CC BY
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places in Africa or Asia, but as an urgent need to patrol Europe’s “frozen frontiers” and to contain chaos and instability in its Near Abroad. So our message to Europe and specifically to the EU is: It is time to be more than just “Visible Mais Absent.” It is time to be visible and relevant. But it is also time for the Black Sea regional actors to be realistic and innovative. If these two vectors intersect and fit each other, then that synergy may produce some real, practical and feasible results and not only for some organizations or countries but for the peoples of the wider Black Sea area and far beyond.
So let us not be consumed by specific structures, outcomes or end-games. Let us just get on with the job. Let us embark on the journey. And who knows, we may all be pleasantly surprised when we arrive at our eventual destination.
Jannatkhan EYVAZOV
Ph.D. (Political Science), Deputy Director of the Institute of Strategic Studies of the Caucasus, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of Central Asia and the Caucasus
(Baku, Azerbaijan).
IRAN’S SECURITY INTERESTS AND
GEOPOLITICAL ACTIVITY IN CENTRAL EURASIA
Abstract
The author investigates the specifics of Iran’s geopolitical activity in Central Eurasia in the post-Soviet period. What are the central security interests be-
hind Iranian policies? What urges Iran to act at the supra-regional level? What tactics does it employ? These and other related topics are discussed in detail.
I n t r o d u c t i o n
Geography, history, and ethnic and confessional affiliation tie Iran to Central Eurasia.1 The death of the Soviet Union made the region doubly important for the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI). On the one hand, the IRI was finally freed from a much stronger power center: from that time on the
1 Here and elsewhere I rely on the concept of Central Eurasia and Central Europe formulated by Eldar Ismailov, according to which Central Eurasia includes three post-Soviet regions: Central Europe (Belarus, Moldova, and Ukraine); the Central Caucasus (Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Georgia); and Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan) (for more detail, see: E.M. Ismailov, “Central Eurasia: Its Geopolitical Function in the 21st
Century,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 2 (50), 2008, pp. 7-29).
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newly created geopolitically autonomous space has been serving a buffer zone to the north of its borders. However, on the other, it turned out to be a source of new security threats. Previously controlled by one power, the region became an arena of stiff rivalry among Iran’s old contenders (Russia and Turkey) and its current opponents (the U.S. and its European allies). From that time on Iran’s security has been interconnected, in a functional way, with the newly independent states that sprang into existence in this region.
This forced the IRI to step up its activities in relation to the newly independent states in the north and the powers seeking geopolitical control over Central Eurasia now free from Soviet domination.
Specifics of Iran’s Contact with Central Eurasia
Iran borders on the Central Caucasus and Central Asia, two out of three Central Eurasian regions. In the absence of adequate capability of its influence projection, this inevitably limits its geopolitical role in Central Eurasia as a whole.
From the geographical point of view, Iran should demonstrate much more functional activity in the Central Caucasus than in Central Asia for the simple reason that it directly borders on two out of three states: it has a 611-km land border with Azerbaijan and a 35-km border with Armenia. Its land contact with Central Asia, however, is longer: 992 km with Turkmenistan and 936 km with Afghanistan (if the latter is counted as a Central Asian state). This means that its geographic contact with Central Asia is three times longer than its Central Caucasian border. The answer to the question of why the Central Caucasus is much more important for Iran’s security policies should be sought in the geography or, rather, the geographic specifics of its supra-regional political structure.
The Central Caucasus is much smaller than Central Asia, but Iran has land contacts with two out of three states in the former, while it only shares borders with two (if we count Afghanistan) out of six states in the latter. The smaller territory and land borders with most of the regional states in the Central Caucasus mean not merely much greater possibilities for sustainable regional influence. Other powers have similar advantages, which diminishes the region’s function of a buffer between Iran and its rivals.
In Central Asia, the IRI faces much weaker and geopolitically much less active actors. In the Caucasus, on the other hand, it borders on Turkey, the rivalry with which goes back into history. Their interests in various spheres, the Central Caucasus being one of them, can be described as clashing. Geography cannot explain everything, but the specifics described above largely stimulated Iran’s different post-Soviet policies in the two regions.
Iran has a sea border with Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Russia; the Caspian Sea (which can be described as a focus of still unresolved military-political and economic problems) is another functional component of Iran’s security closely connected with that of the Central Caucasus and Central Asia. The repeated attempts of the five Caspian states to consolidate the security regime for the Caspian, in particular through settling its international legal status, have failed so far.
