UP FROM THE MONTREUX: UBMARINES FOR GEORGIA,AND NATO’S FUTURE IN THE BLACK SEA
Abstract
On October 2006, Russia’s Black Sea fleet conducted live fire maneuvers off Georgia’s Black Sea coast. According to Georgian officials, Russian ships were as close as 16 miles from the Georgia’s coastline.1 The live fire exercise disrupted civilian shipping in the area, as the Russian military vessels blocked the Georgian ports Poti, Supsa, and Batumi. The Russian government intended this exercise as a hostile act, as they declined to inform the Georgian counterparts of the movements of their vessels, and deliberately misinformed the public of the nature of the exercise. Defense Minister Ivanov labeled it part of Black Sea Harmony (BSH), a joint exercise with Turkey that is supposed to be conducted after advance planning. Ankara, however, rejected this claim, and expressed its surprise at such claims.2
The October live fire exercise followed the Tbilisi-Moscow spy row and signaled sharp deterioration of Russo-Georgian relations. After imposing comprehensive economic embargo on Georgia, and organizing mass deportations of ethnic Georgians from Russia, the Kremlin sharply highlighted vulnerabilities in Georgia’s defenses—its Black Sea coast has been virtually undefended from a potential sea invasion since the breakup of the Soviet Union. The small Georgian navy and coast guard cannot do much to deter such hostile acts let alone repel a full-scale invasion.
The Black Sea remains a sensitive area not only for the Russian Federation, and Georgia, but for the other riparian states as well. Russia would like to remain the only dominant naval power in the area as Moscow desperately tries to halt the
extension of NATO’s naval Operation Active Endeavor (OAE) from the Mediterranean into the Black Sea. The Russians see the Black Sea as their sea and would like to keep this perception alive. For that end the Kremlin has applied considerable pressure on both Georgia and Ukraine. For the latter it has been the question of Crimea, and the rights to the naval base in Sevastopol, which is due to expire in 2017.3 Abkhazia remains the sword of Damocles for the former.
Georgia should assert its sovereignty and independence by establishing a noticeable military presence in the Black Sea. It needs a deterrent for potential invasion and intimidation by a hostile power. With the Black Sea coast exposed, Georgian territorial waters poorly defended, and its exclusive economic zone poorly monitored, Tbilisi’s chances of re-uniting the country and establishing itself as a viable political entity remain small. Even if the country’s current problems could be solved, without a strong naval presence Georgia would remain very vulnerable for future encroachments on its sovereignty
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References
See: V. Socor, “Tbilisi Claims Russian Navy Hold-ing Exercises off Georgian Coast,” Eurasia Daily Monitor,Vol. III, Issue 194, 20 October, 2006, The Jamestown Foun-dation, available at [http://www.jamestown.org/publications_details.php volume_id=414&issue_id=3895&article_id=2371563].
See: V. Socor, “Tbilisi Claims Russian Navy Hold-ing Exercises off Georgian Coast,” Eurasia Daily Monitor,Vol. III, Issue 194, 20 October, 2006, The Jamestown Foun-dation, available at [http://www.jamestown.org/publications_
etails.php?volume_id=414&issue_id=3895&article_id=2371563].
From its early days, the current Ukrainian adminis-tration indicated unwillingness to extend the current term beyond 2017 (see: A. Chernikov, O. Berezintseva, “Naval Retreat: Ukraine Intends to Get Rid of the Black Sea Fleet,”Kommersant daily, 18 April, 2005, available at [http://
ww.kommersant.com/p570863/r_1/Naval_Retreat/]).
See: S. Zimmerman, Submarine Technology for the 21st Century, Trafford Publishing, 2006, p. 35.
See: N. Friedman, Submarine Design and Development, Naval Institute Press, 1984, p. 81.
The Canadian Submarine Acquisition Project, A Report of the Standing Committee on National Defense, Issue No. 41, The House of Commons, Ottawa, Canada, August 1988, p. 33.
Back then Georgia was part of the Soviet Union, and the Soviet army used Georgian sea coast for practice purposes only. One of the authors of this article was part of such exercises in the 1980s.
