So President Bush is pushing for a new high-tech missile defense system. I don’t think very highly of Bush or any of his plans, but he did surprise me with a quote in the May 14 edition of Newsweek.

“We must seek security based on more than the grim premise that we can destroy those who seek to destroy us.” Wow. A complete sentence with a somewhat complicated idea.

It is a “grim premise that we can destroy those who” might do the same to us. That’s what’s kept us away from a nuclear war since the 1950s. Bush must know a missile defense program wouldn’t stop countries like Russia or China if they decided to attack us with nuclear missiles. Russia has - or has the capability of having - a huge arsenal.

The capabilities of nuclear superpowers in the world greatly outweigh any missile defense system we might come up with. The only thing to do in that case would be to launch a counterattack.

When a nuclear superpower launches an attack on another superpower, it has to keep its self-interest and self-preservation in mind. What would possibly motivate a country like China to nuke us, knowing we could reciprocate?

That aside, building more weapons to protect us against other weapons is a self-defeating idea. Not only would we be breaking the Antiballistic Missile Treaty, we would be making the statement that we are preparing for war.

Critics of the treaty have said it is old and outdated, which may be true, but breaking it hardly seems like a good idea.

“The ABM treaty worked well,” German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said earlier this month in The New York Times. “We want control mechanisms that worked very well in the past, should they be replaced, to be replaced only by better ones or more effective ones.

“We don’t want a new arms race.”

The Germans aren’t the only ones. Fisher makes a wonderful point by saying the ABM treaty should only be broken with a new treaty with similar goals.

Albert Einstein once said something I believe: “You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war.”

Bush can’t plan to build a missile defense system that will never be used. If that were the case, it wouldn’t matter how much was spent or how high-tech it was, as long as he passes it off as very powerful.

Russia has had a mild response to the proposed system, knowing it poses the country little threat. China has reacted more actively, possibly because it has weaker defenses against an American strike.

What a defense system would do is protect against threats from smaller countries like North Korea that may try to develop nuclear capabilities. Certainly the last thing we need is an arms race.

So far, the United States and Russia have come to an understanding concerning arms reduction, which is comforting. It makes me queasy to think our president is preparing to defend our country against a nuclear war.

Both China and Pakistan have warned the United States that building a missile defense program would spur an arms race.

A lone supporter in the international community, India has come out in support of the defense system.

Great. Now we have a nuclear ally against the China-Pakistan cooperation. Maybe Bush doesn’t see this, but we’re gearing up for something big.

Tensions with China are already strained; I can’t support anything that would build on our existing negative relations. Challenging China is definitely not an incredibly bright idea.

Even our allies are wary of Bush’s hasty construction of a defense system.

After meeting with German officials, Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz said in The New York Times Germans would prefer the system be approached “in a way that is cooperative, rather than confrontational, in a way that enhances stability rather than generating new tensions and new arms races.”

I’ve never heard anyone praise Bush for his foreign policy or knowledge thereof, but this is ridiculous. He needs to take a good look at the consequences of his actions, which is common sense and good advice for anybody.

A plan that angers some big players in the international community and doesn’t sit well with others is a plan that needs adjustment.

If Bush is going to make the decision to build a missile defense system, the least he could do is attempt to work things out with our allies abroad.

Ryan Weltzer, State News opinion writer, can be reached at weltzerr@msu.edu.