“Rearming for the Cold War 1945-1960″ by retired Air Force Col. Elliott V. Converse III is the first in a five-volume series of books focusing on the history of the acquisition of major weapons systems by the Defense Department. The book’s 766 pages contain a detailed examination of military acquisitions during the early years of the Cold War, and they are full of case studies, personality profiles, charts and photographs.

During a recent joint interview with AFPS and The Pentagon Channel, Converse said the book and its companion volumes were not written for historians. Rather the effort is “primarily aimed at the acquisition workforce, the people who do acquisition day-to-day and perform acquisition for their careers.”

It’s anticipated that defense policy decision makers would also gain something from the books, he added.

Converse earned a doctorate in history from Princeton University and served as the lead historian on the Defense Acquisition History Project team. During the joint interview, Converse said he was attracted to studying this “very dramatic” period of time.

“This was the beginning of the Cold War with the Soviet Union. When the Soviets launched Sputnik in 1957, Americans realized we might be vulnerable if they can put a satellite up there,” Converse said. “There was great concern that our weapons systems counter a threat like that. There was a lot of drama in the 1950s and 1940s.”

Following World War II, U.S. defense policy makers were convinced that the United States’ ability to maintain military supremacy rested on having superior technology, Converse said.

“One important thread that runs through the volume is the consensus that American leaders had at the end of World War II that the United States would seek security in the future by maintaining an advantage in the most technologically advanced weapons systems over any possible opponents,” he said. “They realized that the U.S. could not have an army as big as the Soviets or the Chinese or probably deploy as many systems as they could. So, the theory was that by having the most advanced systems, we’d be able to offset that advantage in terms numbers and equipment.”

That idea of the necessity of maintaining technological superiority to ensure national security affected how weapons systems were developed, produced and deployed, Converse said. It also determined how the Defense Department and the military services organized their acquisition efforts and led to changes in the acquisition workforce.

The book, he said, offers a prime example of how the United States’ perceived need to maintain an edge over its adversaries in advanced weapons technology affected the process of acquisition by its discussion of the acquisition strategy called “concurrency.” Using this approach, production activities would begin before the weapons system was fully developed and tested.

The strategy of concurrency “was in contrast to the way systems were developed before World War II,” Converse said, noting the pre-war system “was a sequential, deliberate system. You would design the weapon, you would develop the prototype, you would test it, you would produce it. All that would be done in series.

“By this new acquisition strategy,” he continued, “production activities began before development was completed. Sometimes, production contracts were let even before … an aircraft had ever flown its first flight. Prototypes, in terms of aircraft, were not generally developed. A new system was selected on the basis of a paper design competition.”

Concurrency was used on a limited basis during World War II, Converse said, and the Navy and Air Force tried to use the strategy after that war ended and before the Korean War started, attempting to speed up production by overlapping development and production. Once the Korean War began, he said, all the services adopted concurrency as an acquisition strategy.

“Its record was not very good during the Korean War,” Converse said. “A lot of the technologies needed for the advanced systems had not yet been developed, and some that had been developed were not proven sufficiently. Another problem was that the people defining requirements for new weapons systems often set requirements that were beyond the state of the art.”

In practice, he said, testing was often inadequate because of the haste to rush weapons systems out to the field, and they often discovered problems with the systems when they were fielded. Those problems frequently required that the systems had to be modified and changed, he added, which drove up cost and which meant that forces in the field still didn’t have systems that operated properly.

The problems associated with the strategy of concurrence were forgotten after the Korean War, Converse said, as the U.S. entered into an arms race with the Soviet Union to develop ballistic missile systems that could deliver nuclear warheads from continent to continent. Each of the services used concurrency in their acquisition programs to develop ballistic missiles, he said, and they encountered the same problems with concurrency that had been encountered during the Korean War. But the situation was now different.

“The difference was that these programs had the highest national priority, which meant that the program managers … all had generous budgets to get their jobs done,” Converse said. “They also had special authorities that exempted them from going through the different layers of bureaucratic approval necessary to get things done when they were developing their weapons systems. And these programs were great successes.”

Some of the systems were developed and deployed within four to five years which, according to Converse, was “an amazing amount of time for such advanced systems.” In the 1960s, he said, decision makers tended to overlook the problems associated with concurrency and it became the preferred acquisition method.

