ConservativeINC

Russia says its response to the further development of a U.S. missile shield in Poland will go beyond diplomacy.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying the U.S. missile shield plans are clearly aimed at weakening Russia.

The U.S. says the missile defense system is aimed at protecting the U.S. and Europe from future attacks from states like Iran.

The United States and Poland signed a deal Wednesday to place a U.S. missile defense base just 115 miles from Russia’s westernmost fringe.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

“When you threaten Poland, you perhaps forget that it is not 1988,” Rice said. “It’s 2008 and the United States has a … firm treaty guarantee to defend Poland’s territory as if it was the territory of the United States. So it’s probably not wise to throw these threats around.”

After Warsaw and Washington announced the agreement on the deal last week, top Russian Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn warned that Poland is risking attack, and possibly a nuclear one, by deploying the American missile defense system, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported.

Poles have been shaken by the threats, but NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop dismissed them Tuesday as “pathetic rhetoric.”

“It is unhelpful and it leads nowhere,” he told reporters at a NATO meeting in Brussels, Belgium.

In response to strong pressure from various world leaders, President Dmitry Medvedev has vowed to pull Russian forces out of Georgia starting Monday, the AFP reports. The announcement contrasts sharply with an earlier report suggesting Russian forces were digging in Sunday for a long stay in Georgia.

Russia said Monday it had begun withdrawing from the conflict zone in Georgia, but it held fast to key positions and sent some of its troops in the opposite direction — closer to the Georgian capital.

Russian troops and vehicles roamed freely around the strategically located central city of Gori, Russian forces appeared to blow up the runway at a military base in the western town of Senaki.

There were few signs Russia was following the terms of a cease-fire to end the short war, which has driven tensions between Russia and the West to some of their highest levels since the breakup of the Soviet Union.

In Paris, the French foreign minister said it appeared “we are witnessing the start” of a Russian withdrawal, but warned France would call an emergency meeting of the European Council to talk about consequences for Russia if that was not the case.

But U.S. defense and military officials said they had seen no significant movement yet of Russian troops withdrawing from Georgia.

In Moscow, the deputy chief of the Russian general staff, Col.-Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, told a briefing that “today, according to the peace plan, the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers and reinforcements has begun” and said forces were leaving Gori.

But Russian tanks and troops roamed freely around the city and made forays toward the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, 55 miles to the southeast. Russia also kept control of the critical highway that slices through Georgia’s midsection.

AP reporters saw four Russian armored personnel carriers, each carrying about 15 men, rolling from Gori to Igoeti, a crossroads town even closer to Tbilisi, passing Georgian soldiers who sat by the roadside.

The Russians moved into Igoeti then turned off onto a side road. As the Russian vehicles rolled past a group of Georgian soldiers and policemen, one swerved and scraped a new Georgian police car. The Georgians looked down at their fingernails.

U.S. officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were discussing intelligence reports, said at least one Russian battalion equipped with more than a dozen SS-21 missile launchers had moved into South Ossetia, within range of Tbilisi. Nogovitsyn disputed the claim.

An Associated Press cameraman was slightly injured outside Gori after four men in camouflage, possibly from an Ossetian militia, pulled up in a car and told him to stop filming.

When the cameraman resisted, the driver produced a pistol and started shooting at the ground. The cameraman, who sustained light ricochet wounds to his legs, handed over the cassette.

The question in Pakistan and for Pakistan, now that Pervez Musharraf has resigned the presidency is, “Now What?”

Will the coalition government go through with the threatened impeachment of Musharraf?  Will Musharraf be tried for treason?  Will the terroroists including the Taliban and al Qaeda continue to be faced with a military assault in the tribal areas now that there are some 200,000 refugees in Bajour Agency alone?

Most importantly, “Will this coalition government survive?”

The coalition, led by Asif Ali Zardari, the leader of the Pakistan Peoples Party, and Nawaz Sharif, the chairman of the Pakistan Muslim League-N, has shown little in the way of leadership or initiative on any issue except the removal of mr. Musharraf.  St first the coalition started discussions with the terrorists.  When the U.S. objected, including during a face to face meeting between president bush and Pakistan’s prime Minister Gilani in the White House, discussions ended and the pakistan Army attacked into the tribal areas.

Pakistan’s economy is suffering, services are failing, and even electricity in Islamabad is now no longer a 24 hour a day affair — for the first time in the memorory of any Western diplomats.

The situation in the tribal areas is far from certain, with the nation divided on the question of “have we removed the Taliban threat or not and do we really want to do that anyway?”