Where does the threat to Central Asia come from in the near future? From the West, China or Russia?

The issue of risk and threats is a very broad topic. Today, poverty, unemployment, environmental problems are a big threat to Central Asia. The biggest of them is the competition between Russia, the United States and China for the possession of the region. This competition is a big threat to MO's future. At one time, the rivalry between the big powers, namely the USSR and the USA, caused a civil war in Afghanistan. Today, "dark clouds" are floating over the rest of the Central Asian countries. The US Secretary of State, who visited the region, said that he does not want to compete with Russia and China for the MO in 2020. But soon after Russia started a war in Ukraine, the USA also joined the big game under the pretext of supporting the sovereignty of Central Asian countries. But Moscow and Beijing have the upper hand in this game. Central Asia has practically reached a dead end. Geographically, the region is located between Russia and the People's Republic of China, at the center of the politics of the great powers. The 2 great countries located on both sides of Central Asia - Russia and China - have in some sense chosen the path of mutual compromise, they are mainly involved in conflict with the West. The multi-vector approach that Central Asia wants to use or is using is very difficult to implement in this context. No one in the West is waiting for the region to end its relations with China and Russia. It is clear that this is impossible. Central Asia is considered the "heart of the Eurasian supercontinent" and relations with this region are important for Moscow, Beijing, and Washington. This year is distinguished by the first meeting of the US president and the leaders of all five Central Asian countries at the S5+1 summit. The S5+1 format itself is not new, the foreign ministers of the Central Asian countries and the US Secretary of State have been meeting in this format for almost 10 years. Why is this meeting being held at the presidential level this time? The United States has finally realized that it needs a serious strategy for Central Asia. In the past, politics was mostly viewed in terms of Afghanistan or other issues. The US strategy seemed to be just a supplement to the Afghanistan strategy and not focused on Central Asia. The war in Ukraine showed how important this region is. When it comes to the two most important foreign policy challenges the United States has faced in the last two years (the war in Afghanistan and the war in Ukraine), it is important to remember that Central Asia is at the center of both.

In May, Chinese President Xi Jinping received five leaders of Central Asian countries at the first China-Central Asia Summit. In October 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin met with five heads of state as part of the first-ever Russia-Central Asia summit in Astana. It's a really interesting time in the region because we're in a multipolar system. Therefore, regional powers have more influence. During the war in Afghanistan, many people looked at Central Asia from the perspective of US-Russia rivalry. Now we are talking about Central Asia from the perspective of competition between China and Russia. These countries will always be participants of dialogue in the region. But the discussions focus too much on the dominance of China and Russia.

It must be openly admitted that every country that wants to dominate our region has its own risks. Let's try to analyze them. At the beginning of the 1990s, Central Asia was like a "wagon disconnected from the road" for Russia, but today the Kremlin is trying to tie this "wagon" more tightly to the "echelon". Because in the early 1990s, Moscow gave in to euphoria and turned to the West, thinking that the West would welcome us and immediately accept us into NATO and the European Union. But the opposite happened. Russia, where corruption and crime are rampant, was not welcomed by anyone. When Vladimir Putin came to power, he decided to restore Russia's former power and status. First of all, it declared the former Soviet republics, including Central Asia, as the area of its vital strategic interests. He is trying to use political and economic means in this way. Frankly speaking, the economic value of Central Asia is not that high for Russia, most importantly, it is of interest for the transit of energy resources. The main goal of Moscow in the region is to create a sphere of its interests, to turn the former Soviet republics into "its vassals, to reduce the sphere of influence of external actors, primarily the United States, as much as possible. Relations with Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan occupy a special place in this policy. But one thing should not be forgotten. As the American political scientist Zbigniew Brzezinski wrote at the end of the last century, Russia is too politically weak to completely close the region to external forces, too impoverished to master these regions only by its own power.

Even in the 21st century, the situation has not changed. Russia's interests in Central Asia are explained, first of all, by its desire to maintain its influence in the region, keeping the remnants of the former Soviet space under its protection. With this, he wants them to confirm the name of Derjava in Eurasia, although not in the world. Such allegations are one of the main motivations of the Kremlin's foreign policy. Because of its fading influence everywhere in the world, Moscow is suffering from this disease. Here, the former Soviet republics are the only part of the world where the Kremlin claims leadership. But he is also "stuck". Secondly, Russia's interests require the preservation and support of regimes that are inclined to it and are ready to develop relations with it. Accomplishing these tasks is also becoming more and more difficult. In particular, the statements of a number of politicians in Russia aimed at annexing Central Asian republics such as Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan after the defeat of Ukraine have worried the population of these countries. Moreover, the foreign policy of the Central Asian countries is characterized by multipolarity. The direction of policy based only on Russia has already failed. From the beginning, Turkmenistan declared its foreign political neutrality and challenged Russia.

Thirdly, Russia is trying to prevent the influence of foreign powers, primarily the United States, to increase in Central Asia. Realizing that it cannot stop the activity of external actors, the Kremlin is trying to find a balance in competition and partnership with countries such as the United States and China. China's expansion is primarily limited by economic and financial aspirations. China is helping to build multi-faceted transport and energy infrastructures that connect itself with Central Asia, while at the same time opening a way for itself to go west, that is, to Europe. So, while Beijing seeks to develop relations with Central Asia in the "Russian space", Russia also claims to create regional infrastructures. Responding to China's call, Russia is engaging with the region through integration projects such as the Eurasian Economic Union and the Collective Security Treaty Organization. Russia does not want instability on its southern borders due to its preoccupation with the war in Ukraine. That is, Moscow considers MO as its southern borders. However, if disputes arise between them in the future over water or territories, they will bring their army under the pretext of stopping them. This means a direct threat to the sovereignty of MO!