Macro Conditions Before and After the Soviet Union’s Disintegration
The interdependence between Iran’s national security and that of the Central Caucasian and Central Asian states does not hinge on geography alone. It is deeply rooted in the rich history of dom-
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ination of the Persian Empire over the regions. In fact, vast stretches of the Central Caucasus and Central Asia belonged, for more or less prolonged periods, to the Persian Empire.2 Iran’s rivalry with other powers in the region likewise goes back into history. The region’s pre-Islamic period can be described as Iran’s military-political and cultural hegemony3; later it had to compete for domination with other powers, the Russian and the Ottoman empires being the strongest rivals. “It seems fairly clear that a triangle has existed for over 250 years between Russia, Turkey, and Iran, in the different forms that these states have taken; from empires in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries to republics at the start of the twenty-first.”4
Despite the rich history of Iran’s contacts with the Central Caucasus and Central Asia, the postCold War geopolitical order offered Iran relatively less favorable conditions. It even became much more vulnerable to regional security threats while the new world order was taking shape.
First, throughout Soviet history, the Soviet Union and Iran created a mutually acceptable security regime. The Soviet Union controlled the Central Caucasian and Central Asian republics and kept the ethnoterritorial challenges on Iran’s northern borders in check. The bilateral relations on the Caspian were based on the treaties of 1921 between the R.S.F.S.R. and Persia and 1940 between the Soviet Union and Iran, which kept third countries away.5 The new realities destroyed the regime and made Iran’s northern land and sea borders much more vulnerable.
On the other hand, the potential military threat presented by a large northern neighbor disappeared, at least theoretically, with the disappearance of the Soviet Union. From that time on Iran could strengthen its position in the liberated regions and set up a buffer zone there.6 In practice, however, the dangers created by the fairly vague post-Soviet security regimes in both regions, political instability, and armed conflicts in the newly independent states and between them coupled with Tehran’s obvious failure to capitalize on the opportune moment to set up a sustainable northern buffer outweighed the newly created geopolitical advantages.
The international legal regime of the Caspian underwent radical changes: from that time on Tehran had to face four coastal states instead of one with different approaches to the problem and no less different foreign policy orientations. The Caspian Sea was gradually becoming militarized before the Iranian leaders’ eyes, while third powers were gradually gaining a foothold in the basin.
Second, seen from the West, the Soviet Union looked like the main ideological enemy and an alternative to the liberal-democratic world. In fact, the politicization and securitization of the Soviet Union as an enemy distracted the West’s attention from other no less rigid and ideologically biased regimes. They, in turn, used the fairly favorable conditions created by the rivalry of two “super ideologies” to extend, on the sly, the fields of their political maneuvering and profit from the rivalry in many other ways. The West explained wars, military coups, revolutions, and other social cataclysms in the world’s “periphery” by the global confrontation of ideologies.
With no Soviet Union in sight, the West, which places much more emphasis on liberal approaches to security issues, turned its gaze toward other “incorrect regimes,” Iran being one of them. The desire to remove the Islamist regime was intensified by geopolitical and energy-related considerations and possible dividends created by control over Iran. Several consecutive events
2 See: A. Maleki, “Iran and Turan: Apropos of Iran’s Relations with Central Asia and the Caucasian Republics,”
Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 5 (11), 2001, p. 90.
3 Ibidem.
4 S.E. Cornell, Small Nations and Great Powers. A Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict in the Caucasus, Curzon Press, 2001, p. 24. The author referred to the Caucasus yet the above is equally true of Central Asia.
5 See: R. Mamedov, “Military-Political Activity in the Caspian in the Post-Soviet Period (Legal Aspects),” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4 (46), 2007, p. 80; V. Kondaurova, “Looking for a Way to Resolve the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea: International Law Provides No Answer,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 6 (54), 2008, p. 76; N.Z. Ter-Oganov, “Iran, problema statusa Kaspiyskogo moria i energoresursy,” Institute of the Middle East, 21 February, 2008, available at [http://www.iimes.ru/rus/stat/2008/21-02-08.htm].
6 See: A. Maleki, op. cit., p. 95.
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(Iraq’s aggression against Kuwait in 1991; the Taliban gaining power in Afghanistan in 1996, and the terrorist attacks of 9/11) worsened Iran’s relations with the United States and its NATO allies. NATO expanded its military presence in Eurasia and used its armed forces to remove the local radical regimes.7
The unfavorable macro conditions Tehran had to cope with in the post-bipolar world were coupled with its fairly insufficient material, political, and ideological potential to be used for active and efficient geopolitical maneuvers in the post-Soviet south. The country’s economy, which was not very strong despite its large oil and gas reserves, limited, to a great extent, its power-projection capability of achieving sustainable influence in the neighboring geopolitical areas. The economic problems of its limited capability (the specifics of the Iranian economy proper aside) were caused by the sanctions imposed on Iran by the United States and some of its Western allies.8
Iran’s military-political potential leaves much to be desired: its technical and technological components depended on import, the stability of which, and external military-political support of Iran for that matter, were highly unreliable because it remained a fairly isolated country. In fact, it entered the post-bipolar era encumbered by numerous problems with neighbors; it has no allies to turn to if an active geopolitical game around it goes the wrong way.
Its main historical rivals—Russia and Turkey—are in a much better military-political position. Russia has its huge military-industrial complex at its disposal coupled with the inherited military potential of the “second superpower.” As a NATO member, Turkey could count on its allies. Deprived of these advantages, Iran could only count on itself, which prompted circumspection and even caution when dealing with relatively delicate geopolitical problems, especially those in which its old geopolitical rivals were also interested.
