Page 2 of
2 Afghan bridge exposes huge
divide By M K Bhadrakumar
rivalries among the South Asian
countries on the one hand and China and Russia on
the other at no direct cost to US regional
interests.
But in the US understanding, a
strategic alliance between Russia and China in
Central Asia within the framework of the Shanghai
Cooperation Organization (SCO) is a long way from
materializing. More important, the US estimates
that it can avoid a strategic alliance by
balancing Russia and China individually or off each
other. There is a wide range
of possibilities for US diplomacy to exploit the
differing priorities of Russia and China within
the SCO.
Alexander Khramchikhin, chief
analyst of Russia's Political and Military
Analysis Institute, wrote in Izvestia newspaper
recently:
Russia is clearly inclined to turn
the SCO into a military-political bloc to
confront and counter NATO [the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization]. Moscow would like a merger
of the SCO and the Collective Security Treaty
Organization, but our partners are still
resisting the idea. Beijing may not be entirely
opposed to a military alliance, but its policy
is entirely rational and pragmatic ...
Beijing is more inclined to see the
SCO's economic component as dominant. China's
priority is oil and gas supplies, of course ...
SCO is perfect for China's purposes. All SCO
countries except Uzbekistan share borders with
China, so energy resources can be delivered via
safe land routes ... Another advantage [is] an
energy market in the SCO framework so that
several oil and gas suppliers [Russia,
Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, and perhaps Iran and
Turkmenistan] would be competing for one buyer,
China ... The economic format of the SCO is
advantageous for China because of its powerful
economy ... From China's perspective, SCO
countries are an important transit corridor for
contacts [with the world
market].
US-China equations
Not surprisingly, the core agenda of the
US policy is to create a wedge between Russia and
China. The point is, over the near to medium term
at least, Washington doesn't perceive China's
growing presence in Central Asia as a pressing
challenge to its interests.
Washington's
comfort level is due to several factors. First,
much as China has made impressive gains in Central
Asia, it faces many challenges and competitors
while furthering its political, diplomatic and
economic presence in the region. Even assuming
that Russian influence in the region is waning
(which is not the case), the hard reality is that
at the end of the day, the Central Asian elites
feel far more at home in harboring close ties with
Russia than with China. Again, despite recent
setbacks, the US remains a major contender in the
region. So is Japan, which is fixated with the
idea of countering Chinese influence in Central
Asia.
Second, in the US perception,
Chinese diplomatic strategy in Central Asia is
mainly driven by China's domestic imperative of
developing and sustaining stable and productive
relations around the country's periphery so as to
create a beneficial external environment within
which Beijing can meaningfully address the
enormous sociopolitical and developmental
challenges within. Of course, China cannot be
faulted if it strives to legitimize its image as a
benign regional leader. In other words, the US has
no reason to feel "threat perceptions" over the
proactive Chinese diplomacy in Central Asia.
Third, Washington appreciates that China
has several legitimate national-security interests
at stake in Central Asia. The huge territorial
concessions that China made in settling its border
dispute with the Central Asian states, and the key
agreements of 1996 and 1997, showed that China
regarded that the region's goodwill needed to be
cultivated, and therefore making compromises was
every bit worthwhile in China's medium- and
long-term interests. China's obsession with the
"three evils" manifest in the region (terrorism,
separatism and religious extremism) is palpable.
Again, the US would have no reason to
quarrel with China for exploring trade and
economic cooperation with Central Asia. In fact,
it suits the US regional strategy that China is
increasingly competing with Russia both in the
energy and non-energy sectors. For instance, there
is a good possibility that China will replace
Russia's UC Rusal in the $ 1.3 billion
aluminum-cum-hydroelectric project in Tajikistan.
A degree of rivalry already exists between
China and Russia in gaining access to
Turkmenistan's gas reserves. The fact is, as China
moves up the economic ladder, it is better placed
than Russia in providing much-needed capital,
technology, expertise and the range of consumer
goods that the Central Asian countries need.
Furthermore, it is possible for the US to
harmonize its Central Asia strategy with China's
focus on building transportation infrastructure,
especially a multilateral highway system, which
would only weaken Russia's Soviet-era stranglehold
on the region's communication links.
Finally, Washington estimates that since
China's relations remain at a relatively early
stage in the region, it is only through a
strategic partnership with Russia that Beijing can
venture into any balance-of-power games. Of
course, looking further ahead, Washington and
Beijing could find themselves competing for
influence in Central Asia as their regional
priorities continue to expand beyond immediate
security concerns and touch on great-power
influence and diplomatic strategy.
In
other words, in the short term at least, the US is
pursuing a careful policy to engage China in the
region and assuring that China's emergence is
consistent with US interests. This indeed helps
Washington to focus on the immediate task at hand,
to roll back Russia's traditional standing in the
region.
The bridge on the Pyanj brings out
these various templates of the United States'
regional policy in Central Asia. It is
extraordinary that the US is prepared to go to any
extent to undercut the SCO and isolating Russia in
Central Asia. There is no denying the fact that
China will be the single biggest beneficiary of
the bridge that connects Tajikistan and
Afghanistan.
Curiously, China seems to
have anticipated that Tajikistan will eventually
prove to be as crucial as Pakistan as a
transportation route. Beijing has been paying
enormous attention to Tajikistan by earmarking the
bulk of its $900 million export loan for the SCO
for its projects in Tajikistan. China's assistance
to Tajikistan in the past five years exceeds $600
million. Trade touched $157 million in 2005. But
the first half of 2006 alone saw a quantum jump to
$114 million. China is generously investing in
Tajikistan's light industry.
The US-funded
bridge across the Pyanj River leads in the north
to China's newly developed road links with
Tajikistan. It provides China's Xinjiang Uyghur
autonomous region with yet another all-weather
communication link with Karachi port, which the
Karakorum Highway cannot.
The bridge
underscores that China doesn't necessarily have to
depend on the SCO for developing its
transportation routes to the South Asia/Persian
Gulf region.
In fact, a US State
Department handout in Washington last week
highlights this by pointing out, "On the Tajik
side, the bridge will connect to routes leading
north, west and east through roads that Japan
plans to build or modernize; on the Afghan side,
it will connect to Afghanistan's nearly completed
ring road and Pakistan's port of Karachi through
roads constructed with ADB financing."
There is enough food for thought here for
strategic analysts rooted in their belief that
China's access to the warm waters of the South
Asian/Persian Gulf region would be completely
antithetical to US strategic interests.
M K Bhadrakumar served as a
career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for
more than 29 years, with postings including
ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-98) and to Turkey
(1998-2001).
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