Russia, China, and the United States in Central Asia: Prospects for Great Power Competition and Cooperation in the Shadow of the Georgian Crisis

摘要

This monograph explores the appearance and reality of a consolidation of anti-U.S. interests in Central Asia via the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Sino-Russian partnership. The author asserts that while there is considerable suspicion of U.S. designs on Central Asia, divergent interests within the SCO, among Central Asian states, and especially between Russia and China, serve to limit any coordinated anti-U.S. activity. The monograph takes a critical look at the Sino-Russian partnership and points to differences on energy and economic integration in Central Asia, despite common interests in maintaining regime security and limiting U.S. influence in the region. A section on the implications of the Georgian crisis shows how this war highlighted the divergence in Russian and Chinese interests, while accentuating the vulnerability of the Central Asian states to Russian influence, and underlining the risks involved in U.S. energy projects in the region. The monograph then addresses the policy implications for the United States of the shifting regional picture in Central Asia. Despite the fissures within the SCO and the competitive tendencies within the Sino-Russian partnership, the monograph asserts that the United States will not have an easy time achieving its aims in Central Asia. American policy goals -- energy cooperation, regional security, and support for democracy and the rule of law -- often conflict with one another. Declining assistance also leaves the United States with fewer effective policy instruments to recoup its declining influence among Central Asian publics, address underlying conditions which lead to regional instability, and press for accountable governments that have the capacity to address the growing range of transnational threats to the region. The author presents policy recommendations in a concluding section.