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EURASIA INSIGHT

US AID BUDGET TO EURASIA: A MONUMENT TO "INTER-AGENCY PETTINESS"
Joshua Kucera 2/12/08

Aid for almost every country in the former Soviet Union will be falling in 2008, under the current foreign affairs budget released by the US State Department. Much of the planned US assistance will go toward helping independent-minded states in the region resist Russian efforts to reassert its dominance in the Caspian Basin and elsewhere. Even so, some Washington experts lament the drop-off in aid, and describe the dwindling budgets in recent years as "monuments to weak analysis, inter-agency pettiness, and trite bureaucratic formuli."

Overall, the budget for the Freedom Support Act, which provides aid to former Soviet states, is $346 million for fiscal year 2009, which actually starts on October 1, 2008. That is down from $396 million in fiscal 2008, and $452 million the year before that.

The aid is heavily weighted toward countries with a pro-Western orientation like Georgia and Ukraine, and it is designed "to promote economic and energy independence, help diversify export markets, and improve democratic governance in the face of increasing Russian economic and political pressure," according to documents that the State Department released to justify the budget.

Aid to Turkmenistan has been increased, though modestly. Freedom Support Act aid, to support education, economic reform, civil society reform and health care, went up from $5.4 million to $8 million. Turkmenistan would also get a small amount of military aid � $150,000 for weapons and equipment � after being denied such aid last year.

"A new focus for assistance is Turkmenistan, where the funding request is increased as the United States seeks to capitalize on new opportunities to promote economic, democratic, and social sector reform following the death of President Saparmurat Niyazov in December 2006," the State Department documents said. US officials are desperately trying to woo Ashgabat into participating in the Trans-Caspian Pipeline, an energy export route that could critically weaken the Kremlin’s control of the oil & gas glow out of Central Asia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

The budget for assistance to Armenia is $24 million, down from $58 million disbursed in fiscal year 2008. Aid to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan is down, as well.

Washington analysts bemoaned the meager budgets devoted to the Caucasus and Central Asia. "Central Asia and the Caucasus present largely Muslim societies that look positively to the West, maintain secular governments, and are open to modern thinking. Any sensible appreciation of the United States’ interests would lead to their being given generous support. Instead, Washington itself is forcibly weaning them from their US ties, using the budget as its tool," said S. Frederick Starr, chairman of the Central Asia�Caucasus Institute in Washington.

"Both the current and proposed budgets for Central Asia and the Caucasus are monuments to weak analysis, inter-agency pettiness, and trite bureaucratic formuli," Starr continued. "It is hard to imagine a wider gulf between the US’s real interests and its budgetary actions."

Just a few years ago, the Bush administration cast itself as a champion of global democratization. But now such rhetoric has all but disappeared. "If Central Asia is among the �most authoritarian regions,’" Starr asked, "why are we not investing more heavily in programs to make it less so? And why are we paying prosperous and authoritarian Russia for ineffective �conflict mitigation’ in the North Caucasus when Russia itself is fomenting and abetting conflict in the South Caucasus?"

Military aid to Eurasian countries rose slightly. Foreign Military Financing, which funds weapons and equipment purchases, would go up to $20.7 million from $17.5 million last year, driven mainly by increases in Kazakhstan and Georgia. Under the budget proposal, Georgia would get more than half of the entire region’s military aid, $11 million.

Funds for International Military Education and Training in the states of the Caucasus and Central Asia would drop slightly, from $4.9 million last year to $4.7 million. Azerbaijan would get $900,000 as opposed to $300,000 for Armenia, both amounts similar to what was disbursed last year. Armenian lobbying groups seized upon the imbalance, despite the modest amounts.

"Given Azerbaijan’s increased war rhetoric, I have strong concerns with giving any military aid to Azerbaijan, and we definitely should not give them more than we’re providing Armenia," said Joe Knollenberg, a Republican from Michigan and the head of the Congressional Armenia Caucus, in a statement released by the Armenian Assembly of America.

Meanwhile, many of the states surrounding the Caucasus and Central Asia stand to receive aid amounts that dwarf those to be given to the former Soviet states. Afghanistan, for example, is to get $250 million in counter-narcotics money, down slightly from last year, and $707 million to for democratization and economic development. Meanwhile, military aid to Pakistan is due to reach $300 million, the same level it has been at for several years, and Islamabad would also get $453 million for democratization and economic development.

Washington also intends to spend $65 million to "support the aspirations of the Iranian people for a democratic and open society by promoting civil society, civic participation, media freedom and freedom of information." It would also launch broadcasts of the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty Azerbaijani service into Iran, where at least a quarter of the population is ethnically Azeri.

"What’s troubling, but not unexpected, is this pull to crisis situations like Afghanistan and Pakistan means that attention to long-term goals to places like Central Asia is jeopardized. That’s the thing that really stood out to me," said Sean Roberts, the Central Asian Affairs Fellow at Georgetown University. "It’s kind of unfortunate that the short term trumps the long-term perspective. It’s good that they’re planning to have some extra money allotted to Turkmenistan, but it’s not that significant when you look at the grand scheme of things."

Editor�s Note: Joshua Kucera is a Washington, DC,-based freelance writer who specializes in security issues in Central Asia, the Caucasus and the Middle East.

The Central Eurasia Project aims, through its website, meetings, papers, and grants, to foster a more informed debate about the social, political and economic developments of the Caucasus and Central Asia. It is a program of the Open Society Institute-New York. The Open Society Institute-New York is a private operating and grantmaking foundation that promotes the development of open societies around the world by supporting educational, social, and legal reform, and by encouraging alternative approaches to complex and controversial issues.

The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily represent the position of the Open Society Institute and are the sole responsibility of the author or authors.