Ariel Cohen at Heritage believes that Moscow has made a “shrewd geopolitical move” by threatening U.S. president-elect Barack Obama with missiles in Kaliningrad, and may have inadvertently painted him into a corner, given that he will be reluctant to show any “sign of weakness.”  It is an especially aggressive piece, considering that this is a phantom issue – a distraction, but Cohen raises some interesting points.

The Kremlin and the Russian military are keeping the myth of a Western military menace alive for their own ends while using the threat of short-range missile deployment in Kaliningrad and the Baltic Fleet for two reasons.

First, the Russian military, despite its victories in Georgia, remains conventionally weaker than the NATO forces. According to U.S. military sources, Moscow may be seeking a pretext to integrate tactical nuclear systems, such as the dual-capacity conventional/nuclear Iskander, into frontline units that would otherwise be too weak to counter NATO. These integrated systems could also hit a broad range of targets in Europe, such as air bases, depots, and a concentration of NATO troops within the 280-kilometer range of the Iskander missile.