There seems to be new trouble brewing in the Baltics.

Fresh on the heels of outlawing Soviet symbolism in what the BBC Russian affairs analyst Steven Eke called “the toughest bans on symbols from the Soviet past adopted in any of the 15 countries that emerged from the USSR”, Lithuania is now apparently in talks with the USA about the possible deployment of the controversial ABM missile shield should an increasingly lukewarm Poland drop out.

Moscow is livid. According to the Financial Times,

“A senior Russian lawmaker warned on Wednesday that discussions between the US and Lithuania over co-operating on Washington's missile defence system "could not but provoke anxiety" in Moscow….

…Konstantin Kosachev, head of the international committee of Russia's lower house of parliament, [said:]

"It seems that, through such little steps, people are trying to cross the "red line' beyond which problems begin for the security of our country”.

Crossing the red line! Yikes!

However, it was entirely natural that Lithuania should have come to America's aid.

After all, Valdas Adamkus, the Lithianian President currently considering stationing US missile interceptors and radar on his territory, had worked for 30 years at the US Environmental Protection Agency (where he was responsible for amongst other things, hazardous waste) in a past life as a Republican American citizen!

There is even an EPA award named after him: the “Valdas V. Adamkus Sustained Commitment to the Environment Honor Award”.