BACKGROUND: In November 2002, Turkmenistan announced that it had uncovered an attempted coup against its government that Russia had facilitated. Notwithstanding the neo-Stalinist grotesqueries of this coup and subsequent repression, there is good reason to believe this charge was not unfounded. It occurred just before a meeting of heads of state of Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, and Pakistan in Ashgabat to initiate a feasibility study on a gas pipeline originating in Turkmenistan that would flow through these two countries to Pakistan’s port of Gwadar in the Arabian Sea. Building this pipeline would provide Turkmenistan’s with more freedom in natural gas exports, reducing its dependence on Russia’s pipelines, and allow it to avoid participating in President Vladimir Putin’s call for a Russian led gas cartel on exploitative terms. The coup attempt has reminded Turkmenistan’s President of Russia’s ability and willingness to undermine his regime. The involvement of Russian energy firms with members of the special services is well known throughout Central and Eastern Europe, and is apparently now a key component of Russian policy in Central Asia. Since then, Moscow has also pushed hard to compel local governments to accept air bases, ostensibly to defend against terrorists and to create the material foundation for the permanent deployment of these forces as part of a CIS-wide defense organization. This organization is clearly likened to the Warsaw pact where Russia effectively limited the sovereignty of its so-called allies. Undoubtedly the strategic purpose is to achieve a similar result in Central Asia.

IMPLICATIONS: These bases also are unlikely to be used for true military purposes for there is presently no active terrorist threat from without. Moreover, it is also highly unlikely that Russian forces will actually be deployed in the event of a threat as all earlier promises of military aid or threats to attack Afghanistan proved to be either too little or too late or mere braggadocio without sustainable or credible forces to back them up. This failure to deploy credible resources did not earn friends for Russia in Central Asia. This explains why Russia refused to adhere to the allied operation to liberate Afghanistan in 2001. Third, many of the Russian forces hitherto deployed in Tajikistan have been found to be corrupted by the drug trade, and given the unreformed nature of the Russian army and its officer corps, it is not improbable that we could find a replication of this previous experience. Apart from the flimsiness of the military rationale for these bases, there are numerous signs of the anger of the Russian political and military establishment at Central Asian states’ support for the U.S. bases there and its overall Central Asian presence. Russian anger seems to particularly harsh regarding Tajikistan. Russian observers consciously see these bases and the American presence in general as trends that could lead to the ousting of Russian influence form the area. At the broader, macropolitical level these same elites have always opposed partnership with America and argue that Russia has received nothing from it. They cite what they call the U.S. disregard for the UN in the current war with Iraq, withdrawal from the ABM treaty, and NATO’s continuing enlargement as evidence that America seeks to be unconstrained and will not give Russia its rightful place at the “presidium table” of world affairs. Therefore, they are determined to contest American Presence in Central Asia. The fact that many of these selfsame elites are still consumed by the belief that Central Asian governments are artificial entities that cannot govern themselves or develop economically or culturally without Russian tutelage also abets this policy of seeking to coerce these governments back into Moscow’s fold.

CONCLUSIONS: All the defects in Russian security policy coalesce here and unless they are countered they will continue to disfigure Russian foreign and defense policies and lead it into adventures that cannot be sustained. Worse, they could drag Central Asia into these adventures as well. The imperial and zero-sum mentalities that see the world in bipolar terms and retain the mystique of imperialism and naked use of pressure upon weak governments are in abundant evidence in Central Asia. The failure to reform either the security or military institutions, and the new found alliances between the security structures and the energy barons also do not presage an expansion of a new oil and gas regime led by Russia but clearly the resort to old-fashioned techniques of subversion and long-range coup planning. Likewise, the efforts to project military power into Central Asia for nakedly imperial purposes are unlikely to be affordable or sustainable, or to create reliable allies or security systems in Central Asia. But what they could do is create more opportunities for corrupt deals among various elements, drug dealers, energy barons, intelligence organizations that account to nobody, and a demoralized and corrupt military establishment. Most assuredly, neither Central Asia nor Russia can benefit from any of those implications.

AUTHOR BIO: Professor Stephen Blank, Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War College, Carlisle Barracks, PA 17013. The views expressed here do not necessarily represent those of the U.S. Army, Defense Department, or the U.S. Government.