Can US supply Afghanistan war without Kyrgyzstan's Manas airfield?

[tekisui]

Source: Christian Science Monitor

New Delhi

Opposition forces have forced the president of Kyrgyzstan to flee the capital and have declared a new interim government. Having taken over government buildings, they are now trying to solidify their overthrow and gain international recognition, though events remain fluid.

The US has a major interest in the Central Asian nation: Manas airbase, a key transit hub for NATO soldiers and weaponry into Afghanistan.

Here’s a look at what the turmoil in Kyrgyzstan may mean for the US supply route into Afghanistan.

Will the toppling of the Kyrgyz government mean the loss of Manas airbase?

Experts are divided. On the one hand, the country’s post-Soviet politics involves clans vying over which powerful families will gain control over state businesses. That history suggests the new clan rising to power will want to renegotiate the lucrative deal with the United States, says Theodore Karasik, a Central Asia expert at the Institute for Near Eastern and Gulf Military Analysis in Dubai.

“It raises the possibility of having to renegotiate access to Manas again because these clans just want more money,” he says. “This was a big source of income for these families who came to power” the last time.

The US pays $60 million in rent, and nearly triple that in fuel fees – money that had been flowing to relatives of toppled president Kurmanbek Bakiyev. Those deals came after Mr. Bakiyev threatened to close the base in 2009, several years after he seized power in a similar popular uprising.

Other analysts disagree that a new deal will have to be negotiated. They say the interim government set up by the Bakiyev’s opposition still needs to unify Kyrgyzstan’s domestic divisions and win international backing.

“If the opposition talks about closing Manas they would burn their bridges with the West before building them,” says Oksana Antonenko, a Russian specialist with the Institute of International Strategic Studies in London. She adds: “The people who are putting this unity government together, I don’t think they are corrupt and looking to enrich themselves.”
How would the loss of Manas impact the US war effort in Afghanistan?

Manas became more crucial after Uzbekistan closed a similar base to the US military in 2005. NATO shifted the operations from Uzbekistan – refueling, moving troops and ammunition – to the Afghan airbase at Bagram.

A Manas shutdown would further strain the now-crowded Afghan base at a time when the US is still surging troops into Afghanistan. Security is also more of an issue at Bagram than at a base located outside the warzone.

more: http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2010/0408/Can-US-supply-Afghanistan-war-without-Kyrgyzstan-s-Manas-airfield

[tekisui]

1. UPDATE*: Kyrgyz Leaders Say U.S. Can Use Air Base

WASHINGTON, Apr 8, 2010 (IPS) - Kyrgyzstan's new leaders sought to reassure Washington Thursday that it can continue to use the strategic Manas airbase near the capital Bishkek as a supply link for U.S. operations in Afghanistan.

Roza Otunbayeva, the head of the interim government, told reporters in Bishkek that as far as the base's fate was concerned, "the status quo would remain".

Otunbayeva's remarks came amid growing uncertainty over whether the new Kyrgyz authorities would allow the U.S. to use the base.

However, the Kyrgyz leader also said new issues needed to be considered, without elaborating further. That might suggest the new government will seek a renegotiation and possibly increase the annual rent of around 60 million dollars that the U.S. pays to use the airbase.

The remarks by Otunbayeva, a former foreign minister, came after some opposition leaders had called Wednesday for the closure of the base.

U.S. officials say that despite the political turbulence in Kyrgyzstan, the Manas airbase is still operating.


http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=50970

[tekisui]

2. There is also this: New Kyrgyz rulers hail Russia, aim to shut U.S. base

BISHKEK (Reuters) - Kyrgyzstan's self-proclaimed new leaders thanked Russia on Thursday for helping to oust President Kurmanbek Bakiyev, and said they aimed to close a U.S. airbase that supplies forces in Afghanistan.

Their comments set Wednesday's overthrow of Bakiyev, who fled the capital Bishkek as crowds stormed government buildings, firmly in the context of superpower rivalry in central Asia.

No sooner had presidents Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev signed an arms reduction pact in Prague as part of an effort to "reset" strained relations than a senior official in Medvedev's delegation urged Kyrgyzstan's new rulers to shut the U.S. base.

The official, who declined to be named, noted that Bakiyev had not fulfilled a promise to shut the Manas airbase, and said there should be only one base in Kyrgyzstan -- a Russian one.

Omurbek Tekebayev, a former Kyrgyz opposition leader who took charge of constitutional matters in the new government, said that "Russia played its role in ousting Bakiyev".

"You've seen the level of Russia's joy when they saw Bakiyev gone," he told Reuters. "So now there is a high probability that the duration of the U.S. air base's presence in Kyrgyzstan will be shortened."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/08/AR2010040801275.html

[Arctic Dave]

3. Let the bidding war begin.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

4. Hopefully, no.

[jody]

5. Yes, unfortunately. n/t

[FarCenter]

6. The big issue is probably jet fuel

Note that a major cause of the recent opposition was that the cost of utilities was rising precipitously. I'd conjecture that it is partly because Kyrgyzstan has to import its oil and refined products. It has natural gas, but no oil AFAIK.

So where is Mina Corp getting the 105 million gallons a month of jet fuel?

KYRGYZSTAN: US AIR BASE CONTRACTS TO FACE SCRUTINY
http://www.eurasianet.org/departments/insight/articles/eav040810c.shtml

<SNIP>

A little known company called Mina Corp. currently holds the jet fuel contract for Manas. According to documents obtained by EurasiaNet under the Freedom of Information Act, Mina Corp. was awarded a contract to supply an estimated 105 million gallons of jet fuel to Manas in July 2009 at a cost of $2.28 per gallon.

The contract ends on July 31, 2010, but contains a further two-year delivery option.

Mina Corp, a Gibraltar-registered company, is closely related to Red Star Enterprises Ltd.

A spokesman for Red Star/Mina Corp., Nikolai Ushakov, told EurasiaNet, "Red Star Enterprises and Mina Corp. share some management and logistics aspects in support of Operation Enduring Freedom, although they are separately registered entities with different profiles."

On April 7, Ushakov categorically denied a link between Red Star/Mina Corp. and any member of the family of Kurmanbek Bakiyev, the Kyrgyz leader who fled Bishkek on April 7 amid mob violence. .

Red Star and Mina Corp. until recently shared office space in the Hyatt Hotel in Bishkek. Chuck Squires, a former defense attaché at the US embassy in Bishkek, has simultaneously held the post of director of operations for both Mina Corp. and Red Star.

Red Star Enterprises was previously linked to alleged payments to family members of ex-president Askar Akayev, who was ousted from power in 2005 in a popular uprising dubbed the Tulip Revolution.