I have wondered when the SCO — the Shanghai Cooperation Organization — would resurface in the news. Today, the Christian Science Monitor highlights an upcoming meeting between SCO member states.

Russia and China could take a step closer to forming a Eurasian military confederacy to rival NATO at a Moscow meeting of the six-member Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Wednesday, experts say.

Yes, yes, of course. China and Russia recently held a joint military exercise on Chinese soil — ostensibly to practice humanitarian intervention in failed states — and recent U.S. endeavors in central Asia have put the squeeze on both nations. Russia is well aware of its post-superpower status even as China senses its own future superpower status:

“Moscow is seeking options to demonstrate - to Washington in the first place - that Russia is still an important player in this area,” says Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of Russia in Global Affairs, a partner of the US bimonthly journal Foreign Affairs. “China’s ambitions are growing fast, and it also wants to turn the SCO into something bigger and more effective.”

Russian leaders blame the Bush administration, with its emphasis on democracy-building, for recent unrest, including revolution in Kyrgyzstan and a putative Islamist revolt in Uzbekistan. “Washington wants to expand democracy, which it sees as a panacea for all social and geopolitical evils,” says Sergei Karaganov, head of the Council for Foreign and Defense Policies, which advises the Kremlin. “But it is clear to us that any rapid democratization of these countries (in Central Asia) will lead to chaos.”

There is no coincidence that China, which surreptitiously once approved of the U.S.-Japan alliance as an antidote to Soviet power in the region, now turns to Russia to combat America’s efforts to influence its neighbors; nor, that former communist nations would ally against the “chaos” of spreading democracy. It should also be noted that the official website of the SCO, while displaying flags from its six member states, has on its front page its name in only three languages — Chinese, English, and Russian.

Member states include:
• People’s Republic of China
• Russian Federation
• Republic of Kazakhstan
• Republic of Kyrgyzstan
• Republic of Tajikistan
• Republic of Uzbekistan.

In addition, Iran has expressed interest in joining the SCO but currently holds observer status. Pakistan, India and Mongolia also hold observer status.

Some, as I myself did, celebrated the U.S.-India cooperation pact, but India — long celebrating its own “neutral” status in the world — is not likely to lose sight of the SCO or dismiss it outright; this should give the U.S. pause. (Neo-Marxist Immanuel Wallerstein has an interesting and informative essay on the U.S.-China-India triangle.)

Meanwhile, another Asian cooperation organization, GUAM (formerly GUUAM), which formed to counterbalance Russian influence, is stagnating. (Just take a look at its official website, which still hasn’t removed Uzbekistan from the list of member states — even though Uzbekistan withdrew in May of this year, leaving Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, and Moldova to flounder about with limited U.S. support.)

Clearly, central Asian powerhouses Russia and China are not likely to reduce their cooperation, thus will continue to sideline GUAM and Japan — and thereby sideline the U.S. in the region, while India and Pakistan play both sides. The official U.S. stance, while in theory supporting the UN, is in truth anti-UN and lukewarm with the EU to the west of SCO influence, while the current Administration prefers a haphazard one-on-one approach to solidifying ties in the region, staking most of its influence in Asia on Japan, India, Pakistan, and its continued occupation of Afghanistan.

So look for this logo to appear more often in the coming years:

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Addendum: Daniel Nexon, of The Duck of Minerva, questions the efficacy and potential of the SCO, and points at the difficulty of distinguishing between “pre-balancing” (in which nations prepare for overt opposition, or balancing), “soft balancing” (in which nations collude through diplomatic and economic ties to hinder another nation’s ability to act, but without direct military build-up/confrontations), and non-balancing which might appear to be either of the first two but is in reality only normal international relations.

I, on the other hand, look at the following three news items, all dated today, of Chinese-Indian cooperation, as signals that the U.S. could become somewhat displaced. That is, even “normal” international relations, when held regularly between two nations, promote closer cooperation and may lead to joint interests — and might create distance from a third party who is not similarly engaging with either:

• China ready to help India crush Maoists
• China, India to mark 2006 Year of Friendship
• India, China sign pact on labour, social security

These may be mere propaganda; but when has the U.S. had a “Year of Friendship” with China, or India?

And of course, the U.S. has not had such a year of friendship with Russia — and does not engage in joint military exercises with Russia.

I think that The Duck of Minerva is a little too dismissive of the story from the CSM and of the reality of the SCO. True, we may not be witnessing a sudden rise of a NATO-like group of nations (as if NATO is always of one mind…heh); but the cooperation that is occurring between these nations is not insignificant.