In the official statements by senior representatives of the United States Mongolia is generally presented as a friendly nation and US partner. Ever since 1991, when US Secretary of State James A. Baker described the US as “Mongolia’s third neighbor”, official statements about Mongolia have been impressively consistent and unambiguous. For example, during his 2011 visit to the country, Joe Biden defined Mongolia as “an emerging leader in the worldwide democratic movement, and … a close friend and partner of the United States.” The US currently sees Mongolia as an “Important Partner in the Indo-Pacific.” However, there is some evidence, rare but highly revealing, that suggests that the real attitude of the United States to Mongolia is rather different, belying the overblown statements made by US politicians about a democratic and free-market partnership and shared ideological values.
A clear example of the duplicitous attitude of the U.S. to its democratic partners in Mongolia is provided in the diplomatic correspondence from the U.S. Embassy in Ulaanbaatar (2006-2010) which was published by Wikileaks in 2011.
These documents are fairly wide ranging, and relate to a number of different aspects of the two countries’ relations. The core issue in the correspondence, and the most pressing one at the time, is the negotiation of an investment agreement between the Anglo-Australian mining corporation Rio Tinto and the Mongolian government in relation to the Oyu Tolgoi mine.
The telegrams make it clear that the US embassy acted as an intermediary, providing support for the transnational company’s predatory endeavors in Mongolia. The US embassy pressurized the Mongolian government into signing the investment agreement as part of its policy of promoting exports by U.S. manufacturers. Specifically, a February 2008 cable states that “participation in Mongolia’s mining industry of companies such as Peabody and Rio Tinto … offers substantial, long-term export potential for U.S. manufacturers, as well as promoting U.S. free-market and democratic goals for Mongolia.” (July 30, 2009). It is unclear how putting pressure on the government of a sovereign country could further the “free market and democracy” part of this program.
Moreover, another telegram states, Mongolian authorities’ restriction of Western corporations’ activities “has already cost U.S. export interests an estimated USD 200 million in equipment sales and other contracts.”
The West has also exercised other forms of economic pressure on Mongolia. For example, the British ambassador to Ulaanbaatar stated that “If Mongolia wanted the British relationship to continue or increase, it had to do what was necessary to get British investment.” In the present context, the meaning is clear: if Mongolia wants to have good relations with the West then it must make concessions to Western business. The phrase about promoting free-market and democratic goals in Mongolia – a country where access to the free market is clearly reserved for special privileged partners – is repeated in February 2008.
Representatives of business communities of leading Western nations (Canada, the UK, Japan, the USA, Australia and Germany), speaking through the US embassy, called on the Mongolian government to “refrain from active participation in the mining sector” in its own country. If that is not interfering in the affairs of a sovereign state, then what is it? And if the authorities’ ability to regulate their own economy is dictated by the US Embassy, and not the Mongolian people, then where is the “democracy” that the US claims to be promoting? (February 2008)
The leaked cables also state that “Mongolia has suffered from a lack of world-class expertise” and that Rio Tinto exploited this by making an excessively low estimate of the volume of investment required to develop the mine.
The cables also reveal that the US attempted to present its aggressive promotion of Western corporations as necessary in order for Mongolia to counter the influences of Russia and China. For example, in February 2008 the embassy warned Mongolia that “without western firms … Mongolia would essentially have to cede its economic independence to whichever neighbor gained control of the asset.“
The Embassy’s cables reveal a striking inconsistency in attitudes to Mongolia, with US officials both praising its progress in promoting democracy and also regretting that it is more difficult to impose their will on the country than it might be if it was less democratic. Thus, a telegram dated March 30, 2009, notes that “Mongolia had become a functioning democracy by the mid-1990s, and the impact of the vote and a constitution that vested power in Parliament had begun to limit what the socialist era barons could force down the throats of the public or Parliament.” These comments were made in view of the fact that it had become almost impossible to use relations with individuals in order to lobby Western economic interests.
The comment in that cable about it being impossible to targeting certain individuals to impose American interests on Mongolia was acted on several months later. A cable dated July 30, 2009 states that USAID, the United States Agency for International Development, is currently focusing on “building a national consensus on development of Mongolia’s vast mineral resources.” It is a mystery – to everyone except perhaps USAID itself – precisely how a foreign agent can build a consensus within a country, and then, in encrypted cables, communicate this fact to representatives of foreign businesses with their own interests in that consensus.
As we have seen, the peaceful and amicable nature of the official statements made by US officials hides an active and cynical campaign to impose the interests of Western business, financial and industrial giants on a small, developing country that is rich in natural resources. In their public statements US officials are full of praise for Mongolia’s democracy, but from their private and confidential correspondence it is clear that they see it, not as an achievement, but as an obstacle to the promotion of the West’s self-serving policies in the country. All these diplomatic cables contain statements and sentiments that directly undermine democratic and free-market values and also the basic principles of international relations. The phrases about the “free market” conceal calls for the creation of exclusive conditions for the benefit of specific companies, while the references to “democratic values” serve as a cloak for systematic attempts to impose the interests of foreign businesses on the Mongolian people. And the “political partnership and balancing act” actually means threatening Mongolia by stressing the dangers of Russian and Chinese economic influence.
Bair Danzanov, independent expert on Mongolia, exclusively for the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook.”
