Of course this event must be viewed in its proper context.

On May 28, the NATO Parliamentary Assembly declared its support for Georgia and Ukraine’s hopes of joining the alliance. A proposal regarding Georgia’s expedited entry into NATO has been floated recently, as the bloc’s summit in July draws closer. The plan submitted for consideration by the American Heritage Foundation offers a “creative way around” the territorial problems with Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The alliance could amend the Washington Treaty by temporarily excluding the two entities recognized by Russia as independent states from NATO’s Article 5 protection. That proposal is being studied by Georgia’s parliament.

Last month, Tbilisi went to the European court of human rights in Strasbourg to accuse Russia of war crimes that were allegedly carried out in August 2008. Back then it was Georgia that was committing an act of aggression by attacking South Ossetia and the Russian peacekeepers, but 10 years later it is portraying itself as an innocent victim — another example of the pot calling the kettle black. That country has vigorously pursued the “more NATO in Georgia and more Georgia in NATO” concept, contributing to NATO operations and becoming part of the bloc’s institutions. Last year, the US administration voiced its support of Georgia’s NATO membership but did little afterwards to back those words up with any deeds.

Ukraine already plays host to the American military and receives lethal weapons from the US. It has recently appealed to Germany and France to support its NATO bid. Ukraine’s president has received an invitation to take part in the upcoming NATO summit.

Moldova is on its way to becoming a foothold for the US military and is embracing NATO. It has announced its decision to buy lethal weapons from the pact’s members. Chisinau is demanding that Russia’s military withdraw from Transnistria immediately and unconditionally. That government is openly unfriendly toward Moscow and does everything to heighten tensions between the two countries.

In March, Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova joined together to form an anti-Russian political and military alliance, reviving the GUAM organization with Azerbaijan, which is ready to cooperate but prefers to keep its distance from the anti-Moscow agenda, thus making it more of a GUM than a GUAM when it comes to opposing Russia.

Now, let’s have a look at what’s in store for this newly formed bloc, which is so hostile to Moscow.

Presidential elections will be held in Georgia in October 2018. The country has been weathering a storm of popular protests. Economic and social hardships are fueling public discontent. Standards of living have stagnated. Falling prices for some exports have reduced spending power. In 2016, the country signed an EU Association Agreement with the European Union. As a result, in the next few years European regulations will be introduced although the benefits of that trade regime will remain out of reach. The country is known for the corruption of its law enforcement agencies. There is no broad political consensus regarding the ongoing constitutional reforms. Full-fledged membership in Western organizations (NATO and the EU) remains a pipe dream. Some nations that have been accepted as members in the past were even less prepared to meet the requirements, but entry into these Western blocs that are focused on other problems still remains out of reach for Georgia. All it gets is promises.

The Ukrainian presidential election is to be held in late March 2019 despite the voters’ mistrust of the authorities. President Poroshenko’s chances of reelection are rather slim. He is polling behind several other candidates. Former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko is leading the polls. The country is facing increasing debt pressure. The risk of instability is high. Foreign investors and human capital are leaving the country. Ukraine remains poor — it is the only former Soviet republic in Europe that has never surpassed its GDP level from its days back in the USSR. Corruption, favoritism, and the power of its oligarchs are undermining Ukraine’s economy. The nation’s future looks bleak.

Moldova struggles with an overwhelming tide of corruption. Economic reforms have been carried out at a sluggish pace. The country is nearly wholly dependent on Russian gas imports via the pipeline system that passes through Ukraine. Moldova remains one of Europe’s poorest countries, with an annual per capita GDP of $2,280 in 2017. The nation is facing a parliamentary election in late November. The Socialist Party, led by pro-Russian President Igor Dodon, is predicted to win and change the country’s foreign policy. The ruling pro-Western Democratic Party has dismal ratings.

