ICC head says missile defence bad news for Inuit

OTTAWA — The Inuit Circumpolar Conference, which represents 152,000 Inuit in Greenland, Alaska, Canada and Russia, is reacting “nervously” to last week’s announcement by U.S. President George W. Bush that his country will pull out of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty.

The ABM treaty, negotiated at the height of the Cold War between the U.S. and the old Soviet Union, prohibits the use of anti-ballistic missiles, to deter nuclear war between the superpowers.

ICC president Aqqaluk Lynge said the U.S. decision to abandon this treaty is bad news for Inuit, and for world peace.

Lynge said he had hoped there would be more international co-operation and multi-lateral decision-making on matters of global security after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.

“Now we are back to Cold War values and habits,” Lynge said.

Bush has said the U.S. will press ahead with its plans to deploy a missile defense shield called the National Missile Defense (NMD) system.

A U.S. withdrawal from the ABM treaty would make it legal for the Bush administration to deploy the NMD.

The NMD would theoretically protect the U.S. from attacks by “rogue” countries such as North Korea or Iraq. It would include missiles launched from ships and lasers fired from modified Boeing 747 aircraft.

By formally informing Russia last Thursday of his intention, Bush set in motion a six-month notice period for withdrawal from the treaty. After June, the U.S. will be able to proceed with any kind of missile defense test it wants.

“I have argued before, as have many others, that the ABM treaty is needed to prevent a new arms race from developing. For Inuit, the unilateral action by Mr. Bush is especially troublesome, as the next American step will be to upgrade military infrastructure across the Arctic and in our backyard,” Lynge said.

The NMD system would include upgrades to American air force bases around the North, such as the Thule base, located in northern Greenland, and sites in Alaska.

Lynge has previously called for more Inuit involvement in any discussions leading to upgrades of military bases in Inuit homelands.

Greenland’s ICC vice-president, Uusaqqak Qujaukitsoq, a hunter from the Thule region, has said “in the event of a conflict, we will surely be the first target.”

“We now need strong leadership within Greenland to face up to the next big American-Danish step – to construct NMD facilities on our land without prior consultation,” Lynge said.

Jonathan Motzfeldt, Greenland’s prime minister, has asked for the home rule government to be involved in any future negotiations about the use of the Thule base.

“I applaud that position, and we strongly support the Greenland government,” Lynge said.

But Motzfeldt has not always come out so firmly against the NMD proposal.

“I can’t see any problems if the Americans develop a defense system. It is neither an offensive nor a nuclear project,” Motzfeldt said in August. “And it comes within the normal use of the U.S. radar base at Thule.”

The Inuit Atqatigiit Party, which recently broke ranks with the Motzfeldt’s previous coalition government, is against the NMD. It passed a resolution last May saying “Greenland is a member of the global society and the Arctic community. The party (IA) cannot accept the United States’ plans for a so-called National Missile Defense.”

Under the terms of the 1978 home rule agreement with Denmark, Denmark is still in charge of matters related to foreign affairs and security in Greenland.

Some are hopeful the U.S. will develop a new treaty as a successor to the ABM treaty.

In Alaska, however, state officials are already saying the construction of local missile defence system sites will proceed without interference.

Plans include building a command centre and five missile silos at Fort Greely and setting up a rocket-launching test site in Kodiak. If the tests are successful, the Fort Greely test facility would be operating by 2004.

However, the technology planned for the NMD is still experimental. A prototype of a rocket booster failed in a test on Thursday – the same day the U.S. formally notified Russia it was pulling out of the ABM Treaty.

The booster rocket, launched in California, veered off course just 30 seconds into its flight and plunged into the Pacific Ocean.

Thule has often been a testing site for new U.S. technology. In the late 1950s and 1960s it spawned the futuristic “Camp Century,” with an underground city with accommodations for hundreds of people, a nuclear reactor, and even a “main street” tunnel more than 1,000 feet long.

During this period, the “ice-worm project” to hide nuclear missiles in a nearby ice cap was also launched.

In 1987, Thule’s ballistic missile system, with its four radar screens the size of football fields, was rebuilt for US $5 billion.

Thule now has one of the world’s most sophisticated satellite tracking systems — precisely the kind of system that the NMD plans call for.