Robert Gates: Missile Defender, and then Opponent

Years ago I wrote a couple of blog posts about Bush administration plans to build long-range missiles in Poland and the Czech Republic.  It now appears that the Obama administration is throwing these plans in the waste-receptacle, which for anyone who has been following this story, should come as great news. 

More than anything, I think this whole saga tells us quite a lot about our current Defense Secretary, Robert Gates.  Where only two years ago he was telling the American people that this missile-defense plan was indispensable for the "indivisible security for the United States our NATO allies," he now alerts us that no threat is imminent, and that such plans now would be silly.  Some might interpret this change of position as an acknowledgment of recent findings on Iranian and North Korean missile capacities, as well as of our change in policy vis-a-vis Russia.  I interpret it as yet another episode in the long-running series of, "Robert Gates will tell the President whatever the President wants to hear."