New data on the second-biggest faith


Novosti

Arabia? No, ChechnyaWHEN Barack Obama made his appeal, back in June, for a new understanding between America and Islam, the venue he chose was Egypt—for some obvious reasons. It is the most populous of the Arab nations adjoining the Middle Eastern conflict zone, with an ancient tradition of Islamic scholarship, and a citizenry that is tempted by fundamentalism but also admires some things about the West.

Still, not everybody liked his choice. Some said he would have made a better point—to his compatriots, especially—if he had addressed the Muslim world from Indonesia, the country where (to quote a line from his speech) he first heard the call to prayer “at the break of dawn and the fall of dusk”. By speaking in Jakarta, Mr Obama might have challenged the mental association that (judging by polls) some Westerners still tend to make: Muslim equals Arab equals hostile to the West.

A new survey of the world’s Muslim population, by the Pew Research Center based in Washington, DC, will help those who are keen to break that link. It estimates the total number of Muslims in the world at 1.57 billion, or about 23% of a global population of 6.8 billion. Almost two-thirds of Muslims live in Asia, with Indonesia providing the biggest contingent (203m), followed by Pakistan (174m) and India (160m).

Perhaps more surprising will be the finding that the European country with the highest Muslim population is not France or Germany, but Russia, where 16.5m adherents of Islam make up nearly 12% of the total national population. Compared with other surveys, the report gives a lowish estimate for the number of Muslims in France (3.6m), as it does for the United States (2.5m); in both those countries, secular principles make it impossible to ask religious questions on a census.

Another set of data from Pew, albeit dating from last year, was at the heart of a report endorsed this week by two luminaries of inter-faith dialogue: Richard Chartres, the Anglican bishop of London, and Ali Gomaa, the grand mufti of Egypt.

In a change from the happy talk of many multi-faith exercises, the report grappled with some unpleasant trends: the rise, among Turks, of negative attitudes to Christians and Jews, and the rise in some European countries, like Spain, of anti-Muslim feeling. The fact that robed gentlemen are on good terms does not always lead to goodwill among their flocks.

America’s change of tack is placating some and worrying others


Illustration by Peter SchrankWHEN a blue-painted Sejjil missile streaked into the Persian skies in May, to calls of “Allahu Akbar” (God is Great) from Iranian officials looking on, the world’s weapons experts took notice. It was Iran’s first successful test of a medium-range missile using solid fuel. Such rockets can be fired at short notice, from mobile launchers, or stored in silos. The older, liquid-fuelled kind are more fiddly: they need filling up shortly before launch. Just as startling was that the Sejjil, with a range of 2,000km (1,240 miles), had two “stages” fired in succession for extra thrust. In February Iran launched a small satellite into orbit. This suggests that Iran is mastering the multi-stage technology needed for scarier missiles.

Many weapons experts now think that the clerical regime’s missile (and nuclear) capability is advancing fast. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the Iranian president, said the Sejjil gave Iran the power to “send to hell” any military base from which “a bullet” could be fired against his country.

Yet a new American intelligence assessment downplays Iran’s intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capability. It highlights, for reasons that are still secret, a sharper threat from shorter-range missiles that can hit American forces and allies in the Middle East and Europe.

So on September 17th Barack Obama’s administration abruptly abandoned previous plans for a powerful missile-defence radar in the Czech Republic and ten interceptors in Poland. Instead, it will deploy smaller radars closer to Iran on land and on Aegis missile-tracking ships. These would be armed with the less potent Standard Missile 3 (SM-3). As the kit becomes more powerful, initial inkspots of protection would grow, covering all of Europe by about 2018 (see maps).

Mr Obama calls the new system “stronger, smarter and swifter”. Russia’s fierce objections to George Bush’s plans had nothing to do with the decision to scrap them, says the administration. It plays down any quid pro quo, such as possible Russian help on sanctions against Iran—though Mr Obama could not conceal his glee when Russia’s president, Dimitry Medvedev, told the un this week that though sanctions rarely worked, they were “in some cases inevitable”.

But Czech and Polish politicians feel abandoned. They pushed for the scheme in the face of Russian threats and sceptical public opinion at home. They hoped that a permanent American military presence in their countries meant a stronger commitment to defend their territory than the paper guarantee offered by NATO. To make up for that disappointment, Poland wants Patriot air-defence batteries (fully armed, and not just for training) as well as perhaps the deployment of American F-16 fighters.

