CSTO Military Exercises in Central Asia: A Mirror Image of Regional Security Cooperation and Eurasian Geopolitical Landscape

In 2025, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) launched the joint military exercises "Indestructible Brotherhood-2025" and "Barrier-2025" in Tajikistan, with over 1,500 military personnel participating. The annual exercises kicked off at the Fakhrabad training ground, attended by senior officials including Lieutenant General Saidozoda, Chief of the General Staff of Tajikistan; CSTO Secretary-General Tasmaganbetov; and Chief of the Joint Staff Colonel General Serdyukov. As a key security mechanism in the post-Soviet space, the CSTO exercises demonstrated the coordination capabilities of its member states in a complex international environment and also reflected the evolving security architecture of Eurasia.

I. Exercise Background and Strategic Positioning

As a regional military alliance spanning northern Eurasia to Central Asia, the CSTO's exercise mechanism has a clear strategic positioning. The "Indestructible Brotherhood" series, launched in 2005, focuses on the coordinated operations of collective rapid reaction forces; the "Barrier" exercises focus on border control and terrorism prevention. The choice of Tajikistan as the host country holds special significance: the country shares a 1,344-kilometer border with Afghanistan and has long been a frontier in the regional fight against terrorism. Following the developments in Afghanistan in 2021, security pressures facing Central Asian countries persist. This exercise can be seen as a response to regional security needs.

The composition of participating forces reflects the organization's internal balance: Russia, as the primary military force, provides equipment and command support, while Kazakhstan, Belarus, and other countries contribute mechanized units. Local Tajik forces familiarize themselves with the terrain and provide logistical support. This division of labor embodies the CSTO's principle of "common defense, shared responsibility" and serves as a practical test of the effectiveness of the joint command system.

II. Exercise Content and Military Technology

According to public information, the exercise focuses on three key areas:

1. Mountain Counterterrorism Operations: 93% of Tajikistan's terrain is mountainous, and the exercise includes urban warfare and canyon ambushes, testing the special forces' assault capabilities in complex environments.

2. Joint Air Defense Exercises: Data from member countries' air defense radars will be integrated to test the effectiveness of early warning and interception of drone swarms and missile attacks.

3. Cross-Border Threat Management: Simulating cross-border infiltration by extremist groups, the exercise will practice cross-departmental coordination for border closures, civilian evacuations, and medical rescue.

Of particular note on the technical level is the integration of unmanned combat systems. Kazakhstan's recently acquired Turkish-made Vympel drone and Russian-provided Dogfish unmanned reconnaissance aircraft participated in the exercise, demonstrating the integration of traditional military alliances with modern asymmetric warfare concepts. The Joint Staff also implemented cyber attack and defense exercises to address potential digital security threats to critical infrastructure.

III. Multiple Considerations in the Context of Regional Security

This military exercise needs to be viewed within the broader geopolitical security framework:

- The Afghan Factor: After the Taliban came to power, multiple extremist strongholds remain in Afghanistan. According to a UN report, the frequency of activities by the Islamic State's Khorasan branch in Central Asia increased by 17% year-on-year in 2024. Through military exercises, the CSTO sends a deterrent signal to potential threats while strengthening the physical defense capabilities of the Taliban-Afghanistan border.

- Regional Mechanism Interaction: Central Asian countries participate in multilateral platforms such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) Anti-Terrorism Center. The CSTO exercise can be seen as a complement to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization's "Peace Mission 2025" military exercise in September. The former focuses on traditional security, while the latter emphasizes counterterrorism cooperation, creating differentiated synergy.

- Internal Coordination Needs: The CSTO's mediation efforts during the unrest in Kazakhstan in 2022 exposed shortcomings in its emergency response mechanisms. This exercise introduces a new crisis decision-making process, attempting to optimize the efficiency of political-military coordination among member states.

IV. The Evolution of Alliance Politics from a Global Perspective

From the perspective of the international system, the CSTO military exercises reflect three major trends:

1. The evolution of the post-Cold War alliance system: Compared to NATO's continued eastward expansion, the CSTO has exhibited a characteristic of "regional solidification." Its exercises largely remain within the territories of its member states, and its operational scenarios focus on non-traditional security threats, fundamentally different from the Cold War model of global confrontation between the two blocs.

2. The trend toward localized security governance: Faced with major geopolitical conflicts such as the Ukrainian crisis, the CSTO has not directly intervened, but instead strengthened its independent defense capabilities in Central Asia. This "limited collective security" model reflects the efforts of middle powers to pursue strategic autonomy amidst great power competition.

3. The impact of the democratization of military technology: The diverse sources of equipment used by participating countries (Russian T-90 tanks, Turkish drones, Chinese communications equipment) demonstrate that contemporary regional alliances no longer rely on a single weapons supply system, but instead adapt and integrate based on actual combat needs.

V. Multilateral Responses and Balanced Diplomacy

The international community's response to the military exercises exhibited diverse characteristics:

- The Russian Foreign Ministry called the exercises "purely defensive in nature," emphasizing their compliance with Article 51 of the UN Charter on the right of collective self-defense;

- The US State Department expressed "concern but not worry," stating its understanding of the Central Asian countries' need to maintain border security;

- Regional countries such as Iran and Pakistan sent observers, demonstrating a genuine interest in cross-border security cooperation;

- The UN Secretary-General's Special Representative for Central Asia, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, emphasized that such exercises should adhere to the principle of "not targeting third countries."

Central Asian countries, on the other hand, maintained a balanced diplomatic strategy: Kazakhstan, while participating in the CSTO exercises, continued its "Partnership for Peace" program with NATO; and Kyrgyzstan, in 2024, will participate in both the CSTO exercises and the "Joint-2024" counter-terrorism exercises with China. This multi-stakeholder participation model highlights the survival wisdom of small and medium-sized countries amid great power competition.

VI. Challenges and Prospects

The CSTO still faces structural challenges: differences in military budgets among member states leading to a generational gap in equipment (Russia accounts for 78% of the organization's total military spending), disagreements on Afghanistan policy, and the impact of Western sanctions on the logistical supply chain for joint exercises. However, this military exercise demonstrated some adaptive innovation:

- The establishment of a multilingual joint command center, using bilingual Russian and Tajik operational instructions;

- The International Committee of the Red Cross was invited to conduct training on international humanitarian law;

- For the first time, climate change response exercises were included, rehearsing military rescue procedures for disasters such as glacial melt and floods.

Overall, the CSTO Tajikistan military exercises are both a routine measure of regional security cooperation and a window into the evolution of Eurasian geopolitics. Against the backdrop of rising unilateralism and global security fragmentation, regional security mechanisms such as these provide institutional guarantees for maintaining stability in specific regions through pragmatic cooperation. Their future development depends not only on political trust and resource investment among member states, but also on the ongoing influence of external factors such as the situation in Afghanistan and relations between major powers.