Iran could not go far with the help of its cultural-ideological potential (“soft power” to use J.S. Nye’s term).9 First, the Central Caucasus and Central Asia are ethnically closer to the Turkic heritage, and hence to Turkey rather than to Iran. In theory, Iran can rely on its “soft power” only in ethnically and linguistically close Tajikistan and Afghanistan.10
Reliance on a shared confessional identity is very much limited by different Islamic trends in most of the countries of both regions and in Iran. Azerbaijan is the only country which shares Shi‘a Islam with Iran; all the other countries, even ethnically close Afghanistan and Tajikistan, follow the Sunni tradition. Though it should be said that at the dawn of the new Eurasian order Iran tried to impose “its own brand of Islamic fundamentalism.”11
Vladimir Mesamed has the following to say about the role of the religious factor in Iran’s activities in post-Soviet Central Asia: “Iran also pinned hopes on confessional unity, yet it cannot be employed in each and every Central Asian state. First, there is no absolute unity since the majority of the local population are Sunnis. On the other hand, the majority of the Central Asian states have not yet acquired a fertile soil for Islam to strike root. Islamic resurrection in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan is slack. In contrast to what is going on in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, these countries
7 In 2002, the George W. Bush Administration listed Iran among the “axis of evil” states.
8 See: O. Oliker, “Conflict in Central Asia and South Caucasus: Implications of Foreign Interests and Involvement,” in: Faultiness of Conflict in Central Asia and the South Caucasus. Implication for the U.S. Army, ed. by O. Oliker, Th.S. Szayna, Rand Corporation, Santa Monica, 2003, p. 209.
9 On “soft and hard power,” see: J.S. Nye, “The Changing Nature of World Power,” Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 105, No. 2, 1990, pp. 177-192; Idem, The Paradox ofAmerican Power. Why the World’s Only Superpower Can’t Go It Alone, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2002.
10 Several of the Caucasian peoples (the Ossets, Talyshes, and Tats) have Iranian ethnic roots, but they are too small and politically dependent. Russia’s recognition of South Ossetia independence did not make this separatist unit independent de facto.
11 O. Oliker, op. cit.; R. Sokolsky, T. Charlick-Paley, NATO and Caspian Security. A Mission Too Far? Washington, 1999, p. 44; V. Sazhin, “On Relations Between Iran and Azerbaijan,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4 (28), 2004, pp. 89-90.
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have much less new religious schools, they print less religious books, there are less religious institutions there, and a much weaker pull to the holy places.”12
William Johnston believes that “the lack of success in exporting the Islamic Revolution to the Persian Gulf countries, and the legacy of the development of Islam under the Soviet Union” dampened its desire to place its stakes on revolutionary Islam in the south of the CIS.13
Second, the social, political, and economic model of the IRI could not be taken as a national self-determination or state development model for the Central Caucasian and Central Asian republics, which had just escaped the Soviet Union’s imperial system. The newly liberated countries wanted to join the ranks of secular democratic states with developed market economies. The Iranian regime differed very much, to say the least, from the “international standards” these countries were pursuing.
Still, Iran’s security interests in the Central Caucasus and Central Asia inevitably produced certain manifestations. At the same time, the unfavorable macro factors described above affected the forms and intensity of Iran’s regional involvement.
Central Eurasia as Seen through the Prism of Iran’s Security Interests
Since it was obviously impossible to draw the regional states into its sphere of influence in the short-term perspective and because of the unfavorable external conditions fraught with West-generated security threats, Iran was concentrating on developing relations with Russia as the legal heir to the former metropolitan country of the Central Asian and Central Caucasian republics, relations with which came second in the list of priorities. A military-political alliance with Russia against the United States and its NATO allies remains vitally important for Iran (this includes supplying Russian armaments and rendering assistance in the sphere of nuclear technology).14 This priority dominates the Iranian foreign policy agenda for Central Eurasia as a whole.
In Central Asia, the Central Caucasus, and Central Eurasia as a whole, Iran was mainly concerned with preventing their transformation into a military-political springboard of the United States and its allies (Turkey included), which could be used against it either in the form of direct aggression and containment, or in the form of other acts designed to undermine its political system.
This could be achieved in three different ways.
■ First, through domination (which proved unattainable in the short-term perspective for the reasons described above).
■ Second, keeping any other power away from the regions or, as R. Burnashev put it, “maintaining the power vacuum in the region and excluding outside powers”15 could hardly be realized because the regions rich in very much needed resources (oil and gas in particular) were too tempting to be left alone.
■ Third, to help the former metropolitan country restore its domination.
12
V. Mesamed, “Iran: Ten Years in Post-Soviet Central Asia,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 1 (13), 2002,
p. 29.
