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Cool-headed
diplomacy
By Adam Wolfe
Russia and China delivered a one-two punch
to Washington's ambitions in Central Asia on the
eve of the Group of Eight (G-8) summit with a
joint statement on "international order" followed
by a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation
Organization (SCO) that was hostile to US
interests. While this combination was not enough
to knock the US out of the region, it was the most
forceful challenge to US interests in Central Asia
since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.
Seeking to prevent any further damage to
Washington's position in the "Great Game", US
Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld traveled to
the region to shore up support for maintaining
American bilateral agreements with the key
players. This was followed by Uzbekistan
announcing a deadline for US withdrawal from a
military base in its territory. These moves
indicate that even though fighting in Afghanistan
has yet to cool down, the traditional power
politics of Central Asia are heating up.
China and Russia combine
Before
the SCO meeting, Russia's and China's leaders met
at the Kremlin on July 1 to discuss their goals in
Central Asia and the upcoming G8 summit. The
meeting signaled a shift toward greater
cooperation between the two states, completely
solved their long-standing border disputes from
the legal perspective and laid the foundation for
greater integration of their state-controlled oil
companies and banking sectors. One reason that the
atmosphere in the Kremlin was so unusually amiable
was the perception that a shared threat loomed
larger than their differences in policy goals;
that threat was Washington's role in Central Asia.
The "Joint Statement of the People's
Republic of China and the Russian Federation
Regarding the International Order of the 21st
Century", signed by Chinese President Hu Jintao
and Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 2,
addresses US hegemony in several less-than-oblique
passages. The text emphasizes "non-interference in
internal affairs"and "mutual respect" for other
nations' "sovereignty", and stresses the role of
"multipolarity" in dealing with conflicts.
In a passage aimed at Washington's
perceived encroachment in Central Asia, the
document states, "The peoples of all countries
should be allowed to decide the affairs of their
own countries, and world affairs should be decided
through dialogue and consultation on a
multilateral and collective basis. The
international community should thoroughly renounce
the mentality of confrontation and alignment,
should not pursue the right to monopolize or
dominate world affairs, and should not divide
countries into a leading camp and a subordinate
camp." This last statement could also easily be
read as a preemptive dismissal of the G-8 on the
eve of the Scotland meeting. Though Russia is now
a member and China an observer of the grouping,
they feel that the organization is dominated by
the West's agenda.
This dismissal of
Western-style multilateralism is further expanded
in a passing broadside aimed at the World Bank and
the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and their
emphasis on reform in exchange for aid or loans:
"The international community should establish an
economic and trade regime that is comprehensive
and widely accepted and that operates through the
means of holding negotiations on an equal footing,
discarding the practice of applying pressure and
sanctions to coerce unilateral economic
concessions, and bringing into play the roles of
global and regional multilateral organizations and
mechanisms."
Beijing and Moscow resent the
West demanding economic reforms before further
integrating China and Russia into the existing
globalization power structures. They wish to
present an alternative marketplace for developing
countries to sell their goods - one that does not
tie economic access to reform or transparency.
China has been able to successfully use the widely
expected expansion of its domestic market to sell
this alternative source of revenue to countries
irked by the IMF or World Bank, from South America
to Africa. Now it hopes to further cement such a
relationship with the states of Central Asia.
In the joint statement, China and Russia
sent a clear message to the other members of the
SCO - Washington poses a threat to Central Asia's
sovereignty; China and Russia can offer a similar
economic and security package, only it will be
designed to preserve the current status quo not to
encourage market economies or democratic reforms.
Fearing future waves of "color" revolutions in the
region, these states were eager to receive this
message.
A bigger and stronger SCO
On July 5, the members of the SCO - China,
Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan - met in Astana, Kazakhstan to discuss
the changing political situation in Central Asia.
While previous meetings focused nearly exclusively
on the "three evil forces" - terrorism, separatism
and extremism - and were dominated by China's
desire to control the Uighur population in its
Xinjiang region and protect its access to energy
resources, this meeting demonstrated that the
organization, which represents nearly 50% of the
world's population, desires to be a serious force
in international affairs. This can be seen in the
granting of observer status to India (at Russia's
request), Pakistan (at China's insistence) and
Iran (to the delight of all members).
The
environment of the SCO meeting was most influenced
by the reaction to Uzbekistan's violent
suppression of the May rebellion in Andijan.
Western criticism of Uzbek President Islam
Karimov's tactics brought to the surface fears
that the clan-based governments of Central Asia
might fall in a wave of "color" or non-violent
revolutions, similar to that of Ukraine's "orange"
revolution. Russia and China provided blanket
support for Karimov after the suppression, while
Washington could only offer nuanced criticism,
fearing that intense criticism of Karimov would
result in the loss of access to the
Karshi-Khanabad air base, or K2, used to support
US operations in Afghanistan; nevertheless, the
loss of this base now appears a likely scenario.
Washington's criticism was enough to
spread fear throughout the ruling clans of Central
Asia that the US is engaged in covert operations
to undermine or overthrow the current ruling
regimes. This fear does not even escape
Kyrgyzstan's subsequently elected government -
which swept into power in a similar manner as
Ukraine's government - because its support still
rests on a shaky foundation of clan alliances.
