On the 70th anniversary of Stalin’s invasion of Poland, President Obama has announced that he is abandoning the democratic ally, along with the Czech Republic, in an apparant gesture of acquiescance to Russian bluster.  The ground-based missile defense shield, a purely defensive technology carefully negotiated with the East European nations, is now being unilaterally scrapped.

While so many of our traditional allies have drifted ever leftward in their perpetual flirtation with socialism, Eastern Europe and the former Soviet bloc states have become the new hope to carry the flame of liberty into the future.  It is with great sadness that I watch them being abandoned for cowardly reasons.

Update: The timing irony thickens:

Experts at the world’s top atomic watchdog agree that Tehran has the ability to make a nuclear bomb and is on the way to developing a missile system able to carry an atomic warhead, according to a secret report seen by The Associated Press.

Here are examples of the two sides of the debate, both on National Review, so you can make up your own mind.

Indefensible – The Editors

Obama Made the Right Decision on Missile Defense – Tom Nichols