13 See: W. Johnston, “Iran’s Cultural Foreign Policy in Central Asia and the Southern Caucasus since 1991,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4 (46), 2007, p. 109.
See: O. Oliker, op. cit., p. 210.
R. Burnashev, “Regional Sec ed. by B. Rumer, M.E. Sharpe, New York, 2002, p. 129.
14 !
15 R. Burnashev, “Regional Security in Central Asia: Military Aspects,” in: Central Asia. A Gathering Storm?
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The latter, the “lesser evil,” was much more attractive than the post-Soviet “power vacuum” filled in, in the course of time, by Turkey or, worse still, the United States. On top of this, the “geopolitical concession” to Moscow could serve as the cornerstone of a future alliance with the concomitant advantages of re-arming, nuclear and missile technologies, etc. Russia could have performed the function which in the past belonged to the Soviet Union: that of containing the threats to Iran’s security created by the ethnoterritorial and confessional factors. Indeed, there are enough weak points along the country’s northern border with the Central Caucasus and Central Asia to trigger a profound crisis in its state system.
Iran’s vulnerability caused by the ethnopolitical processes underway in the regions is much clearer than in case of Russia; this is explained by these states’ different ethnic structures. Russia and Iran are both ethnically heterogeneous states, although the correlation between the titular nations and the so-called minorities (including those living in compact groups in the Northern Caucasus in the case of Russia and in the Southeastern Caucasus in the case of Iran) differs.
■ First, the Russians, as the titular nation, comprise about 80 percent of the country’s nearly 140 million-strong population.
■ Second, over one-third of the population of the Northern and Central Caucasus are Russians and Cossacks, which ties the regions closer to Russia.
In Iran, on the other hand, about 50 percent of the population is non-Persian (non-Iranian),16 mainly Turkic ethnic groups (Azeris and Turkmen) living in compact groups in the country’s north, which borders on the Central Caucasus and Central Asia (Turkmenistan). These groups are ethnically more closely connected with Azerbaijan in the north, Turkmenistan in the northeast, and Turkey in the northwest than with the Persians, who form the titular nation of Iran.
This means that Iran is vulnerable to transborder ethnopolitical impact, mainly from the three states enumerated above. Brenda Shaffer has correctly written in this respect: “Iran’s ethnic groups are particularly susceptible to external manipulation and considerably subject to influence from events taking place outside its borders, since most of the non-Persians are concentrated in the frontier areas and have ties to co-ethnics in adjoining states.. .”17
While external ethnopolitical influence on Russia might, in the worst-case scenario, cost it the Northern Caucasus with its non-Russian population, in the case of Iran such impact might cost it its statehood. By its very existence, the Soviet Union bridled the centrifugal trends in Iran, therefore “in anticipation of the mounting separatism in their multinational country, spurred on by the social and political processes in the U.S.S.R., the Iranian leaders did not rejoice at the Soviet Union’s disintegration.”18
Despite its varied ethnic affiliations, the Iranian population is Shi‘a Muslims, which keeps the ethnic groups together in one state. This partly explains the rigid domestic regime of the Islamic republic; any threat emanating from different state ideologies is taken as a threat to Iranian statehood. This specific feature of Iran’s political regime adds to its hostility toward Turkey, Azerbaijan, and the United States, which are building up their regional presence.
The Caspian is the focus of Iran’s security interests and an area of the shared interests of Iran and Central Asia (Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan), Iran and the Central Caucasus (Azerbaijan), and Iran and Russia. It is the sphere where Iran is most vulnerable to military threats, first, because the sea is not yet completely demilitarized and because the coastal states are strong enough to reach and attack Iran’s Caspian coast. Second, the sea might be further internationalized with the fleets of third countries (America, Turkey, and other NATO members) being deployed there.
16 See: B. Shaffer, “The Formation of Azerbaijani Collective Identity in Iran,” Nationalities Papers, Vol. 28, No. 3, 2000, p. 449.
17 Ibidem.
18 V. Sazhin, op. cit., p. 89.
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Iran keeps its main naval forces in the Persian Gulf, while the Caspian is still regarded as a theater of secondary importance.19 This is quite logical because the Gulf has been and remains a zone where the United States and its allies might deliver their strikes. In Soviet times the Caspian was protected by bilateral Soviet-Iranian treaties on the regime of the Caspian Sea.
In the early 21st century, statements about the need to demilitarize the sea were accompanied by its militarization. Today, Russia has the strongest naval group; while Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan are developing theirs.
The rich offshore oil and gas fields, the still unidentified international legal post-Soviet status of the sea, which prevents clarification of issues related to its natural resources, and the dislocation of the armed forces of the coastal states make the situation even more complicated. Since the mid-1990s, the oil and gas offshore fields have been developing with Western involvement.20 This is another source of Tehran’s great concern.
The possibility of the sea’s internationalization is a source of numerous concerns: it may cause its militarization in the form of arms supplies by external powers to the navies of the coastal states or even their permanent military presence in the sea. Iran’s behavior in the Caspian and Central Eurasia is explained by the logic of possible military threats.
