US Strategic Foothold in Central Asia at Risk
By: Administrative Account | Source: CNSNews.com
April 27, 2006 6:12AM EST

By Patrick Goodenough
CNSNews.com International Editor
April 27, 2006

(CNSNews.com) - Nine months after an Asian bloc dominated by Russia and China moved to set a time limit on the U.S. military presence in Central Asia, the last American airbase in the highly strategic region may be at risk.

If agreement is not reached by June 1 on a demand for a substantial increase in rent, the U.S. presence at Kyrgyzstan's Manas airbase will be terminated, the country's president, Kurmambek Bakiyev, has warned.

Bakiyev has spoken of a 100-fold increase in rent, to around $200 million a year, although other officials have quoted smaller figures. $200 million would be almost half of Kyrgyzstan's total annual budget.

Located at the airport in the Kyrgyz capital, Bishkek, the airbase was established late in 2001, after al Qaeda attacked the U.S.

It is also known as Ganci base, after Peter Ganci, the New York City Fire Department chief who died at the World Trade Center on 9/11.

Manas was one of two bases set up in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, the U.S.-led mission that toppled al Qaeda's Taliban allies in Afghanistan.

The other, at Karshi-Khanabad (K2) in Uzbekistan, was particularly well-located; Uzbekistan borders Afghanistan and K2 was only a short drive to the border. Kyrgyzstan, by contrast, lies one country away from Afghanistan, with Tajikistan in between. The U.S. therefore negotiated overflight and refueling arrangements with Tajikistan.

Regional analysts said the U.S. military presence unsettled both Russia, which regards the former Soviet republics as part of its sphere of influence; and China, because of Central Asia's proximity to its restless western Xinjiang region. Moscow and Beijing also want to exploit the region's considerable energy sources.

Last year, ties between the U.S. and Uzbekistan began to chill over President Islam Karimov's repressive policies, even as Karimov was embraced by Russia and China.

In July, Russia, China and four Central Asian states making up the Shanghai Cooperation Organization called on the U.S. to set a deadline for withdrawing its forces from bases in the region. It argued that military operations in Afghanistan were winding down and the U.S. presence would no longer be needed.

Karimov then gave the Pentagon six months' notice to withdraw from K2, and the last U.S. flights departed from the base in November.

The eviction from K2 enhanced the importance of the Manas base as the remaining U.S. strategic foothold in Central Asia.

But now that, too, is looking shaky, after Bakiyev in a televised interview last week gave the U.S. the ultimatum because of the as-yet unresolved rent dispute.

As was the case with Uzbekistan, Russia is playing a key role in the Kyrgyz situation.

Two years after the U.S. began operating the Manas base, the Russian military opened a base of its own at Kant, some 20 miles away.

Unlike the case with Manas, Russia does not pay rent for Kant, on the grounds it is officially a Collective Security Treaty Organization asset. The CSTO is a military alliance comprising Russia and five former Soviet states, including Kyrgyzstan.

Visiting Moscow this week, Bakiyev and President Vladimir Putin discussed expanding the Russian presence at Kant, an airbase which the Kyrgyz leader said "helps guarantee the security and stability not only of Kyrgyzstan, but also of the Central Asian region as a whole."

Putin said expanding the Kant airbase was a priority for Moscow.

"This base is the Central Asian component of the CSTO collective rapid reaction forces and we would like to increase its resources," he said.

Bakiyev was elected last July, several months after his predecessor was ousted in a popular revolt nicknamed the "tulip revolution." The transition was initially regarded as a triumph for democracy, but since then Bakiyev has been accused of breaking election promises and opposition groups plan mass protest rallies this weekend.

Bakiyev has also tilted Kyrgyzstan increasingly towards Russia. This week's visit to Moscow was his fourth in a year.

Analysts believe Bakiyev is using the Manas rent dispute as a lever: if the U.S. refuses the rent increase demand, he can kick out the Americans in return for Russian rewards.

According to Jamestown Foundation senior fellow Vladimir Socor, Kyrgyzstan first raised the rent issue with the U.S. last fall "at Moscow's instigation."

He saw it as significant that Bakiyev had raised the rent issue and June 1 ultimatum on the eve of his visit to Moscow.

Writing in Jamestown's Eurasia Daily Monitor, Socor said that even if the U.S. does resolve the dispute and remain at the base, Russia will probably prod Kyrgyzstan to set restrictions on U.S. operations there.

Following Bakiyev's ultimatum announcement, the American Embassy in Bishkek issued a statement saying the U.S. was committed to concluding negotiations over the airbase as quickly as possible.

Continue cooperation in rooting out terrorism in the region was in both countries' interests, it said.

'Buying influence'

On Capitol Hill Wednesday, Defense Department official James MacDougall said that since the shutdown of K2, the U.S. relied on Manas for logistical support to American and coalition forces in Afghanistan, but "that is not to say that other options do not exist."

At the same time, he stressed that relations with Kyrgyzstan were important.

"We are committed to an expeditious conclusion of these negotiations [over use of the airbase], which will require determination and flexibility by both sides."

MacDougall, the deputy assistant secretary of defense for Eurasia, was testifying before a House International Relations Committee subcommittee hearing on U.S. policy in Central Asia.

Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.), who chaired the hearing, said Central Asia presented the opportunity for the U.S. to secure its strategic interests "and dissuade other parties, such as Russia and China, and threats to national security, particularly Iran, from seeking to dominate the region."

She said the Manas dispute "raises a number of concerns and issues for U.S. foreign policy toward individual countries in the region; toward the region as a whole; and toward those foreign governments seeking to buy influence and exert greater control over Central Asia."

Shanghai Cooperation Organization officials said recently the bloc may soon open its doors to Iran as well as to two other countries currently accredited as observers, Pakistan and India.

Tehran welcomed the announcement as a way to win more support in its standoff with the West over its nuclear programs.

See also:
China Ready to Admit Iran to Asian Bloc (Apr. 19, 2006)
Central Asians Don't Need to Choose Between US, Russia, Rice Says (Oct. 12, 2005)

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