Russia’s Sphere of Influence Engulfing Kazakhstan

August 26, 2008 From theTrumpet.comKazakhs, watching events in Georgia, seem to be aligning their energy-export policy with Putin’s wishes.

Russian tank treads rolling all over Georgia is making another regional country besides Ukraine stand up and take notice: Kazakhstan. Along with other factors, Moscow’s resurging pressure on its former Soviet neighbors has the Central Asian republic considering its options, particularly in one of its most vital sectors: energy.

Turkish daily Referans reported August 21 that Kazakhstan may soon decide to pump its oil through Russian pipelines instead of shipping it in tankers to the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline in Azerbaijan, which bypasses Russia. For several years, Kazakhstan has sought to reduce its reliance on Russia for getting its energy exports to market. According to Stratfor sources there, this decision could be the first signal that Kazakhstan is abandoning its plan to diversify its energy options away from Russia’s sphere of influence (August 21).

Kazakhstan, a landlocked former Soviet republic of 15 million people, has an economy larger than all the other Central Asian states combined thanks to its natural energy resources. It has long cooperated with Moscow over Western influences—partially out of mutual interests, partially out of intimidation. Its capital, Astana, lies 6,000 miles away from Washington and thousands of miles from Western Europe, with Russia’s Volga region and a few nervous former Soviet satellite countries in between. A third of its population is ethnic Russian, and it shares 4,250 nice, flat, invadable miles of border with its northern neighbor.

In addition, a large Kazakh population works in Russia and sends earnings back to Kazakhstan, and the nation’s energy infrastructure and transportation networks still run on Soviet models, which are Russia-bound.

But, at the same time, Moscow has the inconvenient tendency of crushing its weaker neighbors under Red Army combat boot heels. So Astana has looked for other energy options to diversify its portfolio. Russia’s bloody sortie into Georgia accomplishes more than just sending a strong statement to Astana and all the other former Soviet satellites. In real terms, it also means that Moscow is in control of Georgia and any energy exports that would potentially flow through it. It just so happens that Kazakhstan was considering building the Aktau-Baku pipeline across the bottom of the Caspian Sea. The idea was that it would reduce Kazakhstan’s dependence on Russia. So much for that idea.

Now, Kazakhstan has even fewer non-Russia energy options. Its only other real option is China, but at the moment Kazakhstan exports only 13 percent of its oil to its southeastern neighbor.
So, Kazakhstan will potentially pump its petroleum through Russian pipelines. What is the significance? The significance is that Russia will now grasp even more Asian energy exports, weapons that, along with its dominating foreign policy, project Moscow’s sphere of influence larger and larger. The effect is rippling far beyond shell-shocked Georgians. And it is paying dividends. As men in Moscow continue to increase their power using their two favorite weapons, the Red Army and energy exports—and as the U.S. does little more than blandly watch it all happen on TV—the Asian others will be forced to fall into lockstep.

With increasing Chinese-Russian cooperation coming down the line, the two gigantic powers of Asia will be able to tell Georgia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and the other ‘Stans, Japan, and most of the rest of the continent exactly what they can and must do with their resources. For more on the future of Asia, read Russia and China in Prophecy

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