For comparison, Israel is both a high stakes chip and a difficult ally to abandon, if the U.S. were to consider trad-ing it. Washington will not abandon Israel for not only ideological, but also for very pragmatic reasons—the Arabs, if they were to attack Israel left without U.S. support, would sustain so much damage from powerful Israeli armed forces that the U.S. would not gain anything from this potential trade. A full scale and long war in the Middle East would produce high costs and serious consequences for any U.S. Administration, both domestically and internationally. On the other hand, if Washington were to abandon Georgia, it could gain much from such a potential trade with Russia, and as Georgia would not be able to put up a substantial resistance to Russia, in such a scenario the costs of abandoning an ally will be minimal.
K. Booth, Navies and Foreign Policy, Holmes & Meier Publishers, Inc., New York, 1979, p. 47.
See: N. Friedman, op. cit., p. 158.
Commodore D. Rouleau, Keynote Speech to the 23rd Annual Political Studies Students’ Conference, The University of Manitoba, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, 31 January, 2007.
Interview with Commodore Rouleau, Winnipeg, MB, 31 January, 2007.
See: S. Zimmerman, op. cit., p. 3.
See: R.G. Williscroft, “Is the Nuclear Submarine Really Invincible?” available at [http://www.sftt.org/cgi_bin/cs-News/csNews.cgi?database=DefenseWatch%202004.db&command=viewone&op=t&id=331&rnd=954.9177124505652].
See: Ibidem.
See: The Canadian Submarine Acquisition Project, pp. 3-4.
See: E.C. Whitman, “AIP Technology Creates a New Undersea Threat,” available at [http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/
avpalib/cno/n87/usw/issue_13/propulsion.htm].
See: D. Walsh, “The AIP Alternative: An Idea Whose Time Has Come?” available at [http://www.navyleague.org/
eapower/aip_alternative.htm].
See: N. Friedman, op. cit., p. 131.
See: D. Walsh, op. cit.
For more on the newest efforts to improve non-nuclear submarines see Zimmerman’s Submarine Technology for the 21st Century.
Zimmerman offers extensive discussion of the future of AIP and diesel-electric submarines in his Submarine Tech-nology for the 21st Century.
Interview, 31 January, 2006.
See: “Montreux Convention,” Naval Treaty Implementation Program, available at [http://www.ntip.navy.mil/
ontreux_convention.shtml].
For more comprehensive discussion of the Montreux Convention, and its evolution see an historical review by Professor John Daly, “Oil, Guns, and Empire: Russia, Turkey, Caspian “New Oil” and the Montreaux Convention,” avail-able at [http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/usazerb/325.htm].
See: bidem.
See: A. Cohen, C. Irwin, “U.S. Strategy in the Black Sea Region,” Backgrounder # 1990, The Heritage Founda-tion, available at [http://www.heritage.org/Research/RussiaandEurasia/bg1990.cfm].
Ibidem.
F. Hill, O. Taspinar, “Turkey and Russia: Axis of the Excluded?” Survival, Vol. 48, No. 1, Spring 2006, availa-ble at [http://www.brookings.edu/views/articles/fhill/2006_survival.pdf].
B.P. Jackson, “The ‘Soft War’ for Europe’s East: Russia and the West Square Off,” Policy Review, Hoover Insti-tution, available at [http://www.hoover.org/publications/policyreview/3202956.html].
Ibidem.
Before the June 2007 G8 summit in Germany, President Putin insisted that U.S. ABM policies in Europe would trigger a new arms race (see: “Deistvitel’no razvorachivaetsia gonka vooruzheniy: Vladimir Putin otvetil zhurnalistam i Zapadu,” Vremia Novostei, 5 June, 2007, available at [http://www.vremya.ru/2007/96/5/179687.html]).
See: “6th Fleet Competes Black Sea Port Visits,” Office of the Special Assistant for Military Deployments, avail-able at [deploymentlink.osd.mil/news/aug01/news_82901_001.shtml].
See: “Intelligence Brief: U.S. Military Bases in the Black Sea Region,” PINR, 19 November, 2005, available at [http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=401&language_id=1].
See: J. Dorschner, “Black Sea Security—Taking the Helm,” Jane’s Defense Weekly, 18 May, 2007, available at [http://www.janes.com/security/international_security/news/jdw/jdw070518_1_n.shtml].
See: M. Vignanskiy, “Gruzia uzhe chlen NATO,” Vremia Novostei, 5 June, 2007, p. 5.
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