US Military Presence Still Makes Sense
Friday, 8 June, 2007
US Military Presence Still Makes Sense
Friday, 8 June, 2007
During a visit to Kyrgyzstan on June 5, US Secretary of Defence Robert Gates said the bilateral agreement underpinning the Ganci base, located at Manas international airport outside Bishkek, was in keeping with the arrangements that normally apply elsewhere in the world.
The dispute over the US presence escalated after an incident in December 2006, when an American serviceman shot dead a citizen of Kyrgyzstan working at the base
In late May, five parliamentary committees recommended that Kyrgyzstan should denounce the agreement with the US.
Kyrgyzstan has said it will not allow possible military operations against Iran to be launched from Manas.
Last week, several political movements took part in a protest outside the US embassy in Bishkek, calling for the base to be closed and the serviceman who shot the airport worker to be punished.
Political scientist Toktogul Kakchekeev argues that the US military presence in Kyrgyzstan has not helped to improve the situation in Afghanistan, and the base has not proved justifiable.
“It would make sense to find other ways of conducting military operations in Afghanistan,” he said.
Former parliamentarian Begish Amatov adds that the American military base could become a target for terrorist attacks, and pose a danger to the country’s residents.
However, other NBCentralAsia experts say that the advantages of having an American presence outweigh the risks.
Political scientist Mars Sariev says asking the Americans to leave at this point would be short-sighted given the deteriorating situation in Afghanistan.
“The presence of the base is in keeping with our national interests and could be an instrument for repelling various kinds of expansionism by other states,” he said.
Sariev believes the recent debate about closing Ganci is connected with a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, SCO, which will be held in Bishkek this August. After an SCO summit in 2005, President Kurmanbek Bakiev raised the issue of closing the base. That meeting called for a deadline for a US withdrawal from Central Asia.
However, the Kyrgyz and US subsequently agreed new terms for the Americans to stay on. According to deputy finance minister Kanat Asangulov, a revised agreement signed in 2006 stipulates that the US will pay Kyrgyzstan fees of 17.4 million US dollars a year. In addition, the US Congress has allocated 150 million dollars to Kyrgyzstan this year for a range of assistance programmes.
Political scientist Marat Kazakbaev says that as the situation in Afghanistan remains unstable, Kyrgyzstan cannot, as a member of the United Nations, demand that the airbase should close. Moreover, the terms of the Kyrgyz-American agreement bring economic benefits.
“If the Americans pay 130-140 million US dollars a year to keep the air base, Kyrgyzstan should not look at what other countries want, but act in its own national interests,” said Kazakbaev.
Political scientist Valentin Bogatyrev says the base should be used to expand cooperation with the US rather than creating difficulties in the bilateral relationship.
“Kyrgyzstan should broaden its cooperation with the US. The Ganci base serves as a kind of constraint, for example, on China and other countries with geopolitical interests in Central Asia,” Bogatyrev said.
(News Briefing Central Asia draws comment and analysis from a broad range of political observers across the region.)
