After the CSTO working group meeting in Minsk, several experts raised questions about the organization’s prospects.
Photo: REUTERS
The Caucasus, the Baltic States and Ukraine are three flashpoints where the situation has changed significantly throughout the year, and 2024 may bring new changes.
We talked about this on Radio Komsomolskaya Pravda with military expert, president of the Foundation for Historical Research “Osnovanie”, Alexei Anpilogov.
CAUCASIAN KNOT
– After the meeting of the CSTO working group in Minsk, several experts asked questions about the organization’s prospects.
– Why eliminate a mechanism that works? It was the CSTO that stopped the escalation between Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, where tanks occurred between two CSTO members. And remember the events in Kazakhstan at the beginning of 2022: the CSTO saved us again. This was a joint effort for collective security.
– Was this important to us?
– Then it was extremely important, as we now understand, to have a calm border with Kazakhstan, where the outbreak was serious.
– But for some, the CSTO is like a fifth leg?
– Maybe for Armenia, whose current authorities say they don’t seem to need the CSTO much now…
– Yerevan representatives ignored the negotiations in Minsk.
– But they said that Armenia does not seem to leave, but it is already difficult for them to stay in this organization.
– Is the CSTO reform approaching?
– Probably. There are countries that are on the same path as Russia. This, for example, was confirmed by the transfer of two S-300 air defense systems to Dushanbe. Well, there was a war between Turkey and Greece in the early 1970s. Then Northern Cyprus was formed. But no one dissolved NATO for that. Greece itself left there, but Türkiye remained. Then Greece thought and returned to NATO. Everyone needs security. And Armenia will not disappear from the geographical map.
– But the neighbors won’t go anywhere with their aspirations?
– That’s another question. And here Yerevan needs to think about whether it is worth breaking ties with the CSTO?
– If Armenia breaks with the CSTO, will it be a loss for us?
– For collective security, which is implicit in the CSTO, the loss of any participant in the process is a challenge. Our military base in Gyumri is under attack. If a pro-Western agenda arrives there, the first thing they will demand is the withdrawal of the Russian military base.
– But you won’t be kind by force…
– No. And the military blocks are being reformed. They should not include countries that do not value collective security. Armenia will be left to its fate. Let the new allies send peacekeepers. But we see from the example of Ukraine that they are ready to deliver new tanks and missiles, but not troops.
– Could it be that Armenia is waiting for this?
– You can give them used weapons. And at the price of a new one, as France now says. But if Armenia’s neighbor turns out to be stronger, and is objectively stronger both in the military and political sense, and has more vital alliances, what will happen then? Where is France and where is Turkey, which has a border with Armenia and can “help” from its territory in a conflict with its neighbor?
– And in Yerevan the question will arise: did they get on the right ship?
– Yes. It is not easy for a Christian country in an ethnically and religiously strange environment. This cannot be ignored.
– But Pashinyan received a vote of confidence from the people.
– Yes, he was elected prime minister. But if the population of this country has learned nothing from the events in Artsakh, then the following events are possible in the universally recognized Armenian territory. And if at the same time the CSTO does not exist as a functional structure, what can Russia do?
BALTIC BREEZE
– Will NATO increase tension in the Baltic Sea?
– The Baltic as “inner sea of the alliance” is a kind of maximal narrative. It is driven by Western countries. For example, from the Kaliningrad region to the Gulf of Finland, Russia has held on to the Baltic with two little fingers, so let’s hit it with a hammer on those little fingers. So that Moscow no longer makes any claims in the Baltic.
The Baltic States violate many international agreements and even unspoken rules of the game.
Photo: GLOBAL LOOK PRESS
– But then NATO will move to open confrontation?
– Yes, and already in military terms. Any naval blockade, according to international law, is a cause of war. Lithuania bans transit to the Kaliningrad region, citing pan-European rules that Russia allegedly violates. But this occurs at the beginning of March on very thin Baltic ice.
– But after Lithuanian attempts to ban transit to Kaliningrad, Moscow said this would be grounds for a political-military response.
– And in this case, I wonder if Lithuania will be able to say that it does not pursue an aggressive policy, that this is Article 5, we sit white and hairy on the shores of the Baltic Sea, and the damned hordes from the east. They pressure us.
– But will we one day have to face the Baltic countries closely?
– The Baltic countries violate many international agreements and even unspoken rules of the game. If this were done in relation to Gibraltar, which is an exclave of Great Britain, it would become grounds for a military operation by the country whose sovereign territory is subject to blockade or other violent actions.
– Should we share the interests of NATO and the Baltic countries?
– They are two different entities. The alliance declares a collective security mechanism, but it has never actually been used. Article 5 hangs like the sword of Damocles, but no one knows where it hangs. All these Baltic tigers can jump as long as they understand that nothing will happen to them for it. It seems that NATO has nothing to do with this, and it is a private initiative of Estonia in the case of the Gulf of Finland, or of Lithuania in the case of Kaliningrad. But they wouldn’t be so arrogant if they didn’t think that the alliance would help them tomorrow.
– And what does Russia need to show?
– Demonstrations ranging from the total closure of the border to the expulsion of the Baltic countries from the energy ring, where they still absorb our electricity, are possible. And they should not depend on cable from Sweden or Finland. If you want a blockade of Kaliningrad, you will get a blockade of the entire Baltic region, and in the most severe form.
ECHO OF RAMSTEIN
– Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine Zaluzhny and military leaders of NATO countries met in Ramstein…
– Ramstein does not have the military equipment or the amount of ammunition that Ukraine needs. Money can be found. But another billion from German reserves, when we convert them into real combat material, which is transferred to Ukraine, everything seems sad. The old Soviet weapons are gone. The Czech Republic transferred about a hundred T-72 tanks to Ukraine and will now deliver 14 Leopards to it. Transferring yours to Ukraine now means removing it from combat service. Macron did this once with the Caesar howitzers, but he will not do it a second time: the French army will be left without artillery.
Ramstein does not have the military equipment or volume of ammunition that Ukraine needs.
Photo: GLOBAL LOOK PRESS
– Is an opinion about fatigue being formed in the Western media?
– We saw what the NATO bloc is worth: for a year and a half, the most intense military operations were not enough. And suddenly both ammunition and military equipment for the NATO bloc ran out. And this problem cannot be solved in 2024. Ukraine will be put on a starvation diet next year.
– But still, a lot of ammunition, in particular cartridges, is transferred to Ukraine. Is a new Maidan possible there?
– Maidan is the legalization of a coup from above, which has already matured. But there are also large categories of citizens who are dissatisfied with the current government. These are widows, disabled people, veterans. The same Ukrainian women who lost their husbands and children will come out. And the women’s revolt will demolish Zelensky no worse than the riots that occurred before.
THE NAIS IS OFFICIAL EDITOR ON NAIS NEWS