Russia and China Demand that US Set Date for Central Asia Pullout

[onedomino]

Call for US Date to Leave Central Asia
Tom Parfitt in Moscow
Wednesday July 6, 2005
The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1522174,00.html

A regional security alliance dominated by Russia and China yesterday demanded the US and its allies in the "war on terror" name a date for the removal of their military bases from central Asia.

In a sign of growing tension after the massacre in Andijan, Uzbekistan, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) issued a terse request for Washington to name a deadline for withdrawal of troops and hardware at a meeting in the Kazakh capital, Astana, yesterday.

Ties with the central Asian regimes have soured since troops in eastern Uzbekistan fired on a protest in May, apparently killing hundreds of civilians.

Despite outrage from Nato, the EU and the US, Moscow and Beijing backed the Uzbek president, Islam Karimov, who claimed only Islamic militants and police were killed.

The SCO also includes Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan, with India, Iran and Pakistan soon to join as observers.

Washington struck deals after the 9/11 attacks to use bases in Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan for refuelling aircraft and ferrying troops to fight the Taliban in Afghanistan.

But ties with Washington loosened last month when Uzbekistan retaliated against US calls for an independent inquiry of the killings by curbing flying rights from a base near Tashkent, the Uzbek capital.

Yesterday the SCO claimed its request was because the active military phase of the anti-terror campaign had neared completion.

Sergei Prikhodko, a foreign policy adviser to the Russian president, Vladimir Putin, said the declaration was not intended as an ultimatum. But he stressed the region should beat its own path because "outside forces" were seeking to stir up trouble.

Russia sees the area as its strategic backyard and China is nervous about the presence of US troops on its borders.

Both Moscow and Beijing have their own energy interests in the region, and have shown signs recently of forging a new anti-US alliance.

Sanobar Shermatova, an Uzbek political analyst based in Moscow, said: "There is a growing feeling in central Asia that the Americans are only a source of instability." (er, source of democracy and the Russians and Chinese cannot have that!)

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[CSM]

And so it goes.....

I can understand how China and Russia would see the US as a source of instability....Just as those two countries are a source of instability for the US.

 

[Annie]

And so it goes.....

I can understand how China and Russia would see the US as a source of instability....Just as those two countries are a source of instability for the US.

It's the spheres of influence thing again. China and Russia will only get along as long as we are the 'meat in their sandwhich'. With that said, I don't think we'll be pulling out of that region all that soon. Russia has been weirding out and China acting very aggressive, soooo.

 

[onedomino]

Russia and China do not want American outposts, especially military bases, to undermine their totalitarian efforts to control and suppress populations in Central Asia, South-Central Russia, and Western China. Moreover, until recently, the Chinese benefited from the fact that the US could not readily pressure it from the West. Previously, any sustained American military response to Chinese aggression against Taiwan had to come from the Pacific or NE Asia. Now China has to worry about American military pressure from bases the West; especially Afghanistan and Kyrgyzstan.

 

[freeandfun1]

Well, they both can ally themselves with the Democratic party and then they all three should be added to the axis of evil list.... (ok, little harsh, but fun anyway!)

 

[dmp]

Fuck em.

 

[onedomino]

For whose impression would these exercises be conducted?

China and Russia to Hold Joint Military Exercises Aug 18-26
By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, BEIJING

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?F=957315&C=navwar

China and Russia will hold rare joint military exercises involving up to 8,000 service personnel from August 18-26, a state newspaper reported July 6.

”Peace Mission 2005” will involve China’s army, navy and air force, while Russia will dispatch its navy and air force, said the Global Times, citing Russian press reports.

China’s Defense Ministry has not announced the exercises. But Russian President Vladimir Putin said June 30 during a meeting with his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao that joint exercises would take place later this year.

”Cooperation in the military-technical sphere and cooperation in the purely military sphere is in the process of expanding,” Putin said.

”This year we expect for the first time for many years to have joint military exercises.”

According to the Global Times, which is run by the official People’s Daily, final arrangements for the exercises were agreed on July 1, when Major General Qian Lihua of China’s Defense Ministry visited Moscow.

The paper said the joint maneuvers will begin on August 18-19, when the two sides hold military and political consultations at chief of staff level near Russia’s Pacific Fleet headquarters at Vladivostok.

From August 20-22 the exercises will move to the Yellow Sea and the area off the Jiaodong peninsula in eastern China’s Shandong province, it said. (350 miles from South Korea, and 575 miles from Japan. Originally, the Chinese wanted these exercises to be held near Xiamen, 150 miles from Taiwan. The Russians nixed the proposal saying such a location was too provocative.)

These exercises will involve China’s army, air force and navy, and Russian paratroopers who will jump on to the peninsula, while Russian ships engage in amphibious landing exercises, it said.

Air force exercises involving Sukhoi Su-27 fighter planes and Tupolev TU 95MSs and TU 22M-3s will round out the drills on August 23-26, with long-distance bombing runs and cruise missile attacks, it said. (Hypothetical cruise missile attacks? On what? The US Fleet, e.g., the Kitty Hawk?)

The exercises could also involve China’s nuclear submarine fleet and anti-submarine warfare, the Global Times said.

 

[archangel]

To be honest I am really getting tired of GW being wishywashee...he has said absolutely nothing on the attempted takeover of Unical by China...hey Russia and China have always been partners in the take over of Western Culture...They can kiss my ass as far as I am concerned....I for one can see a spade through the woods...something GW has been lacking as of late...end of story....maybe GW better wake up and smell the coffee...we in the trenches are not asleep... nor are we that dumb! What the hell are they in DC thinking...oh golly gee "Mr.Wizard" if I ignore ya you will go away....give me a break!