The three countries face the same problems: rule by oligarchs, a process of reform that is slow or nonexistent, relatively poor economic performance, and extremely remote prospects for joining Western organizations as full-fledged members. They are given special partner status, which sounds fine but in reality means little. The ruling elites feed the people promises that never come true. Their anti-Russian stance has never made anyone prosperous or secure. On the contrary, joining NATO and becoming springboards for potential attacks will only undermine their security, turning them into targets for the Russian military. Moscow has warned against moving the Western alliance to its borders.

Since Moldova will soon be out, the anti-Russian bloc will be short-lived. Georgia has its own problems as a South Caucasian nation. Those two countries have little to offer each other except vocal support. None of the three GUM bloc members has received massive economic aid from the West or has been treated as an equal by any leading Western nations. None of them, no matter how they try, can break all ties with Russia, due to the realities of geography and economics. None of them is expected to be greeted with open arms in the EU or NATO. The formation of this bloc can be used for propaganda purposes, but in reality it’s nothing but a flash in the pan that will soon be forgotten. It has no future.

Photo: azertag.az

With America’s tacit approval, the GUAM bloc, chaired this year by Moldova, is being revived. Last March, the prime ministers of Georgia, Ukraine, Moldova, and Azerbaijan held a meeting (Baku was represented by its deputy PM) in Kiev. It was the first high level meeting since 2008. The cooperation agreement signed by those foreign ministers last October mentions a free trade zone. The GUAM organization is expected to hold a summit this June. Three of its members – Ukraine, Moldova, and Georgia – act as tools for advancing America’s interests in the region. With the blessing of the US, they signed EU association agreements in 2014. The 2018 foreign-policy priorities list drafted by Moldova includes mention of the US, the Visegrad group, and Japan. According to Chisinau, the countries of the former Soviet Union – long-standing partners with which it shares historical ties – don’t deserve such an honor.

The speakers of parliament from these three countries took part in a security conference in the Moldovan capital titled "Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine: Eastern Partnership and Current Security Challenges," which was held on March 2 and attended by about 150 senior officials and experts from different countries. Of course US lawmakers and pundits were among the participants. As usual, the Atlantic Council, an American think tank that always supports neo-cons and anything anti-Russian, could not miss the chance to kindle anti-Moscow sentiments. Damon Wilson, its executive vice president, announced that the US was carefully watching over Moldova, Ukraine, and Georgia, claiming that they “wish to become part of our family,” as he put it.

The parliamentary leaders seized the opportunity to issue a joint statement condemning Russia’s military presence in what they believe to be their respective states’ territories. The document was published in English to reflect the pro-Western tilt of the three-state group. They are “concerned profoundly” over Russian troops in Moldova (1,000 troops and 500 peacekeepers stationed in Transnistria) and what they call “occupation” and “intervention” in some parts of Ukraine and Georgia.

As usual, Moscow is blamed for supporting “separatist movements” and other nefarious acts. The speaker of the Georgian parliament, Irakli Kobakhidze, said an anti-Russian alliance is needed, because only if they are united can these nations stand up to the “challenges” coming from Moscow. “We need joint strategies to face Russia's aggression,” chimed in Andriy Parubiy, the speaker of the Ukrainian Rada. To dispell any doubts about the new groups’ allegiance to NATO, he emphasized that “On this occasion I would like to speak of the threats faced not only by our region, but also by the Euro-Atlantic zone.”

The idea of reviving this alliance that was designed to counter Russia has failed. Azerbaijan refused to take part in any conference with such a clear anti-Russian agenda. That event demonstrated that there is no unity on Russia within the ranks of GUAM. So, GUAM is actually GUM – a group of three states that have been heavily influenced and pressured by the Americans and which are being used to “contain” Russia and forced to serve as NATO springboards.

These three states could maintain friendly relationships with everyone and stick to a neutral policy. Cooperation with the Eurasian Union could benefit their economies. Good relations with Moscow would not hinder their ties with the EU or other institutions or states, including the US. They could simply refrain from taking sides and concentrate on the well-being of their people. But no, they have chosen to adopt an attitude that is hostile to Russia and join those who are confrontational toward Moscow.

