The Obama administration had a letter secretly delivered to the office of Dmitry Medvedev in the Kremlin several weeks ago. The letter allegedly stated that if Russia were to help with the ceasing of nuclear arms development in Iran that there would be no need to pursue a missile shield in Poland that the Bush administration first proposed. This adds more weight to the Obama administrations presentation of willingness to work with those governments which were deemed enemies of America under the Bush administration. Robert Gates was quoted as saying, “I told the Russians a year ago that if there were no Iranian missile program, there would be no need for the missile sites,” at a meeting of NATO in Krakow on Feb. 19th.

There has been no response to the letter from the Kremlin. But this has raised much political ire in the Czech Republic and Poland where the politicians had to expend much political capital in order to gain support for this project from their people. The very first day of the Obama administration the Russian Bear showed its fangs by threatening to point missiles at the European continent if the missile shield plans continued. Medvedev’s administration has since backed down on the threat.

This detente between the US and Russia is of utmost importance at this time as the issue with Iran’s nuclear program continues to heat up. NATO has debated attempting to create a supply flightpath over Iran and would need the influence of Russia if it were even to negotiate something so paltry compared to nuclear ambitions. Medvedev is quoted as saying that Russia has, “recieved signals,” from the Obama administration and that he looks forward to discussing them with Obama. These discussions will most likely be held at the meeting between these two leaders on April 2nd in London.

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