.Kyrgyzstan Parliament Sends U.S. Eviction Notice (Updated)
Kyrgyzstan's parliament voted today to evict the United States from Manas Air Base, an important logistics hub for Afghanistan operations. According to the Associated Press, deputies voted overwhelmingly -- 78 to one -- to cancel the lease at Manas, which is a transit point for coalition personnel and an operating base for aerial refueling tankers.
If Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev signs the bill, the U.S. military will have six months to find a new base in Central Asia.
Bakiyev caught the Pentagon by surprise earlier this month when he announced plans to close Manas, which the U.S. military has operated since late 2001. The announcement came after Russia offered over $2 billion in aid and credits to the Central Asian nation, but it also follows years of simmering resentment over U.S. management of the base. The Pentagon signed off on a fuel services contract that allegedly helped line the pockets of the family of former Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev; the 2006 shooting of a Kyrgyz truck driver by a base guard also stoked local anger.
So what now? Earlier this week, General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Command paid a visit to Uzbekistan, where the United States previously rented a former Soviet airbase. State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid denied Petraeus was in Uzbekistan to discuss basing rights, but it seems unlikely that the topic didn't come up in some form or another. As Joshua Kucera noted earlier this week, the Obama administration is concerned that regional instability -- as a consequence of economic disintegration or local authoritarianism-- could affect supply lines to landlocked Afghanistan.
Intriguingly, the Afghanistan supply dilemma could provide potential for a diplomatic opening to Iran, which recently completed a road linking the Afghan towns of Delaram and Zaranj to southern seaports. The San Francisco Chronicle quotes Abbas Milani, director of the Iranian Studies Program at Stanford University, as saying: "I certainly think it [the road] represents an opportunity, particularly because it kind of takes up this relationship where it was last at its most amicable: that is, over Afghanistan."
UPDATE: Spencer Ackerman channels Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman's "What, me worry?" response to the pending withdrawal from Manas.
Wired
No evil empire worth it's weight in blood, would put up with this crap.
If Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev signs the bill, the U.S. military will have six months to find a new base in Central Asia.
Bakiyev caught the Pentagon by surprise earlier this month when he announced plans to close Manas, which the U.S. military has operated since late 2001. The announcement came after Russia offered over $2 billion in aid and credits to the Central Asian nation, but it also follows years of simmering resentment over U.S. management of the base. The Pentagon signed off on a fuel services contract that allegedly helped line the pockets of the family of former Kyrgyz President Askar Akayev; the 2006 shooting of a Kyrgyz truck driver by a base guard also stoked local anger.
So what now? Earlier this week, General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. Central Command paid a visit to Uzbekistan, where the United States previously rented a former Soviet airbase. State Department spokesman Gordon Duguid denied Petraeus was in Uzbekistan to discuss basing rights, but it seems unlikely that the topic didn't come up in some form or another. As Joshua Kucera noted earlier this week, the Obama administration is concerned that regional instability -- as a consequence of economic disintegration or local authoritarianism-- could affect supply lines to landlocked Afghanistan.
Intriguingly, the Afghanistan supply dilemma could provide potential for a diplomatic opening to Iran, which recently completed a road linking the Afghan towns of Delaram and Zaranj to southern seaports. The San Francisco Chronicle quotes Abbas Milani, director of the Iranian Studies Program at Stanford University, as saying: "I certainly think it [the road] represents an opportunity, particularly because it kind of takes up this relationship where it was last at its most amicable: that is, over Afghanistan."
UPDATE: Spencer Ackerman channels Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman's "What, me worry?" response to the pending withdrawal from Manas.
Wired
No evil empire worth it's weight in blood, would put up with this crap.
posted by madtom at 8:13 PM
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