On March 2 the three member states actually announced the creation of a new anti-Russian alliance that will negatively affect the political landscape in Eurasia. The immediate objective is to push Russia out and pull the US in. Ukraine is a divided nation, plunged in crisis, and unable to fight its own entrenched corruption. Moldova is facing an election in the fall and the so-called pro-Russian forces are predicted to win. In Georgia, the idea of NATO membership does not have the support of the majority of the population, according to a recent poll. But the governments of these states are pushing the NATO agenda. They coordinate their political activities in order to counter Moscow in any way they can. For instance, they always vote for Ukraine in the PACE, strongly oppose the Nord Stream gas project, and continue to move closer to NATO.

Moldova has announced its decision to buy lethal weapons from NATO members. Its government is chomping at the bit to join “Western institutions.” Ukraine is home to a US naval facility and is scheduled to receive American lethal arms. Tbilisi is pursuing a “more NATO in Georgia and more Georgia in NATO” policy.

What brings them together? All three states are ruled by oligarchs who obstruct reforms. With their economies in dire straits, the ruling elites promise their people paradise if they join the EU and NATO and become good friends of the US. Adopting an anti-Russia policy is their payment for Western aid and support. Their own national interests and sovereignty are being exchanged for crumbs dropped from the master’s table. 

GUAM was conceived as a counterweight to the CIS and the CSTO. The organization was officially born in October 1997 in Strasbourg during a summit of the Council of Europe. The long-term goal set by the project’s Western ideologists was to nip any attempts to integrate the post-Soviet states in the bud. 

Remember that this was preceded by the signing of the Treaty on the Union between Belarus and Russia by the two countries' presidents in Moscow on April 2, 1997. Ever since then, April 2 is celebrated as the Day of Unification of the Peoples of Belarus and Russia. Under this treaty, the decision was made to create a politically and economically integrated community in order to unite the potential of the two states. 

The GUAM bloc arose in response to the birth of the Union of Belarus and Russia.  In 1999 at a NATO summit in Washington, Uzbekistan joined GUAM, after which the organization was renamed GUUAM. However, in 2005 at a summit in Chisinau, Uzbekistan left the organization «due to its excessive politicization» and «the non-implementation of the economic component». In 2006 at the Kiev GUAM summit the organization was renamed the GUAM Organization for Democracy and Economic Development. On May 24, 2006 Romania stated its intention to join GUAM.

From 2007 to 2011 the leaders of GUAM member countries held several meetings; however, these had no results. GUAM never became a military organization which could carry out its declared goals of protecting the transit of oil and gas from the Caspian region to Western markets or participating in the resolution of conflicts on the territory of the former Soviet Union. The GUAM project failed as a first attempt to create a cordon sanitaire on the western borders of Russia. After Georgia's defeat in the war of 2008, GUAM essentially ceased to exist, and in early 2010 Ukrainian presidential candidate Viktor Yanukovich stated that GUAM's activities were no longer relevant. This marked the end of the bloc.

However, in 2008, not long before Georgia's August attack on South Ossetia, the foreign ministers of Poland and Sweden put forward the Eastern Partnership initiative. The idea was presented to the EU Council on May 26, 2008 as a European Union project for developing integration relations between the EU and six former Soviet republics: Ukraine, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia and Belarus.  On May 7, 2009 an inaugural summit was held in Prague at which a declaration on Eastern Partnership issues was adopted. 

Thus, after the failure of the first attempt to fence Russia off with a cordon sanitaire, a second, more substantial attempt immediately followed; even Belarus, Russia's partner in the Union State, formally joined the project, although it later quickly lost interest. 

