U.S. may benefit from defense cooperation with Russia – Pentagon rep.April 19, 2012 - 17:56 AMT PanARMENIAN.Net - Missile defense cooperation with Russia, including the use of Russian radars, would benefit the United States, Director of the Missile Defense Agency Lt. Gen. Patrick O'Reilly said, according to RIA Novosti. O'Reilly testified before a Senate panel about the Missile Defense Agency’s requested budget for 2013. “There actually are [Russian] capabilities that we could benefit from. It's primarily...their large sensors that they have for their homeland defense,” he told the Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee. “The location of Russia itself, looking through - from Europe all the way across through Asia, including Northeast Asia, gives - would give us the opportunity to view threats very early in their flight, if we were able to observe. And their ability to observe flight testing done by other countries would, in fact, provide us beneficial information,” he went on. U.S. administration officials have repeatedly said that missile cooperation between Washington and Moscow will benefit both sides. However, no practical steps have been made so far. O'Reilly said, however, that he was unaware of any “specific proposals” in Russia-U.S. missile defense cooperation talks. “The nature of our work has typically been when the Russian government claims that we are building capability to upset the strategic balance. We've been able to analyze that and provide them data to show we are not - where the errors are in their estimates, such as missiles flying faster than anyone's ever built, and so forth,” the official said. “So I am unaware, first of all, of what those specific proposals are,” he went on. “But also I have never been given any instructions to consider limiting the development of our system.” Russia and NATO agreed to cooperate on the so-called European missile defense system at the Lisbon summit in November 2010. NATO insists there should be two independent systems that exchange information, while Russia favors a joint system with full-scale interoperability. Top stories Authorities said a total of 192 Azerbaijani troops were killed and 511 were wounded during Azerbaijan’s offensive. In 2023, the Azerbaijani government will increase the country’s defense budget by more than 1.1 billion manats ($650 million). The bill, published on Monday, is designed to "eliminate the shortcomings of an unreasonably broad interpretation of the key concept of "compatriot". The earthquake caused a temporary blackout, damaged many buildings and closed a number of rural roads. Partner news | Government reveals details from Pashinyan’s meeting in border village Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has met with a group of residents of a border village in Armenia’s northern Tavush province Narek Manasyan wins European Boxing Championships silver for Armenia Armenia’s Narek Manasyan (92kg) won Armenia’s second silver medal at the European Boxing Championships 2024 on April 28. Blinken urges Azerbaijan to continue negotiations with Armenia Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken has urged Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev to continue negotiations with Armenia. Pashinyan, Blinken talk Armenia-U.S. ties over the phone Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan had a phone conversation with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on April 28, Pashinyan’s office reports. |