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i

iii

Strategic Studies Institute

and

U.S. Army War College Press

CHINA’S RISE AND RECONFIGURATION OF 

CENTRAL ASIA’S GEOPOLITICS:

A CASE FOR U.S. “PIVOT” TO EURASIA

Roman Muzalevsky

July 2015

The views expressed in this report are those of the author and 

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public release; distribution is unlimited.

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Sections 101 and 105. It is in the public domain and may not be 

copyrighted.
iv

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ISBN 1-58487-693-X
v

CONTENTS

Foreword .....................................................................vii

About the Author ................................................. xi

Summary ....................................................................xiii

Introduction...................................................................1

1. China’s Current and Projected 

 Regional Presence...................................................12 

China’s Needs, Interests, Goals, and 

Capabilities.......................................................12

China’s Geo-Economics vs Russia’s 

Geopolitics .......................................................21

China’s West-East “Pull” vs 

India’s South-North “Push”...........................30

China’s Expansion vs U.S. 

Containment?...................................................37

2. Reconfiguration of Central Asia’s 

 Geopolitics .............................................................47

Multidirectional “Push-Pull” Forces ..........47

Division of Labor in Central Asia ................51

Attributes of China’s Regional 

Hegemony ......................................................56

Indigenous Responses to Regional 

Change ............................................................69

3. Advancing U.S. “Pivot to Eurasia”.......................78 

Boosting Military Engagement 

in the Region.....................................................81

Upgrading U.S. New Silk Road 

Initiative............................................................83
Advancing Cooperation with 

Key Partners.....................................................85

Shaping China’s Global Ascendance............92

Conclusion...................................................................96

 If China Succeeds or Fails: The Future 

 of Economic and Security Order

 in Central Asia.................................................96

Endnotes.....................................................................102

vi
vii

FOREWORD

China’s global rise has prompted numerous discussions and studies of this historically monumental 

phenomenon and its implications for the world. On 

the one hand, China’s emergence as a global player 

has generated a lot of optimism for global development and economic convergence. On the other, it has 

spurred concerns about possible collisions on the 

world stage as existing and emerging powers seek 

to retain and redesign their roles and influences. Related opportunities and fears have been especially 

pronounced in countries neighboring China, including in Central Asia where the newly independent and 

post-Soviet republics face a possibility of yet another 

imperial expansion due to strategic advances of the 

“Middle Kingdom.”

As the strongest power on the planet, the United 

States has a major stake in China’s and the region’s future because both directly affect the U.S. global standing and the U.S.-led global economic and security 

order. In this insightful and forward-looking work, 

Mr. Roman Muzalevsky, a widely published analyst 

and author of Central Asia’s Shrinking Connectivity Gap: 

Implications for U.S. Strategy and From Frozen Ties to 

Strategic Engagement: U.S.-Iranian Relationship in 2030, 

assesses China’s global rise through the prism of geopolitical and geo-economic forces sweeping through 

Central Asia. Mr. Muzalevsky concludes that the ability of the United States to “stay relevant globally” hinges on its capacity to boost its lacking regional strategic 

presence in Central Asia. 

The author advocates for “a robust, direct, and 

long-term” U.S. engagement with the region. Washington, he argues, needs to complement its “Pivot to 

the Pacific” with a “Pivot to Eurasia” in order to shape 
China’s rise on both flanks and ensure a more managed 

evolution of the global economic and security architecture. According to Mr. Muzalevsky, the U.S. “pivot” to Asia has aggravated China’s concerns of strategic encirclement by the United States and prompted 

Beijing to exploit an opening along the western track 

of its global expansion through Central Asia. China’s 

regional activities, he finds, are rapidly sidelining all 

other powers, and the U.S. planned withdrawal from 

Afghanistan and the region may herald lost strategic 

opportunities for Washington. 

The author presents a convincing case. Bejing is 

now the major economic force in the region and continues to build up other components of its strategic 

influence in Central Asia in areas as diverse as culture, politics, security, and military. China’s growing 

footprint—if left unmanaged—could transform the 

region’s geopolitics beyond recognition, undermining Washington’s global role and the sovereignty of 

the Central Asian republics. This possibility should 

make strategic planners ponder the implications of 

China’s potential hegemony in Central Asia, if not the 

world—an imperative that Mr. Muzalvesky cogently 

articulates and makes all too clear for policymakers. 

China’s rise and ongoing transformation of the region’s geopolitics due to “push-pull forces” exerted 

by external actors are of strategic importance to the 

U.S. position as the global economic and military 

leader. The Strategic Studies Institute welcomes Mr. 

Muzalevsky’s contribution to the study of these monumental issues and dynamics and highly recommends 

viii
ix

this work for analysts and policymakers interested in 

the fate of China, the United, States, Central Asia, and 

the world.

 

 

 DOUGLAS C. LOVELACE, JR.

 Director

 Strategic Studies Institute and

 U.S. Army War College Press

xi

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

ROMAN MUZALEVSKY works for iJet International 

Inc., performing research, reporting, and analysis of 

global, regional, and national security affairs, risks, 

and trends, as well as providing incident response and 

crises management services. He is also a Contributing 

Analyst on Eurasian Affairs and Security at Jamestown Foundation. Previously, he worked for CSM 

Solutions Inc., National Democratic Institute, DFID 

Public Finance Reform Project, Central Asia-Caucasus 

Institute, security consultancy Wikistrat, and global 

strategy advisory consultancy Krull Corp. in the United States and Central Asia. He conducted research on 

security issues in the post-Soviet space at the Center 

for Political and Military Analysis at Hudson Institute 

as part of the George F. Jewett Foundation Fellowship 

Award for Projects on the Study and Practice of Grand 

Strategies. Mr. Muzalevsky has authored at least 100 

articles on Eurasian and global affairs, geopolitics, security, and strategic trends. In 2014-15, he authored 

two works, Central Asia’s Shrinking Connectivity Gap: 

Implications for U.S. Strategy and From Frozen Ties to 

Strategic Engagement: U.S.-Iranian Relationship in 2030

(Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. Army 

War College). Mr. Muzalevsky received his M.A. in 

international affairs with concentration in security and 

strategy studies from Yale University and a diploma 

in international affairs from the International Ataturk 

Ala-Too University in Kyrgyzstan, Central Asia.

xiii

 SUMMARY

China’s emergence as a global actor has questioned 

the position of the United States as the strongest power 

and the future of the Washington-led global order. But 

achieving the status of a truly global player wielding 

influence in all dimensions of power would require 

China, among other things, to leverage its regional 

influence in Central Asia. This region is increasingly 

representing China’s western leg of economic expansion and development, and is of a growing strategic 

importance for Beijing. It is also a region that should 

be of greater strategic importance to Washington, 

which seeks to preserve its leading position in the international system and ensure China’s peaceful integration in the global political, security, and economic 

architecture. 