“Few people recognized that the reason the ballistic missile system program worked was that they had nearly unlimited funding and special authorities in those programs. Other programs did not have those, and that’s where problems with concurrency surfaced,” Converse said.

In response to those problems, by the 1970s the Defense Department went back to a more deliberate acquisitions strategy, Converse said.

“You didn’t go on the basis of paper designs. You would require two contractors, each to develop a prototype of the system. Then, those prototypes would be tested and, in theory, better decisions [would be] made,” he said.

Converse said understanding concurrency as an acquisition strategy during the Cold War is important because it addresses a central problem that still confronts the Defense Department.

“If your national strategy is to get security through having the most advanced technology, you have to deploy that technology rapidly and have it in the field so as always to maintain that edge over the opponent,” he said. “If that’s your strategy, then you have to find a way to insert advanced technology rapidly enough but at the same time to have it cost reasonably and overcome those problems I talked about before. That’s been a central dilemma.”

Since the 1950s, the United States has tried to find ways to maintain military technological superiority while dealing with the difficulty of rapidly fielding systems that might not yet be sufficiently developed or proven, Converse said, noting that’s “a problem that people working in the field today still face.”

Despite facing the same conundrum, Converse warned against trying to create exact analogies between current situations and those of the past.

“People have said that history does not repeat itself — it rhymes,” Converse said. “You can’t draw exact lessons from the past because the situations are not the same. … The value of history is that by taking a look at the past you can see how your predecessors in this field addressed problems. … History tends to broaden your perspective.”

Converse presented his book May 10 to an audience in the Pentagon during the second installment of the DOD History Speaker Series.

He was joined for a panel discussion by several other authorities. Benjamin F. Cooling, a professor at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces, set the book in the overall historical context of defense acquisition. Jacques S. Gansler, a former undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics, offered his perspective on the book based on his experience managing DOD acquisition. Roy L. Wood, dean of the Defense Systems Management College, moderated the panel.

Title:	REARMING FOR THE CO LD WAR 1945-1960
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Beginning in 2008, a few pilots experienced hypoxia-like symptoms when flying the aircraft, Little said. Hypoxia is a deficiency of oxygen. There have been a total of 12 cases of these hypoxia-like symptoms affecting pilots.

Little said the secretary has followed developments in the F-22 closely and has directed the Air Force to expedite the installation of an automatic backup oxygen system in all of the planes.

In addition, effective immediately, all F-22 flights will remain near potential landing locations to enable quick recovery and landing should a pilot encounter unanticipated physiological conditions during flight, Little said.

Finally, Panetta directed the Air Force to provide him with a monthly progress report as the service continues the search for the root cause of the problem.

These steps are in addition to the measures the Air Force is already taking to determine the root causes of the hypoxia-like symptoms pilots have experienced.

Panetta made this decision in part due to the reluctance of some pilots to fly the aircraft, Little said.

“Secretary Panetta believes the department must do everything possible to ensure pilot safety and minimize flight risks,” Little said.

The secretary’s directions take into account the need for determining the cause of the problem, while still allowing the military to use the unique capabilities provided by the F-22 Raptor. The aircraft are based in the United States and are now deployed to Southwest Asia, Little said. As the only fifth-generation aircraft in the world, he added, the plane is the most capable fighter in the air and is necessary to maintain U.S. air dominance.

“Safety is a zero-sum game,” Pentagon spokesman Navy Capt. John Kirby said at the news conference. The automatic backup oxygen system will complete testing by the end of November, with installation in line fighters beginning in December. Ten Raptors will be retrofitted with this system per month, he said.

Keeping the F-22 fleet flying allows the service to examine the aircraft closely.

But safety is the paramount concern, he said, and if he needs to, the secretary will ground the fleet.

“But right now, he believes … this is the right course,” Kirby said.

The Air Force has been studying the problem since 2008.

“The root cause of hypoxia-like events has not been determined,” Little said. “It is possible … that it could be attributed to the oxygen system in the airplane, thus the installation of a backup system. But it could have other causes, too, and the Air Force is aggressively looking at other factors that could be contributing.”