In the most general form, this space is Iran’s strategic rear, the importance of which is determined by the dynamics of the U.S.-Iranian confrontation unfolding in the Gulf theater and on Iran’s western borders with Iraq and Turkey. This means that Tehran’s priority in Central Eurasia as a whole and in the Central Caucasus and Central Asia in particular is to prevent transformation of this space into a hostile segment of its geopolitical sphere and to prevent its use as a toehold of containment or even an attack (by the United States and its allies). Since Russia is the main regulatory factor in the regions, Iran is treading cautiously there (despite certain fairly urgent problems) and never fails to demonstrate its respect for Russia’s “special” interests.
Specifics of Iran’s Geopolitical Activities
In the post-Soviet period, Iran’s efforts to secure its most vulnerable points created fairly stable amity/enmity perceptions of the regional states and external powers: Azerbaijan, Turkey, and the United States came to be seen as hostile actors, while Armenia and Russia (which opposed the strengthening of the former group’s regional positions) as friends. Iran’s behavior in the region fully corresponds to this: while being aware that its national security depends on Azerbaijan and Turkey, Iran is building up another dependence vector, namely, Russia and Armenia.
In fact, Iran is using Armenia and Russia to oppose Azerbaijan,21 in order to prevent its strengthening and perpetuate its present vulnerability. At the same time, Armenia is building up its military-technical regional potential with the help of Russia, which is helping to strengthen Iran’s position vis-a-vis Azerbaijan and, most importantly, Turkey. To be more exact, the “Armenian buffer” designed to check Turkey’s trans-regional influence is being set up and consistently strengthened. The Turkic ethnopolitical influence on Iran’s northern part should be contained; besides, this fits the logic of the Iranian-Turkic rivalry in the Central Caucasus and Central Asia.
19 See: P. Lakiychuk, “Regionalnaia sistema bezopasnosti na Kaspii. Mezhdu ‘Caspian Guard’ i KASFOR,” Cher-nomorska bezpeka, No. 1 (5), 2007, p. 16.
20 Azerbaijan was the first of the coastal states to internationalize the Caspian’s oil and gas reserves. Since 1994, it has signed several agreements with foreign companies on exploitation of its offshore oil fields. By the early 2000s, it had
21 contracts with 33 consortiums for 14 countries (see: I. Aliev, Kaspyiskaia neft Azerbaidzhana, Izvestia, Moscow, 2003, p. 179).
21 See: R. Sokolsky, T. Charlick-Paley, op. cit., pp. 45-46; B. Shaffer, op. cit., p. 450.
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Informal support of Armenia, in particular its war against Azerbaijan, made its traditional geopolitical function, that of a sanitary cordon against Turkey’s impact on the Turkic nations of the Central Caucasus and Central Asia, much more pronounced. While before 1992-1993, when Armenia occupied the southwestern districts of Azerbaijan as a result of an active phase of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, the narrowest gap in the land border between Turkey and Azerbaijan22 was about 35 km (in the Meghri District of Armenia), today Turkey is separated by much vaster territories from the former Soviet Turkic areas because of de facto Armenian control over Nagorno-Karabakh and the Azeri areas to the west, east and south of it. Tadeusz Swietochowski has aptly described the geopolitical importance of this: “Karabagh formed a link or a barrier (depending on who controlled it) between the Muslims of the Eastern Transcaucasia and Turkey.”23
Iran’s security relations with Georgia are relatively less intensive, which is explained by geographical factors, namely, the absence of a border between the two countries. The history of social and political relations between the two countries may lead to specific functional behavior patterns. The contacts, especially predating 1801 when Georgia became part of the Russian Empire and after the early 1990s when Georgia became independent, can be described as hostile rather than friendly.
In the 16th-19th centuries the Persian Empire waged frequent wars to expand its territory, Georgia being one of its targets. The Safavid and Ottoman empires were at war in 1514-1555; 1578-1590; 1603-1612; 1616-1618; 1623-1639; 1723-1727; and 1730-1736. Georgia was repeatedly divided; its eastern regions were incorporated into Iran. Russia and Iran waged two wars: in 1804-1813 and in 1826-1828. In the post-Soviet period, the diplomatic activities of the two countries reached their peak in the mid-1990s, during Eduard Shevardnadze’s first presidency when bilateral economic and cultural contacts became much more intensive than ever before. Later, when Georgia was developing its pro-American and European bias, caution came to the fore.
Today, the two countries will probably acquire more hostile ideas about each other and will probably develop behavior forms to match in view of the continued tension between Iran and the U.S. and Georgia’s pro-Western foreign policy course.
