Uzbekistan appears to be 'in play', and if it is, will undoubtedly be further confirmation, that a 'draining the swamp' policy is being followed by the Bush and Blair Administrations. 

The country is currently suffering under a shocker of a tyranny, and is one of the countries that pseudo-left's, and others have dragged out, as evidence, to counter the 'drain the swamp' credentials of the U.S. and the British up to this point. So, that situation is about to be stood on its head.  (If I'm right.)

The Coalition have been happy to work with this nasty dictatorship as they made, and continue to make war in Afghanistan, and have established air-bases and the like there.  So, naturally it is an embarassment that opponents have been keen to latch on to. 

Also, the U.S. State Department, (which cut 'aid' and criticised the Uzbek government's human-right's record); and the Pentagon, (which restored funding) have been singing from different Hymn books over the last year.  So, there probably has been dispute from within the U.S. Admin as to what's to be done about this country, but now, I believe the die is cast.

I believe this because both the British and U.S. governments have called for an independent inquiry, into the slaughter that has just taken place, and which is being covered up by the Uzbek government.  This goes directly against the interests of the Uzbek government.  

Anyone who has had anything to do with bourgeois politics will tell you that these type of politicians do not call for independent inquiries, unless they already know basically, what the inquiry is going to find.  (Please don't mention WMD!  I think I just did, but I may have got away with it!)  So, the Coalition are not going to make excuses for the tyranny but are going to demand some dramatic form of accountability; and as with Lebanon, and recognition of Hezbollah as a legitimate player, there are interesting issues of democracy and Islamism that will disorient people. 

The Uzbek government, would not get out of any inquiry without being found culpable in an unacceptable slaughter.  So, the current leader is desperately trying to remind the West that there is Islamic terrorism in his country that has to be dealt with, but evidently, no-one is listening to his excuses. 

Thus, I believe that a decision, that he must go, has already been made; the co-ordinated response by the British, and U.S., strongly suggests that this is the case.  Further, 'if twere well it were done, then twere well it were done quickly' would be the motto here.  So, buckle up for a quick ride, lasting a couple of months rather than several years. 

I know bugger all about Uzbekistan, but if the U.S., is for a change of government, and the people are on the street, to the extent that they are being shot down, en-masse; then the jig is up.  Some method of changing the government will have been considered. 

However, this is complicated because the U.S. military, (somwhat of a law unto themselves in terms of doing things in the same old way) do not want to be kicked out of every other dodgey country in the world who might then fear falling victim to their guest (but I guess this has been a perennial issue even when the U.S. weren't on the side of the angels).  I guess it's just one of the hazards of being a tyranny in the twenty first century.

Anyway, I think this issue is important to run with given that the LS analysis is so little understood. 

What do people think?

 If you were part of the uprising, then the massacre was the most brutal type of state-sponsored oppression. If you are Uzbek President Islam Karimov, on the other hand, then the uprising was a dangerous opportunity for Muslim extremists and militants to seize power, in order to replace the current government with a Taliban-inspired regime sworn to promote acts of terror against the USA and the West.


 

Herein lies the brutal choice that the Bush administration currently faces in Uzbekistan, and which it will have to face in other regions throughout the Muslim world in the coming months and years. It is a choice between two principles that, taken together, constitute the foundation of Bush's policy toward the Muslim world. First, the administration is committed to fighting Islamic terrorists and militants. Second, it is committed to promoting popular democratic government in the Muslim world.



 

For over two years now the Bush administration has insisted that there was no conflict between these two principles. Indeed, the essence of Bush's policy toward the Islamic world has been that the way to end terrorism was by making Muslim societies more democratic, and thus more responsive to popular sentiment. Yet if Muslim popular sentiment turns out to be violent anti-American and virulently pro-terrorist, then what?


 

Given this unattractive choice, there are only two solutions. The Bush administration can continue to insist on more democracy, even if this ultimately means the Talibanization of the entire Muslim world, and the dissemination of virulent anti-Americanism from one end of the region to the other. Or else the administration can do a complete about-face on democracy: discourage the spread of popular government in Islamic societies, and be prepared to back authoritarian governments that are willing to use brutal means to check popular uprisings whenever these uprisings, however popular, threaten to overturn pro-American governments and to replace them with hostile anti-American Taliban-like regimes.

Not Bush and Blair.

I think its pretty clear that  the US is going full speed ahead with its draining the swamps policy - leaving  both the  pseudo-left and the 'realist right'  floundering in its wake. 

