U.S. VS RUSSIA: ATTEMPTED COOPERATION WITH TURKMENISTAN IN THE SECURITY AND DEFENSE SPHERE
Abstract
In the wake of 9/11 Washington stepped up its activities in Turkmenistan which, together with Tajikistan and Kazakhstan, opened its air space for the U.S. and coalition humanitarian flights to Afghanistan. American experts described it as “the only one of the five Central Asian states that is not officially a member of the Enduring Freedom coalition.”1
In 2002 the two countries signed an agreement on the use of Turkmenian air space by American military-transport aviation and the international civilian airport of Ashghabad for fuelling aircraft moving humanitarian cargoes to Afghanistan. This brings from $8 to 12 million into the Turkmenian budget every year.
Meanwhile, the Americans initiated and actively promoted talks on the use of other airfields: one of the three military airbases not far from Nebit-Dag, Ak-Tepe, and Mary-2.2 The latter was selected as the largest of the three able to receive two or more wings of strategic aviation.
This could be described as contradicting the country’s neutrality yet the agreement, which never mentioned the offending term “military base,” would have allowed President Niyazov to continue saying that Turkmenistan did not have foreign military bases on its territory.
The rumors enthusiastically discussed by the Russian press about a possible American base in Mary-2 caused a bout of anger from the Foreign Ministry of Turkmenistan, which resolutely refuted them in its statement of 7 September, 2005 as “pure invention that has nothing in common with reality.”3
The American experts were convinced that “in the context of future planning, preparing for a post-Niyazov regime should be given greater thought, as access to Mary would be a high pay-off investment that would impact Persian Gulf and Central/South Asian contingency planning.”4
In September 2005 it became even clearer that the Americans needed the base: it was completely reconstructed by UAE construction companies and accepted by a commission of the U.S. Defense Ministry. The Arabs first completely restored the Kushka airfield. However, the talks on the Mary-2 military base reached a dead end—there was no agreement on a permanent American presence. Between 2006 and 2008 the Department of State contributed about $1.4-1.7 million a year to Turkmenistan’s security sphere.5 Uzbekistan received more or less the same aid or even less while Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, when there was an American military base on their territory, received several times more.
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References
See: J.K. Davis, M.J. Sweeney, Central Asia in U.S. Strategy and Operational Planning: Where Do We Go From
Here? IFPA, Washington DC, 2004, p. 53, available at [http://www.ifpa.org/pdf/S-R-Central-Asia-72dpi.pdf].
See: I. Kurbanov, “Amerikanskoe voennoe prisutstvie v Turkmenistane, 13 sentiabria 2005,” available at [http://
www.centrasia.ru/newsA.php4?st=1126591680].
See: “O telefonnom razgovore ministra inostrannykh del Rossii s ministrom inostrannykh del Turkmenistana. Gundogar. Za demokratiiu i prava cheloveka v Turkmenistane, 8 sentiabria 2005,” available at [http://www.gundogar.org/].
See: J.K. Davis, M.J. Sweeney, op. cit.
See: site of the U.S. Department of State [http://www.state.gov/p/sca/rls/index.htm].
For comparison: America paid twice as much in Tajikistan and 5 times more in Kyrgyzstan (see the site of the U.S.
epartment of State [http://www.state.gov/p/sca/rls/index.htm].
These structures received dozens of UAZ cars, night vision devices, binoculars, search sets, water carriers, GPS devices, Motorola radio equipment, luggage-checking equipment, radiation detection pagers, test sets for identifying drugs and precursors, and a gas chromatograph. In 2006 the Agreement on Cooperation in the Security and Law and Order Sphere received an Appendix under which the government of Turkmenistan would get $450 thousand more to pay for combating drug trafficking, improving court expertise, fortifying the sea border, and providing English courses (see:
ovosti Posolstva Soedinennykh Shtatov v Turkmenistane, available at [http://russian.ashgabat.usembassy.gov/
rchive.html]).
See: “Pomoshchnik gosudarstvennogo sekretaria SShA Daniel Sullivan naneset vizit v Turkmenistan i primet ucha-stie na tseremonii otkrytiia kontrolno-propusknogo punkta ‘Imamnazar,’” Novosti Posolstva, OOC No. 190, 10.08.2007,available at [http://russian.ashgabat.usembassy.gov/archive.html].