This tension and the frantic efforts of the United States and its allies to build up their influence on the Iranian northern borders will prompt Tehran to establish a stronger strategic alliance with Russia and Armenia. Iran will spare no effort to undermine the positions of America’s real and potential allies, Georgia in particular. Georgia (energetically supported by the U.S. administration), which is consistently seeking NATO membership, might acquire it; this will strengthen America’s military infrastructure not far from Iran and bring it closer to Iranian territory. At the same time, Russia’s invasion of Georgia in August 2008 weakened the pro-Russian public sentiments in Georgia, which means that its present geopolitical orientation will hardly change. This crisis worsened the relations between the U.S. and Russia and gave motivation for even stronger support of Georgia’s geopolitical identity. This, in turn, will boost the Russia-Iran-Armenia vector and the conviction of these states that they should oppose infiltration of the United States and its allies into the south of the post-Soviet space. In this context, Georgia can be described as a bridge the West can use. The structural factors and the logic of alliances will limit the political leeway of all the actors involved; they will form several groups according to the principle “the enemy of my friend is my enemy.” The “Georgian factor” will come to the fore in the security threats as perceived in Iran and the “Iranian factor” in the structure of Georgia’s security threats.
Iran is fairly limited in its influence in Central Asia not only because it has no land border with the majority of the local states but also because the region is a fairly vast one, while the economic and
22 The land border between Turkey and Azerbaijan is limited to the Nakhchyvan stretch (about 15 km long), the area being separated from the rest of Azerbaijan by official Armenian territory.
23 T. Swietochowski, Russian Azerbaijan 1905-1920, Cambridge University Press, New York, Cambridge, 1985,
p. 143.
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military-political potential of the local states differs from that of the Central Caucasian countries. Iran has a common land border with Turkmenistan and Afghanistan, which means that these two countries alone form the ethnoterritorial components of Iranian security and, by the same token, its interest in the region. There is an ethnopolitical tie between Iran, on the one hand, and Turkmenistan and Afghanistan, on the other, presented by compact settlements of Turkmen and Baluchis in Iran (about 2 percent each of the total population)24 predominantly in the border areas.
Even though their numerical strengths in Iran are roughly equal, the impact of these ethnic groups on Iranian security and Iran’s interdependence with its neighbors depend on certain other cultural, civilizational and political factors. On the whole, the Turkmen question is much more functional in Iran even though separately discussed factors make this assessment fairly conditional.
■ First, the Turkmen have a state in which they constitute the titular nation, while the Baluchis are a nationality with no statehood of their own; they are scattered among several states as an ethnic minority. On the one hand, in the absence of statehood the Baluchis might acquire international support of their movement for an independent state. Today, this movement is limited to Pakistan’s western provinces. With international support, the Baluchis might form an independent state with the Iranian southeastern districts as its part. On the other hand, the fact that the Turkmen have a state of their own with good economic prospects and that the Iranian Turkmen never severed ties with their historical homeland,25 as well as the presence of external forces wishing to undermine the political regime in Iran, the irredentist trends on both sides of the Iranian-Turkmen border might be stirred up.
■ Second, the cultural-civilizational distinctions between the Persians (the titular nation in Iran) and the Iranian Turkmen are much more pronounced than the distinctions between the Persian and the Baluchis.26 In other words, the Baluchis, and the Kurds, are much better adapted to a single Iranian state than any of the Turkic peoples. This means that the latter are much more inclined to separatism/irredentism. More than that: the Turkic groups within the IRI or rather their numerical strength and much weaker integration into Iranian society make them an important object of external impact under the banner of Turan or the struggle against the “rogue states.” In view of the rapidly worsening relations with the United States, the latter looks much more realistic.
Post-Soviet Tajikistan was a target for Iranian greatest activity even though the countries have no common border. It is hard to say to what extent Tehran is guided by the material aspects of its security interests, yet its attention to Tajikistan is no less functional than to its regional neighbors (with common borders) with much greater aggregate national power.
The above is habitually explained by the two countries’ cultural, historical, religious, and linguistic closeness.27 Tajikistan, together with Afghanistan, comprises the Iranian ethnocultural cornerstone in Central Asia: their titular nations—Tajiks and Pashtoons—have Iranian/Persian roots. More than that: traditionally, Islam carries much more weight there than elsewhere in the region (in
24 See: CIA World Factbook 2008—Iran, available at [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/ geos/ir.html#People].
25 See: V. Mesamed, “Iranian-Turkmen Relations in an Era of Change,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 4 (46), 2007, p. 121.
26 The Persians and the Baluchis belong to the Iranian group of the Indo-European languages, while the Turkmen belong to the Turkic group of the Altaic family of languages.
27 See: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i perspektivy, ed. by B.K. Sultanov, KISI under the president of RK, Almaty, 2008, p. 215; R. Sokolsky, T. Charlick-Paley, op. cit., p. 47; R. Burnashev, op. cit.; O. Oliker, op. cit., pp. 208—209; Kh. Dodikhudoev, V. Niyatbekov, “The Republic of Tajikistan and the Islamic Republic of Iran: Cooperation Achievements and Prospects,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 2 (50), 2008, p. 134; Ch.H. Fairbanks, Jr., “Ten Years after the Soviet Breakup. Disillusionment in the Caucasus and Central Asia,” Journal of Democracy, Vol. 12, No. 4, October 2001, p. 55.
