RUSSIAN DEFENCE MINISTER SPEAKS IN FAVOUR OF CREATING A CIS DEFENCE ALLIANCE
Brussels-Moscow. (Nezavisimaya Gazeta, December 26. Abridged.)
Igor KOROTCHENKO
According to officers from the Headquarters for the Coordination of Military Cooperation Among the CIS States, the just-concluded two-day international theoretical and practical conference on the military-political integration of the CIS members is seen here as a major event in the life of the Commonwealth, designed to interpret its five-year history and map out guiding reference points for the future. A lengthy report on the theme "The Strategic Interests of the CIS Member States in the Sphere of Military Security" was delivered to the participants by Igor Rodionov. He, as is known, is the chairman of the Defence Ministers Council of the Commonwealth. His speech may generally be characterised as an extremely rigid policy statement steeped in a confrontationist spirit and reflecting the existing point of view of the Russian military leadership on key problems affecting the national security interests of the Russian Federation.
Rodionov noted that the practical actions of the West were aimed at breaching the integrity of the Commonwealth and strengthening the contradictions existing within the CIS. With this aim the existing interethnic, interconfessional, territorial and other problems in the post-Soviet space were being used. Attempts at the outright destabilisation of the political situation within individual countries of the Commonwealth, and the holding back of the integrationary processes underway were noticed.
Touching on the sources of military danger for the CIS states, Rodionov included in their range territorial claims on the part of a number of foreign countries, the existence of foci of local wars and conflicts in direct proximity to the borders of the Commonwealth, the proliferation of nuclear and other types of weapons of mass destruction, the uncontrolled spreading of military technologies in combination with attempts by individual states and terrorist organisations to realise their designs and the unjustified military buildup by some military-political alliances. Particularly dangerous, in the Russian Defence Minister's opinion, are the efforts of the USA, directed at ensuring its undivided world leadership with reliance on the NATO bloc. Proceeding from this, as Rodionov declared, a serious challenge of today and a potential source of military danger for Russia capable of growing into a direct military threat is the activity of the North Atlantic Alliance, which has taken a fundamental decision to expand eastwards.
Another cause for the serious worry of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation has been the attempts of some Asian countries to sharply increase the offensive capabilities of their armed forces. Among them Rodionov mentioned Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, Japan and China, which are seeking to expand their zones of influence and to diminish the political importance of the CIS countries in the solution of key regional problems.
One cannot but notice, stressed the head of the Russian military department, the dangers inherent in the activisation of bellicose religious currents, the spread of religious extremism and attempts to use it for destabilising the situation within the CIS.
In the opinion of Igor Rodionov, the buildup of combat capability by groupings of foreign troops in regions adjacent to the external frontiers of the Commonwealth can even in the near future upset the established relationship of forces. The practical measures being carried out by the West to intensify military preparations attest, as the Russian Defence Minister stressed, to the fact that a whole series of countries are interested in the preservation of the disintegrationary processes both within the CIS and in Russia, and in preventing a revival of the political influence of Moscow, of its economic and military might. The West is seeking, according to Rodionov, to achieve the irreversibility of the process of the rupture into parts of a former great power, as well as to exploit the rich natural resources of this vast region in its own interests.
Under these circumstances, cooperation among the CIS countries in the sphere of military security assumes primary importance. As a strategic factor ensuring the realisation of this there should be regarded the creation of a system of collective security. On the basis of common interests and military-political aims a defence alliance is possible between a number of Commonwealth states with the prospect of creating united armed forces. By the way, even yesterday President of Uzbekistan Islam Karimov at a press conference in Tashkent rejected the idea of creating "a military-political bloc within the CIS" as a counterweight to NATO's expansion to the east.
Igor Rodionov especially singled out the role and significance at this stage of the strategic nuclear forces of the Russian Federation and the necessity of maintaining the high level of their combat readiness. "The strategic nuclear forces are the most important means of containing aggressive proclivities against Russia and its CIS partners," declared Rodionov. Among other priorities he listed the creation of an effective unified air defence system, and systems of reconnaissance and direction of coalition groupings of forces on the territory of the Commonwealth. "We must assuredly ward off all the emerging threats," stressed Igor Rodionov.
Yuliya Petrovskaya
One of the next few issues of Nezavisimaya Gazeta will carry an interview by NATO Secretary-General Javier Solana touching among others on the question of the reaction of the North Atlantic Alliance to the possible creation under Russia's aegis of a new military bloc. We cite the reply of Mr Solana.
"If Russia decided to take this path as a response to NATO expansion, I would very much regret it, since in this case we would deal with an erroneous reaction. The NATO nations, and consequently, NATO as a whole, do not threaten Russia. NATO is not seeking any unilateral strategic advantages, but a comprehensive and open system of security in Europe. The NATO nations have reached agreement that each state is free in the choice of methods of ensuring its own security, including accession to our alliance. Since such decisions are taken by way of a sovereign and democratic choice, no-one can have any grounds for objection."
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