008 and lasted 300 days.
On September 17, 2009, it was announced by the Obama administration that plans for the project had been scrapped.
In October, with a trip by Vice President Joe Biden to Warsaw, a new, smaller interceptor project on roughly the same schedule as the Bush administration plan, was introduced, and welcomed by Prime Minister Donald Tusk.
Read more about this topic: US Missile Defense Complex In Poland
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