Viewing cable 09WARSAW170, POLAND WANTS LIVE PATRIOTS, “NOT POTTED PLANTS”

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S E C R E T WARSAW 000170 

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EUR FOR FRIED/GARBER, T FOR A/U/S MULL 
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EO 12958 DECL: 01/11/2019 
TAGS PREL, MAPP, PL 

SUBJECT: POLAND WANTS LIVE PATRIOTS, “NOT POTTED PLANTS” 

REF: 10 AUGUST 2008 U.S. NON PAPER ON DEPLOYMENT OF A U.S. PATRIOT BATTERY IN POLAND

Classified By: Ambassador Victor H. Ashe for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)

¶1. (S) SUMMARY. GOP officials are not privy to the full range of U.S. planning and thinking with regard to the prospective Patriot battery rotation here, but they do have expectations -- some naive, some tactical -- that they are making increasingly clear. For example, when told last autumn that the Patriots would not be integrated -- at least initially -- into the Polish air defense system, Deputy Defense Minister Komorowski angrily responded that Poland expected to have operational missiles, not “potted plants.” Merited or no, our Polish interlocutors believe: 1) (assuming successful SoFA talks) Patriots will start rotating to Poland this year regardless of the outcome of Washington’s review of the Missile Defense program; 2) the battery will have some undefined “operational capability;” 3) the garrison remaining in Poland after 2012 will have the same size and composition as the uniformed elements that will staff the rotations; and 4) access to Patriot equipment for training will not be substantially impeded by provisions of the Export Control Act. To help us manage these issues, this cable lays out what we understand about Polish expectations and the backstory of how they got there. END SUMMARY.

PATRIOTS AND MD - CONNECTED OR NO?

¶2. (S) The proposed Patriot rotation was a condition of Polish agreement to sign the Ballistic Missile Defense Agreement (BMDA), and the U.S. would likely not have offered it outside of that context. A (very) simplified recounting of the story of how we got here seems in order.

¶3. (S) The question of Patriots in Poland hung (largely silently) over the BMDA negotiations for much of last spring. The final breakthrough in the BMDA negotiations in fact came with a July 7 Polish non-paper, which indicated a GOP willingness to contribute to the deployment of a Patriot battery in Poland. The U.S. non-paper response of 10 August said that “in the context of a broader and deeper bilateral security relationship, including the deployment of missile defense interceptors in Poland, the United States is prepared to deploy a U.S. Army Patriot battery in Poland (emphasis added).” The Patriot deployment plans were made public in the Declaration of Strategic Cooperation, signed at the time of the BMDA, where we agreed to intensify our security and defense cooperation, including through “the deployment of a U.S. Army Patriot air and missile defense system in Poland” starting in 2009.

¶4. (S) Since then both sides have used this connection to urge greater negotiating energy on the part of the other: the U.S. saying clearly that it will not move forward on Patriots without ratification of the BMDA and SOFA (a condition outlined in the 10 August non-paper), and the Poles moving cautiously at times on SOFA talks out of concern that the U.S. is not on schedule for a 2009 commencement of the Patriot rotation. Correctly or not, the Poles believe that ratification of SoFA and the BMDA gets them Patriots in 2009, independent of a USG decision on BMD, and that the Strategic Declaration signed at the time of the BMDA stands on its own. They have even turned our language on us in making the point, asking that the U.S. not be so “transactional” in tying its obligations to Poland’s defense to new thinking about interceptors.

WHEN IS A PATRIOT A PATRIOT?

¶5. (S) The Declaration of Strategic Cooperation outlines some parameters for the proposed Patriot “deployment,” allowing that a Patriot battery rotation “will include joint training opportunities that will enhance Polish air defense capabilities.” The Poles interpret “will include” to mean “not limited to” and they expect that Polish air defenses will be enhanced in some operational capacity by the Patriot rotation. Repeated U.S. statements since August 2008 that the battery will not be operational are interpreted by the Poles to be part of a larger discussion of C4ISR and the inter-operability of Patriot in their overall air defense architecture. After months of back and forth, we think the Poles now understand that the rotation battery will not be fully operational and cannot be integrated immediately into the Polish system and that the battery will focus on training and exercises.

¶6. (S) However, this is a good juncture to point out the most glaring gap in understanding between us and the Poles. The Poles have not been told that the battery will rotate without actual missiles -- i.e., not only will the rotation not be operational in the initial phase (due to C4ISR and other issues) but it will also not be operational, and certainly interoperable, at any point in our current plans. This will be a question of basic definitions for the Poles: is it a Patriot battery if it doesn’t have live missiles? The Poles think the Patriots will become not only operable, but interoperable, over time - thus enhancing Poland’s air defense. When told last Fall that the Patriots would not be operational, at least at first, Deputy Defense Minister Komorowski angrily responded that Poland expected to receive operational Patriot missiles, “not potted plants.”

WHAT IS A GARRISON? WHAT IS JOINT TRAINING?

¶7. (S) The GOP also has a different concept of the footprint involved when the U.S. agreed (also in the Declaration) to establish a “garrison to support the U.S. Army Patriot battery” by 2012. The Poles believe the permanent battery arrangement will have around 110 personnel -- about the same number required to staff planned temporary rotations between 2009 and 2012 -- which is to say that the Poles expect the “garrison” to convert the rotation itself into a permanent presence. Current U.S. planning appears to call for only 20-30 permanent personnel to maintain forward deployed equipment. In addition, the Poles understand that technology transfer regulations would normally restrict their access to Patriot equipment for purposes of training and exercises, but have interpreted the clause in the Declaration allowing for “joint training opportunities” to mean that they will have greater access to technology than is generally granted by the Export Control Act.

COMMENT

¶8. (S) We need to navigate the way forward carefully. We may be able to close some of the gaps between our plans and the Poles expectations with time and focus and patience on both sides. However, the “potted plant” problem, is much more tricky. Prime Minister Tusk, neither a fan of MD nor as wed to the U.S.-Polish strategic relationship as his predecessors, sold the BMDA to the Polish public as enhancing Polish security because of the Patriot agreement. Assuming the European missile site plans don’t completely wither on the vine, the Poles will expect the Patriot rotation to not only go forward, but to have some operational, if not eventual interoperational capability. As we move forward, we will want to be careful not to stumble into this chasm. We need a strategy for how we will consult with the Poles to close the gap before it undoes much good work to date. 

ASHE