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3 The Great Game moves
south By Zorawar Daulet Singh
Over the past year, the northwestern
frontiers of the South Asian subcontinent have
emerged as a vital theater for geopolitical
competition renascent of earlier eras. This
episode includes the three great powers of the
contemporary system - the United States, Russia
and China, the latter two exploiting their vital
positions in the Eurasian geopolitical landscape.
The patterns of the game cannot be
discerned without a critical
evaluation of the
foreign-policy interests of the three protagonists
and other regional powers in the region. What
follows is a reflection of how the game has now
decisively moved south and thereby likely to
influence the "look West" policies of New Delhi
and Islamabad.
In the winter of 2001,
Afghanistan became the target of a spectacular air
and ground assault by the United States, laying
the foundations for a gradual strategy whose
rationale was beyond just the annihilation of
al-Qaeda. In February 2002, then secretary of
state Colin Powell told Congress that the US "will
have a continuing interest and presence in Central
Asia of a kind that we could not have dreamed of
before".
Now fast-forward to spring 2005,
and the US has established an array of military
bases in the heart of Central Asia, poised to
crush the historic Russian hold over the region.
By the summer of 2005, it had became
apparent to Moscow that the US was hardly planning
a limited military deployment and what in the
aftermath of September 11, 2001, appeared to be a
legitimate response to terror networks was now
expanding into a more traditional realpolitik
strategy. Counterbalancing was inevitable.
The turning point came in July 2005, when
the Russian Foreign Ministry classified US forces
as "non-regional", and declared that such a
military presence in the region must be rolled
back. Similar calls to set a timetable for the
withdrawal of US bases in Central Asia were voiced
by the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).
Moscow's and Beijing's (more discreet) intentions
were henceforth made explicit.
The first
manifestation of Russian resurgence in Central
Asia came with a defensive alliance with
Uzbekistan, militarily the most important of the
five Central Asian republics, in November 2005,
thus making it Russia's largest strategic
bridgehead in Central Asia. Shortly after, most of
the other Central Asian states followed suit and
made a strategic choice to re-establish contacts
with an invigorated Kremlin. Recently, there are
indications that Washington's last remaining
airbase in Manas, Kyrgyzstan, itself a few
kilometers away from Russia's expanding Kant
airbase, may be asked to exit altogether.
Suffice it so say, with the specter of
US-sponsored "color revolutions" having receded,
and the drive to augment a permanent US military
presence north of Afghanistan not only checked but
dramatically rolled back, there was a change of
tactics in Washington.
In February 2006,
the State Department reorganized its South Asia
Division and included the five Central Asian
states in its jurisdiction. The formal strategy
was articulated in speeches by assistant secretary
of state Richard Boucher in the spring of 2006. In
what was termed the "Greater Central Asia"
strategy, Washington would henceforth refocus its
diplomatic attention to steer the region
southward, dangling the energy issue to open
Central Asian hydrocarbons to energy-deficit South
Asia, and promising to provide India and Pakistan
a channel for influence into Central Asia.
This tactical retreat into South Asia was
predicated on the stabilization of Afghanistan,
which given its location would be the pivotal link
in connecting South and Central Asia. Naturally,
the seminal "de-hyphenation" of US engagement with
India and Pakistan whereby it achieved the
historically unattainable - stable relations with
both states - and arguably the enduring success of
the post-September 11 US diplomacy in South Asia
made such a strategy conceivable in the first
place.
Anticipating that the SCO too was
vying for South Asia's attention, the US timing
and motive were clear - introducing another option
for India and Pakistan to participate in the
affairs of Central Asia, and thus nip any regional
realignment in the bud.
In essence, the
new US strategy is based on "multilateralism",
with the US playing the role of a midwife between
Central and South Asia, of which Afghanistan is
the core. Yet transformation of Afghanistan from
its historic buffer status toward that of a
"bridge" has not been shared as an overwhelming
goal by other regional actors, especially since
the corollary of an open-ended US
military-strategic presence in Afghanistan would
impinge on the security interests of all the
surrounding actors - Iran, Russia, China and
Pakistan. India may be the only exception.
Russian consolidation The
extensive Russian pipeline infrastructure that
transports Central Asian gas exclusively via
Russia into Europe ensures that the area is
integrated into the wider Russian energy strategy,
and any instability or reorientation in Central
Asia will directly impinge on Gazprom's export
strategy.
A number of hydrocarbon deals
since early 2000, and reaffirmed more recently
between Moscow and the Central Asian republics,
implies that even if the US does accomplish the
formidable objective of creating a vibrant
Afghanistan, regional surplus reserves are simply
insufficient to meet South Asian demand, thus
making a pipeline financially infeasible.
For instance, Russia is projected to
purchase 85% of Turkmenistan's gas exports (50
billion cubic meters, or bcm) in 2008. The
remainder is to be pumped into northern Iran. A
Russian-Turkmen agreement valid until 2028 implies
that there is little gas available for other
markets. Thus the
Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India pipeline
is truly a pipe dream.
As for Kazakhstan,
the other hydrocarbon oasis, the most recent
statement by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev
after a meeting with his Russian counterpart
Vladimir Putin last week underscores the robust
strategic pull of Moscow: "Kazakhstan is
completely committed to transporting most, if not
all, of its oil (and gas) across Russian
territory." (In 2006, Kazakhstan exported 80% - 42
million tons - of its total oil exports via
Russian pipelines.)
This was followed by a
landmark trilateral pipeline deal in Turkmenbashi,
under which 20-30bcm of gas annually would flow
from Turkmenistan along the Caspian Sea shore via
Kazakhstan into the Russian pipeline network
beginning 2012. Finally, according to a joint
declaration, which included Uzbek President Islom
Karimov, the Soviet-era Central Asia-Center
pipeline network is expected to be upgraded.
There are indications now that Russia and
Afghanistan are reviving contacts, first signaled
in February when Moscow reopened its
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