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Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkmenistan). The fact that Tajikistan and Afghanistan are predominantly Sunni countries, which makes them functionally less useful for Iran, should not obliterate another important confessional factor: that they have the region’s most numerous Shi‘a communities.
Tehran is interested in Tajikistan for political reasons: the latter is connected with Afghanistan and influences, to a certain extent, the situation there. For geographical reasons (a common border), Afghanistan might affect Iran’s security. Political instability in Afghanistan, which accompanied the war against the Soviet Union (in the bipolar world), the coming to power of the Taliban, the civil war of the mid-1990s-early 2000s and, finally, the military presence of the U.S. and its NATO allies in Afghan territory remain one of the major sources of threats to Iranian security.
Being fully aware that its direct involvement in the Afghan conflict will never help it realize its interests in this country, Iran placed its stakes on the military-political groups inside the country and used its weight to support the so-called Northern Alliance, the anti-Taliban coalition.28 When the Taliban was overthrown, “Iran continued to support its own client groups in Afghanistan (and within the interim government), seeking to ensure their victory in internal Afghan conflict within the Northern Alliance.”29
It should be said that the groups involved in the civil war in Afghanistan relied, among other things, on ethnic affiliation. While the Taliban was staffed mainly by Pashtoons (members of the titular nation), the Northern Alliance (supported from many sides, including Iran) represented the interests of ethnic minorities (the largest of them being Tajiks, who constituted 27 percent of the total size of the country’s population).30 Nearly all of its leaders—Ahmad Shah Massoud, Burhanuddin Rabba-ni, Mohammad Qasim Fahim, and others—were Tajiks.
Stability in Tajikistan and Iran’s position in the country are seen as the main conditions of the continued functionality of its influence in the Tajik-populated north of Afghanistan and, by the same token, of the political groups with large Tajik membership and their potential inside the country. This explains Tehran’s active involvement in settling the Tajik conflict in the 1990s, as well as its cooperation with Moscow in an effort to stabilize the situation in Tajikistan.
Iran’s post-Soviet policies were free of any intention to seek close military-political cooperation with any of the two regions’ newly independent states outside Russia’s involvement. The same can be said about Tehran’s institutional initiatives, especially if they could have been interpreted as an attempt to build up Iran’s military-political influence there at Russia’s expense. Iran relied on the economy (energy production, transportation, and investments) to acquire political dividends; in the military-political sphere it prefers to remain in Russia’s shadow or act together with it.
In Armenia, its close cooperation is limited mainly to the transport and energy sphere31; in Kazakhstan it is involved in investment, energy transportation, and agricultural projects32; in Kyrgyzstan, in hydropower production33; in Tajikistan, in hydropower production and transportation34; in
28 See: O. Oliker, op. cit., p. 213.
29 Ibidem.
30 See: CIA WorldFactbook 2008—Afghanistan.
31 Together with Armenia, Iran is building a gas pipeline between the two countries; there are joint projects in the field of electric energy exchange (see: H. Khachatrian, “Armenia’s Energy Sector: A Regional Actor with No Energy Resources,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 5 (53), 2008, p. 100).
32 Transportation of products produced in Kazakhstan, including oil and grain, to the world market across the sea along the Aktau-Neka sea route (see: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i perspektivy, pp. 212-213).
33 In Kyrgyzstan, Iran is involved in building hydropower stations, dams, and power lines to export energy to the north of Iran via Tajikistan and Afghanistan (see: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i per-spektivy, p. 214).
34 In Tajikistan, Iran is building the Sangtuda Hydropower Plant; the Anzob tunnel and a transportation route between the Lower Panj and Herat via Sherhan, Kunduz, and Masar-i-Sharif (see: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i perspektivy, p. 215; Kh. Dodikhudoev, V. Niyatbekov, op. cit., pp. 135-138).
THE CAUCASUS & GLOBALIZATION
Turkmenistan, in irrigation, trade, transport and communication35; in Afghanistan, it helps to develop personnel training, transport, communications, and agriculture,36 etc.
The post-Soviet status of the Caspian was practically the only stumbling block between Iran and Russia; their continued interaction on the issue showed that the contradictions lay in the economic rather than in the military-political sphere. From the very beginning of the talks on the sea’s new status Tehran insisted that it should remain in the joint use of the coastal states (the condominium principle) or divided into five equal parts so that each of the states acquired 20 percent of the bottom area irrespective of the length of the coastal stretch.37 In this case, the Astara-Hasankuli line (the sea border between Iran and the Soviet Union) would have been pushed about 80 km toward the north. The Iranian variant is based on economic considerations because it would have placed the Alov, Araz and Sharq offshore oilfields (developed by an international oil consortium under an agreement with Azerbaijan)38 within the Iranian zone.
