ABOUT TIME: Poland Opens Long-Awaited US Missile Base.

Polish and American officials on Wednesday opened a US missile base in northern Poland originally intended to defend the West against threats from the Middle East, but now aimed at confronting Russia.

The Redzikowo base, 230 kilometers (143 miles) from the Russian border, has been operational since July but was officially inaugurated only on Wednesday.

“A US destroyer on Polish soil has become a fact,” Polish Defense Minister Wladyslaw Kosiniak-Kamysz said at the ribbon-cutting ceremony, describing it as “of historical importance for the security of Poland, the United States and NATO.”

“Through the conflicts which are ongoing right now, the conflict in Ukraine or in the Middle East, we can see how important air defence and missile defence is,” he added.

First announced in 2009, the project was plagued by delays, and Russia has since emerged as the main security concern for the military alliance’s eastern flank.

NATO chief Mark Rutte told reporters in Warsaw the base “significantly enhances our ability to defend against the growing threat of ballistic missiles from outside the Euro-Atlantic area.”

Despite NATO stating that the Redzikowo facility and a similar system in Romania are purely defensive, Moscow has frequently labeled it a threat.

Any tool that might blunt Moscow’s aggression, no matter how benign, is a “threat.”