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Bush Adviser Says Russia Warming to US ABM Tests
US President George W. Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, said that Russia's leaders are becoming persuaded that the Bush administration's plans to test a missile defense system are "not actually a threat" to Moscow, the New York Times reported on Sunday.
In an interview on Friday before leaving for Camp David with President Bush, Rice said months of consultations were now " bearing fruit." She declined, however, to go into any detail about the outlines of the deal on missile defense taking shape in advance of Russia's President Vladimir Putin's arrival here in a little over two weeks.
Rice presented what she views as the latest development not as a pragmatic quid pro quo with the Russians, but as an American breakthrough in the administration's constant efforts to change the Kremlin's mind about the plans for missile defense.
"I think that the Russians are beginning to see that what we've said all along is true: that the near-term program for missile defense, which is really a testing and evaluation program, is not actually a threat to them," Rice said.
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