Agency WPS
DEFENSE and SECURITY (Russia)
June 2, 2006 Friday

DEFENDING OIL

by Igor Plugatarev

CIS LEADERS CONSIDER USING COMMON FORCES TO DEFEND PIPELINES; Defense
of oil and gas pipelines could soon become a priority for the CIS
Collective Security Treaty Organization. The subject has been
discussed for some time already, but the heads of state have yet to
make up their minds. US Army and NATO units will provide security for
the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline.

Defense of oil and gas pipelines could soon become a priority for the
CIS Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO). The matter
concerns pipelines built across the territories of member states –
Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan.

Alexander Orlov, advisor to the CSTO secretariat, says that the
subject has been discussed for some time already, but the heads of
state have yet to make up their minds. Orlov says that it is not
permanent defense of the pipelines that it meant at this point, it is
their defense for the duration of “special circumstances periods”
that may occur every now and then. “When the pipeline defense is to
be upgraded, it may be done by deployment of the Fast Response
Collective Forces or Collective Peacekeeping Forces. Organization
General Secretary Nikolai Bordyuzha recently said that provisions and
other necessary documents on the latter are being drafted now,” Orlov
said.

“There is already a precedent for it,” the advisor continued. “CSTO
members signed a Railroad Defense Agreement in 2004.” Orlov said that
he himself supports the idea of defense of pipelines but promoted
what he called “correlation of actions with oil and gas
transportation companies.”

“Moscow is out to augment its already dominating role in Central
Asia, in the Caucasus, and in Eastern Europe,” said Colonel Anatoly
Tsyganok of the Center of Military Forecasts. “It stands to reason to
expect that railroads and pipelines are just the beginning, and that
other strategic objects (oil terminals, major airports, nuclear
objects, and power plants) on the territories of Organization members
will end up under the protection of Moscow’s military structures as
well. Establishing base stations and plain bases within the framework
of the CSTO, Russia will solidify its positions in these regions in
line with the concept of a new center of power on the geopolitical
map.”

Oblique confirmations of all this include the statement from the CIS
Counter-Terrorism Center to the effect that an exercise will be run
on the premises of a bona fide nuclear power plant in Armenia this
autumn. Ostensibly organized within the framework of the CIS, the
exercise will only involve CSTO units and formations stationed in
Armenia.

In fact, there is nothing unusual about what the CSTO is doing or
considering. Security for the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, for
example, is to be provided by the US Army and NATO units. According
to the Special State Security Service of Azerbaijan, eight units
totalling 800 personnel have been set up to defend pipelines on Azeri
territory. US Army personnel, assisted by local personnel, guard
pipelines in Georgia.

Source: Nezavisimaya Gazeta, June 1, 2006, pp. 1, 4

Translated by A. Ignatkin