M. Shahidul Islam
A new geo-strategic reality is propelling Bangladesh’s foreign policy away from the traditional dependence on the USA and other Western countries, and, pushing the strategically located South Asian nation towards the rising Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) bloc of countries steered mainly by China and Russia.
This scenario bodes ill for Washington. Despite being ostensibly an economic power bloc, the SCO purports to counterbalance NATO’s military influence in the Asia-Pacific region in particular.
Bangladesh’s new foreign policy re-calibration has partly been ushered in by the aggressive Myanmar attitude in demarcating the mutual maritime boundaries while the USA’s increased softness towards — and collaboration with — the military-backed Myanmar regime has instilled fear among many within Bangladesh.
That fear is a genuine one. Many Bangladeshis are haunted constantly by Myanmar’s reckless flouting of human rights of the ethnic Rohingya Muslim minority, many of whom cross the border to flood Bangladesh which already has the highest geography vs. population ratio in the world.
Demeaning attitude of AL-led regime
Another reason is the increasingly stellar ties that have persisted between Dhaka and Washington over the preceding years due to Washington’s tougher stances on a number of issues; including human rights abuses and the demeaning attitude of the Awami League-led regime against the country’s Grameen Bank founder and Nobel laureate, Dr. Mohammed Yunus.
As ties with Washington frosted, China, a traditional Myanmar ally, moved aggressively to fill the void. Beijing also lost its nerve with the Myanmar regime due to Myanmar embracing Washington as an ally and hedged much of its bets on neighbouring Bangladesh; spurring in the process enhanced collaborations with Dhaka of both Beijing and Moscow in economic and military fields.
Bangladesh’s desperate quest for energy added much to fasten the arrival of this changed reality, besides attempts by Beijing and Moscow to lure Bangladesh away from Washington. Bangladesh currently produces around 2.04 billion cubic feet of gas per day (bcdf) against a whopping demand for more than 3 bcfd. It has 160 million mouths to feed.
A big chunk of the country’s proven gas reserve, about 6 trillion cubic feet, lies beneath deep waters in the 2 million sq. km triangle-shaped Bay of Bengal which is the largest Bay in the world, and, the resources of which are claimed and contested by neighbouring Myanmar, India and Thailand too.
Over the years, tussle over the ownership of the Bay – and steps for off shore exploration of oil and gas – has led to Myanmar’s military preparedness to confront Bangladesh a number of times, compelling the latter to obtaining military capabilities of a kind that can match or outdo the Myanmar threats.
Since March 2012, Bangladesh also felt emboldened by the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea’s (ITLS) first ever verdict against Myanmar in the maritime boundary dispute, and, felt the necessity to prepare militarily in case Myanmar breaches the ITLS’s verdict.
Hence, within months of obtaining 44 Chinese MBT- 2000 tanks worth about US$162 m, Bangladesh inked with Russia another major arms deal on January 15. The $ 1 billion deal is the largest of its kind signed by this impoverished South Asian nation. It contains a veritable package of much-needed military hardware; including armored vehicles, battlefield weapons, air defense systems and Mi-17 transport helicopters, according to defense officials.
The procurement will be financed from a soft-termed loan granted by Moscow as a gesture of goodwill to cement strategic bonds between the two countries which remained stalled since the mid-1970s following the removal from power of the Sheikh Mujib regime, deemed by the West as distinctly pro-Moscow at the height of the Cold War.
Decades on, this is the first visit to Moscow by a Bangladeshi PM since Mujib’s visit in 1972 when the two nations were best of allies due to Moscow’s diplomatic and military supports for Bangladesh’s 1971 war of independence. Hasina is Mujib’s daughter.
Military and technological cooperation
“Our countries intend to expand their military and technological cooperation,” President Putin told Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during a Kremlin ceremony. “Russia will extend Bangladesh a credit of $1 billion, which will be spent on the purchase of Russian weapons and military technology,” a seemingly exuberant Putin added.
Of the six MoUs and the three agreements signed during the Bangladesh PM’s three-day Moscow visit, one relates to the coveted – and, perhaps much needed – 2000 MW nuclear power plant construction for which Moscow has agreed to provide $500 m as the initial seed fund to kick start the project. The two reactors needed for the project are expected to cost $4 billion, for which Moscow agreed to continue financing after the first phase of the project is complete.
Observers say this was otherwise a remarkable feat for Bangladesh which got yanked by the USA and many other Western countries for over three decades when approached for nuclear cooperation for peaceful uses.
The six MoUs signed with Moscow encompassed mutual cooperation in the fields of agriculture, public health, medical science, education, counterterrorism, culture, law, justice and parliamentary affairs. The arms and nuclear deals aside, Dhaka and Moscow committed to pushing their bilateral trade level to $1 billion mark annually, from its current $700 m level.
One senior officer of the Bangladesh military said the induction of the 44 MBT-2000 tanks has ‘added some biting teeth to the army’s fighting capability’ which already has 200 other combat-ready Chinese tanks.
Earlier, Beijing agreed in principle to finance the construction of a deep-water port at Sonadia near the coastal town of Cox’s Bazar, where a new air base is also slated to be constructed with Chinese assistance to help protect the country’s offshore interests in the Bay of Bengal.
One source in the army said some of the soon-to-be purchased merchandise for the military includes two squadrons of Chinese-built FC-1/JF-17 and FC-20/J-10 fighter aircrafts – in lieu of the earlier planned decision to buy eight more Mig-29 fighter jets which is proving costly – and a submarine for the navy. “The fighter jet procrement decision is not final as yet,” said another source.
The newly procured military cargos add to the procurement in November of two new Dauphin AS 365 N3+ helicopters – each with a capacity to carry 12 personnel at 269 km per hour speed- for the army’s aviation squadron. The helicopters can be used for both disaster management and combat operations.
As these arms shopping spree continues, some critics within the country say these are pre-election stunts of a regime that is desperate to win over the hearts and minds of the military brasses to weather better an impending mass uprising being stirred by the regime’s negation to hold election under a neutral regime. Others say money is being wasted for reasons that are not productive enough.
Notwithstanding such criticism, which will keep pouring due to Bangladesh needing more carrots than cannons, the deals are unlikely to have any major impacts on the approximate $1.6 billion budgetary allocation slated for Bangladesh armed forces. “Our military earns much more annually from its UN peacekeeping mission,” swaggered a Colonel, insisting anonymity (globalreview.ca).
Source: Holiday
