8 May, 2009 – Global Research

“We are not afraid of anything, including the prospect of a new Cold War, but we don’t want one” – Russian President Dmitriy Medvedev

In his 1997 book entitled The Grand Chessboard American geostrategist Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote that if Russia ever attempted to launch its own defense pact, it would include, “at most”, Belarus and Tajikistan[1]. Twelve years later, his list turned out to be incomplete. Moreover, the attempts being made in order to enhance the Russian-led CSTO’s actual power projection capabilities and the efforts undertaken to bring the organization’s members closer together is something Brzezinski failed to anticipate and it seems that the latest developments concerning CSTO demonstrate that his triumphalism was premature.

The Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a.k.a. The Tashkent Pact, is an institutional framework created by countries from the post-Soviet space. Its charter was signed in 2002 by the Russian Federation, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia. CSTO, along with the Eurasian Economic Community (EurAsEC) and the Russia-Belarus Union State, is one of the organizations which sponsor integration efforts in the former Soviet Union. Its creation was clearly a response to NATO’s uninterrupted expansion eastward. CSTO articles include a mutual defense clause. Nevertheless, at the time, CSTO’s goal was more political than military because the organization was basically meant to prevent its members from being incorporated into NATO provided that this security pact stipulates that no member can join any other military alliance. For years, CSTO accomplished little more than conducting military exercises. This limited role was due to the fact that, back in 2002, the Russian Federation was still trying to recover from the chaos it had to deal with during the 90’s.
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