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Formerly called the American Committee for Peace in Chechnya, the American Committee for Peace in the Caucasus (ACPC) is a project of Freedom House that claims to be "dedicated to monitoring developments in the region and providing expert analysis of their implications for security, stability and the human rights situation."[1]

ACPC was founded in 1999 by Freedom House, a neoconservative organization that has worked closely with the U.S. government, receiving funds from the National Endowment for Democracy and other U.S. democratization initiatives. ACPC updated its name to include the broader region after conflicts erupted between Russia and other Caucasus enclaves such as Ingushetia, Dagestan, Kabardino-Balkaria, Karachay-Cherkessia and North Ossetia.[2]

ACPC's activities include organizing public education programs, developing policy recommendations for lawmakers, and collaborating with activists, journalists, and scholars. It also works closely with a range of nongovernmental policy groups and think tanks, including the neoconservative policy outfit the American Enterprise Institute and the right-wing Jamestown Foundation. The committee distributes a weekly email news service and newsletter entitled News of the Week. ACPC's web site contains a news archive, policy papers relating to the U.S. role in the Caucasus, and academic papers, maps, and photos of the conflict.

Glen Howard, the president of the Jamestown Foundation, also serves as ACPC's executive director.[3] Howard previously worked as a military analyst for Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), a high-tech defense contractor, and has served as a consultant for the Department of Defense, National Intelligence Council, and "major oil companies operating in Central Asia and the Middle East."[4]

The publications of Howard’s two organizations often overlap. For example, the Jamestown Foundation produces North Caucasus Weekly, an ezine that features contributions by ACPC board members.[5] ACPC’s website is typically dominated by reposts from Jamestown. Both groups also work extensively with Soviet defectors and Chechen dissidents.

ACPC's board of directors has included both Democratic and Republican elites, including Zbigniew Brzezinski, Alexander M. Haig, Jr., Steven J. Solarz, and Max Kampelman. The committee's more than one hundred members has also reflected a wide political spectrum, including such figures as Richard Gere, Morton Abramowitz, and the late Geraldine Ferraro. However, membership is overwhelmingly hawkish, and many high-profile neoconservatives, some associated with the Project for the New American Century, have featured on its membership rolls, including Richard Perle, Frank Gaffney, Elliott Abrams, Midge Decter, William Kristol, Michael Ledeen, and James Woolsey.[6]

ACPC supports the Chechen rebel movement, apparently as a strategy to weaken Russia and establish better U.S. ties in a region of increasing geopolitical value, which has vast, unexploited natural resource reserves including rich oil, gas, and hard mineral deposits.[7]

ACPC is perhaps the only U.S.-based organization in which national security militarists and neoconservatives openly support an insurgent movement that is not only nationalist but also largely Islamist.[8] Although ACPC notes its concern about human rights violations and issues of self-determination, far more attention appears to be given to simply advancing U.S. geopolitics by weakening Russia and China.[9]

The Smith Richardson Foundation has been the largest donor to the ACPC, giving sums totaling almost $420,000 to Freedom House from 2002-2004.[10]

Please note: IPS Right Web neither represents nor endorses any of the individuals or groups profiled on this site.