The
Great Game On A Razor's Edge
By M K Bhadrakumar
27 December, 2006
Asia
Times Online
The
accidental killing of Alexander Ivanov, a Kyrgyz fuel-truck driver,
by Corporal Zachary Hatfield, a US serviceman, at the Manas Air Base
on the outskirts of the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek in December is threatening
to snowball into a first-rate crisis for the United States' regional
policy in Central Asia.
Manas is the lone US military
base in all of Central Asia - close to the Chinese border of Xinjiang.
Curiously, this was also how the year 2006 began, as Washington was
grappling with the call made by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization
(SCO) for a timeline for the withdrawal of the US military presence
in Central Asia.
In a nationally televised
address, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev called for reviewing the
Manas base agreement with the US. The Kyrgyz Parliament passed a resolution
that given the "negative perception of the American image among
our country's population", Bakiyev should examine the continuance
of the base. The Foreign Ministry made a demarche with the US that Hatfield
shouldn't leave until the Kyrgyz due process of law took its course.
This is rhetoric out of Latin
America. Yet Bakiyev had only come to power on the crest of the US-backed
"Tulip Revolution" of March 2005. But US-funded Kyrgyz "civil
society" groups are nowadays arrayed against him on account of
his increasingly pronounced foreign-policy leanings toward Russia and
China.
They turned rowdyish in November,
and humiliated him, forcing on him a new constitution curtailing his
presidential powers. That is to say, Washington must now seek Bakiyev's
help while backstage it could be funding and instigating political activists
bent on overthrowing him. Bakiyev's overthrow may help the US firm up
its grip on Manas, but today his helping hand is useful for preserving
US interests. Nothing could be more surreal. Nothing would so vividly
epitomize the complexities of the geopolitics of Central Asia.
Great Game slows
down
The Great Game in Central
Asia itself may appear to have considerably slowed down in 2006. But
nothing could be more deceptive an impression. True, we've witnessed
nothing like the cataclysmic events of the previous year - "Tulip
Revolution" or the Andizhan uprising in Uzbekistan. Yet great-power
rivalries most certainly continued - passions that were largely driven
underground, where they simmered without taking a confrontational character.
Partly this was because the
bickering over geopolitical influence became somewhat manifestly lopsided,
with Russia and China not only retaining their gains of yesteryear but
also consolidating them, and the US painstakingly attempting to recoup
its lost influence in the region.
The single biggest "success
story" of US diplomacy in the Great Game during the past year has
been that Washington prevailed on Russia and China to give consideration
to its reasoning that granting full membership to the Islamic Republic
of Iran in the SCO might not be consistent with their own long-term
interests. This was no mean achievement, considering that both Russia
and China have such high stakes in their bilateral relations with Tehran.
But Iranian President Mahmud Ahmadinejad attended the summit as a special
invitee. The SCO evidently keeps open the "threat" of Iranian
membership.
Equally, the fact that, unlike
its previous year's summit, the SCO meeting in June 2006 did not assume
an overt anti-American overtone must remain a matter of relief for Washington.
In many ways, the SCO demeanor has come to be the litmus test of the
United States' geopolitical standing in Central Asia at any given time.
Contrary to earlier US estimations, the SCO is increasingly acquiring
a swagger that is suggestive of its potential to become the main powerhouse
of the Eurasian region - arguably, a leading Eurasian economic and military
bloc. The SCO comprises China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan
and Uzbekistan.
During the five-year period
since its birth in 2001, the SCO, which has as members a number of underdeveloped
countries including some desperately poor ones with nothing ostensibly
to bind them together except their common geography, has not only held
together but has grown in size and influence.
Initially drawing on the
Chinese tri-fecta of "terrorism, separatism and extremism",
the SCO speaks today about the establishment of a free-trade area and
about common energy projects such as exploration of hyrdrocarbon reserves,
joint use of hydroelectric power and water resources. But from the US
perspective, the SCO agenda continues to be laden with a heavy cloud
of suspicion regarding the United States' geostrategic intentions in
the Central Asian region.
This impression gets further
confirmed by the SCO's decision to hold large-scale joint military exercises
scheduled for the coming summer in central Russia with the Collective
Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the military alliance that is Moscow's
answer to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's enlargement into
the post-Soviet space. The CSTO includes Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan,
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
That the military exercises
will take place against the backdrop of the chill that has descended
on Russia-US relations in the past year or two, and in the light of
the likely deployment of the first interceptors of the US missile defense
systems in Central Europe and the Asia-Pacific region, is no doubt significant.
