"Geopolitical
Setting"
Central Asia to play prominent role in US-Russian cooperation
The September 11 terrorist attack initiated a shift in the world’s geopolitical tectonic
plates
Ariel Cohen: 9/14/01
The September 11 terrorist attack on New York and Washington,
apparently perpetrated by Islamic radicals, initiated a shift in the world’s
geopolitical tectonic plates. This change of paradigm clears the way for a global struggle
against terrorism. In this fight against terror, as with World War II’s anti-fascist
crusade, the United States and Russia have coinciding interests that could end up forging
a close alliance.
Russia reacted with great emotion to the carnage in America. President
Vladimir Putin is leading an effort to put Russia squarely in the anti-terrorist camp.
Putin has communicated with President George Bush on several occasions, and has reportedly
ordered all intelligence information on ties between terrorist mastermind Osama bin Laden
– the chief suspect in the September 11 events – and the Taliban to be passed on the
US security officials.
According to Boston University researcher Lyuba Schwartzman, who
monitors Russian TV, the flag on the Russian White House has been lowered to half-mast. At
noon on September 13, a moment of silence was observed at Putin's cabinet meeting and
around the country. By that hour, the lawn of the US embassy had been covered with
flowers, placed there by sympathetic Russians. Muscovites, like the Israelis, have come to
hospitals to donate blood. This is an unprecedented expression of solidarity.
Putin and Russian Defense Minister Sergey Ivanov have declared that
Russia is prepared to act jointly with NATO against international terrorism. However,
Ivanov clarified that Russia will not participate in retaliatory attacks, especially as
long as it is not clear against whom they will be directed.
As the United States is focusing attention on the Taliban, which
controls roughly 90 percent of Afghanistan’s territory, Russia’s immediate priority
seems to be settling the Chechnya question. To take care of the home front, Putin met with
Justice Minister Yuri Chaika and Interior Minister Boris Gryzlov to discuss beefing up
anti-terrorism measures. Hundreds of civilians have been murdered in car bomb blasts
throughout Russia since 1999. The Russian government blames Chechen militants for those
attacks, while the Chechens have denied responsibility.
The leaders of Russia have not missed this opportunity to state their
case about the need to crush Chechnya. Russian General Prosecutor Vladimir Ustinov met on
September 13 with a delegation of the European Assembly and discussed
"improvements" in Chechnya. Ustinov claimed that Moscow has proof that Chechen
fighters undergo training in terrorist camps that are run and financed by bin Laden. In
addition, Moscow is using the terror attack to advance other policy priorities. For
instance, the Ministry of Defense has suggested that US efforts to create a missile
defense shield would be futile, given that the terrorism threat is relatively low-tech.
Russia is also emphasizing the Taliban-Chechen connection to score
propaganda points. The Taliban regime is one of very few which has formally recognized
independence of Chechnya. And as the Chechens have a diaspora throughout the former Soviet
Union and Eastern Europe which is tough, business-oriented, but has often been accused of
involvement in criminal activity, they are a perfect conduit for a large scale drug
distribution network. Thus, the Afghan-Chechen connection may have as much to do with
spreading the opium poppy in Europe as with spreading religion.
In combating Islamic radicalism, the United States is plunging into a
region in which Russia has historically had a prominent presence. One immediate US
priority concerns Pakistan, which has close ties to the Taliban. It looks increasingly
likely that the United States will pressure the military government of Pakistan – which
had had strong relations to the US since the 1979-98 Afghan war – to punish the Taliban,
and to help apprehend bin Laden.
At the same time, Central Asia figures to play a prominent roll in
US-Russian cooperation. If the US government does not succeed in pressuring Islamabad, or
if it wants to open a second front from northern Afghanistan against the fundamentalist
regime, Washington will need to deal with the Kremlin, as well as with the governments of
Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, to ensure their cooperation.
Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have all supported the so-called
Northern Alliance, which has battled the Taliban for control of Afghanistan. The alliance,
which is dominated by ethnic Tajiks, has most of its stronghold in northern areas of the
country, near the Tajik-Afghani border. It is the prime opposition against the
predominantly Pushtun Taliban.
One option for the US would be to provide immediate assistance to the
Northern Alliance. However, the alliance’s leader, Ahmed Shah Masoud, the best military
commander of the Afghan war, was either killed or severely wounded on September 10, a day
before the New York attack.
Northern Afghanistan is the logical location to develop a staging area
for anti-Taliban forces. Russia already has its 201st Division in the area, which is
11,000 strong, and is guarding the Tajik border.
Only ten days prior to the attack on Masoud, the Taliban appointed bin
Laden the military commander of their army. Of special note, bin Laden then nominated Juma
Namangani, a leading Uzbek militant Islamic fighting to topple the Uzbek regime of
President Islam Karimov, as his deputy. [For
additional information see the Eurasia Insight archives]. Thus, over the last
couple of weeks, the Islamist expansion into Central Asia has become more likely than
ever.
These appointments, as well as the blow against Masoud, may be
connected to the September 11 events. If it is established that the Taliban knew of or
cooperated with bin Laden in the attack against American targets, they may have been
trying to anticipate a typical US response, which would be to arm and train the existing
opposition in Afghanistan. However, if the Northern enclave is overrun by Kabul in the
near future, there will be no opposition left for the United States to back. It would also
complicate efforts by the United States to establish bases in the region.
Cooperating in the fight against terrorism may help the United States
to "clear the air" in its relations with Russia, as well as with China, and open
a new page for relations between the great powers during the 21st century. At the same
time, the strategic alliance against terrorism must be careful to coordinate strategic and
tactical priorities in order to reduce the chances for misunderstanding that could fuel
new forms of international tension. The lessons of history show that the spirit of
cooperation that prevailed between the United States and Soviet Union during World War II
gave way to the ideological confrontation of the Cold War.
Editor's Note: Ariel Cohen, Ph.D., is a Research Fellow in
Russian and Eurasian Studies at the Heritage Foundation. He is the author of Russian
Imperialism: Development and Crisis, Greenwood/Praeger, 1998.
http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav091401.shtml
EurasiaNet, 15 September 2001
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