TURKEY’S PROPOSAL OF ‘CAUCASUS ALLIANCE’: HOW LIKELY IS ITS SUCCESS?
by Guner Ozkan
Journal of Turkish Weekly
Aug 21 2008
Turkey
Amidst desperate attempts of the EU, and of toughening words from
the US against Moscow, to get an immediate cease-fire and withdrawal
of Russian forces in the war between Russia and Georgia, Turkey
has offered the establishment of a formation named as ‘Caucasus
Alliance’. Surely, Turkey is acting in a good faith as it has, with
some reservations, good economic, political and social relationships
with both Moscow and Tbilisi, and seeking a durable peace on its
doorstep. So, what does the Turkish proposal include? and how likely
can it be successful in such a region as complex as the Caucasus,
and why?
Goals and Means of the ‘Alliance’
Though still in the process of creation, the Turkish Prime Minister,
Erdogan, after his prompt visits to Moscow and Tbilisi, outlined the
purpose and content of the ‘Caucasus Alliance’. The main objective
of the ‘Alliance’ is meant to be the establishment of a permanent
peace and security in the region through bringing all regional states
together in a joint formation. To this end, in the new structure
regional states are expected once again to re-assure each other of
respecting state sovereignty, refraining from the use and threat to use
of force, inviolability of state borders and of non-harming economic
and energy security in their common space of the Caucasus. Such
principles as state sovereignty, inviolability of borders and so on
in the formation will take their main references from the Charter
of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE),
of which Russia, Turkey and all other Caucasian states are members.
Erdogan is seeing that the establishment of a lasting peace and
security is the principal aim here and he believes that this goal
could be archived through the increase of economic cooperation among
the regional states. In order to better present this idea, he gave the
examples of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC), Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum (BTE)
and Baku-Tbilisi-Kars (BTK) projects as the best economic ventures
contributing to the regional peace and security greatly.
He pointed out the necessity to develop more that sorts of projects
and to expand them such a way that they could connect all peoples in
the Caucasus.
Russia and Georgia appear to have accepted the new formation in
principle and foreign ministries of the three states are going to
work on details, while Turkey is getting ready to offer it first to
Azerbaijan and Armenia and then to the EU for their participation. The
Turkish side is particularly hopeful that the ‘ Caucasus Alliance’
in the offing will resolve the other most important regional security
issue, the Nagorno-Karabakh (NK) conflict, between Baku and Yerevan
once-and-for-all.
Interdependence as Security Solution
In fact, the proposal Turkey is now presenting is a method that it has
been discussed in security studies in international relations for years
mainly between the Liberal and Realist thinkers on security. Turkey’s
suggestion of ‘Alliance’ for the Caucasus takes its logical base from
liberal views on security solutions developed mainly as responses
to those of the state centric realist perspectives in inter-state
relations.
Of others, neo-liberal institutionalists principally suggest that
there are various diverse and important actors in domestic and
international levels which function away from the strict control of
governments. Inter-governmental organisations, as well as private
ones, with having diverse agendas is and can influence governments’
decisions in the way of pushing them to co-operate among themselves
further and thereby allowing states to get over a number of inter-
and intra-state disputes. Basically, liberal school suggests that
presence of complex interdependence among societies and states allows
multiple channels open between those actors in their trans-governmental
and transnational relations. This ‘complex web of linkages’ between
formal and informal actors deals with a myriad of issues in which
military security and/or survival of the state prioritized by the
Realists is supposed not to take top priority. Rather, it is assumed
that if or when states manage to construct a complex interdependence
among themselves, like voluminous trade relations and joint economic
projects in a particular region, the risk of the use of military
force will be greatly evaded.
Realist perspectives on security on the other hand do not share
much of those liberal views on security. For them, though complex
interdependence is a source of cooperation and an important method
for problem solving, or at least decreasing the tension among states,
the same sources are the scarce commodities for which individuals
and states often strive for control paving the way for inter- and
intra- state military conflicts. Indeed realists argue that states
always seek for maximising their power in line with their national
interests in economic, military and security issues and minimise the
risks in the same matters. Realists see that complex interdependence
can only work so long as all parties get satisfied, and yet this is
often impossible to succeed and hard to sustain. So, interdependence
resembles no more than a fierce power competition and domination
over scarce resources. As continuous rivalry on scarce resources is
a never-ending phenomenon, conflict cannot always be avoidable. In
this never-ending state of rivalry, inter-governmental organisations,
for the realists, are no more than instruments in the hands of states
for promoting their national/security interests.
Energy Pipelines for Peace?
The interdependent model, so to speak ‘Alliance’ of Turkey in this
case, needs to be such in kind that it must cover most, if not all, of
the intra- and extra regional security issues and actors, if it wants
to produce fruitful results. But, how easy is it to bring them all
together while they all have polarizing priorities and interests? As
Erdogan hinted, diversification of energy pipelines in the region is
the backbone of the suggested ‘Alliance’. This entails that if those
actors such as Abkhazia, South Ossetia (S.Ossetia) and Armenia benefit
from existing or impending regional big economic projects like energy
lines and railways, ethno-territorial wars, the most serious regional
security issues, can be prevented and even resolved totally.
