Moscow, March 2 (RIA Novosti) Deployment of a US anti-missile radar system in the Caucasus would not affect Russia's defence capabilities, but the country could respond to the move nevertheless, the Russian Air Force commander Vladimir Mikhailov said Friday.
"Let them deploy (a radar)," he said. "It is their decision. Unfortunately, we have also heard of plans to place US missile shield elements in countries like Ukraine and other states, including former Soviet republics." Mikhailov said Russia was capable of offering an adequate response to the deployment.
Washington said the defences would be designed to counter possible strikes from North Korea and Iran, which are involved in long-running disputes with the international community over their nuclear programs.
Russia, which has been anxious about NATO bases that have appeared in erstwhile communist-bloc countries and areas that had formed the now dismembered Soviet republic, has blasted the plans to deploy anti-missile systems in Central Europe as a national security threat and a destabilising factor for Europe.