The question of future economic and security order in Central Asia is thus of paramount importance 

to global stability. China is already projecting the 

strongest economic presence in the region and has the 

potential to build “comprehensive influence” across 

economic, cultural, political, military, and security 

spheres. 

Just as in the Asia-Pacific, it is the rise of China and 

its perceived efforts at domination in Central Asia that 

are driving the reconfiguration of the region’s geopolitics and are challenging the U.S. global supremacy, 

requiring Washington to advance creative economic 

and military solutions in the heart of Eurasia. To stay 

relevant globally and regionally, the United States has 

to pursue a robust, direct, and long-term strategy of 

engagement in Central Asia. 

As it seeks to do so, Washington cannot premise 

its cooperation with other powers in Central Asia on 
the isolation of China—a global force calling for engagement where beneficial and containment where 

necessary. Washington should boost military engagement in the region, upgrade its New Silk Road Strategy (NSRS), advance cooperation with key partners, 

and shape China’s global ascendance by leveraging 

its position in Central Asia. It should consider joining multilateral institutions involving the regional 

countries and China, or seek the creation of new ones 

to shape China’s regional activities. It should link its 

NSRS with China’s “belt” strategy where it benefits 

the region’s development while ensuring multidirectional contours of regional geo-economic forces. It 

should also start pondering how to leverage its potential strategic relationship with Iran, which links the 

Middle East with Central and South Asia, and shares 

growing economic ties with China. Finally, it should 

develop platforms of cooperation with China in economic and security spheres pertaining to both global 

and regional affairs. 

None of these tasks are easy to accomplish. This 

policy monograph, written in March 2015, sheds light 

on the crucial forces at work, assesses the possibility and implications of China’s hegemony in Central 

Asia, and highlights the need for Washington to play 

real politics at the table rather than from across the 

high seas.

xiv
1

CHINA’S RISE AND RECONFIGURATION OF 

CENTRAL ASIA’S GEOPOLITICS:

A CASE FOR U.S. “PIVOT” TO EURASIA

INTRODUCTION

China’s Rise and Shifting Landscape 

of Central Asia. 

Since China’s opening to the world in 1978, the world 

has changed China—and now China is beginning to 

change the world.

 David Shambaugh1 

Despite a slowdown of China’s economy over the 

last few years, analysts view the long-term rise of the 

“Middle Kingdom” as a given—an unimpeded development challenging the U.S. global position and reshaping the global order, potentially through a war 

between the rising and the status quo power or an 

accommodation and global economic convergence. 

High economic growth since 1970s has turned China from an isolated actor confined to East Asia and 

constrained by the Cold War into the second-largest 

economy benefiting enormously from globalization. 

China has lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty, 

becoming the largest trading partner of more than 120 

countries and producing $U.S.1.5 trillion more in gross 

domestic product (GDP) than the output of the rest of 

the BRICS’ (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa) economies combined.2

 Today, China is shaping 

politics in every corner of the world, having overtaken 

the U.S. economy in 2014 as the world’s largest, based 

on purchasing power parity calculations. By 2040, its 

economy is projected to be three times the size of the 
2

U.S. economy and produce 40 percent of the global 

output.3

While Beijing’s continued ascendance is not necessarily assured or bound to result in a “harmonious” 

world its grand strategy purportedly seeks to achieve, 

its expanding capabilities and global role have caused 

apprehension among powers of all shapes and sizes. 

This is evident in neighboring Central Asia—the region bordering China’s restive Uyghur Autonomous 

Region of Xingjian and representing a “periphery” for 

China, a “backyard” for Russia, and a “forepost” for 

the United States. Traditionally viewed as a backwater—despite the collapse of the Soviet Union, which set 

the regional countries free, and the U.S. first-ever military presence in the post-Soviet space, which opened 

the region’s connection with South Asia—Central Asia 

today is on the verge of being turned by China into the 

“Silk Road Economic Belt” linking dynamic centers 

in the East and the West and advancing the region’s 

internal and external integration. Beijing’s regional 

presence—growing rapidly and already changing the 

contours of the region’s geopolitical space is projected 

to increase significantly, as China and Central Asian 

countries lay cross-regional investment, energy, trade, 

and transit infrastructure to satisfy their and China’s 

growing appetite for Eurasian resources, markets, and 

investment opportunities. 

China’s growing capabilities and the “belt” strategy enable it to pursue a more assertive role in Central 

Asia so as to reduce its dependence on maritime routes 

patrolled by the U.S. and Indian navies; claim a geopolitical stake in the region contested by established and 

rising powers; enhance stability in Central and South 

Asia, especially following the withdrawal of U.S.-

led coalition forces from Afghanistan; exploit trade, 
3

investment, and energy development opportunities in 

Eurasia; and ensure a more even development of its 

coastal and continental zones. China’s overall regional 

strategy hinges on its economic expansion, which has 

made it the dominant economic actor in Central Asia 

and is accelerating the geopolitical realignment in the 

heart of the continent, expanding the region’s internal 

and external connectivity. As one analyst put it, “The 

frontiers of China are moving even if its boundaries 

are not.” While China relies mostly on sea-borne trade, 

its expansion as the soon-to-be largest economy has 

spurred increased demand for transcontinental land 

corridors via Central Asia. Strategically important as 

they are for China’s energy security, the land corridors would still not fully meet China’s energy import 

needs and are arguably “more vulnerable to physical 

security disruptions than sea routes.”4

Beijing has relied on the “belt” strategy, bilateral 

deals, and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization 

(SCO), comprised of China, Russia, and the Central 

Asian states of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, 

and Tajikistan, to expand economic flows that are supposed to link its internal areas with neighboring economic zones. Beijing’s reliance on bi- and multilateral 

frameworks of cooperation fits the logic of a Chinese 

proverb that “we must walk with both legs.”5 Central 

Asia is emerging as a second “leg”—in addition to Beijing’s “leg” in East Asia—and a springboard for China 

to develop its restive and poor areas of Xingjian, Tibet, 

and Inner Mongolia, and to expand its external, westward development push.