In 2008 the sum was limited to $7.1 million.
They include the agreements on cooperation between the Main Intelligence Directorate of the RF General Staff and the Intelligence Directorate of the Defense Ministry of Turkmenistan; on training the military of Turkmenistan in Russia’s educational establishments, on joint airfield and technical support to aircraft, and on military-technical cooperation. The two countries are widely cooperating in the use of military infrastructure.
See: “Otvety ofitsialnogo predstavitelia MID Rossii A.V. Yakovenko na voprosy RIA ‘Novosti’ po rossiisko-turk-menskim otnosheniiam, 10 aprelia 2003,” available at [www.mid.ru].
See: Soglashenie mezhdu Rossiei i Turkmenistanom o sotrudnichestve v oblasti bezopasnosti, Moskva, Kreml,10 aprelia 2003.
Ibidem.
See the site of the Embassy of the Russian Federation in Turkmenistan [http://www.turkmenistan.mid.ru/rus-tm.html].
See: M. Vignanskiy, “Gruziia prodala Turkmenii modernizirovanny shturmovik SU-25,” Vremia novostei, 27 Octo-ber, 2007.
According to KISI under the president of the Republic of Kazakhstan.
See: V. Koziulin, “Gosudarstva Tsentralnoi Azii: razvitie vooruzhennykh sil i perspektivy voenno-tekhnichesko-go sotrudnichestva s Rossiei,” Indeks bezopasnosti, No. 3 (83), 2007.
From the speech of R. Simmons, NATO special representative for the Caucasus and Central Asia, during his visit to Ashghabad in May 2008 (see: “V ob’iatiakh NATO,” Voenno-promyshlennyi kurier, No. 20, 21-27 May, 2008).
See: “Turkmenia rasshiriaet sotrudnichestvo s NATO,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, 13 May, 2008.
He discussed this idea with President George W. Bush at the Bucharest summit.
“Der Spiegel: Turkmenia peredast NATO voenno-vozdushnuiu bazu v Mary?” Fergana.Ru, 20 May, 2008.
Admiral W. Fallon, Commander of the U.S. Central Command, visited Turkmenistan in June 2007 and January 2008. Before that Commander of the U.S. Central Command General John P. Abizaid has come to the republic twice (in July 2004 and August 2005). The deputy commander visited Turkmenistan in September 2004.
“Turkmenskiy voennyi muskul,” Voenno-promyshlennyi kurier, No. 28 (244), 16-22 July, 2008.
The Ministry of the Interior of Turkmenistan has already received about 150 new Hunter high mobility vehicles from the Ulianovsk Car Plant totaling $1.5 million. See: V. Paramonov, O. Stolpovskiy, “Dvustoronnee sotrudnichestvo Rossii i Turkmenistana v voennoi sfere,” site of the Institute of Strategic Studies and Forecasts at the KRSU, Bishkek [http://
ww.easttime.ru/analitic/1/2/541.html].
“Turkmenskiy voennyi muskul,” Voenno-promyshlennyi kurier, No. 28 (244), 16-22 July, 2008.
Ibidem.
Ibidem.
See: M. Berdyev, “Turkmenskiy bronepoezd,” Oasis, No. 16 (84), August 2008.
Ididem.
RusEnergy.com refers to its own sources, which said that everything started as provocations. Armed people rode around in cars, approached police posts, and, frightening policemen and police patrols, demanded a meeting with the min-ister of the interior. One of the posts was fired at, a policeman was killed. On Friday some of the terrorists captured a drinking water plant in the north of Ashghabad not far from the international airport and the Karakum canal (an extensive area of Khitrovka) and took about 50 hostages. The extremists demanded that the president, the medjlis, and Khalk Maslakhaty (the higher representative structure) declare the formation of an Islamic State of Turkmenistan at the sitting of the Popular As-sembly scheduled for 26 September that had been expected to adopt a new Constitution describing Turkmenistan as a sec-ular state. See: B. Seidakhmetova, “Tanki v Ashkhabade,” Novoe pokolenie (Kazakhstan), 19 September, 2008.
See: S. Arbenin, “Turkmenistan: V kapkane neitraliteta,” Ferghana.ru, 24 September, 2008.
See: “Turkmenistan prismatrivaetsia k ODKB,” Nezavisimaia gazeta, 19 December, 2008.
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