North Korea and Iran are developing more advanced missile capabilities, along with nuclear programs, even as the United States is cutting funds for missile defense programs, a missile defense expert noted.

Peter R. Heussy, president of GeoStrategic Analysis consultants and senior defense consultant with the National Defense University (NDU) Foundation, spoke on the record at a university missile defense conference at the university campus at Fort McNair in Washington, D.C.

Iran now wields solid fuel and 2,000-plus km missiles, putting south and southeastern Europe at risk, he noted.

Separately, President Obama has proposed providing a token $51 million to the planned European Missile Defense (EMD) system in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2010. And Congress has forbidden use of any funds to build the EMD system in the Czech Republic (radar) and Poland (interceptors in ground silos).

As for North Korea, not only has it tested nuclear weapons, and launched short-, medium- and long-range missiles, it has proliferated this technology to others, including a reactor in Syria that an alarmed Israel had to take out in an air strike,

To protect against North Korean intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), the United States has in place the Ground-based Midcourse Defense system in Alaska and California, also known as the National Missile Defense system. It is the only U.S. shield against ICBMs. But the Obama budget plan would defer to some later time installing the final 14 GMD silos in the ground, deciding instead to freeze the number of silos at 30, for the time being.

A key point here, Heussy observed, is that Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said that the GMD system can work to take down incoming enemy missiles.

North Korea is intransigent, Heussy continued, endlessly going through the same cycle of committing provocations, using them to extort rewards such as food or fuel from developed nations in return for promises to denuclearize, but in the end returning to more outlaw behavior to extort yet more rewards.

Expecting North Korea or Iran to change their habits is futile, Heussy indicated.

Rather, the United States must recognize that they and other nations constitute threats that can’t be wished away, meaning that U.S. forces need effective missile defense systems.

Missile defense gives a U.S. president confronted with incoming enemy missiles a defensive choice, other than ordering a massive retaliatory nuclear strike on the nation that launched the missiles, he noted.