China is now the largest trading partner of Russia, 

Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan, as well as the secondlargest partner for Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, and 

the third-largest partner for Tajikistan.6 More than 75 
4

percent of external trade of Xingjian, which hosts China’s nuclear testing ground at Lop Nor and nuclear 

ballistic missiles, is with Central Asia. Xingjian, which 

means “new territory,” is home to China’s largest deposits of gold, uranium, oil, and gas. As China’s economic growth model changes from the one predominantly based on savings and exports to the one based 

largely on domestic consumption and export of hightech products,7

 the burgeoning “Middle Kingdom” 

will need to rely on nearby economic zones to sustain 

its economic expansion. This task is imperative, given 

a slowdown of China’s economic growth rate, looming 

debt, and difficulties with the management of popular political and economic expectations regarding the 

country’s development and role in global affairs. Central Asia’s growing strategic importance for Beijing’s 

transcontinental and global policies thus highlights 

benefits and challenges for the region’s connectivity 

with the world and for the U.S. global role and policy, 

as Beijing seeks to secure its unity and the periphery (China often views its neighbors as “periphery 

countries”8).

Beijing’s regional agenda conflicts with long-term 

designs of other powers, even if China has not yet 

matched its growing economic presence with military expansion in Central Asia. Great and mediumsized powers alike perceive its economic advances as 

constraining Russia-led Eurasian Union (EU), India’s 

“Connect Central Asia” policy, and U.S. Silk Road 

Economic Strategy (NSRS), among other similar projects advanced by Japan, South Korea, Turkey, and 

other actors. Points of convergence exist within regional policies of these states, and select components 

of these policies contribute to regional development. 

But the long-term designs of these powers on Central 
5

Asia can also produce mutually exclusive policies and 

outcomes or create conditions for instability due to 

external rivalries for influence and primacy in Central Asia. On the one hand—Russia and China: two 

authoritarian powers with imperial histories respectively are seeking to retain and project dominance in 

the region. Moscow and Beijing are advancing alternative and opposing geo-political visions for Central 

Asia, while working in concert and individually to 

keep Washington and Delhi out of the region. On the 

other hand—the United States and India: the democratic superpower from across the high seas and the 

global power-in-the-making from within the broader 

region, are respectively struggling to anchor their 

strategic presence, while trying to break Moscow’s 

security monopoly and shape China’s geo-economic 

expansion. 

Converging and diverging capabilities and goals 

of these powers—both as loose partner camps and 

individual actors—and attempted multivector policies of the regional republics prompt reconfiguration 

of Central Asia’s geopolitics by producing multidirectional “push-pull” forces and shifting economic 

flows that simultaneously “glue” the regional states 

and their partners together and pull them apart in a 

continuously shifting mode of geopolitical and geoeconomic interaction. An already observed outcome 

of these developments is a functional division of labor 

among external powers, with Russia retaining a predominant security role; China gaining the preeminent 

economic role; the EU positioning itself as an economic, democratization, and development partner; the 

United States leading a military role in Afghanistan 

while advancing north-south integration; and India 

pursuing its assumed role of interconnector of Central 
6

and South Asia. These dynamics position China as the 

major force capable of projecting hegemony in Central 

Asia if other players sleep through another round of 

the unfolding “Great Game.” 

The sheer economic advance by China today 

makes the Central Asian states ponder security and 

geopolitical implications of Beijing’s growing regional 

presence. Their mission and fate seem to be clear: they 

could either leverage China’s rise to become more autonomous units or fall into Beijing’s orbit and delay, if 

not lose entirely, their nascent evolution as sovereign 

subjects. But the reality is also clear; the prevalent talk 

and unfolding of the “Great Game,” as well as the role 

of the big players in the region’s future, demonstrate 

that the Central Asian states have not consolidated 

their sovereignties and are subject to pressures to conform to agendas of great powers, despite their relative success in balancing them off one another. There 

is a light at the end of the tunnel, however. Just as the 

external pressures are a source of alarm, they are also 

a source of opportunity if the regional states play the 

“Game” right; undertake major reforms, integrate 

from within, and position the region as a strong platform for players of all sizes.

Assuming China succeeded in exerting hegemony 

over Central Asia, what attributes would this hegemony have? How could the United States, its partners, 

and the Central Asian countries shape it while protecting their interests? If history and China’s recent activities are any guide, China would be unlikely to pursue 

territorial control over the region, unless its expanded 

interests are threatened significantly. Instead, it would 

likely project an economic, political, and cultural influence through strategic bilateral relationships and 

multilateral institutional networks involving massive 
7

infrastructure projects with significant Chinese capital, as well as cultural and demographic presence that 

would only grow with China’s expanding economic 

footprint. 

China would complement the practical aspects of 

this hegemony by drawing on the legacy of its tributary system of relations with “peripheral” territories, 

Confucian values propagated via already proliferating 

Confucian Institutes, and political ideas and practices 

favoring both open markets and state control. The 

more China imbeds itself economically and culturally 

in the region, the more likely it is to project a military 

presence in Central Asia. With time, the Confucian 

values of “harmony,” “universal concord,” “co-existence,” and “co-prosperity” could replace Western 

narratives and practices of geopolitical control and 

domination and form a new logic of geopolitics with 

emphasis on cooperation.9 Of course, China could still 

use its increased military strength to fuel a military 

expansion into parts of Central Asia that hold strategic value for its global or regional hegemonic position, 

including by establishing military bases. 

What happens to China’s social, economic, and 

political transformation in the long term and how it 

could affect its hegemony is a question of great importance. China’s projected rise to the high-income status may spur democratization of its political system, 

generating beneficial effects on Central Asian regimes. 

On the other hand, China may demonstrate a sustained capacity to be simultaneously wealthy and authoritarian, impeding democratization of the regional 

countries. 

If China’s hegemony brought development and 

prosperity to Central Asia—and it could—historians 

would term it a benevolent one. If it brought subjuga-
8

tion and exploitation, it would be yet another episode 

of imperial expansion by a neighboring power. Either 

way, the Central Asian states must have a say in their 

future. The region’s history and geography dictate 

that they can only have this voice by building diverse 

ties with as many powers as practical so as to prevent 

one power from dominating the region. The regional 

states will be prompted to turn to Russia, India, the 

EU, and the United States to deflect growing pressure from the “east” as they continue their, at times, 

unintended quest of connecting with each other and 

the world. 