“The placement of new strike weapons in the south and northwest of Russia against [NATO] missile defense components, including the deployment of Iskander missile systems in Kaliningrad region is one possible way of incapacitating the European missile defense infrastructure,” Chief of the General Staff Nikolai Makarov said.

Taking into account the “destabilizing nature of the missile defense system… the decision on the pre-emptive use of available weapons will be made during an aggravation of the situation,” he said.

The projected European missile defense system could by 2020 have the ability to intercept Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles, Secretary of Russia’s Security Council Nikolai Patrushev said on Thursday.

The United States and NATO agreed to develop the system at a summit in Lisbon in 2010, but talks between Russia and the alliance have floundered over NATO’s refusal to grant Russia legal guarantees that the system would not be aimed against Russia’s strategic nuclear deterrent.

“By 2018-2020 – that is the third and fourth phases of the deployment of the Euro-missile defense in Europe – the continent should have enough anti-missile defense to be able to intercept part of Russia’s intercontinental ballistic missiles, and submarine launched ballistic missiles,” Patrushev said at an international conference on Euro-missile defense in Moscow.

“The geographical regions and technical characteristics of these missile defense systems create the foundations for additional dangers, especially considering the current and future levels of high-precision armament of the United States,” he said.

“Our experts say other targets, which could require serious missile defense against it, do not really exist,” he said.

Patrushev said the creation of the Euro-missile defense, which is taking place without Russia’s agreement and will lead to a degradation of Russia’s nuclear deterrent, could lead to a disbalance in strategic stability at the regional and global levels.

“The refusal to discuss the conditions for providing legal binding guarantees for the deployment system to be not aimed at Russia strengthens our convictions that the real goal of this missile defense system could differ from what is stated,” he said.

Russia’s military and political leadership has already warned its western partners several times that if talks fail, Russia may take a series of measures including deployment of Iskander short-range nuclear-capable tactical ballistic missiles in the Kaliningrad exclave.

NATO denies its missile defense proposals are aimed at Russia.

“In fact, we have no desire at all to disturb global strategic stability,” NATO’s Deputy General Secretary Alexander Vershbow told the conference. “Quite the contrary: NATO missile defense will be capable of intercepting only a small number of relatively unsophisticated ballistic missiles. It does not have the capability to neutralize Russian deterrence.”

The “Missile Defense Factor in Forming a New Security Space” conference has been organized by the Russian Defense Ministry. More than 200 military specialists and experts are taking part from over 50 nations inclduding the 28 NATO nations. As well as NATO and Russia, representatives of China, South Korea, Japan, the CIS nations and the OSCE are taking part in the conference.

Since 2008, officials say at least a dozen F-22 pilots have reported suffering a lack oxygen but engineers have yet to figure out how to fix the problem.

Under Panetta’s decision the F-22 Raptor will no longer be conducting longer-range flights and would instead stay within reach of runways to ensure a pilot could land in an emergency, Pentagon spokesman George Little told reporters.

He said that “effective immediately, all F-22 flights will remain within the proximity of potential landing locations, to enable quick recovery and landing should a pilot encounter unanticipated physiological conditions during flight.”

The move meant that “long-duration airspace control flights” out of Alaska would be carried out by other aircraft, Little said, without offering more details.

Panetta also called on the Air Force to “expedite” the installation of a back-up oxygen system in the F-22 planes and to provide a monthly progress report on efforts to get to the bottom of the undiagnosed technical problem. The first back-up systems would be installed by December, officials said.

The announcement on the radar-evading F-22 marks the latest setback for the aircraft, the most expensive in the US fleet at $143 million per plane.

Touted as the most sophisticated fighter in the world, the F-22 has yet to be deployed in combat, and its cost overruns became a long-running political controversy until the program was curtailed.

Panetta’s decision followed a CBS “60 minutes” television report on May 6 in which two F-22 pilots said they had refused to keep flying the warplane because of safety fears. The two pilots have sought “whistleblower” legal protections through a Republican lawmaker.

Little denied the television interviews triggered Panetta’s announcement but pilots’ concerns “figured into his decision to direct these actions today.”

