The News Behind The News
June 9, 2000
The Bear is Back
by Paul Michael Wihbey - IASPS Strategic Fellow"The bear is back in Central Asia" was the opening sentence to The Wall Street Journal's feature story of Russia's expanding influence in the five Central Asian states of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgystan. Published on May 22nd, the article reported on the success of Russian President Putin to induce the Central Asian states into greater economic and security cooperation with Moscow. In particular, Russia has seemingly convinced its former colonies to integrate their oil and gas development schemes within the greater Russian energy grid of pipelines, shipping depots and refineries. Furthermore, building upon the credibility of its military commitment against Chechen rebels, Russia has further showcased its offer of security assistance by pointing to its treatment of Taliban-supported Islamic insurgents. The result is evident in the enthusiastic response by the relatively fragile regimes of Central Asia.
Conversely, the current attitude of the Central Asian states towards the United States was best stated by Kazakstan's President Nursultan Nazarbayev, "We aren't going to run hot on the heels of the U.S. with our pants hitched up around our waists."
Over the last two years, IASPS analysis (see "The Southern Eurasian Great Game," IASPS Research Paper in Strategy No.8, "Turkey's Role in The Caucasus and Central Asia," (ATAA Sept. 30, 1999) and Caspian Project Report, Dec 2,1999) on this subject has projected the erosion of U.S. influence in the face of superior strategic calculus by Russian planners using a more relevant set of operational assumptions to advance national security objectives. Unlike the U.S., Moscow grasped the notion that short-term regime maintenance, in economic and security terms, for the Central Asians superceded longer-range political reform and fiscal transparency. By offering its own (at fee) export routes, and thus markets, for the valuable oil and gas volumes of Central Asia, and by manifesting its will that it is not risk-averse towards confrontation with Islamic rebels, Moscow has forwarded the necessary geostrategic guarantees to convince the Central Asian states that their regimes are better secured in a pact with Moscow.
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