China’s long-term economic expansion and hegemony are not a given. China faces significant social, 

environmental, and economic challenges, as well as 

agendas of other powers, that could derail or constrain its global rise.10 Russia is trying to revitalize 

its regional influence; India seeks to establish a strategic presence; the EU tries to expand its regional 

economic role; and the United States continues to be 

a major regional military power given its presence in 

Afghanistan. 

But these powers are not without their own challenges, and that has been good news for China. Russia’s economic fundamentals are weak, making it look 

like a contracting empire but act like an expanding 

one; India is a latecomer to Central Asia, embroiled 

in domestic and South Asian politics holding it back 

from marching northward; the EU lacks the “teeth;” 

while the U.S. economic influence is insignificant and 

its regional military role is a big unknown after 2016. 

This allows China to advance its influence across all 

areas in Central Asia, as well as build and project its 

“comprehensive national power,” while addressing 

its domestic and global challenges. 
9

Washington has done much to open China and 

Central Asia to the outside world. But it now risks 

foregoing the benefits of Central Asia’s rise as a transcontinental hub of energy, trade, and transit in Eurasia. Washington’s withdrawal from the region and 

China’s rise raise the question of how to shape Central 

Asia’s evolution on terms favorable to Washington 

and the Central Asian countries and how to link the 

pursuit of this objective with the U.S. global agenda 

and grand strategy. If it wants to stay relevant globally and regionally, the United States has to pursue 

a robust, direct, and long-term strategy of engagement in Central Asia. This is not only because of the 

planned military withdrawal from Afghanistan, or the 

renewed push by Moscow for regional integration. 

Washington is facing an unfavorable future because 

of its declining global standing and reconfiguration of 

the global security and economic architecture caused 

by the rise of new power centers, especially China. 

Just as in the Asia-Pacific, it is the rise of China and its 

perceived efforts at domination in Central Asia that 

are challenging the U.S. global supremacy, requiring Washington to advance creative economic and 

military solutions in the heart of Eurasia. The United 

States should complement its “Pivot to the Pacific” 

with a sharp “Pivot to Eurasia” in order to effectively 

shape China’s rise and the evolution of the global 

security order. 

As it seeks to do so, Washington cannot premise 

its cooperation with other powers in Central Asia on 

the isolation of China—a global force calling for engagement where beneficial and containment where 

necessary. Washington should boost military engagement in the region, upgrade its NSRS, advance cooperation with key partners, and shape China’s global 
10

ascendance by leveraging its position in Central Asia. 

It should consider joining multilateral institutions involving the regional countries and China or seek the 

creation of new ones to shape China’s regional activities. It should link its NSRS with China’s “belt” strategy where it benefits the region’s development while 

ensuring multidirectional contours of regional geoeconomic forces. It should also start pondering how to 

leverage its potential strategic relationship with Iran, 

which links the Middle East with Central and South 

Asia and shares growing economic ties with China. Finally, it should develop platforms of cooperation with 

China in economic and security spheres pertaining to 

both global and regional affairs. 

As it calibrates its policies as part of the proposed 

“Pivot to Eurasia,” the United States should cooperate 

with all players of the “Game.” Most importantly, it 

has to cultivate “weighty” relations with the Central 

Asian countries themselves. It should develop a practical NSRS to position Afghanistan and Central Asia 

as an Eurasian trade and transit hub, leaning on and 

contributing to similar initiatives of other powers, including China, as long as doing so helps ensure that 

no single power emerges to dominate Central Asia politically and militarily. This revitalized strategy would 

not merely rely on existing and future economic forces 

driven by its potential challengers, but would assume 

a direct role for Washington in various projects on national, regional, and cross-regional levels. The United 

States would do well to reconfigure the Northern Distribution Network running supplies in and, increasingly, out of Afghanistan, into a more self-sustaining 

trade channel linking Central and South Asia following 

the full withdrawal of coalition forces from Afghanistan. Staying in the region in a capacity of a significant 
11

and active economic player would add credibility to 

U.S. commitment to regional and global stability. In 

the age of growing multipolarity, this commitment 

should rest on having an integrated Central and South 

Asia serving as a robust transcontinental node and on 

ensuing a managed rise of China and India, including 

in areas bordering these rapidly expanding powers.

None of these tasks are easy to accomplish. But 

if there were any major failure that could characterize U.S. current or future regional policy on China, it 

would be Washington’s lost opportunity to connect the 

dots by zooming in on the region destined to serve as a 

nexus of the U.S. global policy toward traditional and 

emerging powers alike. If it sees that interest clearly, 

its commitment to achieving it will follow. This work 

sheds light on the crucial forces at work, assesses the 

possibility and implications of China’s hegemony in 

Central Asia, and highlights the need for Washington 

to play real politics at the table rather than from across 

the high seas.
12

CHAPTER I 

CHINA’S CURRENT AND 

PROJECTED REGIONAL PRESENCE 

It is China’s intention to be the greatest power in the 

world.

 Lee Kuan Yew.11

China’s Needs, Interests, Goals, and Capabilities. 

In his Foreign Affairs article, advisor to Chinese 

leadership Zheng Bijian articulated the concept of 

China’s “peaceful rise” (later changed to “peaceful 

development” to avoid a negative association with 

the word “rise”). According to the concept, China 

seeks to achieve for itself the status of a great power 

without wars that have traditionally marked the rise 

to power of other states and by promoting “incremental reforms” and the “democratization of international 

relations.”12 This overarching framework has guided 

China’s increasingly active foreign policy in Central 

Asia, which has largely rested on a deferential treatment of the region’s perceived security guarantor—

Russia. This treatment for the most part concerns 

Moscow’s regional security role given China’s needs 

to retain Russia as a strategic partner on numerous 

global issues. 

However, China has no reservations about outperforming Russia economically and has already started 

assuming a more confident security role in the region 

as it seeks to address the threats of “three evils” (terrorism, extremism, and separatism), prepare Beijing 

for a post-2016 Afghanistan, exploit Central Asia’s 

vast energy resources and transit potential, and position itself favorably vis-a-via other powers in Eurasia. 
13

China is especially concerned that a premature exit of 

coalition forces from Afghanistan without a durable 

solution to the conflict would lead to increased threat 

of regional and domestic terrorism and separatism. 

Beijing views the possibility of Uygur militants infiltrating restive Xingjian with a particular alarm and has 

therefore stepped up its counterterrorism and military 

collaboration with SCO partners in Central Asia. 