The F-22 Raptor was grounded last year for four months after a spate of incidents with pilots saying they had passed out or suffered a lack of oxygen. The plane was cleared for flying in September 2011 but engineers are still trying to solve what they suspect may be a problem with the jet’s oxygen supply.

Despite safety concerns, the Pentagon said it would go ahead with plans to deploy some F-22s to a base in “Southwest Asia,” a reference to an airfield in the United Arab Emirates.

Some lawmakers and analysts have demanded that all F-22 flights be suspended until the Air Force figures out what is causing the fainting spells.

“Until the actual nature of the problem is uncovered, the pilots and ground crew remain at risk. The rationale for a fleet wide grounding remains clear,” said Winslow Wheeler, an outspoken critic of the Pentagon from the Center for Defense Information at the Project on Government Oversight.

A US Air Force scientific board carried out an elaborate inquiry but concluded the root cause remained unclear.

Air Force officers who presented the board’s findings in March said the number of incidents involving a lack of oxygen was extremely small, amounting to about one in every 9,000 flights.

The officers also said that effects of flying the F-22 are still not completely understood.

The F-22 flies at a higher altitude than other jets, above 50,000 feet, and relies solely on pressurized oxygen instead of a mixture of oxygen under pressure and air in the cockpit, according to the Air Force.

The plane is also faster and more agile than older fighters, with the pilot facing more gravitational forces than in other planes, officials say.

The design of the F-22, manufactured by Lockheed Martin, influenced plans for another new fighter still being developed, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, also produced by Lockheed Martin.

But officials said there was no sign the F-35 shared the F-22 Raptor’s oxygen problem.

“I think it’s safe to say that everybody in leadership is concerned about this, even in the defense industry environment,” Pentagon spokesman Captain John Kirby told the same briefing.

“But we are all going to work very hard to make sure that the problem gets solved for this aircraft and doesn’t get repeated in another.”

The training included boarding procedures, proper weapons handling, and engaging compliant and non-compliant ships. It also gave the multinational service members the opportunity to train with other countries and learn to work together.

Working together in an environment where security forces come from many different nations and backgrounds means the instructors had to make sure the participants were at the same capability level in order to properly function as a team during the training.

“This training is important because these are the basics,” said Senior Chief Fire Controlman Allen Bylls, a Simpson boarding team member. “You want to do this in a controlled training environment so you can get the fundamentals down before you go out into a real world situation.”

The combined training also helps service members identify and overcome potential obstacles that could get in the way of the team’s performance.

“One of the biggest obstacles we encountered was the language barrier,” said U.S. Marine Corps Sgt. Brenton Paulk, a staff instructor from Rota, Spain. “It’s something we are learning to overcome during our training and I think learning how to interact with other nations will be helpful during real-world maritime interdiction operation.”

PE12, a multinational maritime exercise between Southern European, North African and U.S. Naval forces, is designed to improve cooperation among participating nations and help increase safety and security in the Mediterranean Sea.

Participants and observers in PE12 include Algeria, Croatia, Egypt, Greece, Italy, Libya, Morocco, Spain, Tunisia, Turkey and United States.

“Open Spirit” will be among the biggest naval exercises in the Baltic Sea this year, where more than 150,000 naval mines were planted during the two world wars. It is all part of a day’s work for U.S. Navy divers, who in addition to hazardous missions face natural perils like oxygen toxicity and decompression sickness every day.

A video, released May 15, highlights how Office of Naval Research (ONR) scientists are working with medical experts to protect America’s undersea warriors. The video can be viewed at http://youtu.be/1TqYx5-HBEc.

The field is called Undersea Medicine-and it is designated a National Naval Responsibility by the Chief of Naval Research. Viewers can get an inside look at this world of the deep in “Protecting Navy Divers: The Undersea Medicine Solution” – a look at the groundbreaking work being done by the divers beneath the waves, and the scientists improving their ability to perform missions.

“There is no such thing as a pure 100 percent safe dive,” said Cmdr. Matthew Swiergosz, a program manager with ONR. “Navy divers take on jobs that are extraordinarily dangerous, and they do them with a poise and professionalism that would inspire every American who could see it.”

Continued domination of the undersea domain, officials say, is a vital component of national security.

“The Earth is mostly water,” said Swiergosz. “Most people live within a handful of miles of our oceans, seas, rivers. So any military force that’s supposed to provide national security must have underwater capabilities.”