Ever since Ronald Reagan launched his “Star Wars” programme, missile defence has been a polarising issue in American politics. Robert Gates, the defence secretary, calls it bordering on theology. Critics said missile defence was a futile quest; any country able to build long-range missiles and nuclear warheads would have the skill to devise countermeasures. Contradictorily, critics also argued that the shield would upset Russia and the nuclear balance. Another cavil was that if a country like Iran did build a nuclear bomb, it might smuggle it in, say, an anonymous shipping container rather than using a missile that would have an obvious return address and invite retaliation.

Nevertheless, the Bush administration vigorously pursued missile defence, withdrawing from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002. In addition to two interceptor sites in Alaska and California, it sought a third site in Europe for Ground-Based Interceptors (GBI); some mockingly called these “George Bush Interceptors”. The European system was optimised to hit Iranian ICBMs aimed at America. US-based interceptors would be a back-up. It was sold to Europeans on the ground that it would defend them too.

But the Bush administration accepted that the GBI would not protect south-eastern Europe. This could be addressed by “fill-in” systems, such as Aegis ships, or by a NATO-developed area defence. Under Mr Obama, this fill-in system has become the priority. To protect areas closer to Iran, Mr Obama has pushed back the option of taking two shots at putative Iranian ICBMs until at least 2020, when updated versions of the SM-3 might be able to hit them.

But will the new system be as good at defending Europe? Mr Gates now says that the GBI shield he once promoted is inadequate. Fixed radar and interceptor sites would be vulnerable to pre-emptive attack. And with just ten interceptors, the system would soon be overwhelmed by more than a handful of missiles; America would then, officials say, have to decide whether to sacrifice Europe in order to have enough missiles to defend itself.

Aegis ships, by contrast, can each carry about a hundred SM-3 missiles. These could also be placed on land-based mobile launchers. And instead of having a big fixed radar, smaller mobile sensors would be deployed on land, on ships, in space, on drones and even blimps, all linked together by powerful networks. Such a system would be harder to destroy and easier to deploy to hotspots, and easier to beef up in a crisis. The SM-3 system has so far performed better in tests than the GBI, downing a wayward satellite last year.

Yet questions surround Mr Obama’s plans. Having ships permanently on station is costly. Even with an updated version (the Block IB update of the SM-3 missile, now due to be introduced in 2015), seven ships deployed in European waters could provide only patchwork protection. Maintaining it permanently would need more than the 18 Aegis ships that America now has. In a crisis, ship-based defences could “surge” only temporarily.

The more powerful Block IIA version of the missile, expected in 2018, should mean that Europe can be protected from just three locations. But a study by the Congressional Budget Office in February reckoned that placing these on ships would cost almost twice as much as the GBI system. A favoured site would be the Black Sea, but the 1936 Montreux Convention limits foreign warships’ presence there.

The Pentagon says it wants to deploy at least some SM-3 interceptors on land bases from about 2015, which would be cheaper. But this could run into the same political problems that dogged the GBI. Favoured options include Turkey and central Europe. Officials have promised the bruised Poles and Czechs “first refusal” to host these missiles; but would they risk it again? The Pentagon also talks of deploying a mobile tracking radar in “the Caucasus”. The most likely location is Georgia. But Russia loathes Georgia’s ties with America.

Given the uncertainty over still-untested future versions of the SM-3, Mr Gates says the Pentagon will continue developing the GBI as a hedge. Some ask why he bothered to scrap the original scheme in the first place. The combination of the GBI system with the other defences would have been a powerful way to deal with both present and future threats. Pentagon officials say that limited budgets mean they had to choose between systems. But it is hard to avoid concluding that dumping GBI was, in part, a gesture to Russia.

The smaller SM-3 system should, on the face of it, address the Kremlin’s claim (derided by the Pentagon) that the GBI could weaken Russia’s nuclear deterrent or be turned into offensive missiles carrying nuclear warheads. Losing the Czech radar reduces America’s ability to snoop deeply into Russia. The Obama administration is renewing Bush-era attempts to engage Russia in joint missile defence.

In spite of Mr Medvedev’s words at the UN, Russia’s response to the new policy has been mixed. Vladimir Putin, the prime minister, said he expected more concessions. The chief of Russia’s general staff, General Nikolai Makarov, noted that the anti-missile shield had only been modified not scrapped. If America’s missile defences do evolve into the networked, flexible and globally deployable system that Mr Obama is seeking, western officials say, Russia may yet loathe it more than the hated “George Bush Interceptors”.