Dayum, We've Irritated Another Dictator - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Elphaba · 08-01-2005, 09:09 PM

American foreign policy has a long history of siding up to a dictator if there was something to gain. This may be a first, however.

Uzbekistan Kicks US out of Military Base
By Nick Paton Walsh
The Guardian UK

Monday 01 August 2005

Pentagon given six months to quit as Washington's relations with hard-line dictator sour in wake of civilian massacre.
Uzbekistan has given the US six months to close its military base there, in its first move to sever relations with its former sponsor.

The air base near the southern town of Khanabad, known as K2, was opened weeks after the September 11 attacks to provide vital logistical support for Operation Enduring Freedom in neighboring Afghanistan.

Analysts have said that Uzbekistan agreed to the base, the first Pentagon presence in what is a former Soviet stronghold of central Asia, because of a large US aid package and Washington's silence about the country's appalling human rights record.

A US defense department spokesman said at the weekend: "We got a note at the US embassy in Tashkent on Friday; the gist of it was that we have 180 days to cease operations at the K2 airfield."

He added that the defense and state departments were evaluating "the exact nature" of the request. "K2 has been an important asset for the war in Afghanistan," he said. "We will have to evaluate what to do next."

The US presence in Uzbekistan has been under intense moral scrutiny after the massacre by Uzbek troops of hundreds of civilians in the southern city of Andijan in May.

The White House was at first muted in its criticism of the massacre, but the state department has grown increasingly vocal in condemning the attack and calling for an independent investigation.

The Pentagon has sought to renew the leasing agreement for the base, for which it has paid $15m to the regime of President Islam Karimov since 2001.

Critics have accused the US of propping up one of the world's most brutal regimes in exchange for the base's short-term benefits. The Uzbek authorities are accused of killing and jailing ordinary Muslims under the guise of fighting religious extremism and terrorism, and the state department says torture is used by police in Uzbekistan as a "routine investigation technique".

A former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who was sacked after criticizing western support for the Uzbek regime, said: "The US has managed to hand the dictator Karimov the propaganda coup of kicking out the world's greatest power. Western policy towards Uzbekistan has been unsustainable for a long time."

He said the Uzbek decision to curtail relations with Washington was "due to a change-around in economic policy. There has been no significant investment from the west for a while; it's all Russian and Chinese state-owned companies."

"Karimov took the decision years ago not to have democracy and capitalism, it just took the US a lot longer to work that out.

"If they had any dignity they would have jumped before they were pushed."

He said the move would put pressure on other central Asian states to turn away from the west, towards China and Russia, because of their reliance on Uzbekistan's resources.

Uzbekistan's demand for the Americans to leave the base prompted a senior state department official to cancel a planned visit to the capital, Tashkent, according to the New York Times.

R Nicholas Burns, the undersecretary of state for political affairs, was due to hold negotiations about the future of the base with the Karimov regime, and was to echo demands for an international investigation into the Andijan massacre.

The Uzbek government continues to maintain that 187 people in Andijan, mostly criminals, were killed when troops suppressed a prison breakout. Human rights groups say unarmed protesters were fired on, the injured were killed, and that up to 800 people may have died.

The New York Times also quoted a senior state department official as saying that the Uzbek demand was connected to US support for neighboring Kyrgyzstan's refusal to send home those who had fled Uzbekistan after the Andijan massacre.

The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, has phoned the Kyrgyz government about 29 of those who fled, now being held in the southern city of Osh, and asked that they be ferried out by the UN to a neutral third country.

Her intervention sparked the Uzbek demand for the base to be closed, the official said.

Elphaba · 08-01-2005, 09:10 PM

This space reserved for Ustwo & J8ear for mocking the:

Poster:

The Source:

No need to save space for the content is there?

martinguerre · 08-01-2005, 10:34 PM

i've long thought Karimov was the worst deal with the devil we made in the war on terror.

the andijen massacre was public and in the MSM, but he had quietly been repressing the hell out of that country, but as long as he was tactically necessary, we didn't say too much. to me, it's SOA all over again. we help penny ante dictators get better at controling communist insurgents/terrorists, and then they go around and just rape American nuns/kill their own citizens.

i hope this marks the beginning of a new chapter in our attitude, one of confrontation of the serious problems going on in Karimov's regime.

alansmithee · 08-02-2005, 01:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

This space reserved for Ustwo & J8ear for mocking the:

Poster:

The Source:

No need to save space for the content is there?

Ahh, another worthwhile and well-thought out post. Of course, what else should you expect from such a reasoned, in depth, thought-provoking thread opener. Also, I didn't know we had a reporter for The Guardian posting in the politics board.

Hardknock · 08-02-2005, 02:28 AM

Honestly, those names did pop into my mind as I read the origional post.

