Azerbaijan Ponders Russian Caspian Defense Initiative

Last week's proposal by Russian Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov for a multinational Caspian Sea security collective could force Azerbaijan to choose between aligning its strategic interests with Russia or the US, local experts say.

Although few details are known about the collective, the so-called CASFOR proposal, described by Ivanov as "a real-time interaction naval group," appears to largely mirror the Caspian Guard surveillance initiative set up by the US and Azerbaijan in late 2003 to prevent trafficking in drugs, terrorists and weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the Caspian Sea basin.

Like the Caspian Guard, Russia's CASFOR, stated Ivanov during his January 24 visit to Baku, is intended "to prevent the threat of terrorism and WMD proliferation, [and] the illegal trafficking of weapons and drugs "in the Caspian Sea basin. The initiative would also "protect the economic interests" of the Sea's five littoral states, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Iran and Russia. The plan, which would require the approval of all five Caspian Sea countries, is expected to be part of the official agenda during Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit to Baku in late February.

Azerbaijan is already serving as a platform for surveillance activity by both Russia, which rents a radar station in Gabala region and the US, which has recently stationed two mobile radar stations in the north and south of the country to monitor the Caspian Sea. Ivanov was preceded in Baku on January 19 by General Charles Wald, deputy director for the US's European Command, which oversees the Caspian Guard initiative.

Nonetheless, political and military experts in Baku expressed surprise both that Azerbaijan appeared willing to consider Ivanov's proposal, and questioned the likelihood that both initiatives could exist simultaneously in Azerbaijan. The fact that Russia's initiative is even under consideration suggests that Azerbaijan's foreign policy may be undergoing key changes, they argued.

Some experts link the situation with increased regional tension connected with both the nuclear crisis in neighboring Iran and intensified talks with Armenia over the breakaway region of Nagorno Karabakh. Others attribute the potential co-existence of two Caspian Sea security initiatives to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who, they say, unlike his father, the late President Heydar Aliyev, has failed to balance Azerbaijani interests carefully between the US and Russia.

Eldar Namazov, a political analyst who served as an aide to President Heydar Aliyev, says that Ilham Aliyev's domestic policies have dictated "obvious" changes in Azerbaijan's foreign policy. Azerbaijan's previous foreign policy was a sort of "symbiosis of authoritarian domestic policy and friendship with Western democracies," he said, but now that the "authoritarian" elements have "become a big issue in the West," Azerbaijan is "forced to look for allies among strong countries which do not care about democracy in Azerbaijan." The result, he argued, will be stronger ties with Russia, aided by Moscow's support for the Aliyev administration after the disputed results of Azerbaijan's November 2005 parliamentary elections.

While Aliyev's intentions toward CASFOR are not known, Namazov suggests that negotiations on the initiative "are either a bluff or [mean that] the Azerbaijani government intends to tickle the West's vanity." The US has already started to transfer "some ships and radar stations to Azerbaijani naval forces," he noted, while the Russian proposal would first require resolution of the dispute between the five Caspian Sea states over their territorial rights in the Sea. "If the initiative will work, it means that Azerbaijan is keen to support Russia's efforts to challenge US interests in the region," Namazov said.

Rustam Mammadov, president of the Baku-based Caspian Sea: Partnership for the Future think-tank, also argues that two such initiatives in one sea would never work, but adds that a military pact between the five littoral states would help in obtaining a treaty on territorial rights in the Caspian Sea.

Mammadov, however, contends that the Russian proposal is intended to block outside countries from the Caspian Sea basin and reserve the area for Moscow's own influence. "[W]ho from the five littoral Caspian states possesses WMD, or do these five countries really have joint economic interests to secure, and where is the threat? Which army will be the strongest contributor to this group, when some littoral states do not even have a military navy?"

One Azerbaijani military expert also suspects that Russia intends the initiative to weaken American influence with the Aliyev administration, as well as to put a potential dampener on Western-run energy projects in the Sea by reconnoitering provisions for the defense of existing fields. "Russia justifies it with the necessity of a joint struggle against terrorism, smuggling, and WMD trafficking. However, history shows that Russia itself and Iran have been the main threats for the Caspian region," Janmirza Mirzoyev told Turan news agency on January 27.

CASFOR was not the only Ivanov proposal that presents a potential strategic choice for Azerbaijani foreign policymakers. Military training for Azerbaijani military staff in Russia was also discussed, but local military experts argue that the proposal is at variance with Azerbaijan's long-term plans to convert its military to North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) standards by 2007. Azerbaijan cannot divide its army between "NATO-oriented and Russian-style," argued Rustam Mammadov. The trainings would be "useless" for "the NATO-oriented and professional army that Azerbaijan declares it wants to create," concluded Namazov.

A recently formed bilateral commission on military and technical cooperation suggests that Azerbaijan may be willing to tolerate any such dichotomy, however. The commission, to be co-chaired by Alexander Fomin, deputy director of the Russian Federal Military Technical Partnership Service, will address the possible supply of Russian arms to Azerbaijan as well as the enlargement of military cooperation, Ivanov stated at a January 24 press conference in Baku.

Russia's only remaining military land installation in Azerbaijan, the Daryal Radio Location Station in the mountainous region of Gabala, was the site of a January 25 visit by Ivanov and Azerbaijani Defense Minister Safar Abiyev. Built during Soviet times and now rented by Russia, the station allows Moscow to track ballistic missiles launched from the Persian Gulf area. The installation is located some 360 kilometers from a radar station to be modernized by the US on the Iranian border at Lerik, and about 130 kilometers from the second such station, at Agstafa on the border with Georgia.

The two ministers discussed options for supplying Daryal by railroad and interferences with the station's frequencies that Ivanov claimed were caused by "different transmitting stations" in the neighborhood. A frequency expert, speaking anonymously, told EurasiaNet that military facilities were the likely cause. Ivanov, speaking to reporters, gave no indication if Azerbaijani, Iranian or American radar stations were to blame, but affirmed that a plan exists for rectifying the problem.

Janmirza Mirzoyev believes that Ivanov's visit served not only to sell arms to Azerbaijan, but to secure a transport corridor for arms deliveries to Iran via Azerbaijan. "Azerbaijan's military budget was increased up to $600 millions in 2006. It attracted Russia's attention. So far, Azerbaijan has bought weapons in third countries – Ukraine, China, Eastern Europe. The Commission on Military Technical Cooperation is intended to change this," Mirzoyev told Turan.

A secure land route would allow Russia to send arms to Iran without attracting the notice of the US radar stations, which monitor the Caspian Sea, he said. "The increased tension between US and Iran will increase the volume of military cargoes [sent] from Russia to Iran. On one hand, this situation will increase importance of the sea route through the Caspian Sea. However, the American radars will pinpoint any movement in Iran's direction. That is why Russia will likely be keen to use land transport through Azerbaijan," he said.

Commented expert Ilgar Mammadov: "It is a difficult time for diplomacy."