GEOPOLITICS OF AN AFGHAN SETTLEMENT

Year 2000, Volume: 5 Issue: 4, 0 - 0, 01.12.2000

Peter Tomsen

Abstract

The road to an Afghan political settlement must proceed through two challenging rings: an inner ring of conflict among Afghans, plus an outer ring of nations manoeuvring for influence against each other inside Afghanistan. The two rings overlap. External powers use Afghan factions as surrogates to serve their own competing objectives in the region. This essay will concentrate on the outer ring, examining the geopolitical incentives and disincentives motivating outside powers to promote - or to prevent - an Afghan political settlement.

References

• 1 Ahmed Rashid, 'Radical Islam's New Frontiers', Foreign Affairs, November-December 1999, p. 27.
• 2 Jane's Defence Weekly, 'Struggle for Recognition', 4 October 2000, p. 1.
• 3 Ivan Ivanov, Russian Security Council Secretary, quoted in ITAR-TASS article, '30,000 Foreigners Fighting in Afghanistan-Russian Official', 13 October 2000, St Petersburg.
• 4 Jane's Defence Weekly, op. cit., p. 2.
• 5 Ibid., p. 2.
• 6 The 'half war' refers to the 1999 fighting along the International Line of Control in Kashmir near Kargil.
• 7 George Grassmuck, L.W. Adamec, and F.H. Irwin, Afghanistan: Some New Approaches, University of Michigan Press, 1969, p. 277.
• 8 Leon B. Poullada, and Leila D.J. Poullada, The Kingdom of Afghanistan and the United States: 1928-1973, Centre for Afghanistan Studies at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, University of Nebraska Press, p. 96.
• 9 Foreign Broadcast Information Service, 1980 Near East/North Africa Report, FBIS Washington report No. 2174, 3 September 1980, p. 45.
• 10 George P. Shultz, Turmoil and Triumph, Charles Scribners Sons, New York, 1993, p. 1091.
• 11 From a 19 October 2000 interview with UN Special Envoy Norbet Holl's Assistant, Thomas Gouttierre, Dean, University of Nebraska at Omaha, Department of International Studies and Programs. Also, taken from AFP article on Special Envoy Brahimi's resignation. AFP, 'UN Special Envoy to Afghanistan Intends to Resign', 20 October 1999.
• 12 IRNA, Khorasan Province, 'Police Kill 30 Afghan Bandits in Six Months', 14 October 2000.
• 13 Nation, Islamabad, 'Tehran Called for Progress', 14 October 2000.
• 14 Ibid.
• 15 Russian diplomats have utilised Russia's co-chair of the OSCE's Minsk Group to subtly thwart Armenian-Azeri compromise on the Nagorno-Karabakh dispute.
• 16 Zbigniew Brzezinski, The Grand Chessboard, Basic Books, New York, 1997, p. 107.
• 17 Russian military and economic pressure on Moldova, including the retention of the Russian Fourteenth Army on Moldavian territory and Moscow's support for a separatist movement which has split Moldova, have combined to make Moldova a less enthusiastic participant in GUUAM.
• 18 The Azeri state-owned oil company joined US, Western European, Turkish, Japanese and Saudi oil corporations in signing (on 18 October in Tbilisi and 19 October in Ankara) an agreement to construct the Baku-Ceyhan MEP between 2002 and 2004. See Jamestown Foundation Report, 26 October 2000.
• 19 Olivier Roy, The New Central Asia, New York University Press, New York, p. 193.
• 20 Jamestown Foundation Report, 'Karimov Lashes Out at Moscow's Policy in Central Asia', 23 September 2000.
• 21 Jamestown Foundation Report, 23 October 2000.
• 22 Itar-Tass, Namangan Region, 'Uzbekistan, China Sign Military Co-operation Accord', 29 August 2000.
• 23 Philip Andrews-Speed and Sergei Vingradov, 'China's Involvement in Central Asian Petroleum: Convergent or Divergent Interests', Asian Survey, Vol. XL, No. 2, March/April 2000, University of California Press, p. 384.
• 24 Ibid., p. 389.
• 25 Ibid., p. 387.
• 26 NNI, Islamabad, 'China to Assist Afghanistan in Communications Sector', 19 September 2000.
• 27 Sheehan, op. cit., p. 3.