It is irrelevant whether
the SCO can be called a latter-day Warsaw Pact or a "NATO of the
East". What is important is that on a practical plane, when it
transpired that the US aircraft deployed at Manas Air Base might be
undertaking reconnaissance missions into sensitive military regions
in central Russia and China's Xinjiang, Moscow and Beijing put their
foot down and acted in concert within the framework of the SCO, insisting
that the stated purpose of the US military presence in Central Asia
must be fulfilled in letter and spirit, namely that it restricted itself
exclusively to undertaking resupply missions for the "war on terror"
in Afghanistan.
The then-Kyrgyz president,
Askar Akayev, was caught in the middle and overthrown from power in
the process as a furious Washington let loose the "Tulip Revolution"
on him for his perceived intransigence in turning down the US request
for the stationing of AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) aircraft
in Manas. But the SCO quietly and firmly held its ground. Thereby it
made an important point - that it had gained traction as a security
organization. Not only that, the SCO proceeded to follow up at its summit
in June 2005 with the call for the vacation of the US military presence
in the region.
Indeed, going one step further,
the SCO emphatically rallied behind the leadership of Uzbekistan in
its move to ask for the vacation of the US air base at Karshi-Khanabad.
On both counts - restrictions placed on the use of Manas and the eviction
from Karshi-Khanabad - Washington meekly had to give in. In the process,
Bishkek even renegotiated the bilateral agreement on Manas a few months
ago by getting Washington to increase the annual rent of the base from
US$2.7 million to between $150 million and $200 million.
The year 2006 has thus made
it clear that the US is unlikely to become a single dominant power in
Central Asia. Simply put, Russia and China have together put up the
SCO dikes delimiting the US influence in the region, which will be difficult
for Washington to breach for the foreseeable future. During the year,
by and large Washington has vainly exhausted its energies in attempts
to create misunderstandings between Russia and China and in pitting
one SCO member state against another.
The heart of the matter is
that apart from the bleeding wounds in Iraq and Afghanistan, which remain
a major distraction for US diplomacy worldwide, US policy in Central
Asia is seriously handicapped in two other respects. First, the United
States' complete loss of influence in Tashkent after the Andizhan mishap
in May 2005 is cramping overall US diplomacy in the region.
There is no denying that
Uzbekistan is a key country in Central Asia. In the Soviet era, everyone
from Josef Stalin down knew the axiom that Uzbekistan was the hub of
the geopolitics of the region. True, the US put out several feelers
to Tashkent through intermediaries for reconciliation, and lately even
the European Union lent a hand, but Tashkent wouldn't budge. The laceration
of Uzbek national pride by the US over Andizhan opened such painful
wounds that forgiveness may take much time coming and will extract sincere
repentance on the part of Washington for its role in the Andizhan uprising.
Meanwhile, the US has been left with no option but to watch Russian
and Chinese influence in Tashkent expanding by leaps and bounds.
In a similar fashion, but
in an even more fundamental sense, US diplomacy in Central Asia is seriously
hobbled by Washington's alienation from Iran. Ten years have gone by
since the famous article by Zbigniew Brzezinski in Foreign Affairs magazine
calling for unconditional abandonment of the US policy of containment
of Iran. Brzezinski had brilliantly argued the case (which most US career
diplomats assigned to the region then also believed) that for US regional
diplomacy to be anywhere near optimal in the Caucasus, in the Caspian
region and in Central Asia, it must befriend Tehran. But Washington's
mental block over Iran persists.
Meanwhile, the "Greater
Central Asia" strategy unveiled by Washington last April with so
much elan has already fizzled out. The strategy was avowedly intended
to roll back Russian and Chinese influence in the region. Testifying
before the US Congress that month, a senior State Department official
said, "A lot of what we do here is to give the countries of the
region the opportunities to make choices ... and keep them from being
bottled up between two great powers, Russia and China."
The US official conjured
up visions that could only belong to the world of fantasies: "Students
and professors from Bishkek and Almaty can collaborate with and learn
from their partners in Karachi and Kabul, legitimate trade can freely
flow overland from Astana to Islamabad, facilitated by modern border
controls, and an enhanced regional power grid stretching from Almaty
to New Delhi will be fed by oil and gas from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan
and hydropower from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan."
No wonder there are no takers
in Central Asia for Washington's policy construct. Central Asian states
are aware of the Taliban's resurgence in Afghanistan, and reckon that
peace is a distant goal. Even New Delhi seems embarrassed. Islamabad
keeps quiet. The only capital to evince enthusiasm for Washington's
paradigm of steering Central Asian states toward South Asian allies
has been Kabul.