The new video offers viewers unique insights into the hazards that await divers and the progress made to lessen the dangers.

Around the globe, ONR scientists continue the fight, with historic advances against natural perils in the deep. In addition to ongoing diving operations like Open Spirit with allied nations, a new joint research effort specifically in diving medicine was just announced between the U.S. Navy and the Vietnam People’s navy.

“What has been great about ONR is the ability to have the vision to see years into the future,” said Dr. Michael Qin, an ONR-supported research scientist who is featured in the video.

A Navy diver puts it even more succinctly.

“Without undersea medicine, we would still be in the stone age when it comes to underwater operations,” said Chief Warrant Officer 3 and diver John Theriot.

The Department of the Navy’s Office of Naval Research (ONR) provides the science and technology necessary to maintain the Navy and Marine Corps’ technological advantage. Through its affiliates, ONR is a leader in science and technology with engagement in 50 states, 70 countries, 1,035 institutions of higher learning and 914 industry partners. ONR employs approximately 1,400 people, comprising uniformed, civilian and contract personnel, with additional employees at the Naval Research Lab in Washington, D.C.

For Maj. Kent Solheim, the Charlie Company, 4th Battalion, 3rd Special Forces Group Company commander, and Maj. Robert Eldridge, 2nd Battalion, 7th Special Forces Group executive officer, their personal courage, coupled with their desire to continue to serve alongside their Special Forces brothers, was stronger than any challenge that confronted them, including the amputation of their limbs.

Solheim was injured July 27, 2007, in Karbala, Iraq, while conducting a raid to capture an insurgent commander. During the firefight that ensued, Solheim was shot four times. The barrage of bullets struck both legs and also hit his left shoulder.

His road to recovery was long, taking two years and involving 29 surgeries. This included one year at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as both an inpatient and outpatient.

Solheim did not initially lose his leg. It was only after he lost function of his lower left leg that doctors felt there was a slim chance of making a full recovery. Solheim continued to fight the diagnosis a long time before eventually electing to amputate his leg below the knee.

“I had dealt with my injury at its worst for 18 months, so it was a relief to have the surgery. It marked an opportunity for me to get a new start and end a long and hard chapter of my life,” said Solheim. “I was uncertain, but I saw many other amputees being more capable than I was, so I was confident that it would improve things for me.”

For Solheim, the road to recovery was tough, but overcoming challenges was nothing new to him.

“I did not want to be defeated by my injury and felt that I could still contribute regardless of the fact that I am an amputee.”

Solheim not only felt his quality of life would improve, he also knew others who continued to serve on active duty with a prosthetic. For this warrior, the decision to once again stand tall and fight alongside his brethren was made.

“I still deal daily with the challenges of being an amputee, and with chronic pain,” said Solheim. “But the alternative was certainly worse.”

Although both officers spent time recovering at Walter Reed Medical Center, their paths to recovery were different.

Eldridge was injured while on a combat patrol in Shkin, Patika province, Afghanistan, Dec 17, 2004. He was in the lead vehicle when it was struck by an anti-tank mine. In the aftermath of the horrific blast, Eldridge knew he was critically wounded.

“I have a medical background, so I knew I was seriously injured,” said Eldridge. “Our team medic was driving and was able to get to me quickly.”

Eldridge injuries included his severe damage to his left leg, multiple fractures in his right leg, a shattered ankle and damage to his left eye. At one point, a large piece of his leg bone was lying on the floorboard of the vehicle. Upon arriving at Forward Operating Base Salerno, his left leg was immediately amputated in order to save his life.

Within three days of the explosion, Eldridge was stateside beginning his recovery process. Eldridge didn’t waste any time, and quickly began exercising on his bed’s support bars.

“I knew my arms worked, so I just started doing pull-ups,” said Eldridge.

In less than a week, he was in physical therapy working out several hours a day.

Growing up with his Green Beret father, Bob Eldridge, and his brother Eddie, who’s currently serving in Special Forces, Eldridge understood that quitting, either mentally or physically, was never an option.

Much like Solheim, Eldridge saw other Special Forces members around him recovering from their own injuries and getting back to the fight. He knew with hard work, anything was possible.