To achieve the aforementioned objectives, Beijing, 

in part, relies on the “belt” strategy to develop and 

link trade, energy, and transit networks across Eurasia with those in China, as it implements its West 

Development Strategy designed to develop Xingjian, 

Tibet, and Mongolia, among other provinces. In 2013, 

China’s President Xi Jinping signed U.S.$50 billion in 

deals with Central Asian counterparts as he unveiled 

the “belt” strategy to advance economic integration 

across Eurasia from the Pacific to the Baltic Sea. The 

choice of “belt” over “road” presumably suggests Beijing’s attempts to showcase its “win-win” approach 

and desire to “widen the common ground” with participating countries.13 Months later, Xi announced China’s Maritime Silk Road strategy to complement the 

country’s geo-economic push throughout continental 

Eurasia. Beijing aims to link the “belt” and maritime 

“silk roads” via a planned China-Pakistan Economic 

Corridor and the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar 

Economic Corridor. A third “silk road” initiative that 

China is pursuing involves the building of a commercial network through the Arctic.14

Notably, China has called for improving currency 

convertibility as part of its economic expansion and 

already entered currency swap arrangements with numerous countries as part of its “silk road” initiatives, 

including Russia, Kazakhstan, and Uzbekistan in Central Eurasia and South Korea and Japan in East Asia, 
14

in order to promote internalization of its currency.15

The focus on currency convertibility is a countermove 

to Russia’s own integration initiatives in Eurasia in 

response to China’s growing economic influence, as 

well as a response to the U.S. dollar-based global trade 

system. According to SWIFT’s report, China’s currency, the RMB, was ranked as the 5th most-traded 

in the world in 2014, positioning Beijing well in “the 

contest for the title of global reserve currency” in the 

next few decades.16 China is also leveraging its world’s 

largest foreign currency reserves to pursue “going 

out” (or “going global”) policy, investing in strategic 

industries globally. It is estimated to invest between 

U.S.$1-2 trillion overseas by 2020, with Central Asia 

being its destination for natural resources and energy 

investments.17

Map 1. Proposed China’s Land- and Sea-based 

Silk Roads.18
15

China seeks to link the “belt” with its other previously announced initiatives that rest on development 

of transit and trade infrastructure both within and 

outside China. One such mega initiative is to build 

a high-speed railway network to facilitate economic 

flows across Asia and Europe via Central Asia, linking 

17 countries and comprising three major routes connecting Kunming in China with Singapore through 

South Asia, Urumqi and Germany via Central Asia, 

and Heilongjiang with Southeastern Europe through 

Russia. China’s Pan-Asian railway plan is yet another 

major project that seeks to link 28 states with 81,000 

kilometers of railroads. 

Currently, China provides Central Asian countries 

with access to East Asia through 11 trade ports, the 

second Trans-Eurasia railway, and the UzbekistanKyrgyzstan-Xinjiang highway. It also helped finance 

the north-south corridor linking China, Tajikistan, 

Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan, and is building a rail 

line via Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Afghanistan, 

which will form the Trans-Asia railway network. China further helped construct the north-south road and 

the port at Gwadar in Pakistan, facilitating linkages 

with Afghanistan, the Arabian Sea, Central Asia, and 

Southeast Asia. In 2013, China agreed to build a railroad from China to Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, planning to extend links to China, Turkey, and Iran. “It 

is not important for China as to who will be building 

this railway line. The most important thing is that it is 

built,” Chinese Ambassador to Kyrgyzstan Wang Kaiwen remarked on the U.S.$2 billion project.19 Beijing 

has also been actively building roads and highways in 

the region, supporting the Western Europe-Western 

China International Transit Corridor to improve main 

roads linking China and Europe. Notably, Russia 
16

announced that it would not build its portion of the 

line until 2020.20

China’s involvement in the region’s transit infrastructure goes hand in hand with its successful efforts 

to invest in the region’s vast energy markets and to 

develop energy export routes as alternatives to seabased corridors that navies of major powers control 

or could challenge. Together, these efforts facilitate 

China’s trade in energy resources, commodities, and 

goods across Eurasia, feeding the country’s development and global economic reach. It also reduces China’s dependence on the Indian Ocean and the Strait 

of Malacca (which the U.S. and Indian navies patrol) 

for energy imports and undercuts the perceived U.S. 

policy of “strategic exclusion” of China. In 2011, 77 

percent of China’s oil imports passed through the 

Strait of Malacca.21 By 2025, the country’s dependence 

on oil imports is projected to reach 68.8 percent. China 

is not a member of either energy consuming or energy 

exporting group of countries, which accentuates the 

challenge of accessing material resources and hinders its otherwise faster rise.22 As Ye Hailin with the 

Chinese Academy of Social Sciences put it: 

A big country that builds its prosperity on foreign trade 

cannot put the safety of its ocean fleet in the hands of 

other countries. Doing so would be the equivalent of 

putting its throat under another’s dagger and marking 

its blood vessels in red ink.23

Besides being number one or two importer of oil 

and mineral resources, China is the number one exporter across a wide variety of goods and depends 

heavily on sea-borne trade. In 2011, 60 percent of 

China’s trade was sea-borne. Furthermore, its investments grew from U.S.$33.2 billion in 2003 to U.S.$531.8 
17

billion in 2012. Meanwhile, the number of its citizens 

working overseas skyrocketed from 3.5 million in 

2005 to 5.5 million in 2014. These trends call for sufficient military capabilities to not only address but also 

prevent threats and attacks on these vital flows.24

In Central Asia, ensuring access to the region’s resources and their safe passage is arguably one of the 

major aspects of China’s regional strategy,25 though its 

push for the economic “belt” in the region reveals a 

rapidly growing need to facilitate exports of China’s 

goods to Europe and the Middle East, as well. The share 

of the region’s gas climbed to 65 percent of China’s 

gas imports, constituting 17.6 percent of China’s gas 

consumption in 2012. China also imports almost all of 

its uranium from the region.26 Building infrastructure 

in Central Asia further allows China to expand the use 

of its Xinjiang-Shanghai gas pipeline linking China’s 

west and east.27 Potential participation of Japan and 

South Korea in this and other projects could foster a 

dynamic connection between Central and East Asia, 

with China turning into the central node of Eurasia’s 

expanding trade, energy, and transit links28—a role it 

has been successfully assuming in East Asia and the 

Pacific over the last 3 decades. China’s activities in 

Central Asia are designed to advance simultaneously 

China’s internal development and promote its westward expansion as an aspiring global power.29