Sino-US convergence?
But failures may often hold
the key to success. In a way, the current failures in regional policy
may open a window of opportunity for the US in the period ahead. The
point is: Without the glue of a serious US geopolitical challenge to
bind them together into undertaking collective countermeasures, can
the Sino-Russian condominium hold together in Central Asia for long?
It is apparent that divergences have already appeared in the respective
Chinese and Russian interests in Central Asia.
China has used the SCO forum
and the Russian influence in Central Asia to return to the region, which
is indeed its back yard, for the first time in nearly 1,000 years. It
is important to bear in mind that Beijing launched the idea of the SCO,
and Russia accepted it. China views Central Asia as its "near abroad".
As China's economic muscle grows, Beijing can afford to be more assertive.
China's soft power is already
at work in the region. It is increasingly able to invoke its bilateral-cooperation
mechanisms with Central Asian countries. There is hardly any need for
China to ride piggyback on Russian goodwill or Russian influence in
the region. China has used the SCO for acquiring local knowledge, and
in building relations with the region's indigenous political, economic
and military elites.
It is in the area of energy
security that Chinese interests and concerns have already begun diverging
significantly from those of Russia. The trend during 2006 has been that
Russia's energy interests - in controlling the region's transportation
routes for oil and gas, in sourcing the region's energy for meeting
Russia's domestic needs that would leave an exportable surplus for meeting
its commitments in Europe, in having a say in determining the price
of energy in the region - are increasingly affected by China's robust
quest for oil and gas in the region.
The early signs of this contradiction
in Sino-Russian cooperation in Central Asia began appearing in 2005
when the China National Petroleum Corp acquired the PetroKazakhstan
oil company for $4.18 billion.
China's gas deal with Turkmenistan
in April 2006; the commissioning of an oil pipeline from Kazakhstan;
China's proposal for an energy-pipeline grid for Central Asia and connecting
it with Xinjiang; China's cooperation agreement with Iran in the Caspian
region; China's gas deals with Uzbekistan; China's interest in participating
in a Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan gas pipeline - all these are
happenings within one calendar year, each imbued with strategic significance.
This past year, too, China
has waded into the controversial waters of the Caspian Sea in search
of oil when last January Iran's North Drilling Co and China Oilfield
Services Ltd signed an oil-exploration agreement relating to the disputed
deep waters of the southern Caspian. In one way or another, all these
developments cut into Russian interests in Central Asia's energy sector.
Having said that, however,
the China-Russia strategic partnership has a much greater regional and
global logic than Central Asia, and the attempt in Moscow and Beijing
will presumably be to harmonize their differences in Central Asia from
spinning out of control. Also, both Moscow and Beijing realize that
Central Asian states themselves will seek out Russia to balance their
relations with China.
How these contradictory tendencies
will play out within the SCO processes presents an engrossing topic.
Clearly, the opportunity arises for the US to establish a dialogue with
the SCO. A breakthrough may come in 2007. The prominent Russia hand
in the Heritage Foundation in Washington, DC, Ariel Cohen, wrote recently,
"Given that the SCO primarily serves as a geopolitical counterweight
to the US, Washington stands little chance of ever receiving full membership
in the group ... But US officials do not necessarily need full membership
in the organization in order to work closely with the Central Asian
states. It would serve Washington's best interests to remain in close
contact with the SCO. To do so, it could resubmit an application seeking
observer status.
"To boost the chances
of success," Cohen added, "the US should engage Central Asian
states by balancing democracy promotion and democratization with its
other national interests, including security and energy."
Conceivably, we may expect
even a NATO overture to the SCO in the coming year. In an exclusive
interview with People's Daily last month, NATO secretary general Jaap
de Hoop Schaffer held out the interesting suggestion to Beijing that
there doesn't have to be a contradiction between China's membership
of the SCO and China's future cooperation with NATO.
Without doubt, a palpable
sense of urgency is already apparent in US thinking to the effect that
the Chinese-Russian strategic partnership poses a serious threat to
the United States' geopolitical position in Central Asia, and second,
that China is actively remaking Central Asia's order. Last September,
the US Congress held a special hearing titled "The Shanghai Cooperation
Organization: Is it Undermining US Interests in Central Asia?"
Moscow seems to anticipate
that another US bid for observer status with the SCO is looming - and
that unlike in 2005, Beijing may not oppose it this time. Curiously,
at the end of December, Russia formalized a mechanism for regular political
dialogue with the Mercosur grouping of Latin American countries, which
has a definite slant (comparable to the SCO's) against US economic hegemony
in the Western Hemisphere.
