NATO invites Russia to join Afghan fray
M K Bhadrakumar, Asia Times, Oct 27 2010
NATO officials have revealed that their proposal to Moscow regarding a vastly stepped-up Russian involvement in the Afghan war is in the final stages of negotiation, and they are hopeful of formal agreement being reached at the alliance’s two-day summit in Lisbon from Nov 19. Russian Pres Medvedev has announced his acceptance of the NATO invitation to attend the Lisbon summit, where he also scheduled to have a two-hour meeting with Obama. Aside from Afghanistan, Medvedev’s agenda includes Iran, a Russian proposal on a European security architecture and NATO’s offer to cooperate with Russia on its missile defense system. Afghanistan promises to be the biggest vector of Russia-NATO cooperation to date. Russian ingenuity aims at making cooperation with NATO a lucrative business deal as much as a political embrace. However, the timing is significant. NATO hopes to tango with Russia in Lisbon within a few hours of settling into a long-term partnership with Kabul under a status of forces agreement with the Afghan government. In short, NATO is joining hands with Russia even as it consolidates its military presence in Central Asia. Moscow seems increasingly confident of the reset with the US. The big question is how Afghan Pres Karzai and a host of others, Iranians, Central Asians (especially Uzbeks), Chinese and the Afghans (especially Pashtuns) view an emergent NATO-Russia condominium. NATO officials indicated that the deals included a supply of Russian helicopters and Russian crews to train Afghan pilots, Russian military instructors training Afghan military, expansion of the transit and supply routes for NATO forces in Afghanistan via Russian territory, and effective cooperation in curbing drug trafficking and strengthening border security. NATO Sec-Gen Rasmussen told the Guardian:
The summit can mark a new start in the relationship between NATO and Russia. We will hopefully agree on a broad range of areas in which we can develop practical cooperation on Afghanistan, counter-terrorism, counter-narcotics. Russia is strongly interested in increased cooperation. Last December when I visited Moscow I suggested that Russia provide helicopters for the Afghan army. Since then Russia has reflected on that and there are now bilateral talks between Russia and the US. I would not exclude that we will facilitate that process within the NATO-Russian Council.
Russian helicopters are rugged machines suitable for the tough conditions in Afghanistan and Afghan armed forces are used to Soviet-era equipment. Russia has been insisting on a “commercial” deal. But the deal has manifestly political overtones. Will Russia be deputing its military instructors to Afghanistan or will Afghan officers get trained in the Russian military academies? The proposal to deploy Russian helicopter crews to Afghanistan is a dramatic step. Of all the images etched deep in the Afghan consciousness and jihad mythology, it is the Russian helicopter gunships criss-crossing the Afghan skies raining death and destruction during the period 1979-89 that still evokes fear and fury. No doubt, the return of Russian military personnel will become a highly symbolic turning point in the 30-year Afghan civil war. How far is NATO is coordinating with Karzai? Karzai kept a cool distance from Moscow, and only lately, when his relations with the West began plummeting, did he begin thawing. Karzai will now have to think hard and measure the hostility toward Russia still among the Afghan people. He is debilitated in the Afghan bazaar by the image of being a puppet of foreign powers. Karzai is barely keeping equilibrium in a tempestuous relationship with Western forces over whom he has no control. Two days ago, he lashed out at the West. He also “stormed out” of a meeting with Petraeus. Conceivably, he is also watching with disquiet the latest chapter in the US’s dalliance with the Pakistani military. Karzai’s preference will be to have independent dealings with the regional powers, especially Russia.
The Russian entry will cast shadows on the Afghan ethnic mosaic. It has been with non-Pashtun nationalities, especially Tajiks and Uzbeks, that Moscow got deeply involved over the years. Moscow had little to do with the Hazaras and was mostly on uneasy terms with the Pashtuns (despite keeping subsoil contacts with the Taliban). The officer corps of Afghan armed forces is predominantly Tajik, and the Pashtuns have misgivings that Moscow is once again developing the sinews of its erstwhile proxies. More so, as the Russian military personnel will be coming in at a time when non-Pashtun groups have begun secretly arming themselves fearing a Taliban takeover in Kabul. The Taliban will take serious note of any form of Russian military involvement in the war, and that can have serious implications for the Taliban’s future cooperation with Central Asian militant groups. The Taliban accepted the fact that Russia provided NATO with air and land supply and transit arrangements. But the threshold of the Taliban’s tolerance may change, especially if the nascent peace talks fail to take off and the accent falls on the resistance. Suffice to say that regional powers like China, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan will be curious about Russia joining hands with NATO bilaterally, sidestepping the CSTO and the SCO. In effect, the kaleidoscope of collective security in Central Asia undergoes an ominous tilt. NATO still views the CSTO and SCO disdainfully.
