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U.S. Interests in Central Asia and the Challenges to Them (2007)

Central Asia is an area whose importance to the United States is growing. Yet it also is an imperiled region because it faces numerous constant challenges stemming from pervasive internal misrule and the continuing interest of terrorist organizations in overthrowing local regimes. Its significance is strategic due to its proximity to the war on terrorism and major actors like Russia, China, Iran, Pakistan, and India. Only secondarily is it important by virtue of its energy. Another key interest of U.S. policy is the promotion of democratic reforms and of open societies throughout the region. Today, American interests in Central Asia are under challenge in three definable areas: (1) Russia and China have launched a coordinated campaign to oust the U.S. strategic presence from Central Asia; (2) they and local governments, who have good reason to fear democratic reforms, have waged an ideological campaign, accusing the United States of organizing color revolutions to oust those regimes from power; and (3) the Taliban has revived its offensive in Afghanistan. The purpose behind Moscow and Beijing's efforts is to preserve the status quo and to further erode America's capability for action in the area. Thus, America faces simultaneous and overlapping military, political, economic, and ideological challenges to its interests there. These challenges succeeded to a point in 2005 because of a lack of policy coordination at home and diminishing policy interest in the region. Consequently, any successful U.S. strategy must be holistic -- it must embrace and utilize all the instruments of power. The recommendations for policy makers that are contained in this monograph emphasize the need to work with allies both within the area and outside it, such as India, the European Union, and NATO. This also means working with all the Central Asian regional governments, no matter how unsavory their conduct is or has been.

Support for continuing operations in Afghanistan and for antiterrorism has been the driving force for the strengthening of American security cooperation with Central Asia. This monograph 1) explores the military rationale for U.S. security interests in Central Asia; 2) examines the impact of the Iraq war on the sustainability of U.S. forward basing in Central Asia; 3) evaluates the broader consequences for U.S. foreign policy of an American military presence in Central Asia; and 4) assesses the implications for the U.S. Army. The U.S.-led war in Iraq has introduced new complications into security cooperation between the United States and Central Asia and revealed inconsistencies in the U.S. approach to regional security. The increased U.S. security focus on the region has led other regional powers--especially Russia, China, and India--to compete for influence there more overtly, and a continued American military presence is likely to create tensions in Russian-American relations in particular. Central Asian leaders concerned about the implications of the U.S. interest in regime change for their own rule, now have an added incentive to overstate terrorist threats facing their countries, while justifying the persecution of any political opposition and peaceful religious activity.

The current U.S. military presence in Central Asia is something of an historical accident. The question is whether or not it is also an anomaly. For the first ten years after Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan became independent, sovereign states, the United States saw its interests in the region as limited. What engagement there was demanded little from the U.S. military, and there seemed to be no particular reason that this should change in the future. The region was remote, landlocked, and of little strategic consequence. Although Central Asia's energy resources and proximity to Russia, Iran, and China required some U.S. attention, and the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) infrastructure remaining after the Soviet Union's breakup made for an even more compelling concern, the region was far from critical to the United States. Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) called on U.S. forces to deploy to and fight in a part of the world where few planners had ever envisioned sending them. Central Asia suddenly became valuable real estate to the United States as it decided how to deploy and maintain forces for that operation. In fall 2001, U.S. forces deployed to Central Asia and set up bases and operations. At the same time, the U.S. government stepped up its cooperation programs with the host countries. This document argues that although the United States has significant interests in Central Asia and must maintain relationships with the states of the region, the military component of this effort, while essential, is comparatively small. Operation Enduring Freedom creates real requirements, but these will end when that operation does (or as it draws down). Even if the military role is small, however, the evolution of U.S. security policy toward Central Asia will be a critical component of the U.S. national security strategy for reasons beyond OEF itself.

As Secretary of State Colin Powell told the House International Relations Committee in February 2002, the United States will have a continuing interest and presence in Central Asia of a kind that we could not have dreamed of before. After providing background on the development of U.S. security interests in Central Asia, this monograph examines post-9/1 1 trends in U.S. policy and military engagement. In the 1990s the United States initiated military engagement with Central Asia to support the region's integration with western political-military institutions, as well as to protect the sovereignty and independence of these states, assist them to improve their border security against transnational threats, encourage them to adopt market-oriented reform and democratization, and ensure access to energy resources in the region. U.S. military cooperation expanded rapidly with Central Asian states in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 due to the framework of relations that had been built piecemeal in the 1990s. For the first time the United States acquired temporary basing in this region in response to a changing security environment, as Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan became frontline states in Operation ENDURING FREEDOM. Anti-terrorism became the central focus of U.S. policy in the region, although other goals still remain important.

Growing U.S. Security Interests in Central Asia (2002)

Strategic Consequences of the Iraq War - U.S. Security Interests in Central Asia Reassessed (2004)