But China defiantly refuses to interfere in the internal affairs of Central Asian countries. No matter who comes to power in these countries, Beijing does not want to quarrel with its powerful neighbor Russia. China's growing presence in the Middle East has put a damper on Russia's economic activity, but this is seen as inevitable in the Kremlin, which sees Central Asia as a partnership between the two superpowers. The symbol of this cooperation is the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Russia, which has agreed on the rules of the game with China, is strongly opposing the United States in order to limit its influence in the region. Due to language and migration, Russia will have a long-term influence in education, culture and media than China: Russia has a large number of immigrants from Central Asia. Now Russia is in a very difficult situation. He lost many of his men to war or death. This makes Central Asian immigrants more desirable to Russia and brings the region closer to Moscow.

However, rising chauvinism and nationalism in Russia pose a great threat to MO. Indeed, for several years, Kazakhstan has become a target of Russian politicians. They intimidated Kazakhstan through informational attacks and threats, creating an atmosphere of hostility. I would attribute this to the rise of neo-imperialism in Russia in recent years. In Russia, politicians who are increasingly reminiscing about their old "glory days" have gained strength, and neo-imperialist ideas are on the rise. Russia continued to spread the idea that "the republics of the former Soviet space should remain within the sphere of influence of Russia." It has become such a sight that many experts are starting to see it as a threat. Of course, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan do not share a border with Russia. For this reason, Kazakhstan became the first target. In addition, Kazakhstan has the longest land border with Russia. For this reason, Kazakhstan is a country open to pressure from Russia.

The strategy of the USA in Central Asia is to support the independence, territorial integrity and sovereignty of the former Soviet republics, including the Republic of Uzbekistan, to ensure regional stability, to prevent conflicts, as well as to promote the democratization of society and economic development. These strategic tasks can be assessed as a call to Russia. Because in this case, sovereignty means greater independence of the MO countries from the former "metropolis", and democratization means the creation of political systems close to Western models. The US is helping to reform local economies, and Russia itself, which needs to modernize, can provide limited assistance. However, since the Central Asian regimes are heavily dependent on Russia, and the US wants to spread democracy to the region, the regimes see the US as a threat. Washington, which is pursuing the Greater Middle East policy, wants to establish dominance in the region, of course, as it does in the Middle East and Africa, it will try to overthrow the rulers of the MO countries and appoint their own emissaries in their place. On the other hand, the ISIS project belongs directly to the US. If they want to go head-to-head with Russia and China, the "quiet ISIS" in Afghanistan will wake them up. Or if the Taiwan-China war starts with the hand of Washington, it may cause the struggle for independence to start in Xinjiang as well.

The US is concerned about China's growing power. Therefore, it creates a problem for the "One Place One Road" initiatives in both Central Asia and Europe. The fact is that China sees this region as a road to Europe and the Middle East. In the past, China's concept of "One Space, One Road" focused mainly on connecting Europe through Kazakhstan, and then Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus. Ukraine was an important center of this project, and then the events of 2014 happened. As a result, they moved to Belarus, but in 2020 there was an attempted coup in Belarus following allegations of fraudulent elections. Belarus also fell into Russia's orbit. Therefore, it will be difficult for China to use Russia, Ukraine or Belarus to enter Europe.

Energy games between Russia and the USA are also a big threat. The United States has long been and continues to be a major investor in Central Asia's energy sector. There is now talk of helping Central Asia export more oil and gas to the west via the Caspian Sea, as Europe stops buying gas from Russia and shows interest in alternative sources. Trans-Caspian pipelines should connect to Baku and from there to existing oil and gas pipelines. But China is also interested in connecting to Baku, so there may be competition over whether gas goes east or west. Russia is interested in gas pipelines through Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan to the markets of China, Pakistan and South Asia. This will increase the games and the conflicts behind them in the near future.

But the greatest threat to our independence is still Russia! I don't think Russia's complete collapse, but just any weakening, say a major military setback, would give Central Asia more autonomy in determining its own policies. It is necessary to imagine the opposite: suppose that he occupied Ukraine or occupied a significant part of it. This would be very bad for Central Asia, as Russia has territorial claims to Northern Kazakhstan. What happened to Ukraine can also happen to Kazakhstan. But if Russia becomes too weak, this threat will disappear. I think that Central Asia will be able to make its own decisions without thinking about what the Russians will say, how they will react, etc. On the other hand, there is no political and economic unity among Central Asian countries. If the countries of this region had not established border control and economic nationalism, but had united into a single market, they would have had much larger markets and could have prospered. This will probably be done by the leaders of the countries in time.

The issue of sanctions is also very painful for Central Asia, because Afghanistan is under sanctions from the south, Iran from the southwest, and now Russia from the north. In addition, relations between the United States and China have deteriorated. Since Central Asia is landlocked, it needs neighbors for trade. The population is poor, economic growth is needed. Central Asian countries want to comply with sanctions, but they are in very difficult economic conditions. No country in the region wants Russia to succeed in Ukraine, to win this war, but economically they are suffering a lot. We certainly hope that in the near future, the economic engines of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan will lift the region and solve the problem of poverty through economic integration and cooperation.

Abduvali Soyibnazarov,

political scientist