A RESURGENT CSTO? For long dismissed as a poor imitation of NATO, the CSTO has grown in ambition over the past few years. Mary Kavita Dominic is a Policy Research Associate with the Synergia Foundation. She is a Rhodes Scholar from Oxford University.
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ith Kazakhstan engulfed by mass protests, the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) has emerged from the ash heap of history to “restore order” in the country. The Russia-led security bloc did not hesitate to provide assistance when President KassymZhomart Tokayev issued a call for help. Of course, many regional observers were taken by surprise, as this was the first time in its 30-year history that the organisation exercised collective security powers to militarily intervene in a member state. Predictably, the events in Kazakhstan have triggered speculations about Russia extending its reach in Central Asia through a military alliance of ex-Soviet states. The growing chaos in Afghanistan, spurred by the withdrawal of U.S troops, has only fuelled these conjectures even further. It remains to be seen if the CSTO will indeed move beyond its image as a ‘symbolic anti-Western body’ to exercise more powers in the coming years.
A TEPID HISTORY
The timing of the CSTO actions in Kazakhstan is significant, as 2022 marks the 30th anniversary of the Collective Security Treaty. As can be recalled, the defence pact had been signed by members of the Commonwealth of Independent States in 1992, when the Soviet Union collapsed, and the Warsaw pact was dissolved. Ten years later, the member-states had declared themselves a full-blown military alliance, leading to the formation of the CSTO. Currently, the bloc enjoys observer status in the United Nations, with a membership of six countries - Russia, Tajik-
With the looming prospect of a war in Ukraine, Russia may have sensed this as an opportunity to show off the might of the CSTO. Through its swift deployment of troops, it has sought to demonstrate the Kremlin’s readiness to muster force when former satellite states drift away from its sphere of influence. Only time will tell whether the CSTO will indeed be instrumentalised by Moscow to tip more such regional events in its favour. istan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan. Like NATO, it is based on the principle of collective defence, whereby an attack on one member state is taken as an attack on the entire alliance. Critics, however, write it off as a paper tiger, owing to its repeated failure to come to the aid of member states. For instance, in 2010, when Kyrgyzstan’s acting premier appealed for help to control the clashing Kyrgyz and Uzbek ethnic mobs in his country, the organisation had not intervened in the situation. Similarly, it had rebuffed Armenia’s appeal for assistance during the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in 2020. Given this reality, there is much scepticism about the effectiveness of CSTO, even among regional players. The organisation has very few deliverables to speak of besides periodic military exercises and roundtable discussions on political/military issues. In fact, many member states view it as a mere forum to negotiate the purchase of discounted weaponry from Russia. It is no surprise, therefore, that