China’s economic reach in Central Asia is especially pronounced in Kazakhstan, where its China 

National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) acquired energy firms Petrokazkahstan for U.S.$4.18 billion and 

half of MangistauMunaiGas for U.S.$2.6 billion. It also 

bought an 8.33 percent share of Kashagan oil field, the 

largest discovered field in the last 3 decades, solidifying its presence in the country’s energy market. China 
18

provided U.S.$10 billion in loans to Kazakhstan in 

2009 during the global financial crisis and, along with 

Kazakhstan, launched the Beineu-Bozoi pipeline in 

2014 to deliver up to 14 million tons of Kazakh oil to 

China annually. As a Kazakh official explained, “The 

Chinese have told us quietly but clearly that their energy demands are massive and urgent—and that they 

are willing to pay a steep price to address them.”30

In Turkmenistan, China loaned about U.S.$4 billion for developing South Yolotan fields and provided 

U.S.$6.7 billion for the construction of the Turkmenistan-China gas pipeline with an annual capacity of 

40 billion cubic meters that runs via Kazakhstan and 

Uzbekistan. Beijing and Ashgabat now plan to build 

a new pipeline to supply gas to China via Uzbekistan 

and Kyrgyzstan. In Uzbekistan, China invests heavily 

in the transport market and has become the country’s 

second-largest trade partner. In Kyrgyzstan, China is 

actively involved in trade facilitation and oil-processing business.31 In Afghanistan, China is focused on 

developing transit and trade infrastructure and has 

become the country’s largest investor. It won rights 

to develop the world’s second-largest undeveloped 

copper reserves located in Afghanistan at Aynak—a 

project worth U.S.$4.4 billion.32 Beijing also supported 

the establishment of the SCO-Afghanistan Contact 

Group to promote regional security33 and supported 

the SCO’s decision to give Afghanistan observer 

status.34

China’s economic and military footprint is bound 

to increase in the world and broader Central Asia. This 

is not only because of internal conditions calling for 

development of China’s western zones as opposed to 

saturated markets in advanced coastal areas—itself an 

imperative. It is also because China needs a “window” 
19

to the “West” (yes, this time, China, not Russia; and 

the “West” for China is now Europe and the Middle 

East) to mitigate its concerns about the U.S. “pivot” on 

its eastern flanks and to expand trade across Eurasia 

on its western flanks. China cannot afford to lose to 

other great powers in Central Asia, not when internal 

social expectations demand even more economic miracles from the country that is experiencing growing labor costs and a shift from one economic development 

model to another. Other powers try to “reintegrate,” 

“reconnect,” or “pivot,” but it is China that observes 

quietly and pushes on actively around Eurasia. 

China’s growing global economic footprint and increasingly common occurrences of protests, lootings, 

killings, and kidnappings that target Chinese nationals and interests have prompted debates in China on 

the issue of military development and expansion to 

protect its economic interests.35 In a long-expected 

move, given its growing security and economic stake 

in Central Asia and Afghanistan, in 2014 China agreed 

to provide U.S.$6.5 million in military assistance to 

Kyrgyzstan and “hundreds of millions of dollars” to 

Tajikistan for police uniforms and training.36 In early-2015, China delivered anti-missile defense systems 

HQ-9 to Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, which became 

the first-ever recipients of China’s own-produced 

anti-missile defense systems.37 Previously, it provided training, military uniforms, and communications 

equipment to Kabul, Dushanbe, and Bishkek. It also 

increased the number of military exercises with participation of Central Asian states and its military aid 

to the countries’ security sectors.38 The SCO held a total of 13 separate military exercises in each member 

state, with the number of personnel ranging from 800 

to 10,000.39
20

While reflecting a need to boost military capabilities of Central Asian states given the security situation 

in Afghanistan, this move also signals the beginning of 

a shift in the regional politico-military balances. While 

Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan are not members of the 

Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organization 

(CSTO), both have traditionally relied on Moscowsupplied weapons systems. But China’s growing military aid and sales and economic footprint increasingly 

sideline Russia and the United States in Central and 

East Asia, respectively. 

China increasingly views stability in broader Central Asia and Xingjian as key to its emergence as a 

global power, prompting to consider the need for a 

long-term military presence in the region to mirror its 

relatively more advanced military profile in the east 

where it faces an “unruly” Taiwan and menacing U.S. 

fleet. These areas, poorly developed as they are, currently serve as barriers to China’s expanded development and security from within. Only by consolidating 

itself internally by ensuring a more even economic 

development between coastal and continental zones 

can China actually mitigate concerns about social implosion and marshal far more advanced internal resources for the pursuit of geo-strategic objectives of 

truly global proportions. This is an imperative familiar 

to China’s sages and strategists obsessed with questions of unity and prosperity throughout China’s long 

history as the world’s only continuous civilization 

to date. So far, China’s military advances in Central 

Asia have remained limited, even if steadily growing, 

including on both bilateral and multilateral levels in 

the form of cooperation within the SCO. 

The SCO serves as China’s vehicle for promoting 

its security role in broader Central Asia. The SCO 
21

members collaborate against the “three evils” and 

seek to ensure regional stability, given volatile security situations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Xingjian. 

On occasion, China has used the platform afforded 

by the SCO to challenge, along with Russia and the 

regional states, the U.S. regional military presence. In 

2005, the SCO called for eviction of U.S. military bases from Central Asia. The SCO is also a new concept 

and model of security cooperation with which China 

is experimenting,40 while trying to deflect negative 

perceptions about its growing military capabilities. 

The membership of Russia in the organization supports this conclusion, though it also helps the regional 

countries and Moscow to shape China’s evolution as 

an economic giant and a nascent military force in the 

wider region. A Kazakh diplomat pointedly portrayed 

the relationship of Russia and China with the SCO as 

a “dance of a mongoose and cobra.”41 But, unlike its 

economic engagement, China’s military collaboration 

with and role in the region has been less aggressive. 

China has publicly acknowledged Russia’s predominant security and military role, while slowly building 

up its regional military profile. At this stage, it is still 

China’s geo-economics that primarily define Beijing’s 

rise in Central Asia and the world. 

China’s Geo-Economics vs Russia’s Geopolitics. 

