Obama commented on Russia’s plans to lift a ban on the sales of S-300 air defense systems to Tehran in his interview with MSNBC on Tuesday.
The president, however, stressed the difference in the defense budgets of the two countries and noted that the US would be able to bypass the systems, if it needed.
“We have to keep this in perspective. Our defense budget is somewhere just a little under $600 billion. Theirs [Iran’s] is a little over $17 billion. Even if they’ve got some air defense systems, if we had to, we could penetrate them,” warned the president.
The $800-million contract to supply Iran with the missile system was signed at the end of 2007. Moscow was to supply five S-300PMU-1 battalions to Tehran.
However, on September 22, 2010, then-President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree cancelling the contract.
On April 13, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree lifting the ban on the sales.
During his 13th annual Q&A session on April 16, President Putin touched upon the subject, saying Moscow sees no reasons to keep embargo, adding that Iran is demonstrating extreme flexibility and a clear desire to reach compromises on its nuclear energy program.
“If someone’s afraid that we began lifting sanctions, then obviously our colleagues don’t know that the UN sanctions list doesn’t include the delivery of these systems. We froze the fulfillment of this contract unilaterally and now, after there’s been positive progress on the Iranian nuclear path, we don’t see any reason to retain the ban.”
Putin added that Russia would honor the existing UN sanctions list.
