Russians Not Allowed on US Territory

Few have remarked on some of the lines in the monumental U.S. defense budget. The U.S. Congress rejected a two-year-old Russian request to install GPS antenna relays on U.S. soil. There is no question about this, responded lawmakers, fearing that the relay stations would only help the Russians to spy some more on their country. A funny story!

The Russians had requested to put antenna relays on U.S. soil in order to improve GPS system precision. It is a project particularly dear to Vladimir Putin. Officially, we are talking about improving the Russian GPS system baptized Glonass — Global Navigation Satellite System — which guides not only bombers, but also lost drivers. Therefore, the Russians were also hoping to be able to contest the superiority of the American system on commercial grounds. The Department of State was in favor of authorization, but after The New York Times revealed the request in November, Republicans in Congress made known their opposition to the installation of all the antennas in the United States. Thus, the Pentagon’s defense budget was drafted in a very restrictive manner in order to guarantee the death of the Russian request.

For the authorization to go through, Congress must obtain a guarantee from the secretary of defense and director of intelligence that the six Russian relay stations could not serve to improve the precision of Russian weapons or to spy on the United States. This is a guarantee that Congress will not get until hell freezes over, to reference Nikita Khruschev’s famed phrase before the United Nations. The law requires both that transmissions are not encrypted and that all persons involved in the installation and maintenance of the antennas be American. In short, there is little chance that the Russians could install relays in the United States, at least not until Edward Snowden gets sent back to the U.S. and Russia stops supporting Bashar al-Assad. Chances are this will take time.