China and Russia are both dissatisfied with the 

global status quo and seek to adjust the U.S.-led international order. This is a strategic objective that binds 

the two states as they work, separately and in concert, 

to undermine the already weakening U.S. global influence. Both cooperate closely in the United Nations 

(UN) Security Council, oppose interventionism (in 
22

rhetoric anyway), and support state sovereignty while 

sharing aversion of and working against U.S. alleged 

efforts to project hegemony worldwide. Both are also 

concerned about prospects of “color revolutions” that 

either occurred or are yet to sweep throughout Eastern Europe, South Caucasus, and Central Asia. Both 

have boosted their economic ties in the last decade, 

planning to increase bilateral trade to U.S.$200 billion 

by 2020. Chinese expert Feng Yujun has described 

Russia as the most important country for China’s 

diplomacy: both are “neighboring countries, major 

powers, and developing countries” which look to expand their “multilateral relations” to dilute U.S. global 

influence.42

Be it as it may, Moscow and Beijing also have major 

differences, which will surface more clearly as China 

expands its capabilities and role in the world and in 

Russia’s “zone of privileged interests.” As a Chinese 

official responsible for Central Asia policy remarked 

on Russia’s treatment of the region as a backyard, “we 

understand. But you are supposed, after all, to look 

after your own yard, water the flowers.”43 This Russia 

has failed to do. Beijing and Moscow are yet to become 

more open adversaries and strategic competitors in 

what could be a repeat of tensions that existed during 

the Cold War. As Chinese scholar Bobo Lo stated:

The Russia-China relationship is neither an authoritarian alliance nor a genuine strategic partnership. It is 

a limited partnership sustained by the perception of 

mutual is asymmetric gains, and the wisdom to underplay significant differences where they occur. . . . 

The question is how long this accommodation can last

. . . . The time will come when the differences between 

Russia and China cannot be so easily fudged.44
23

The base of power and foreign policy approaches 

of China and Russia differ in substance and emphasis. 

Both rely on geo-economics and geopolitics as tools 

of trade, but Beijing’s approach to national development and foreign affairs has predominantly favored 

geo-economics as a tool of statecraft. Russia, on the 

other hand, has focused more on geopolitics to advance its national interests. In a way, this division of 

labor is mutually reinforcing as it undercuts the perceived U.S. global preeminence using both economic 

and geopolitical means. But this division has also impacted the development and strategic potential of the 

two great powers differently. 

China’s reliance on geo-economics as a tool of 

statecraft has achieved far more influence in the conditions of the 21st century than Russia’s persistent grip 

on geopolitics, both globally and in Central Asia. President Barack Obama had a point when he described 

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin as being stuck in the 

19th century. The communist China understood in the 

1970s that “opening up” would allow it to modernize 

and compete globally. It would also enable China to 

amass power to deflect encroachments that had previously humiliated China. As Xiaoping once said, “It 

does not matter if it is a black cat or a white cat; if it 

catches mice, it is a good cat.”45

Beijing has been effectively and consistently expanding its economic development and influence 

globally ever since, becoming the world’s second-largest economy and biggest global trading nation. China 

views its sought-after great power status as a way to 

redress past injustices and reclaim its lost leadership 

position in the global powers hierarchy. As Henry 

Kissinger wrote:
24

China does not see itself as a rising, but a returning 

power. . . . It does not view the prospect of a strong 

China exercising influence in economic, cultural, political, and military affairs as an unnatural challenge to 

world order—but rather as a return to a normal state 

of affairs.46

To achieve this task, China has adhered to policy 

advice of Deng Xiaoping and subsequent leaders, 

highlighting the need for China to “bide its time, 

hide its brightness, not seek leadership, but do some 

things.” Put differently, China should avoid costly 

geopolitical entanglements and focus on sustaining its 

development drive at home. (While Xiaoping did state 

that China “. . . will become a big political power if we 

keep a low profile . . .,” no evidence reportedly exists 

indicating that he used the “bide its time . . .” phrase.47) 

As it has enmeshed itself in global trade, China’s economic drive at home has been predicated on its economic expansion abroad. Starting with the collapse 

of the Soviet Union and, especially since 2000s, this 

expansion has increasingly affected Central Asia. China has been marching west in search of new markets, 

resources, investment opportunities and, above all, 

ways of reclaiming its position as the central power.

China’s push westward through Moscow’s “backyard” has unnerved Russia. Kremlin is now preoccupied with warding off the U.S. military projection and 

Chinese economic expansion in Central Asia. It is concerned not just because of the complexity of the tasks 

at hand. Russia also lacks instruments at its disposal 

and suffers from a shrinking economic power base. It 

has seen its post-Soviet influence erode significantly 

due to its imperial foreign policy and authoritarian 

domestic politics. In the 1990s, Russia experimented 

with liberalization but failed to consolidate demo-
25

cratic gains and project power effectively at home or 

abroad. In the late-1900s and early-2000s, Russia accumulated substantially more wealth and power under 

Putin’s leadership. But the sources and fundamentals 

of that power continue to rest on petro-revenues and 

a skewed economic model favoring energy exports. 

Instead of fixing economics and politics at home, Russia resorted to using “hard power” abroad to settle 

scores in the 2008 Russian-Georgian war and has relied on geopolitics in the ongoing conflict in Ukraine 

after Kyiv refused to join the EU. Western sanctions 

on Moscow in response to its seizure of Crimea and 

involvement in the Ukrainian conflict and a roughly 

60 percent decline in oil prices since June 2014 have 

significantly weakened Russia’s economy, causing a 

substantial outflow of capital, depreciation of ruble, 

and spike in inflation, undercutting its accumulated 

wealth and power base. 

Meanwhile, Russia’s continued reliance on geoeconomics to expand its influence and its preoccupation with geopolitics have undermined its regional 

geo-economic initiatives. Moscow spearheaded the 

creation of the EU, which came into force in 2015 and 

comprises Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia, and 

Kyrgyzstan. But it has failed to secure participation 

of other post-Soviet states. A decision of Ukraine’s 

leadership in 2014 to pursue a free trade association 

agreement with the European Union rather than join 

the EU prompted Moscow to rely on geopolitics to 

advance its interests in Ukraine after anti-government 

protests in Kyiv forced the pro-Russian Ukrainian 

President Viktor Yanukovich to flee. Russia dismembered Ukraine by seizing Crimea and has supported 

pro-Russian rebels in the east of Ukraine—the actions 

in part motivated by the perceived expansion of the 

West and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization 
26

(NATO) to Russia’s borders, both militarily and economically. Given its weak economic base, Russia was 

unable to use “soft power” and resorted to the use of 

“hard power” to impose its will on neighbors. The 

post-Soviet states have not approved Russia’s actions 

in Ukraine (despite symbolic statements of support 

by a select few under the shadow of Russia’s strong 

influence), weakening the appeal of Russia’s security 

and economic initiatives, including the EU. While Yerevan and Bishkek decided to join the union, they still 

have strong apprehensions about Russia’s intentions, 

which the former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton portrayed “as a move to re-Sovietize the region.”48