In this environment, the SCO sought to
limit Washington's presence in the region -
Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan
shifted their support to China and Russia in order
to protect their sovereignty from US meddling. The
joint declaration issued at the end of the summit
took aim at Washington by rejecting attempts at
"monopolizing or dominating international affairs"
and insisting on "non-interference in the internal
affairs of sovereign states". The members further
urged the US-led forces in Afghanistan to declare
a timetable for withdrawal from Afghanistan and
the Uzbek and Kyrgyz bases in the region that were
established to support the Afghan operations. The
Central Asian states see it in their interests to
fill the power vacuum that the withdrawals would
create with that of China and Russia, which they
believe would better ensure the longevity of their
regimes.
Top US General Richard B Myers
summed up Washington's interpretation of the shift
in blunt terms: "It looks to me like two very
large countries were trying to bully some smaller
countries." Ten days later, Rumsfeld landed in
Kyrgyzstan to ensure that the world's only
superpower wasn't elbowed out of the region.
Washington pushes back
The US
secretary of defense's visit to Kyrgyzstan and
Tajikistan was aimed at shoring up support for the
continuation of the US military presence in each
country, which was successful at least for the
mid-term. Kyrgyzstan hosts a US military base at
the Manas air base, and Tajikistan offers the US
military and NATO fly-over rights and hosts a
small contingent of French soldiers involved in
Afghan operations. French Defense Minister Michele
Alliot-Marie was in Dushanbe on July 21 to firm up
that arrangement. Notably, Rumsfeld did not visit
Uzbekistan, the other SCO member-state that hosts
a US military base. Whether his absence was the
result of an Uzbek request or a calculation of
Washington's, it demonstrated how the US plans to
address the shifting power relations in the
region. Nevertheless, Uzbekistan subsequently gave
the US 180 days to pull out from the
Karshi-Khanabad (K2)air base, used for US
operations in neighboring Afghanistan.
Washington has approached Central Asia on
bilateral terms, never treating the SCO members as
a bloc. In terms of leverage in the relations,
this shifts the fulcrum to Washington's advantage.
China and Russia encourage the SCO states to act
multilaterally in an effort to limit Washington's
reach. Rumsfeld's trip demonstrated Washington's
ability to act bilaterally with Kyrgyzstan, which
has a newly elected government and has yet to
fully congeal its foreign policy, and Tajikistan,
which has traditionally been the SCO member that
follows a balanced approach with its foreign
suitors.
Recently, relations between
Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan have shown the strengths
of Washington's bilateral approach. When more than
500 Uzbeks crossed over into Kyrgyzstan following
the crushing of protesters in Andijan, Kyrgyzstan
initially reacted in step with the Uzbek
government. Eighty-seven Uzbek refugees were sent
back, prompting outrage from the UN and
Washington. This led to negotiations between the
UN and officials in Kyrgyzstan, which, by
Washington's design, left out any avenue for input
from Uzbekistan. On July 29, a plane with 440
Uzbek refugees left Kyrgyzstan for Romania. This
demonstrated Washington's ability to directly
influence the geopolitics of Central Asia only a
few weeks after the united front presented by the
SCO called for a US withdrawal.
However,
in dealing with Karimov's government in
Uzbekistan, Washington's bilateral approach is no
longer effective, in part because of its success
in Kyrgyzstan. The Uzbek suspicion of Washington's
involvement in the Kyrgyzstan revolution and
uprising in Andijan has caused Karimov to throw
his government's support behind China's and
Russia's vision for the region. As such, the same
day that the plane carried refugees out of
Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan asked Washington to leave
the K2 air base.
The immediate reaction
from Washington was to hold back on sending a
high-level representative to renegotiate the
arrangement while waiting for things to "cool
down".
This seems to suggest that the US
is leaning toward the future goal of regime change
in Uzbekistan and is willing to sacrifice the air
base if necessary. This does not mean that
Washington will cut off all relations with
Uzbekistan, but if it becomes apparent that future
negotiations will not lead to an extension of the
air base use agreement, Washington can be expected
to pursue further bilateral agreements with the
other governments in Central Asia to isolate
Karimov's government.
Conclusion
Beijing, Moscow and Washington are once again
using Central Asia, the setting for the "Great
Game" between Tsarist Russia and Victorian England
over 150 years ago, as their game board in a
region rarely neglected by the world's great
powers. In the contemporary version of the game,
Washington approaches each state bilaterally,
offering incentives to support the operations in
Afghanistan while undermining the consensus put
forth at the recent SCO meeting.
China and
Russia are acting in tandem to shore up support
for SCO policies by offering blanket support for
the current regimes and implicitly calling
attention to US-led efforts to undermine their
governments. The states hosting the game board
will continue to swing their support from China
and Russia to the US, and back again, so long as
they keep their hold on power. The past month has
seen a flurry of activity in the Great Game, and
it can be expected that things will not cool down
any time soon.
Published with
permission of the Power and Interest News
Report, an analysis-based
publication that seeks to provide insight into
various conflicts, regions and points of interest
around the globe. All comments should be directed
to content@pinr.com |
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