Comments on: Substitute

By: Registan.net » I knew it!

Registan.net » I knew it! — Sat, 21 May 2005 20:40:48 +0000

[...] May 2005
I knew it!
Posted by Nathan under Uzbekistan|Email This Article

So, I said here that if you’ve been reading long enough, you could probably step in for me and write why it is I find [...]

By: Tim Newman

Tim Newman — Sat, 21 May 2005 19:21:11 +0000

....you could probably write it all for me. I've had a go here.

By: Nathan

Nathan — Sat, 21 May 2005 13:18:57 +0000

I wish that there was some kind of cosmic law that dictated writing that the US is doing something in a country next to but not in countries with oil and pipelines (and not to mention that what the country has is bought up by another company) would result in lightning to come down on the writer's head.

By: Tim Newman

Tim Newman — Sat, 21 May 2005 13:03:08 +0000

Ah, I should have read the article first! I see that Hari also thinks that:

Islam has never been strong in central Asia.

Not even in Afghanistan, eh Johan?

By: Tim Newman

Tim Newman — Sat, 21 May 2005 13:00:37 +0000

I wrote this in response to an article in The Telegraph which asserted that Central Asia was "pretty secular" even before the Russians came. It seems that post Andijon, everyone's an expert on Uzbekistan even if they couldn't locate it on a map two weeks ago.

By: sharifabad

sharifabad — Fri, 20 May 2005 23:15:35 +0000

The real tragedy is that the Islamofascists in Uzbekistan have now gained the upper hand and have made the non-violent secular democratic opposition, the traditional standards bearer for freedom and democracy, look like idiots. We all know Karimov is a dead man walking. So who is going to inherit power if the secular democratic opposition has been discredit and identified with the US pro-Karimov stance?

Uzbekestan is a “wedge issue”. It is driving a wedge between liberal hawks-neocons on one side and the Realpolitiks on the other side. It would be a strategic mistake on the part of the US to take the side of the pragmatists and Realpolitiks. US has its huge air bases in Afghanistan and can get another one in Afghanistan just 30 miles from the one it has inside Uzbekistan. If there is one Islamic country without significant oil resources and of less strategic value, it is Uzbekistan.

The harm that this wedge issue is doing on the historic discourse is so immense, that no amount of geostrategic advantage can justify this harm.

US should immediately give a final ultimatum to Karimov and get the Europeans to put equal pressure on Putin, and force their hands. Every day we are getting closer to the point of no return in Uzbekistan where the Islamist ideologues will take over, and by extension the region. The Realpoliticians will turn it into another Chechniya and then excuse themselves: “well aren’t we pinning Putin down on another front?”.

Such policy does not befit the interest of the United States or the liberalization of Uzbekistan.

-molavi