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Guest Post: Central Asian Setback For The U.S. Military
Submitted by John C.K. Daly of OilPrice.com
Guest Post: Central Asian Setback For The U.S. Military
The last few weeks have seen the U.S. Department of Defense suffer a number of setbacks in its effort to retain military influence overseas.
First came the startling announcement on 21 October, when President Obama announced that all American troops would be withdrawing from Iraq by 31 December under the terms of the Status of Forces Agreement. Accordingly, 39,000 U.S. soldiers will leave Iraq by the end of the year.
The deal breaker?
Washington’s demand for continued immunity for any remaining U.S. troops, and the Iraqi government of President Jalal Talibani couldn’t, or wouldn’t, deliver.
Now the handwriting’s apparently on the wall further east, as Kyrgyz president-elect Almazbek Atambaev firmly told the United States on 1 November to leave its Manas military air base outside the capital Bishkek when its lease expires in 2014.
Atambaev, the former Prime Minister, won Kyrgyzstan’s 30 October presidential election. Speaking to journalists in the wake of his victory Atambaev said, “When I was appointed Prime Minister last year, and again this year, I warned employees and leaders of the U.S. embassy and visiting representatives that, in 2014 and in line with our obligations, the United States should leave the base. We know that the United States very often participates in various military conflicts. It happened in Iraq, in Afghanistan and now there is a tense situation with Iran. I wouldn’t want any of these countries one day to make a return strike on the military base.”
If Atambaev carries through with his pronouncements, then assuming that the U.S. military effort in Afghanistan extends beyond 2014, the Pentagon’s efforts there will be impacted, as the Manas facility remains the sole U.S. military base in Central Asia outside of Afghanistan. While the Obama administration has promised to fully withdraw all troops from Afghanistan the same year that the lease for the Kyrgyzstan base expires, 2014, next year’s presidential elections could upend that scenario.
But, roiling beneath the surface, it is the Pentagon’s close relationship with the former presidential administrations of Askar Akayev and Kurmanbek Bakiev that stoked populist resentment against the Manas facility, especially the cozy fueling agreements, details of which are only slowly coming to light, but which apparently provided both presidencies with a massive “off the books” cash flow. Key to the Pentagon’s efforts were murky agreements with the fuel entity Mina/Red Star, which provided fuel for Manas so off the record that when it was awarded a no-bid renewal contract in 2009 worth $729 million over three years journalistic inquiries were met with a stony “national security” defense to deny particulars of the agreement.
The presidency of interim president Roza Otumbaeva raised the stakes in 14 January, when Kyrgyz government representatives presented U.S. officials and Mina Corp. executives with the proposal to pay $55 per ton of fuel in excise tax, or else volunteer to pay $100 per ton of fuel directly to the state budget. Under the terms of the existing basing agreement for Manas, the U.S. government and its contractors were exempted from all local taxes.
Washington’s response was immediate and predictable. U.S. embassy spokesman Christian Wright in Bishkek said the exemption from excise tax is “vital” to the U.S. military’s ability to operate at Manas, offering the legalese, “Under the bilateral 2009 Agreement for Cooperation, the acquisition of articles and services in the Kyrgyz Republic by or on behalf of the United States in implementing the agreement is not subject to any taxes, customs duties or similar charges in the territory of the Kyrgyz Republic. Such articles and services include all fuel provided to the Manas Transit Center, including fuel supplied by sub-contractors.
This is standard practice around the world. The U.S. government has similar agreements with many countries throughout the world for fuel to be delivered free of all duties and taxes. The exemption from fuel taxes is a vital part of our ability to carry out the mission of the Manas Transit Center.”
Having thrown the dice to continue to operate Manas on the cheap, the Pentagon seems to have lost significant position on the grand Central Asian geostrategic chessboard. What is most extraordinary is that this represents the third time around for Washington wrangling over Manas and its attendant costs. After Akaev was ousted by the March 2005 “Tulip Revolution,” Washington quickly refashioned similar agreement with the new administration of President Kurmanbek Bakiev, who was subsequently ousted by popular unrest in April 2010.
For the Kyrgyz, the Russians are the devil they know, the Chinese are the devils flush with yuan, and the Americans, two decades after the collapse of the USSR, are the tight-fisted guys all too willing to cut a deal corrupting the previous presidential administrations of Akaev and Bakiev while delivering lectures about democracy. To quote some of the acerbic critics of former U.S. President George W. Bush, “all hat, no cattle.”
The Pentagon has lost yet another opportunity to expand its global footprint, but to use an American baseball metaphor, “three strikes and you’re out.” It’s not as if anyone except the most tone-deaf in Washington couldn’t see it coming.
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This is by design. The US must fall in order for the world government to be ushered in. We have been a patsy in the bankers plan all along.
Oh, these guys again. Every few years, Kyrgyztan ups the rent for the base and services. So far, each time, they take it right to the edge, then a solution is found.
Economic diplomacy.
I'm inclined to agree... Uncle Gorrilla will just up the bribes (and threats) to whichever oligarch seems to be calling their bluff.
The question I haven't seen anyone ask:
What are all of these soldiers going to do once they return home? Many of them will apply to be police or other public first-responders, but there's only so many of those jobs available.
Unemployment is already through the roof (and higher than our .gov admits to). War is a way to keep the poor employed (not that I agree with it, but reality isn't always what one wants).
