Czech Parliament to Vote on Radar Agreements

According to CTK (the Czech news service) and Respekt.cz, the Czech Parliament today meets to discuss whether to approve two radar agreements previously signed with the United States this summer in Prague. One agreement allows for the stationing of a radar missile defense system in Brdy, Bohemia, about 80 km southwest of Prague. The missile defense system is planned to be connected with 10 nuclear interceptor missiles based in neighboring Poland. The other agreement, called SOFA, is centered on the legal conditions on stationing American soldiers in the Czech Republic. The last foreign soldiers to occupy the Czech Republic were Russian troops, who finally withdrew in 1990 after invading and occupying the nation since 1968. The ability to pass these two agreements in Czech Parliament is the main factor whether America's Central European missile defense system will come about.

Unlike the Munich Agreement in 1938, where neither the Czech government or Parliament was consulted, these votes on the radar agreement symbolize the nation's representatives last chance to claim Czech sovereignty before being made into a defacto American military colony.

We can only hope that the tragedies of 1848, 1938, and 1968 are avoided by the People's last resort against a government willing to sell out the entire nation. For rather than an overhaul of national sovereignty, if the votes come out NAY, 2008 could be as symbolic as the declarations of independence and liberty in 1918 and 1989. Now, is the decisive time.