Not going into too much detail, however, examples on the ground suggest
otherwise. As many remember, similar proposals were discussed and
even offered to the conflicting sides to resolve their differences for
permanent solutions in the midst 1990s. At that time, it was suggested
that if Russia had joined into energy projects and pipelines in
Azerbaijan, this would have integrated not only the Caucasian states
and ethnic republics but also the neighbouring countries. By this
way, for instance, the Chechen problem was believed to be resolved
peacefully as Grozny would get transit fees from the Baku-Novorossiysk
early oil pipeline crossing the Chechen territory. Yet, Russia did
not get so much satisfied with the only early oil pipeline from
Azerbaijan. Nor did the Chechens accept the amount of revenues that
they would have received from the Azerbaijani oil transportation via
their territory. As well known, Russia pushed further for main oil
pipeline, later to be known as BTC, to cross its own territory. Not
enough, the dispute between Moscow and Grozny forced Russia to change
the direction of the Baku-Novorossiysk line from Chechnya to Dagestan
Republic. Equally, neither the flow of Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline nor
Moscow’s shares in the ‘Contract of Century’ and Shah Deniz projects
in Azerbaijan did soften its pro-Armenian position in the NK dispute,
and even continued to supply huge amount of arms to Yerevan ready to
be used by the NK Armenians in an eventual war against Azerbaijan.
Similarly, the US negotiator in the NK dispute, John Maresca, made
public in Winter 1995 that if an oil pipeline, called ‘peace pipeline’,
had followed the direction from Baku to Ceyhan via the NK and Armenian
territories, this would have encouraged the like-minded Armenian
politicians to capitalize it and so get involved in an honest effort
to resolve the dispute. Obviously, the suggested ‘peace pipeline’ was
thought to have the potential that it would have resolved the still
existing problems between Turkey and Armenia, too, and given the two
the chance to normalise their political and economic relations. At
the end, both sides ruled out the project from the outset and did
not have any serious discussions on its potential benefits for
the inter-state relations and regional security. While Azerbaijan
concentrated on alternative roads for its oil, Yerevan followed a
realist way of heavily arming itself with Russia’s military hardware
against Azerbaijan, and intensified its effort of the recognition
of the so-called ‘Armenian genocide’ by the international community
against Turkey.
Intergovernmental Organisations for Solution: the OSCE
Interdependence model of the ‘Alliance’ regarding the
inter-governmental organisations can unlikely generate any positive
results in the region either. The OSCE, which is referred as another
important means in the ‘Alliance’, has already been involved in the two
of the three conflicts of S.Ossetia, Abkhazia and NK for more than a
decade. The organisation had had no mandate in the Abkhaz conflict,
while it has maintained a very limited role, only 8 observers
for monitoring the cease-fire, in S.Ossetia in the Joint Control
Commission alongside Russian, S.Ossetian, N.Ossetian and Georgian
representatives. With such a limited number of observers and a weak
mandate, the OSCE could not have been able to stop unleashing the
current fire and Russia’s heavy-handed behaviour.
The OSCE’s involvement in the NK is even much more worrisome. The
Minsk Group established within the framework of the OSCE in 1992
has specifically been dealing with the NK problem in the forms of
either bringing the sides to negotiating table or proposing its own
peace-plans to Baku and Yerevan. Since then, it brought the sides
together for dozens of times for a possible break-through in the
dispute. As this did not work, it prepared three different peace-plans
for the resolution of the NK dispute, but they were not accepted
by either Azerbaijan or Armenia due to the disagreement centred
especially on the final status of the region. Most importantly, the
Minsk Group has three permanent members of Russia, the US and France,
each of which is holding chairmanship of the Group in rotation. As
Russia has actively participated in the NK since its inception
with a pro-Armenian stance, similar to those of the conflicts
between Georgia and breakaway regions of Abkhazia and S.Ossetia,
the Minsk Group especially under Moscow’s watch did not yield a
permanent solution acceptable for both Baku and Yerevan. Hence if the
‘Alliance’ is wanted to become successful on the resolutions of all
three conflicts via inter-governmental involvement, the OSCE, as well
as its sub-entity of the Minsk Group, must be much more active on the
ground and most importantly divorce itself from being influenced by
its powerful members, such as Russia, in the Caucasus.
As far as the differing behaviours and conducts of the regional and
extra-regional actors above are concerned, the ‘Caucasus Alliance’
of Turkey, boosted up with the interdependence model of liberal
thinking rested on intensive economic relations and institutional
involvement, highly unlikely generates any promising results in the
establishment of a permanent peace in the region. Indeed, Turkey put
‘Caucasian Home’, a very similar proposal carrying the same objectives
as that of the current one, on the agenda in the 1990s. This met
with an outright rejection from the Armenian side claiming that it
was against the national interests of both Armenia and Russia, and
that it was nothing but aimed to resuscitate the ‘old Pan-Turkist
dream’ of uniting all Turks from Caucasus to Central Asia. There is
no any reason now why Armenia should not think the same way as it
thought few years ego. In fact, Russia has come out of the war against
Georgia much stronger and domineering along its backyard than before,
and is now much more defiant against the more active involvement of
international organisations (e.g. OSCE) in the ‘near abroad’. So,
it can be hardly said that Moscow has genuinely believed in the
formation and the success of the ‘Alliance’. If it is the case, why
then the Russian military is bombing various economic sites, destroying
railways and sinking ships and boats in Poti and Georgia in general is
the question waiting for some answers for all these are the important
means for Tbilisi upon which the ‘Alliance’ is supposed to be built.
It is unfortunate once again to see that old realist thinking of
power maximisation of states overwhelms the liberal model of complex
interdependence, and of the Turkish proposal of ‘Caucasus Alliance’,
at the expense of peace and security in inter-state relations. How
this can be reversed the other way around does not and will not have
an easy answer for long years ahead. Indeed, the Caucasus is not a
unique region in that respect in the world. This is the fact of the
post-Cold world order/disorder, and it can be easily seen all around
if one just turns around and looks at what is happening in Iraq today
and then asks himself why.