“You can get angry and upset, but you can’t get angry and upset if you don’t do anything about it,” said Eldridge. “These guys make it through the (Special Forces) qualification course for a reason. They have the mental capacity to overcome something like this. You see them in the hospital and they’re the guys figuring out what they need to do to get better, not waiting around for someone to do it for them.”

For both these men, having their family and friends surrounding them through rehabilitation made the difference in not only improving their physical capability, but also their spirit and outlook on life.

“There have been many people who have helped me along the way since my injury. Most of these people also had difficult experiences in their lives, but have persevered,” said Solheim. “Every day when I put on my prosthetic leg, it is a sobering reminder of July 27, 2007, but that event has allowed me to connect with people in life that I otherwise would not have been able to connect with. I hope my experience might help someone else overcome a trial they are facing like the people that were able to help me.”

Now back in uniform, and once again serving in a combat zone for the second time since their surgeries, both Solheim and Eldridge are appreciative of the support to return to duty and pass on their knowledge and leadership to others.

“I appreciate being afforded the opportunity to continue my service in the military,” said Eldridge. “Including the trust showed to me by allowing me to continue to lead our nation’s sons and daughters.”

Although Solheim and Eldridge are not the first service members to be severely injured in battle, their experiences and resolve may inspire others in the future, like those who have motivated them.

“Last year I sat at the bedside of a friend who had just lost both legs in Afghanistan,” said Solheim. “He told me this was the hand he’s been dealt, so he should make the best of it. I took those words to heart and would like to think this is my mantra also. This is the hand I’ve been dealt, but life goes on and I will make best of it.”

Both men continue to serve their nation to the best of their ability, and hope they may be viewed as positive role models for other injured warriors looking to get back in the fight.

“The most important advice I could give someone is to make an honest assessment and determine if their personal injuries are such that they still have the capability to contribute,” said Solheim.

“At the end of the day, what we do is bigger than any one person, and continued service needs to be for the benefit of both the individual and the organization.”

“I like to say about the environment that if you like the complexity, the uncertainty and the increasing danger of today, you’re really going to like tomorrow,” Marine Corps Lt. Gen. George J. Flynn said. “Nothing is really going to change. The world is going to remain complex, uncertain, and it’s going to be increasingly dangerous.”

All of this change, including rapid developments in the Arab world, he said, is coming at a time of sharp fiscal restraint.

“Nobody is writing us more checks,” he said. “When I go to work in the morning, nobody says, ‘Here’s some more money, see what you can do with it.’ Everybody says, ‘What can you do with less money, and can you deliver the same way?’”

Flynn pointed to the Cold War and the Arab Spring as examples of change in the operating environment.

“The Cold War lasted 42 years,” he said. “It was an evolutionary event characterized by deliberate change. The world was connected, but it was characterized by very deliberate change in our connectivity, and it was a chance to understand the context all the time.”

In contrast, he said, the Arab Spring occurred in about three to four months.

“This was revolutionary, and it caused us to have reactive change,” he said. “Through the hyperconnective world – the media environment – word of these events spread almost instantaneously. And our strategy, at best, was to hope to influence the events and the way the world would change.”

Flynn noted the future operating environment – both the technology and the threat – will continue to increase at greater rates of change due to the accessibility of information.

“Now, in many ways, technology has been democratized,” he said. Years ago, billions of dollars on research and development could provide an operational advantage in technology for years, but today, because of the Internet, the same investment would only provide that advantage for days, or maybe months, he added.

Another point Flynn emphasized is the greater availability of information potentially empowering conventional and nontraditional state actors. He referenced a Harvard Business Review article detailing the Mumbai terrorist attack as an example.

“All the mission planning was done via Google Earth,” he said. “There was no investment in technology of [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance] platforms or anything like that.”

Flynn said the terrorists used cellular phone networks as command and control and social media to track and thwart the efforts of Indian commandos. “How much technology or how much investment was made to create that terrorist capability?” he rhetorically asked.

Space and cyber, the general said, also are examples of why the homeland is now part of the battle space.

“Space and cyber will continue to play an increased role in events, with each becoming increasingly contested domains – so it’s a new domain that we’re going to have to contest,” Flynn said. “Security challenges will have both local and global aspects, we think, with events occurring across the globe.