There will be more, dont worry.
Stuff them into the VA claims system and have them sit for a few months and years while they stew.
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.
~ George Orwell
#WWIII
the usa isn't just losing a few battles it is losing the war. the real prize in the region is india. whoever india decides to align with will be the new rulers of the world if india sides with russia and china or the usa maintains and even expands the empire if india chooses the usa. russia and china and the other -stan countries in the shanghai cooperation organization will ask india to join in its goal for a multipolar world in the next coupla months. pakistan is cozying up to china already and has given india most favored nation status. china has come to some agreement about the use of the yuan as a medium of exchange with the members of the asean alliance. all of the arab oil countries and persia have oil trade agreements with china with iran serving as the fulcrum for both russia and china to persuade them. turkey is closer to russia than the west now that israel has upset them. that means the usa controls parts of africa, israel and not much of iraq with the saudis between a rock and a hard place.
these are all the reasons why an attack on iran has to happen soon. russia is still relatively weak militarily. china is still weak and india won't get involved yet(all they need are good shoes if they would get involved.) control of iran by the usa changes the entire dynamics of the region putting the usa in the position of power from the mediteranean sea to the edge of china and russia, it must be done. it will be done.
I will go on record: strategic control of Iran by the US is IMPOSSIBLE. To even entertain such a notion show a serious lack of geopolitical, geographic and military knowledge, not to mention a serious lack of seriousness.
Also, that's the first time I've ever heard of India referred to as a prize. One whiffy prize if you ask Vlad.
It's true, they do smell, as does their entire subcontinent. What IS the Indian's (and the Sri Lankan's) obsessive attachment to filth and squalor? They just seem to relish these things and I wish I could fathom it. And don't tell me it's poverty. The Indian's love for human feces straddles all socio-economic borders.
The same India that recently called Christians "Bedbugs?"
I think not.
of course it is impossible. taking on iran will be the end of the usa empire but that will not stop the mission especially if the effort is the only viable means of maintaining the empire given that maintaining the empire is the paramount goal of the crazies in charge of foreign policy. empires have regularly met their end trying to do more than they can in the name of empire so it can't be dismissed just because it is obviously stupid.
I don't think the US---or anybody else for that matter---has much to fear in the way of a China-India alliance. I'd bet Syria and Israel would become sloppy lovers before those two became friends.
China is doing a lot to aid Pakistan, and has gained access to an Indian Ocean port at Gwadar. On the other side of India, China has a new port and pipeline facility going in on the Arakan Coast of Burma, and maintains listening posts on Burmese-controlled islands that spy on India. Add to that the fact that an increasingly water-starved, 1.21 billion Indian population is seeing the sources of its rivers dammed on the Tibetan side by China, and kissing cousins in not in the immediate future.
india will decide which wat to turn based upon it's interpretation of the future of the region and the world. russia and india are close. russia and china are close. india will ally with china through russia. think malta when the usa and britain allied with stalin. india, russia china and asia pacific represents a formidable foe with half the world's population and most of the land mass aginst tiny europe and isolated usa. who wins? the answer is obvious. the path for india is obvious. if india allies with europe and the usa it is an isolated outpost surrounded by adversaries.
USA touch Iran, A "series of explosions" go off in Bagram, Saudi Arabia.
Poof - goes the hyper-leveraged US economy (and this is where it is learned, like in Japan, that someone had gone and "leveraged" the strategic fuel reserves too).
China will say: "No tickee, no washee" and WallMart runs empty within days. The world will be enriched with thousands of videos about fatties killing each other for food on http://www.mentalzero.com/ and the cops killing fatties for fun.
Yup - Obummah should go for it.
Poof? Not here.
Have gas, have food, have colonial and civil war era tech to live by. Horse and buggy isnt all that bad. Maybe a bit of weaponry to protect one's own freedom.
What will go poof is Japan, Europe and Russia will collect enormous riches.
Besides you forgot the great Artic Circle and it's fabalous riches up there. If we do it right, we can discharge the middle east and not need a drop of thier oil.
I have everything but enough energy. Solar panels for emergency power and a small generator to supplement. Batteries and gasoline will go bad if new stock is not created. Land, timber, and wood gassification are the way to go. http://www.ag.auburn.edu/agrn/bio-truck/
the horse and buggy are the equipment most people have neglected to procure.
i agree with you. engaging iran is monumentally stupid but it will be done nevertheless. i would suggest putin is encouraging it and has already bought the vodka to celebrate it.
http://policyandmore.blogspot.com/2011/11/leaders-songs.html
While the last paragraph of the piece was a mixed metaphor trifecta - normally the problem for the tone deaf is that they did not hear it coming. Unless the military is now wearing prints and plaids together.
The "setback" came when our 3 letter agencies got Microsoft style bloated and decided they needed wars and complete armies to do what they used to do back in the 1950s with 100 guys in a secret team.
The whole way American foreign policy is conducted is dumb, bloated, overly violent and wasteful.
Actually it goes through 4 year election cycles while our enemies think 50-100-500 Plus years into the future.
This describes the migration to a new global reserve currency and the commodity price fixing that defines the macro environment. Oil traders in particular will continue to get bent as the process evolves.
The greenbackers are at long last printing their debt free notes but alas, they are still paying taxes! Doh?
The goldbackers are still trying to figure this out, waiting to become overnight billionaires. Waiting. Some Day, Right?