Superbelt · 08-02-2005, 04:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by alansmithee

Ahh, another worthwhile and well-thought out post. Of course, what else should you expect from such a reasoned, in depth, thought-provoking thread opener. Also, I didn't know we had a reporter for The Guardian posting in the politics board.

Well, Ustwo is on record here supporting our alliance with Uzbekistan because of the strategic benefits we received from them, and despite the clear attrocities that that government was committing.
What's a few tortured and murdered brown people when there are American interests to be secured?

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...ght=uzbekistan
Ustwo quotes from that thread

Quote:

-Here is a question for you all. If you have a choise of picking a monster on your side or a monster not on your side, which monster do you pick?

-Gobbly gook. Letting your mortal enemies win to be an example of virtue leads to Christian martyrdom.

-...I would not. The stakes are far different now then they were then as are the circumstances.

j8ear · 08-02-2005, 04:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

American foreign policy has a long history of siding up to a dictator if there was something to gain.

Agreed and I don't much like it. Somethings however are just the best of two bad options.

What's your opinion on the matter?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

This may be a first, however.

A first what?

-bear

Lebell · 08-02-2005, 07:43 AM

It is a VERY bad idea to start responses with complaints about other posters.

Please do NOT do this again.

Consider this a friendly warning to knock it off and get back on topic.

(My thanks to those who ignored the temptation to follow suit.)

Charlatan · 08-02-2005, 08:01 AM

Ultimately the US gets to have a base of operations that allows them easier access to Afghanistan... but at the cost of supporting another brutal dictatorship.

It really sounds like the more things change the more they stay the same.

Considering the new policy the Rice was mouthing earlier this year (the one that said they were going to help spread democracy) it seems their departure is over due. That is unless you believe that the precense of the base was to spread democracy to Uzbekistan.

host · 08-02-2005, 09:04 AM

In edit....

Elphaba · 08-02-2005, 05:23 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by j8ear

Agreed and I don't much like it. Somethings however are just the best of two bad options.

What's your opinion on the matter?

A first what?

-bear

I think you will find your answer from the article:

A former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who was sacked after criticizing western support for the Uzbek regime, said: "The US has managed to hand the dictator Karimov the propaganda coup of kicking out the world's greatest power. Western policy towards Uzbekistan has been unsustainable for a long time."

Willravel · 08-02-2005, 05:40 PM

I don't personally have relations with those who are involved in massacres as a rule. I hope that some day a U.S. administration will follow my example. My opinions of the war on terror aside for a moment, I am always troubled to hear we are either putting an embargo on a democracy or are dealing with those governments who clearly have immoral policies. Can we really be so lax in choosing friends? Are we so desperate that we must lie with war criminals?

j8ear · 08-02-2005, 05:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

I think you will find your answer from the article

Except that I didn't....that's why I asked the question.

And we still haven't heard your opinion on the matter....except for "that this maybe a first," what ever 'this' is.

-bear

Locobot · 08-03-2005, 07:43 AM

I don't understand why we need a military base in Uzbekistan now that we have airfields in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as bases in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, and use of Pakistan airspace.

joshbaumgartner · 08-03-2005, 02:27 PM

Getting in bed with monsters that we aren't at war with to go after monsters we are at war with just seems to set up the next war. After all, Osama was forged as a weapon to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan, and Saddam's military was the product of anti-Iranian policies. While these relationships are built on a supposedly pragmatic basis, the problem is the fact that there is no end game strategy, but instead just a repeating cycle that sucks us into constant conflicts. Some may want this, I suppose, but if you really want to follow a path of stabilizing an area, you can't succeed by propping up bad regimes along the way. The record of failure for this strategy is long, and it is dissapointing to see our current leadership repeating the same errors.

Josh

Elphaba · 08-03-2005, 05:32 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by j8ear

Except that I didn't....that's why I asked the question.

And we still haven't heard your opinion on the matter....except for "that this maybe a first," what ever 'this' is.

-bear

Did you read my quote I provided for you, Bear? Perhaps I am wrong that a third-world dictator has "kicked out" the only super power is a first? Can you name a precedent?

Bear, I completely agree with your statement that it is a bad idea to romance a dictator to further our foreign policy interests, but would you agree that we have had a poor history of success in choosing the lesser of two evils?

j8ear · 08-03-2005, 05:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

Did you read my quote I provided for you, Bear? Perhaps I am wrong that a third-world dictator has "kicked out" the only super power is a first? Can you name a precedent?

Bear, I completely agree with your statement that it is a bad idea to romance a dictator to further our foreign policy interests, but would you agree that we have had a poor history of success in choosing the lesser of two evils?

