On May 16, Iranian media announced that Iranian Defense Minister Ali Shamkhani and Azerbaijani Defense Minister Safar Abiyev signed a nonaggression pact in which the two agreed not to allow a third party to use their territories for an attack against the other. Tehran's goal in this pact is obvious — get Baku to prohibit the United States from using Azerbaijani territory for a potential attack against Iran. U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's highly secret surprise visit to Baku on April 12 to discuss military cooperation between the two countries undoubtedly flummoxed Tehran. The visit and its secretive nature might have been news to Iran, but Washington's increasing influence in Azerbaijan — and the Caspian Sea region in general — is not.