On September 3, 2013 during a meeting between Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow, Armenia's accession to the Customs Union was announced; and on November 21 the government of Ukraine announced that the process of Ukraine's signing of an association agreement with the EU has been suspended. Dissatisfaction with the Eastern Partnership program is growing in Azerbaijan as well. In late October 2013 a group of Azerbaijani journalists and cultural figures urged Ilham Aliyev to abandon participation in the program.  The initiators cite Brussels' haughtiness toward Azerbaijan and the EU's double standards on the issue of Karabakh as the motivation for their proposal.  

Thus the question arises: might not this next anti-Russian project known as the Eastern Partnership meet with the same fate as its predecessor, the failed GUAM bloc? And yet projects with no economic, cultural or historical foundation based solely on the logic of creating a belt of limitrophe states in Europe to separate Russia from the western part of the European continent are apparently destined to arise regularly in the minds of Western politicians. 

A regrouping of forces in the settlement in Transdnistria also took place after May, 2010. The joint declaration on the issue signed by the presidents of Russia and Ukraine on May 18 showed clearly that in the future the two countries would be implementing a concerted approach towards Moldova. The document reaffirmed the stabilizing impact of the peacekeeping operation which is underway in the region. As a result, the hope of the Moldovan right and the West to expel Russia from the region and to invite European mediators supporting Moldova's current administration to take Moscow's place evaporated.

The signing of the June, 2010 Russian-German memorandum on the establishment of the Russia-EU committee on foreign policy and security at ministerial level led watchers to conclude that Moscow and Berlin were about to reach consensus on the settlement in Transdnistria. A breakthrough was also made in the sphere of CIS integration projects. The code of the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan was enacted on July 6, 2010 as stated at the EurAsEC summit in Astana. The presidents of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan indicated that the two countries would likely join the Customs Union which considers erasing national borders by 2012 or even forming a common currency space in a more distant future. 

The above geopolitical shifts echoed with deep concern in the West which saw its plans to fragment the CIS and to gain control over Eurasian energy supply routes jeopardized. Meeting with Washington's resistance, the South Stream project was still outpacing the US-patronized Nabucco. Under the circumstances, Washington had to focus on the scenarios of “gentle” containment of Russia. In the context, a key role was given to Moldova, the republic where the April 6-7, 2009 color revolution swept away the administration Moscow could regard as more or less cooperative. The Alliance for European Integration put together in great rush started – gradually but steadily – to steer Moldova away from Russia towards NATO and Romania and to strengthen the dormant GUAM. Romania's president and the region's number one US loyalist Traian Băsescu became the de facto curator of the Alliance.

Shortly after D. Medvedev and V. Yanukovych signed the joint declaration, Moldova's interim president Mihai Ghimpu signed the divisive decree setting June 28, 1940 as the date of Soviet occupation and calling for an immediate withdrawal of Russian troops from Transdnistria. Ghimpu's decree saw the light of day immediately after Romanian president rather unexpectedly unveiled his discovery that Russian peacekeepers in Transdnistria somehow posed a threat to Romania's security. Interestingly, almost at the same time the Lithuanian parliament added to the country's criminal code an article making the denial of “Soviet occupation” a punishable offense. In a clear effort to champion the cause, the Georgian administration highlighted not one but two dates in the national calendar, establishing February 25 as the “occupation day” and August 23 – as “the victims of totalitarian regimes memorial date”. All of the above is unlikely to be a coincidence. 

