The example set by Ukraine and Uzbekistan has had an impact even on the leaders who have been more deferential to Moscow’s central concerns. The Kremlin must have been especially disturbed to hear Kazakstan’s Nursultan Nazarbayev and Georgia’s Eduard Shevardnadze declare in September 1996 that they would leave the CIS “if our independence is threatened.” More generally, as a counter to the CIS, the Central Asian states and Azerbaijan stepped up their level of activity in the Organization of Economic Cooperation, a still relatively loose association of the region’s Islamic states—including Turkey, Iran, and Pakistan—dedicated to the enhancement of financial, economic, and transportation links among its members. Moscow has been publicly critical of these initiatives, viewing them, quite correctly, as diluting the pertinent states’ membership in the CIS.
In a similar vein, there has been steady enhancement of ties with Turkey and, to a lesser extent, Iran. The Turkic-speaking countries have eagerly accepted Turkey’s offers of military training for the new national officer corps and the laying down of the Turkish welcome mat for some ten thousand students. The fourth summit meeting of the Turkic-speaking countries, held in Tashkent in October 1996 and prepared with Turkish backing, focused heavily on the enhancement of transportation links, on increased trade, and also on common educational standards as well as closer cultural cooperation with Turkey. Both Turkey and Iran have been particularly active in assisting the new states with their television programming, thereby directly influencing large audiences.
A ceremony in Alma-Ata, the capital of Kazakstan, in December 1996 was particularly symbolic of Turkey’s identification with the independence of the region’s states. On the occasion of the fifth anniversary of Kazakstan’s independence, the Turkish president, Suleyman Demirel, stood at the side of President Nazarbayev at the unveiling of a gold-colored column twenty-eight meters high, crowned with a legendary Kazak/Turkic warrior’s figure atop a griffinlike creature.
At the event, Kazakstan hailed Turkey for “standing by Kazakstan at every step of its development as an independent state,” and the Turks reciprocated by granting Kazakstan a credit line of $300 million, beyond existing private Turkish investment of about $1.2 billion.
While neither Turkey nor Iran has the means to exclude Russia from regional influence, Turkey and (more narrowly) Iran have thus been reinforcing the will and the capacity of the new states to resist reintegration with their northern neighbor and former master. And that certainly helps to keep the region’s geopolitical future open.
NEITHER DOMINION NOR EXCLUSION
The geostrategic implications for America are clear: America is too distant to be dominant in this part of Eurasia but too powerful not to be engaged. All the states in the area view American engagement as necessary to their survival. Russia is too weak to regain imperial domination over the region or to exclude others from it, but it is also too close and too strong to be excluded. Turkey and Iran are strong enough to be influential, but their own vulnerabilities could make the area unable to cope with both the challenge from the north and the region’s internal conflicts. China is too powerful not to be feared by Russia and the Central Asian states, yet its very presence and economic dynamism facilitates Central Asia’s quest for wider global outreach.
It follows that America’s primary interest is to help ensure that no single power comes to control this geopolitical space and that the global community has unhindered financial and economic access to it. Geopolitical pluralism will become an enduring reality only when a network of pipeline and transportation routes links the region directly to the major centers of global economic activity via the Mediterranean and Arabian Seas, as well as overland. Hence, Russian efforts to monopolize access need to be opposed as inimical to regional stability.
However, the exclusion of Russia from the area is neither desirable nor feasible, nor is the fanning of hostility between the area’s new states and Russia. In fact, Russia’s active economic participation in the region’s development is essential to the area’s stability—and having Russia as a partner, but not as an exclusive dominator, can also reap significant economic benefits as a result. Greater stability and increased wealth within the region would contribute directly to Russia’s well-being and give real meaning to the “commonwealth” promised by the acronym CIS. But that cooperative option will become Russia’s policy only when much more ambitious, historically anachronistic designs that are painfully reminiscent of the original Balkans are effectively precluded.
The states deserving America’s strongest geopolitical support are Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan, and (outside this region) Ukraine, all three being geopolitically pivotal. Indeed, Kiev’s role reinforces the argument that Ukraine is the critical state, insofar as Russia’s own future evolution is concerned. At the same time, Kazakstan—given its size, economic potential, and geographically important location—is also deserving of prudent international backing and especially of sustained economic assistance. In time, economic growth in Kazakstan might help to bridge the ethnic split that makes this Central Asian “shield” so vulnerable to Russian pressure.
