During his one-week visit to the United States at the invitation of U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Safar Abiyev completed a comprehensive program traveling to Tampa, Florida; San Antonio, Texas; Tulsa, Oklahoma; as well as New York City, and held meetings with members of the U.S. Congress as well as with U.S. civilian and military leaders. At these meetings, various aspects of military cooperation between Azerbaijan and the U.S. were covered, including the security of the main export pipeline projects, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil and Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipelines. Azerbaijan’s defense chief repeatedly touched upon the Armenia-Azerbaijan conflict and the threat this conflict poses to the stability and development of the region. Though not mentioned in the Azerbaijani official reports, but undoubtedly discussed, were problems related to Iran and Russia.

Minister Abiyev is an advocate of closer military cooperation with the United States and has hosted high ranking U.S. officers such as Secretary Rumsfeld in Baku. Only in March of 2004, Abiyev received U.S. delegations, including the U.S. State Department’s deputy director for security and policy in Europe Eric Schultz, U.S. mission adviser at NATO Bruce Rogers, Deputy Commander of the U.S. European Command General Charles Wald, and others. Emphasizing the importance of the region at these meetings, the American side repeatedly stated that the scope of Washington’s interests includes overall security in the region and its vital, primarily energy, infrastructure. Importantly, the U.S. is also moving ahead with more funding for increase in security cooperation. Special attention will also be paid to further integration of Azerbaijan into Euro-Atlantic structures through NATO’s Partnership for Peace program.

Secretary Rumsfeld reiterated his gratitude for Azerbaijan’s strong active support and participation in the U.S.-led anti-terror coalition. No doubt, Minister Abiyev was especially pleased to hear praise for the performance of Azerbaijani troops serving in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Iraq. As part of the joint efforts to curb proliferation of WMDs and trafficking, Rumsfeld and Abiyev agreed to expand cooperation in strengthening the security of Azerbaijan’s sector of the Caspian.

Neither Baku’s cooperation with the United States on security issues, nor Azerbaijan’s objective of integration into Euro-Atlantic community is a new development. Yet Moscow continues to make a point of making its displeasure over the U.S.-Azerbaijan partnership known. Russia is concerned with the political situation in Azerbaijan and its reaction to Safar Abiyev’s words about possible deployment of U.S. military bases into Azerbaijan a few months ago was not slow to come. Russian Ambassador to Azerbaijan Nikolai Ryabov said that if foreign bases were deployed in Azerbaijan, Moscow would take retaliatory action, in particular by slapping a visa regime on Baku. Thus, the Kremlin still possessively watches the region through the prism of the past and sees any independent steps by the pro-Western regional governments as a threat to itself.

Baku has been very careful recently not to antagonize Russia excessively. Unlike neighboring Georgia, where Russian bases are still a significance presence, Azerbaijan, the first post-Soviet nation to get rid of Russian military on its soil as early as 1993, can afford the luxury of friendliness with Moscow. Yet given that Moscow’s vision of friendship is best exemplified in the region by Armenia’s complete military and economic dependence on Russia and the history of Russia’s open support for Armenia in the latter’s war with Azerbaijan, there is a limit how far Azerbaijan can accommodate Kremlin’s demands.

Before Minister Abiyev’s visit to the U.S., a possible agreement on deployment of US military bases in Azerbaijan had been a subject widely discussed in the Azerbaijani media. Both sides, however, deny information related to such deployment. Last week, in Baku, U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage also pointed out that “he had not discussed military bases during his meeting with Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev, “because his country had “no desire” to “set up bases in Azerbaijan”. Nevertheless, it is hard to exclude some form of U.S. military presence in Azerbaijan in the near future, both as a result of deepening bilateral cooperation and the necessity based on the region’s realities. This is especially clear given the evolving restructuring of U.S. global military presence abroad, to adjust to new realities and new security threats that are radically different from those of the Cold War. Given Azerbaijan’s critical geographic location as the only country bordering both Russia and Iran and forming, with Georgia, a corridor from NATO territory to Central Asia, it is hard to imagine that the restructuring of U.S. military bases would bypass Azerbaijan.

Safar Abiyev’s visit symbolically preceded another round of NATO expansion, this time through inclusion of the Baltic nations, by a couple of days. As the Alliance moves eastwards, it should also look at ways to promote stability and security in the strategically crucial Caspian region. Perhaps, Azerbaijan’s possible future acceptance into NATO as a member should also be seen in this context. For now, though, Abiyev’s successful visit comes as another evidence of Baku’s deep-rooted pro-Western strategic orientation. Incidentally, the visit’s lower profile suggests that Azerbaijan’s objective is to further the working relationship rather than to seek photo-ops.