On balance, NATO and the US are net gainers. The timing is perfect. NATO ensures that Moscow acquiesces in its long-term military presence in the region. NATO has multiple motives. With the specter of defeat staring at it, NATO has nothing to lose. These are days when the alliance and the US in particular feel lonely when the dusk falls, and it’s good to have company of friends who have moved about in the dark in the Hindu Kush. In any case, Moscow has been bending over backward to be helpful. It is useful to keep Russia engaged instead of ignoring it, lest it acts as a “spoiler.” Moscow still wields influence over non-Pashtun groups opposed to reconciliation with the Taliban. Also, Pakistan no longer objects to Russia’s entry. Moscow made serious overtures to Islamabad to reach a modus vivendi over Afghanistan and it is paying dividends. In practical terms, the northern supply route via Russian territory is a great boon for NATO with insurgents having stepped up attacks on the two routes running through Pakistan. But the geopolitics of NATO-Russia tie-up isolates China and Iran. Conceivably, the US is pursuing this tie-up as a matter of regional policy. According to NATO officials, a separate agreement on limited Russian cooperation with NATO’s European missile defense plans is also in prospect at the Lisbon summit, which is a symbolic demonstration of a security matrix struggling to be born. It seems the reset process with Russia that Washington mooted modestly as a course correction from the Bush 43 era is beginning to impact on the geopolitical chessboard.
6 Comments
Raw Story has an OpEd from Gorbachev advising the Simians to pull its troops out of the unwinnable Afghan war.
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/10/gorbachev-victory-afghanistan-impossible/
At the end of the Raw Story article there’s a link to an Independent – UK story about potential Russian involvement. Amid the Indep story there’s a panel with a link to another angle on the Russia story.
AfPak is still shaping up to be a monumental SNAFU, isn’t it?
It has been suggested to me that Russia has extensive power over factions in the old ‘Northern Alliance’ such as Hekmatyar’s and is now preparing the final stage in a grand conspiracy. At the extreme of this, it is even argued that the whole global ‘Islamist’ movement is nothing more than a long-running KGB false flag front and provocation, this being the mirror image of the well-known theory that it is a long-running CIA/MI6/Mossad false flag front and provocation. Obviously the soviets would have endeavoured to insinuate themselves into the matrix of ‘Islamist’ groups as and when possible, but there are clear divisions of a mutually exclusive sort which separate the nationalist groups that regularly received soviet support in their day, from the theocratic ‘Islamist’ groups. Provocateur pseudo-gangs can always be distinguished from what they are pretending to be, and the two things, the genuine and the pseudo, should never be confused with one another, as if all the genuine groups were simultaneously pseudo-gangs, which would be nonsensical. There are individuals whose behaviour seems very difficult to explain on any one hypothesis, such as Viktor Bout (who is by the way a Jew) and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar, but perhaps they were/are simply opportunists. In any case, I would dismiss any idea that Russia has been manipulating events in Afghanistan from behind the scenes and is now preparing to stage a come-back there as implausible. The only element of truth in it is that Russia may have some influence on some parts of what used to be called the ‘Northern Alliance’, including possibly on Hekmatyar. But this is not sufficient to base a grand conspiracy theory on.
I agree with your comment from “In any case…” onward. Imo, Russia’s drug problem gives it a legitimate ‘official’ reason to get involved in Afghanistan. But if it can avoid taking on, or getting embroiled in, a combat role, it has a large number of unofficial reasons to have a presence there. Its offer of a safer, Russian supply route is fraught (for Uncle Sam) imo. I’m beginning to think the USAians are even stupider than we imagined.
The arms deal with Saudi Arabia – and now this…
Well, if you can’t quite imagine the line of argument I am rejecting, here are a couple of examples of it:
http://www.globalpolitician.com/23436-terror-russia/
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1398099/posts
The latter actually comes from the same web site as the former, David Storobin’s “Global Politician,” but I can’t find the original of it there.
from what I understand, Russian troops will not have a presence in Afghanistan but will be training Afghans on Russian soil, sorry – don’t remember where I read that.
Ouch! You’re right, RB.
I also agree with your opinion re the conspiracy theories, especially so now that you’ve ID’d Freepers as one source of same. I didn’t like the theories, which is quite a different matter.
@ Bill Wade.
Training on Russian soil is much more in keeping with my expectation of Russian involvement in Afghanistan.