Speaking on the occasion
in Brasilia, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said, "We have,
by and large, been watching with the most sincere sympathy the integration
processes in South America. We consider that the strengthening and elevation
of the level of integration within the region works objectively in favor
of the creation of a more stable and more fair world order in which
all problems will be tackled multilaterally. I am certain that the partnership
between Russia and Mercosur will be instrumental in attaining this goal."
The US estimation is basically
that behind the facade of unity, China, Russia and the other SCO members
and observer countries harbor serious differences of opinion. While
"discord" may be too strong a word, to quote a US strategic
analyst, "It is quite possible that differences will grow behind
the facade of [SCO] unity. Washington must be alert to exploit any openings
to gain geopolitical advantage. While the political, ideological and
military dimensions of the New Great Game in Central Asia continue to
heat up, it should be clear to all players that plenty of time remains
in the contest. The SCO now appears to have momentum on its side, but
such an advantage can dissipate quickly."
Thus the US would tell China
that Russia was needlessly dragging it into an anti-American bloc, and
that there was nothing irreconcilable involving US and Chinese interests
in Central Asia. US strategic analysts have been arguing that both the
United States and China are interested in the stability of the region;
both are against the ascendancy of extremist forces in the region; both
are interested in Central Asia's transition to market economies and
in the region's globalization; both have stakes in the rapid development
of Central Asia's hydrocarbon sector and in the diversified and efficient
flow of the region's energy to the world market.
There are signs that the
US is also using the oil-price issue as a wedge to divide Russia and
China. The US has also been campaigning in the capitals of SCO member
countries (and observer countries) that Russia is aspiring to transform
the SCO into a club of energy producers and to be its dominant partner,
and that if the Russian stratagem is allowed to proceed unchecked, that
will be detrimental to the interests of Central Asian energy producers
- and even of China and India. These are interesting straws in the wind.
The recent five-nation energy
summit of major Asian consuming countries (China, Japan, South Korea,
India and the US) hosted by China is partly at least an expression of
Beijing's commonality of interests with Washington in leading an energy
dialogue of consuming countries vis-a-vis Russia. Conceivably, Beijing
may be harboring grievances that Moscow is keeping Chinese companies
out of investment opportunities in Russia's strategic oil and gas fields
in Russia's Siberia and the Far East, and even in the Russian pipelines
leading to the Chinese market.
China may also be displeased
with Gazprom's insistent attempts to get in on the Sakhalin energy projects.
ExxonMobil is under pressure for a proposed gas pipeline from Sakhalin-1
to China. Russia's gas monopoly seems to want to discount any competition
for its own plans for a gas pipeline to China through the Altai highlands
near the Russian-Kazakh-Mongolian border. Its preference seems to be
to buy all gas from Sakhalin-1 so that it remains the sole exporter
of gas to China. China is also keenly watching the holdup in Sakhalin-2,
being the highest-profile foreign-investment project in Russia's energy
sector to date.
Important investment decisions
are pending in 2007 with regard to Sakhalin-1, Sakhalin-2, Sakhalin-3,
the Shtokman gas fields and the vast Russian energy reserves in the
Far East on the whole. How the Kremlin makes these decisions will have
a significant bearing on Chinese thinking and, indirectly, that can
cast shadows on the geopolitics of Central Asia.
Besides, the ground reality
is that according to recent studies, Russia will need to import 79 billion
cubic meters (bcm) annually from Central Asia's gas-producing countries
(Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan) to meet its domestic needs
and to fulfill its export commitments. How this plays out in Russia's
overall political and economic ties with Central Asian countries will
have a significant impact on the regional milieu.
It is obvious that Gazprom
views Central Asia as a priority area. A major development in 2006 in
Central Asia's energy sector was the agreement between Gazprom and Uzbekneftgaz
to undertake a geological survey of Uzbekistan. Gazprom is committing
$260 million in the coming three years alone for the exploration of
the Ustyurtki oil and gas deposits in Uzbekistan. Again, Russia and
Kazakhstan entered an agreement in October to set up a gas joint venture
at the Orenburg gas refinery in Russia - the first time Kazakhstan was
making a major investment in the Russian economy.
The joint venture is expected
to process 30.6bcm gas in 2012, including 15bcm from Kazakhstan's Karachaganak
gas field (which has an estimated 1 trillion cubic meters of reserves),
which Russia and Kazakhstan are pledged to develop jointly.
Niyazov's secret
The struggle over control
of oil and gas and their transportation routes is bound to intensify
in 2007. It will remain central to the geopolitics of Central Asia.
