In this essay, the author exposes the Central Asian trap which risks snaring NATO forces by virtue of their dependence on logistic supply. A generalised ‘Afghanisation’ of Central Asia is developing along two lines—drugs and terrorism—which are mutually supporting. Hope of stabilisation of the area seems well and truly compromised.

President Rosa Otunbayeva is apparently a tough character: she will need to be if she is going to lead her provisional government to a safe harbour! In Bishkek the obstacles to the exercise of power, internal and external, are sizeable and numerous.

This is an enlarged version of a presentation given in Russian in Kyrgyzstan on 21 October 2008 at the opening of the forum of the Franco-Swiss Foundation for Human Progress (FPH) dedicated to ‘the future of Central Asia and the code of ethics for its armed forces’.

In an article in last month’s issue of Défense nationale et sécurité collective entitled ‘The Afghan nightmare: an update’, the author showed how NATO action in Afghanistan is missing the point: the drugs war. He highlighted the way in which the Americans and their allies have taken the wrong track to the point of alienating a population initially well disposed towards them. The Atlantic Alliance is caught up in an interventionist spiral, and we have to ask ourselves what we are fighting for in Afghanistan. The answer to that question will tell us whether the operation should be maintained, with the sacrifices that that will entail, or whether NATO should withdraw to allow other forces to take over.

The Americans have opportunely switched the burden of their punitive expedition into Afghanistan onto NATO’s shoulders. Because of their mistakes, what should have been a war of liberation has become a war of occupation, not to say a war on the way to being lost. Just like the Soviet Union before it, the North Atlantic organisation, whose reputation is at stake, has slipped into the interventionist spiral, in which ever more troops and materiel are required. This is the moment, before it is too late, to do one of two things: either fight seriously with new combat and pacification tactics, or pull out of a conflict which is heading for catastrophe.