In this region, America shares a common interest not only with a stable, pro-Western Turkey but also with Iran and China. A gradual improvement in American-Iranian relations would greatly increase global access to the region and, more specifically, reduce the more immediate threat to Azerbaijan’s survival. China’s growing economic presence in the region and its political stake in the area’s independence are also congruent with America’s interests. China’s backing of Pakistan’s efforts in Afghanistan is also a positive factor, for closer Pakistani-Afghan relations would make international access to Turkmenistan more feasible, thereby helping to reinforce both that state and Uzbekistan (in the event that Kazakstan were to falter).
Turkey’s evolution and orientation are likely to be especially decisive for the future of the Caucasian states. If Turkey sustains its path to Europe—and if Europe does not close its doors to Turkey—the states of the Caucasus are also likely to gravitate into the European orbit, a prospect they fervently desire. But if Turkey’s Europeanization grinds to a halt, for either internal or external reasons, then Georgia and Armenia will have no choice but to adapt to Russia’s inclinations. Their future will then become a function of Russia’s own evolving relationship with the expanding Europe, for good or ill.
Iran’s role is likely to be even more problematic. A return to a pro-Western posture would certainly facilitate the stabilization and consolidation of the region, and it is therefore strategically desirable for America to encourage such a turn in Iran’s conduct. But until that happens, Iran is likely to play a negative role, adversely affecting Azerbaijan’s prospects, even as it takes positive steps like opening Turkmenistan to the world and, despite Iran’s current fundamentalism, reinforcing the Central Asians’ sense of their religious heritage.
Ultimately, Central Asia’s future is likely to be shaped by an even more complex set of circumstances, with the fate of its states determined by the intricate interplay of Russian, Turkish, Iranian, and Chinese interests, as well as by the degree to which the United States conditions its relations with Russia on Russia’s respect for the independence of the new states.
The reality of that interplay precludes either empire or monopoly as a meaningful goal for any of the geostrategic players involved. Rather, the basic choice is between a delicate regional balance—which would permit the gradual inclusion of the area in the emerging global economy while the states of the region consolidate themselves and probably also acquire a more pronounced Islamic identity—or ethnic conflict, political fragmentation, and possibly even open hostilities along Russia’s southern frontiers. The attainment and consolidation of that regional balance has to be a major goal in any comprehensive U.S. geostrategy for Eurasia.
Chapter 6
The Far Eastern Anchor
AN EFFECTIVE AMERICAN POLICY for Eurasia has to have a Far Eastern anchor. That need will not be met if America is excluded or excludes itself from the Asian mainland. A close relationship with maritime Japan is essential for America’s global policy, but a cooperative relationship with mainland China is imperative for America’s Eurasian geostrategy. The implications of that reality need to be faced, for the ongoing interaction in the Far East between three major powers—America, China, and Japan—creates a potentially dangerous regional conundrum and is almost certain to generate geopolitically tectonic shifts.
For China, America across the Pacific should be a natural ally since America has no designs on the Asian mainland and has historically opposed both Japanese and Russian encroachments on a weaker China. To the Chinese, Japan has been the principal enemy over the last century; Russia, “the hungry land” in Chinese, has long been distrusted; and India, too, now looms as a potential rival. The principle “my neighbor’s neighbor is my ally” thus fits the geopolitical and historical relationship between China and America.
However, America is no longer Japan’s adversary across the ocean but is now closely allied with Japan. America also has strong ties with Taiwan and with several of the Southeast Asian nations. The Chinese are also sensitive to America’s doctrinal reservations regarding the internal character of the current Chinese regime. Thus, America is also seen as the principal obstacle in China’s quest not only to become globally preeminent but even just regionally predominant. Is a collision between America and China, therefore, inevitable?
For Japan, America has been the umbrella under which the country could safely recover from a devastating defeat, regain its economic momentum, and on that basis progressively attain a position as one of the world’s prime powers. But the very fact of that umbrella imposes a limit