"Kicked Out" seems a little off base...especially since it was essentially, 'excuse me, Mr. Super Power, yes you, the US of A, now that things have wound down significantly in the Afgan Theater, perhaps you and your troops could be persuaded along the lines of withdrawling from my humble little country within the next six months? If it's not to much trouble. Thank you kind US of A for allowing me to even ask. Also, as promised when you arrived, would this now be a good time to feign anger and power over you to the people I subjugate. It would go a long way towards me continuing my reign.

Mr USofA responds with a simple "AS YOU WISH!"

Thank you again Mr US of A...thank you....thank you.../walks away without turning around, and bobbing head in an up and down bowing fashion, without intentionally making any eye contact/ ...by your leave....thank you...thank you.'

You are right though, no precedent comes to mind.

To your second point, I largely agree except for your intonement of this being a poor choice. I can't think of a better choice of an evil dictator to get into bed with. Success, when all options are essentially 'poor' is certainly tough to measure though.

I still don't like it...getting into bed with dictators, but the region we needed to operate in is surrounded by dictators. I'm hard pressed to see how it could have gone better?

-bear

Ustwo · 08-03-2005, 06:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Superbelt

Well, Ustwo is on record here supporting our alliance with Uzbekistan because of the strategic benefits we received from them, and despite the clear attrocities that that government was committing.
What's a few tortured and murdered brown people when there are American interests to be secured?

http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showthr...ght=uzbekistan
Ustwo quotes from that thread

Superbelt you are back! I've missed you so much

In ignoring this thread, since it was basically a troll from the start, I missed you quoting me.

And damn straight I supported our 'alliance' at the time, because we needed them and we had vital interests at stake. If we took the road to hell with good intentions and didn't get a base there, odds are our little dictator would still be in power, and we would have been short a badly needed airbase. So now the guy flakes out a bit because we are saying maybe it’s a bad idea to kill people and kicks us off the base. I am unaware of how vital this base currently is, but if it is still vital then the State Department needs an asskicking, its not their job to endanger the lives of American service men, if its not so vital then good riddance, it served its purpose.

Ironically this IS the same policy most of the world wanted us to take with Iraq. Lift the sanctions and work with Saddam, I'm sure we can make things better in the long run, after everyone gets rich.

Elphaba · 08-03-2005, 07:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

Superbelt you are back! I've missed you so much

In ignoring this thread, since it was basically a troll from the start, I missed you quoting me.

Please explain the "troll" accusation. It certainly was not my intent.

Ustwo · 08-03-2005, 08:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Elphaba

Please explain the "troll" accusation. It certainly was not my intent.

Note the yellow text above.

08-01-2005, 09:09 PM	#1 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	Dayum, We've Irritated Another Dictator American foreign policy has a long history of siding up to a dictator if there was something to gain. This may be a first, however. Uzbekistan Kicks US out of Military Base By Nick Paton Walsh The Guardian UK Monday 01 August 2005 Pentagon given six months to quit as Washington's relations with hard-line dictator sour in wake of civilian massacre. Uzbekistan has given the US six months to close its military base there, in its first move to sever relations with its former sponsor. The air base near the southern town of Khanabad, known as K2, was opened weeks after the September 11 attacks to provide vital logistical support for Operation Enduring Freedom in neighboring Afghanistan. Analysts have said that Uzbekistan agreed to the base, the first Pentagon presence in what is a former Soviet stronghold of central Asia, because of a large US aid package and Washington's silence about the country's appalling human rights record. A US defense department spokesman said at the weekend: "We got a note at the US embassy in Tashkent on Friday; the gist of it was that we have 180 days to cease operations at the K2 airfield." He added that the defense and state departments were evaluating "the exact nature" of the request. "K2 has been an important asset for the war in Afghanistan," he said. "We will have to evaluate what to do next." The US presence in Uzbekistan has been under intense moral scrutiny after the massacre by Uzbek troops of hundreds of civilians in the southern city of Andijan in May. The White House was at first muted in its criticism of the massacre, but the state department has grown increasingly vocal in condemning the attack and calling for an independent investigation. The Pentagon has sought to renew the leasing agreement for the base, for which it has paid $15m to the regime of President Islam Karimov since 2001. Critics have accused the US of propping up one of the world's most brutal regimes in exchange for the base's short-term benefits. The Uzbek authorities are accused of killing and jailing ordinary Muslims under the guise of fighting religious extremism and terrorism, and the state department says torture is used by police in Uzbekistan as a "routine investigation technique". A former British ambassador to Uzbekistan, Craig Murray, who was sacked after criticizing western support for the Uzbek regime, said: "The US has managed to hand the dictator Karimov the propaganda coup of kicking out the world's greatest power. Western policy towards Uzbekistan has been unsustainable for a long time." He said the Uzbek decision to curtail relations with Washington was "due to a change-around in economic policy. There has been no significant investment from the west for a while; it's all Russian and Chinese state-owned companies." "Karimov took the decision years ago not to have democracy and capitalism, it just took the US a lot longer to work that out. "If they had any dignity they would have jumped before they were pushed." He said the move would put pressure on other central Asian states to turn away from the west, towards China and Russia, because of their reliance on Uzbekistan's resources. Uzbekistan's demand for the Americans to leave the base prompted a senior state department official to cancel a planned visit to the capital, Tashkent, according to the New York Times. R Nicholas Burns, the undersecretary of state for political affairs, was due to hold negotiations about the future of the base with the Karimov regime, and was to echo demands for an international investigation into the Andijan massacre. The Uzbek government continues to maintain that 187 people in Andijan, mostly criminals, were killed when troops suppressed a prison breakout. Human rights groups say unarmed protesters were fired on, the injured were killed, and that up to 800 people may have died. The New York Times also quoted a senior state department official as saying that the Uzbek demand was connected to US support for neighboring Kyrgyzstan's refusal to send home those who had fled Uzbekistan after the Andijan massacre. The US secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, has phoned the Kyrgyz government about 29 of those who fled, now being held in the southern city of Osh, and asked that they be ferried out by the UN to a neutral third country. Her intervention sparked the Uzbek demand for the base to be closed, the official said. __________________ "You can't ignore politics, no matter how much you'd like to." Molly Ivins - 1944-2007