I just posted a couple of  relevant news items:

UK ponders talking with Hamas and Hizbullah

excerpt:

 The British government is considering a major Middle East policy switch that would mean engaging directly and openly for the first time with the militant groups Hamas and Hizbullah, who are expected to make significant gains in elections in the West Bank and Gaza and in Lebanon. .....the Foreign Office is swinging behind the view that it would be hypocritical to encourage democracy but refuse to accept the outcome, even if it means working with groups it finds distasteful.

 

also 

And for an older but  very relevant article about  US policy and Islamism see:

We firmly support efforts by Uzbek authorities to strike down the three forces of terrorism, separatism and extremism. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman, Kong Quan, on the Central Asian republic's crackdown, which left hundreds dead.

Karimov is not morally equivalent to the Taliban or Saddam Hussein. He has not invaded neighboring states, or committed genocide, or subverted the Non-Proliferation Treaty, or hosted international gangsters. However, the fact remains that he is a nasty tyrant, and that American policy has come to adopt a position that post-Soviet states should be helped to overcome post-Soviet dictatorial malaise. The record here, in Georgia and Ukraine and Kyrgizstan and (soon, one hopes) Belarus, is not too discreditable. The president has changed the lazy manner in which he used to greet the appalling Vladimir Putin and has quite rightly criticized the post-Yalta settlement and its ancestry in the Hitler-Stalin pact. The defensible elements of this policy succeed only in making Uzbekistan an even more conspicuous and ugly exception. And one ought never to forget Chechnya, where the West in general has been amazingly supine in the face of Russian depredations....

... It's therefore rather depressing and alarming that President Bush has not said a word about conditions in Uzbekistan, or indeed in Saudi Arabia. Uzbekistan has been a hypocritical ally of regime change, and Saudi Arabia a cunning foe in the guise of a friend, but our complicity in both is about the same.

Ms. Politovskaya takes us on a trip of Russia since Putin took power five years ago. Our first stop is the military. Through several heart wrenching stories she makes us understand that the military is a law unto itself and that as such it is in fact lawless. Officers soaked in spirits beat the stuffing out of draftees on a whim and sell these draftees to private citizens as slaves for their term in the military. Well, at least the lucky ones get sold as slaves. Those who remain in barracks are subject to a brutality that would chasten inmates at the most frightening US prisons.

Politovskaya then takes us on a tour of a certain Russian province ruled by a crime syndicate. If you thought Don Corleone was tough you should look at how criminals have taken over almost every aspect of Russian business. By failing to protect small and medium sized enterprises from extortion Russia's government has wiped out the middle class. Only street vendors and huge enterprises have a chance of surviving in a society of tireless thieving by criminals and the even more powerful government bureaucrats whose dearly bought signature a business needs for just about everything it does.

The most pitiful stories in this book are those of the unlucky spectators caught up in a commando assault on the Moscow production of Nord-Ost a wildly popular musical in 2002. Troops let a narcotic gas into the theater, stormed it, and killed all the Chechen terrorists holding the place hostage. The problem with the operation is that 400 people ended up needing medical attention and this was given only hours later by no more than 50 available medical staff. Families tried to sue the government for incompetence but were insulted by the judge and sent packing.

President's Press Conference, May 31, 2005

Q Two questions about the consistency of a U.S. foreign policy that's built on the foundation of spreading democracy and ending tyranny. One, how come you have not spoken out about the violent crackdown in Uzbekistan, which is a U.S. ally in the war on terror, and why have you not spoken out in favor of the pro-democratic groups in Egypt that see the election process there unfolding in a way that is anything but democratic?

THE PRESIDENT: Well, I thought I did the other day, in terms of the Egyptians. I think you were traveling with Laura, maybe just got back, but I was asked about the Egyptian elections, and I said, we expect for the Egyptian political process to be open, and that for people to be given a chance to express themselves open -- in an open way, in a free way. We reject any violence toward those who express their dissension with the government. Pretty confident I said that with President Abbas standing here -- maybe not quite as articulately as just then.

In terms of Uzbekistan -- thanks for bringing it up -- we've called for the International Red Cross to go into the Andijon region to determine what went on, and we expect all our friends, as well as those who aren't our friends, to honor human rights and protect minority rights. That's part of a healthy and a peaceful -- peaceful world, will be a world in which governments do respect people's rights. And we want to know fully what took place there in Uzbekistan, and that's why we've asked the International Red Cross to go in.

Uzbekistan formally evicted the United States yesterday from a military base that has served as a hub for combat and humanitarian missions to Afghanistan since shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Pentagon and State Department officials said yesterday.
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