I'm watching the Polish news right now on the itvn channel we receive via our satellite dish and couldn't be more proud of my fellow Poles. The itvn is interviewing many citizens and nearly all of them are very opposed to the presence of President Bush in Poland and also are adamantly against the installation of a missile defense system on Polish land. Only 25% of Poles polled [ha] are in favor of such a system, and most of these people only support an American missile defense system on Polish ground in the hopes it would bring American tourists, and their money, to the country.
As the PolishPress reports:
Antiglobalists announced they will protest during the president’s visit near the residence. They plan to bring signs saying “Welcome to hell” in English. [Adam's note: This protest is in the Polish town Hel, hence the play on words] - ‘Over a hundred, maybe even 500 antiwar activists will manifest outside the residence’ - declared Filip Ilkowski from Inicjatywa Stop Wojnie (No Wars Initiative). - ‘We want to demonstrate peacefully against the situating of antimissile defense system, however if there will be any difficulties, then all sorts of things can happen’.
Another Polish protester states:
We came to protest again George Bush’s visit in Poland, against the policy he represents. Moreover against the construction of American installations perversely called “shield”, and also against Polish government’s participation in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Both disgraceful, cruel and bloody. Bush himself is a politician, who is the head of the biggest military organization in the world, and has more blood on his hands than any other politician. So when he comes to a country, there always are protests against him. Poland is no different.
All Polish people I've spoken to and seen interviewed on the Polish news are very opposed to the missile defense system because they (validly) believe it will attract terrorists to Poland to attack the system. Even worse, as Joseph Cirincione, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress, tells Katrina Heuvel of The Nation:
President Bush is rushing to deploy a technology that does not work against a threat that does not exist," Cirincione says. "Iran is at least 5 to 10 years away from the capability to build a nuclear weapon and at least that far from having a missile that could hit Europe let alone the US. And anti-missile systems are still nowhere near working despite $150 billion spent since the 1983 Star Wars program started and years of phony tests staged to demonstrate ‘progress' and ‘success.'
President Bush, you've already screwed up my country and residence, please leave my ancestor's home alone.
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Post written on 2007-06-08.