In turn, pipeline politics in the Caspian can be expected to produce
strange bedfellows.
Already, geopolitical circumstances
in the Caspian Basin have led to a sharp deterioration in Russia-Azerbaijan
relations. Again, despite all the wooing of Kazakhstan by Washington,
the indefinite postponement of the Odessa-Brody pipeline project last
week has stemmed from Kazakhstan having to be mindful of Russian sensitivities.
Least of all, Iran remains
the wild card in the pack. Depending on which way the Iran nuclear issue
develops in 2007, Iran can impact on the energy map of China, Central
Asia, the Caspian, the Caucasus, Russia and Europe - and, conceivably,
the United States itself.
But an entirely new ball
game opens up with the sudden demise of Turkmen president Saparmurat
Niyazov on December 21. It calls attention to the fragility of the Central
Asian calculus. The political uncertainties centered on Niyazov's successor
come at an extremely tricky time when Russia, China and the US are virtually
preparing to besiege Ashgabat with offers and counter-offers for gaining
access to Turkmenistan's gas reserves.
Will Niyazov's successor
follow his policy of "positive neutrality"? Russia strives
to retain its strategic leverage as the monopolist transporter and re-exporter
of Turkmen gas. The European Union, supported by the US, on the other
hand, is attempting to resist the Russian leverage by opening direct
access to Turkmen gas.
In 2006, the US and Turkey
revived the 10-year-old idea of a trans-Caspian gas pipeline project
(as part of the so-called East-West Energy Corridor) to supply Turkmen
gas to Europe via Turkey. Turkmenistan's gas output may well approach
80bcm annually at present. The trans-Caspian pipeline envisages an annual
draw of 16bcm from the Turkmen output in the first stage, to be expanded
to 32bcm in the second stage. In the US geostrategy, the project is
vital for reducing Europe's heavy dependence on Russian energy supplies.
Niyazov had prevaricated in the light of Moscow's opposition. But what
will be the outlook of Niyazov's successor?
Russia, on the contrary,
will insist on the fulfillment of its April 2003 framework agreement
with Turkmenistan, which provides for a 25-year contract on gas supplies
to Russia, with Ashgabat pledging to supply 100bcm per year of gas from
2010 onward (a total of 2 trillion cubic meters cumulatively over the
25-year period). Moscow now seeks to tap even more deeply into Turkmenistan's
gas reserves for meeting Russia's domestic needs and for re-export to
Europe as "Russian gas".
Meanwhile, Turkmenistan also
stands committed to supply 8-10bcm of gas to Iran's northern region,
apart from occasionally voicing interest in the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan
pipeline project. China, on its part, entered an agreement with Niyazov
in April for purchase of 30bcm of Turkmen gas annually from 2009 onward
for a 30-year period, and jointly to explore and develop Turkmen gas
deposits on the right bank of Amu Darya River.
Besides challenging Russia's
monopoly control of Turkmen gas hitherto, China has also undercut the
Russian practice of buying cheap Turkmen gas, by agreeing that China
will pay a price "set at reasonable levels, and on a fair basis,
pegged on comparable international market price". At the same time,
China's deal also threatens the West, which will be a strategic loser
if Turkmenistan decides to send its gas eastward instead of Europe.
The European Union's 3,400-kilometer
Nabucco gas pipeline from eastern Turkey to Austria and central Europe
at an estimated cost of $5.8 billion, to be commissioned in 2010, will
be a net sufferer in that case, as it is predicated on the expectation
that Turkmenistan can be a key supplier country.
Niyazov was always an enigmatic
figure on the Central Asian political chessboard. But the biggest puzzle
he has left behind was no doubt his chance remark shortly before his
death in a conversation with visiting German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter
Steinmeier in Ashgabat that Turkmenistan recently discovered a super-giant
gas field, South Iolotansk, with proven reserves of 7 trillion cubic
meters of gas.
Like Corporal Hatfield in
his sentry post in Manas Air Base in Kyrgyzstan, Niyazov didn't probably
realize what a maelstrom he was creating. If South Iolotansk indeed
holds such untold treasures, the impact on the energy map of Russia,
Europe and China will be dramatic. And certainly, the center of gravity
of the Great Game will overnight shift eastward to the home of the fabled
Ahalteke race horse - away from the SCO and all that. Central Asia,
then, may never be the same again.
M K Bhadrakumar served as
a career diplomat in the Indian Foreign Service for more than 29 years,
with postings including ambassador to Uzbekistan (1995-98) and to Turkey
(1998-2001).
Copyright 2006 Asia Times
Online Ltd.
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