“So the bottom line [is that] if you liked the past challenges of the past 11 years, you will like the future,” he said.

The missile defense system in Poland does not jeopardize Russia’s nuclear forces, Army General Nikolai Makarov, chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, said.

“However, if it is modernized…it could affect our nuclear capability and in that case a political decision may be made to deploy Iskander systems in the Kaliningrad region,” he said in an interview with RT television.

“But that will be a political decision,” he stressed. “So far there is no such need.”

NATO members agreed to create a missile shield over Europe to protect it against ballistic missiles launched by so-called rogue states, for example Iran and North Korea, at a summit in Lisbon, Portugal, in 2010.

Russia has strongly criticized NATO’s reluctance to provide written, legally binding guarantees that its European missile shield will not be directed against Moscow.

President Dmitry Medvedev has ordered an array of measures to strengthen the country’s missile defense capabilities to counter NATO’s shield, including the deployment of Iskander missiles on the border with Poland.

NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen telephoned President Asif Ali Zardari to invite him to the May 20-21 summit, a day after Pakistan’s foreign minister said it was time to “move on” after US air strikes killed 24 soldiers last November.

Islamabad shut its Afghan border crossings to NATO supplies after the deaths and its relations with the United States, already frayed by the discovery of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan, plunged into their worst ever crisis.

NATO spokeswoman Oana Lungescu said Pakistan had “an important role” to play in the future of Afghanistan, which will be the focus of the second day of the summit.

“We’re working very closely with Pakistan to allow the opening of the transit line because obviously this is in everybody’s interest,” she said.

Nadeem Hotiana, a spokesman for Pakistan’s embassy in Washington, said Zardari was “likely” to travel to Chicago for the summit.

Pakistan’s involvement in the Chicago talks would minimise its international isolation and could boost its leverage over the future of neighbouring Afghanistan, as NATO countries pull out their combat forces by 2014.

The invitation marks a return from the cold for Islamabad, which boycotted the last major international talks on Afghanistan, held in Bonn in December.

The Pakistani parliament has called in vain for an end to US drone strikes targeting Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants on its soil, and a formal US apology for the November air strikes.

Analysts say Pakistan has no choice but to reopen the border as US cash is needed to help boost its meagre state coffers, at a time when major NATO discussions are under way affecting its own strategic future.

A cabinet committee led by Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani met on Tuesday evening to discuss whether the NATO supply lines into Afghanistan, closed since November, should be reopened, but remained non-committal.

“No final decision has been taken,” Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira told AFP.

“We want solutions of the problems and it is in line with this policy that we are trying to sort out the issue,” he said without putting a time frame on the decision.

Sources familiar with the discussions earlier told AFP the government had effectively decided to end the blockade, probably by the beginning of next week.

But an official statement said the committee was considering imposing a precondition “to the effect that only non-lethal cargo would be allowed to transit through Pakistan to Afghanistan”.

It said Pakistan would “continue to remain engaged with the US on the question of apology (for the November strikes) and cessation of drone attacks”.

The United States has also guaranteed payment of at least $1.1 billion should the borders reopen, as compensation for fighting militants, one source told AFP.

Pakistan previously negotiated a fee of $160 per 40-foot container and is now looking to secure anywhere from $320 to $500, although the figure has yet to be agreed, the source added.

Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar said on Monday that Pakistan had made its point and that “we now need to move on and go into a positive zone and try to conduct our relations.”

The US State Department said both countries had made “considerable progress” on ending the blockade, which has halted fuel and supply trucks from the port city of Karachi in the south to two Afghan border crossings.

“We will continue to work on this throughout the week. Obviously, it’ll be a wonderful signal if we can get it done by the time of the summit,” State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said.

The United States has made increasing use of more expensive routes into northern Afghanistan and the Pakistan supply routes constitute as little as 25 percent of what NATO needs to sustain itself in its nearly 11-year fight against the Taliban.

Mir Mohammad Yousuf Shahwani, chairman of the All Pakistan Oil Tanker Owners Association, told AFP he had been informed by a senior official in the petroleum ministry that Pakistan would reopen the supply line within days.