08-01-2005, 09:10 PM	#2 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	This space reserved for Ustwo & J8ear for mocking the: Poster: The Source: No need to save space for the content is there? __________________ "You can't ignore politics, no matter how much you'd like to." Molly Ivins - 1944-2007

08-01-2005, 10:34 PM	#3 (permalink)
martinguerre whosoever Location: New England	i've long thought Karimov was the worst deal with the devil we made in the war on terror. the andijen massacre was public and in the MSM, but he had quietly been repressing the hell out of that country, but as long as he was tactically necessary, we didn't say too much. to me, it's SOA all over again. we help penny ante dictators get better at controling communist insurgents/terrorists, and then they go around and just rape American nuns/kill their own citizens. i hope this marks the beginning of a new chapter in our attitude, one of confrontation of the serious problems going on in Karimov's regime. __________________ For God so loved creation, that God sent God's only Son that whosoever believed should not perish, but have everlasting life. -John 3:16

08-02-2005, 07:43 AM	#8 (permalink)
Lebell Cracking the Whip Location: Sexymama's arms...	It is a VERY bad idea to start responses with complaints about other posters. Please do NOT do this again. Consider this a friendly warning to knock it off and get back on topic. (My thanks to those who ignored the temptation to follow suit.) __________________ "Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience." – C. S. Lewis The ONLY sponsors we have are YOU! Please Donate!

08-02-2005, 08:01 AM	#9 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	Ultimately the US gets to have a base of operations that allows them easier access to Afghanistan... but at the cost of supporting another brutal dictatorship. It really sounds like the more things change the more they stay the same. Considering the new policy the Rice was mouthing earlier this year (the one that said they were going to help spread democracy) it seems their departure is over due. That is unless you believe that the precense of the base was to spread democracy to Uzbekistan. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

08-02-2005, 02:28 AM	#5 (permalink)
Hardknock Republican slayer Location: WA	Honestly, those names did pop into my mind as I read the origional post.

08-02-2005, 09:04 AM	#10 (permalink)
host Banned	In edit.... Last edited by host; 08-02-2005 at 09:22 AM..

08-02-2005, 05:40 PM	#12 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	I don't personally have relations with those who are involved in massacres as a rule. I hope that some day a U.S. administration will follow my example. My opinions of the war on terror aside for a moment, I am always troubled to hear we are either putting an embargo on a democracy or are dealing with those governments who clearly have immoral policies. Can we really be so lax in choosing friends? Are we so desperate that we must lie with war criminals?

08-03-2005, 07:43 AM	#14 (permalink)
Locobot is awesome!	I don't understand why we need a military base in Uzbekistan now that we have airfields in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as bases in Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, and use of Pakistan airspace.

08-03-2005, 02:27 PM	#15 (permalink)
joshbaumgartner Insane	Getting in bed with monsters that we aren't at war with to go after monsters we are at war with just seems to set up the next war. After all, Osama was forged as a weapon to fight the Soviets in Afghanistan, and Saddam's military was the product of anti-Iranian policies. While these relationships are built on a supposedly pragmatic basis, the problem is the fact that there is no end game strategy, but instead just a repeating cycle that sucks us into constant conflicts. Some may want this, I suppose, but if you really want to follow a path of stabilizing an area, you can't succeed by propping up bad regimes along the way. The record of failure for this strategy is long, and it is dissapointing to see our current leadership repeating the same errors. Josh