Russia, Azerbaijan, and Kazakhstan share a different approach: they suggest dividing the sea bottom along the median line and placing the surface in common use.39 In fact these countries have already concluded agreements among themselves. Iran and Turkmenistan40 have not done this. Under this variant, Russia will acquire 19 percent of the Caspian seabed; Azerbaijan, 18 percent, and Kazakhstan, 27 percent. The three countries will thus control 64 percent of the Caspian seabed. Iran will have to accept from 11 to 14 percent of the remaining 36 percent of the sea bed.41 The Alov, Araz and Sharq oil fields will remain in the Azeri sector.
Despite the little-productive talks about the Caspian Sea’s status, Iran is even more concerned with other, rather than economic, issues. This is amply shown by the difference in its activity when discussing different parts of the Caspian package. It is concerned with potential threats coming from the north and caused by possible American and NATO military-political pressure coming from the land stretches of the Caspian countries and the sea. In this respect, Iran is supported by Russia and other Caspian states.
This was clear at the Tehran Second Caspian Summit held in October 200742 which discussed the purely legal aspects of the sea’s future status, as well as coordinated their positions on the most urgent geopolitical and security issues. Russia and Iran agreed that no third countries should be present in the sea. This was discussed at all stages of the talks on the Caspian problems and was endorsed at the summit even though no convention of the Caspian’s legal status followed. The final declaration registered the countries’ determination not to allow third countries to use their territories in case of aggression against any of the Caspian coastal states.43
35 Iran is involved in about 50 joint projects, including a hydropower station on the River Tejen and exploitation of the Dostluk water reservoir built with Iranian assistance. A railway along the Caspian eastern coast is being contemplated. It will connect the five coastal states within the North-South transportation corridor (see: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i perspektivy, p. 217).
36 Iran has offered multimillion grants to training projects for civil servants. In the last three years it implemented 22 agricultural projects (see: M.T. Laumulin, The Geopolitics of 21st Century in Central Asia, KazISS, Almaty, 2007, p. 194).
37 See: N.Z. Ter-Oganov, op. cit.
38 See: Sotrudnichestvo i bezopasnost v Tsentral’noy Azii: sostoianie i perspektivy, p. 212.
39 See: N.Z. Ter-Oganov, op. cit.
40 Turkmenistan objects to the median line idea because the Russian, Azeri, and Kazakhstan variant deprives it of the Kiapaz, Azeri, and Chirag offshore oil fields, which will be found in the Azeri sector.
41 See: N.Z. Ter-Oganov, op. cit.
42 See: A. Lukoianov, “The Tehran Summit, Or the Russian President’s Visit to Iran,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 1 (49), 2008.
43 See: N. Najafov, “Iran and the Southern Caucasus,” Central Asia and the Caucasus, No. 1 (49), 2008, p. 43.
THE CAUCASUS & GLOBALIZATION
In Lieu of
Conclusion
Iran’s post-Soviet geopolitical involvement in Central Eurasia was greatly limited by geographical factors and its opportunity to exert its influence on the vast region. At the same time, the range of its security interests is much wider than those born by its geographic proximity to the Central Caucasus and Central Asia. The IRI entered the 21st century still involved in a conflict with the only superpower; its continued exacerbation does not exclude the use of force. This means that Iran should take into account the specifics of the Central Eurasian spaces liberated, in the post-Soviet era, from rigid geopolitical control.
The fact that the security interests of Iran and its newly independent Central Eurasian neighbors (ethnic and territorial issues, the Caspian legal status, etc.) are intertwined stimulates Iran’s adequate regional policies. On the whole, however, in Central Eurasia, Iran’s geopolitical activity is concentrated around its efforts to prevent the U.S. and its allies from using this space as a foothold to contain Iran and undermine its domestic political stability or even to deliver strikes against it.
Unable to fill the post-Soviet geopolitical vacuum on its own, Tehran has to cooperate with Russia (which, unlike Iran, has direct geographic contacts with all the Central Eurasian regions and enjoys much greater possibilities of projecting its influence onto them). In fact, seen from Tehran, the Kremlin’s control in Central Eurasia looks like a “lesser evil” than Washington’s, which is determined to transform the Tehran regime. More than that: Russia and Iran see it as their vitally important task to squeeze the West from this vast area.
This geopolitical logic determined Iran’s post-Soviet activities in Central Eurasia, which took the form of its obvious and deliberately manifested respect for Russia’s “special interests” in the region, concentrating its activity on economic cooperation with the local newly independent states and refusal to support serious regional political initiatives which exclude Russia.
Anton FINKO
Ph.D. (Philos.), expert at the Kiev Center for Political Studies and Conflictology
(Kiev, Ukraine).
UKRAINE: POLITICS IN THE BLACK SEA-CASPIAN REGION AND RELATIONS WITH THE CAUCASIAN STATES
Abstract
T
he author offers an overview of Ukraine’s relations with the Caucasian states within the framework of its pre-
sent policy in the Black Sea-Caspian Region and looks into the distant past in search of the roots of the present developments.
