Bush Renews Focus on Missile Defense

RIDLEY PARK, Pa. —  A day after tussling with Democrats over the future stationing of U.S. troops, President Bush focused on a years-old national security conflict Tuesday, charging that opponents of a satellite-guided missile defense system were “living in the past.”

Bush has long backed such a system, which some critics deride as a technological boondoggle that will prove unworkable. But during a stop at a Boeing Co. defense plant near Philadelphia, Bush invoked the issue as a tangible difference on defense policy separating him from his Democratic challenger, Sen. John F. Kerry.

Engineers from Boeing, one of three contractors working on the $53-billion program, recently installed the first interceptor missile into a silo at Ft. Greely, Alaska, Bush told the crowd of plant employees and campaign supporters.

“It’s the beginning of a missile defense system that was envisioned by [former President] Ronald Reagan -- a system necessary to protect us against the threats of the 21st century,” he said. “We want to continue to perfect this system, so we say to those tyrants who believe they can blackmail America and the free world, ‘You fire, we’re going to shoot it down.’ ”

Opponents of the program don’t understand the threats that lie ahead, he said.

“They’re living in the past,” said Bush, who campaigned in 2000 as a supporter of missile defense and has doubled the project’s funding despite objections from many Democrats. “We’re living in the future. We’re going to do what’s necessary to protect this country.”

Kerry has said he does not oppose a missile defense system in theory, but has questioned the priority the Bush administration has put on it. Kerry has said other steps -- such as adding 40,000 troops to the military and improving U.S. intelligence-gathering -- are more important to combat the threats facing America.

Rand Beers, the Massachusetts senator’s top national security advisor, accused the White House on Tuesday of a “near obsession” with developing a missile defense program.

“John Kerry believes an effective missile defense is crucial to our national security strategy,” Beers said. “But John Kerry also understands the importance of facing our most pressing national security threats while continuing to develop and deploy a national missile defense which we know will work.”

Bush has rarely raised the topic of the missile defense system -- designed to target and destroy incoming nuclear missiles -- since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks prompted the administration to oust the Taliban regime in Afghanistan and invade Iraq.

But the program is in many ways a vivid symbol of the contrast Republican strategists hope voters will see in the Bush-Kerry contest: a strong-willed commander in chief with a vision for modernizing the military versus a more equivocal challenger.

Coming a day after Bush laid out his plans to bring as many as 70,000 U.S. troops home over the next decade and shut hundreds of bases across Europe and Asia, the president’s invocation of the antimissile system provided a retort to Democratic critics who said the proposed realignment of forces would embolden North Korea, which is flaunting its nuclear technology and has reportedly developed long-range missiles.

The modernization of the military also is likely to be a theme at the Republican National Convention, which begins in less than two weeks and is expected to highlight Bush’s national security record.

The president made his remarks on another day of visits to pivotal battleground states. After his stop in Pennsylvania, he addressed a rally in Hedgesville, W.Va., late Tuesday afternoon.

Bush lost Pennsylvania to Democrat Al Gore in 2000, and recent polls show Kerry leading there. But Bush has worked hard to woo the state’s voters. Tuesday’s visit marked his 32nd to Pennsylvania since becoming president -- a statistic he noted as he hit Kerry for a regional faux pas.

During a stop in Philadelphia last year, the senator ordered a cheesesteak with Swiss cheese. The sandwich traditionally is made with Cheez Whiz.

“I like my cheesesteak ‘Whiz with,’ ” the president told the crowd at Boeing, using the preferred phrasing for ordering the sandwich with Cheez Whiz and fried onions.

Bush also spoke at a Boeing plant in Seattle on Friday. In his remarks Tuesday, he reiterated his criticism of European subsidies given to Airbus, which is based in France and is Boeing’s biggest rival in the passenger airliner business.

The White House now says it is considering a lawsuit to block the subsidies, which Europeans say are legal. Opposing the subsidies puts Bush in line with the Democrats, who have long called for action amid claims that the payments jeopardize jobs for Boeing workers.