Media reported on August 6-17 that presidents M. Ghimpu and M. Saakashvili met in Georgia to declare their commitment to reanimating GUAM believed to be stillborn since 2007. At the moment Belarus – the republic going through a period of chill in the relations with Russia – is being lured into GUAM to fill in the vacuum left by Ukraine which no longer takes any interest in the bloc.Russia seemed explainably unperturbed by the plan to revive GUAM – from the strategic point of view, the bloc was too big a failure to ever be taken seriously. The attempts made by certain forces in the West to support the color revolution which started brewing in Andijon in 2005 alienated Uzbekistan, Central Asia's key player in the gas market which was supposed to be GUAM's heavyweight. Moreover, for practically all of the GUAM countries the membership came with serious costs. Moldova had to shoulder the gas price of $230 per 1,000 cu m instead of the previous $80 and barely retained a quarter of its former share of Russia's vine market. The losses eventually forced the Moldovan president to state that the involvement of the country with GUAM would from now on be limited to economic projects. Georgia had to say Goodbye to 1/5 of its Soviet-era territory  and, by the way, was debarred from Russia's vine market completely. For Ukraine, membership in GUAM earned problems with Moscow and, of course, the European-level gas prices. Even the Odessa-Brody oil transit project – invented as an alternative to Russia's Druzhba pipeline – collapsed as the pipeline construction was frozen before reaching Europe.

Without Ukraine and the oil-rich Azerbaijan, these days GUAM stands no chance as an alternative to Russia in the sphere of energy supplies. Azerbaijan's energy sector is cooperating tightly with Russia, and Ukraine under Yanukovych shares a series of significant projects with Russia in the aerospace and metallurgy sectors that sooner or later are sure to boost Ukraine's GDP, so that its participation in anti-Russian projects seems out of question.

Belaruscan only be admitted to GUAM with an observer status. Considering that the country is a member of the Customs Union and the Collective Security Treaty Organization, it is improbable that President Lukashenko will dare to outrage Moscow over GUAM.

Nevertheless, the Ghimpu-Saakashvili mini-summit was not an escapade staged by two madmen. Ghimpu is in the full sense of the word a subordinate of Băsescu who is a staunch ally of the US. Obviously, the West is launching a broad offensive against the CIS aimed at preventing the Customs Union from expanding and achieving greater cohesion. Tensions between the pool of Georgia, Moldova, and Belarus, on the one side, and Russia, on the other, must be an element of the plan. Washington has already done part of the work. Băsescu announced on February 4, 2010 that Romania would host US missile defense infrastructures, and Belarus reneged on the pledge to recognize the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Contrary to expectations, the US did not have to close the Manas airbase in Kyrgyzstan. Serbia is carved up and Georgia is in the process of active rearmament. Moldova took part in NATO exercises and signed an agreement on security forces cooperation with Romania.

Notably, the list of countries invited to the would-be “GUBAM“ is – with the exception of Armenia – identical to that of the Eastern Partnership. Consequently, both blocs might be components of  the same project. These days GUAM no longer dispenses markedly unrealistic promises to create pipeline networks alternative to those owned by Russia or to rid the West of the dependency on Russian energy supplies (though the Nabucco project and the plan to extend the Odessa-Brody pipeline to Poland's Płock are still alive). The current agenda seems to be:

• To prevent the enlargement of the Customs Union and the Collective Security Treaty Organization and to divert Armenia, Azerbaijan, Moldova, and others from joining the blocs by building “alternative” alliances. In the case of Mensk the plan is to convince Belarus to sacrifice its membership in the above organizations.
• To form a cordon around Russia which would be locked once the administration in Ukraine is replaced.
• To coordinate anti-Russian activities, to smear Moscow in the UN, the Council of Europe, the PACE, and the OSCE; to jointly stake financial claims against Russia over “occupation”, “repressions”, “holodomor”, the 1992 and 2008 “aggressions”, etc., thus making it possible for the US and the EU to arbitrate and mediate as in fact they routinely do.
• To downscale the Russian space by limiting the use of the Russian language, jointly commemorating “occupations” and “repression victims”, etc.
• To provoke gas wars against Russia (Belarus being the candidate for an active role in the process).
• To coordinate efforts aimed at getting Russian peacekeepers out of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Moldova and bringing in NATO forces instead.
• To create common political, economic, and military infrastructures for the integration of the countries located in the Western part of the CIS into NATO.

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Bogdan Tsidrya is the Political Programs Director of the Priznanie Russian Humanitarian Foundation