 Like any other major economic project led by a 

great power, the EU initiative has a geopolitical subtext—it enables Russia to expand its influence and 

guard against Western and China’s encroachments in 

the post-Soviet space. The union’s mission to facilitate 

free movement of labor, capital, and technologies conflicts with China’s plans to expand trade westward, 

allowing Moscow to constrain China’s advances and 

explaining its caution in approaching Beijing’s proposal on cooperation between the union and the “belt” 

initiatives.49 Whether out of despair or hope, China 

and Russia issued a statement in 2014 about China’s 

“belt” project: 

Russia believes that China’s initiative to form a Silk 

Road Economic Belt is very important and highly values the willingness of the Chinese side to keep Russian 

interests in mind during its development and implementation.50

Unless Beijing implements its proposed free trade 

zone with the union, which Central Asian states could 

resist,51 its “belt” project could falter. 
27

For now, economic trends and statistics demonstrate that China, the gross domestic product (GDP) 

of which was five times the size of Russia’s in 2010, 

is winning big vis-à-vis Russia in Central Asia. It 

has already become the top trading and investment 

partner for the region, its trade with Central Asia in 

2011 amounting to U.S.$39 billion compared to Russia’s at U.S.$16.5 billion and its foreign direct investment (FDI) hitting U.S.$2.9 billion in 2010 compared 

to Russia’s U.S.$3.17 billion. In 2012, China’s trade 

with the region reached U.S.$46 billion, 100 times the 

amount it was in 1992. Beijing’s energy trade and investments particularly have challenged Russia’s positions in these areas. Russia now seeks to purchase 

gas and oil distributions networks to at least control 

energy resource deliveries, if not to secure regional oil 

and gas fields. In 2015, Russia’s Gazprom announced 

a substantial reduction of gas purchases from Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, planning to buy four billion cubic meters (cbm) of gas from the former and 

up to one billion cbm from the latter, as opposed to 

previously planned 10 billion and four billion cbm, respectively. Beginning in 2009, Russia has been reducing purchases of regional gas, just as China has been 

buying up and investing throughout the region to secure the production and transit of regional gas to fuel 

its growing appetite for energy resources. The same 

year, China, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan opened the first-ever regional gas pipeline with 

Beijing’s involvement since the collapse of the Soviet 

Union, breaking Russia’s long-held monopoly on energy resources and deliveries. China and Kazakhstan 

now plan to open a second oil pipeline.
28

Figure 1. Gazprom Purchases of Central Asian Gas 

from 2007-2013.52

Just as Russia has been leveraging geo-economics 

to advance its interests in the post-Soviet space, China 

has, too, relied on geopolitical instruments to pursue 

its regional agenda. While Beijing lags behind Russia 

in promoting its military influence in Central Asia, it 

has recently been stepping up its geopolitical involvement by leaning on the SCO framework and bilateral 

ties to expand counterterrorism and military collaboration to boost regional security. This is in part due to 

the uncertainty surrounding the outcome of the war 

in Afghanistan and China’s growing economic stake 

in Central and South Asia, where it pursues its “belt” 

strategy and economic corridors through Myanmar, 

Nepal, and Pakistan. China’s sale of its own new 

generation medium-to-long range HQ-9 air defense 

systems and its percussion unmanned aerial vehicles 

Yilong-1 to Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan in return for 

reduced gas prices (official reason reported in media) 

based on agreements made in 201353 demonstrates its 

growing military influence in Central Asia, especially 

considering the sophistication of the systems and their 

interoperability issues with the predominantly Russiamade and supplied weapons systems. It has also been 

training—alongside the United States as a third party 
29

in another country for the first time—Afghan forces 

ahead of the withdrawal of coalition troops.54 The upshot: for the first time in the last 2 centuries Moscow 

is constrained to leverage its position in Central Asia 

to expand its influence vis-à-vis China or pressure 

Beijing as part of the new “Great Game.”55

Unlike Russia, however, China has not secured 

military bases in the region. In part, this has to do with 

Russia’s overwhelming regional military role; the lack 

of a substantial economic stake by China in the region; 

and nascent formation of China’s geopolitical interests and perceptions driving decisions on the deployment and use of military force. Moreover, the Chinese 

military has not yet developed effective logistics and 

combat capabilities for military deployment and basing. In Central Asia, China’s regional geopolitical role 

will therefore remain limited in the intermediate term. 

China’s involvement in the SCO is there to help, but 

the SCO faces a number of challenges constraining the 

geopolitical and geo-economic reach of its members. 

It enables China to balance against the United States 

and Russia, as well as do the same for Russia vis-à-vis 

China and the United States. It also helps it advance 

economic development, political stability, and security in the region. But the SCO lacks the spirit of multilateralism, with China and Russia preferring bilateral 

deals with the regional states to bypass each other’s 

opposing responses. 

The membership of Central Asian states in the SCO 

indicates the “primary constraint of strategic regionalism,” manifesting itself in the desire of these countries 

to restrain their more powerful partners and promote 

most favorable outcomes given external pressures. 

Internal incoherencies and antagonisms within the 

SCO thus make it more of a crippled economic and 
30

political player rather than a geopolitical heavyweight 

opposing the United States or NATO. As Ivan Safranchuk, editor-in-chief of the Bolshaya Igra (The Great 

Game) magazine put it: “SCO does not intend to oppose the US globally or regionally, so that it operates 

not against America, but without it.”56 That said, some 

view the SCO as a type of “comprehensive security” 

organization that is a China alternative to U.S.-promoted “collective security” alliance structures.57 This 

is not to dismiss the appeal of the organization among 

a number of countries that have expressed desire to 

become members or have already attained some form 

of association with the organization. Some even propose that the United States consider becoming a member of the SCO in order to shape China’s and Russia’s 

policies in the broader region.58 But this is unlikely to 

happen any time soon, if at all, given “cool responses” 

to such ideas thus far.59

China’s West-East “Pull” vs India’s 

South-North “Push.”

China’s growing presence in Central Asia also worries India—a superpower in the making concerned 

about Beijing’s global and regional expansion and 

one of the few states capable of challenging China’s 

preeminence in the decades ahead.60 Unlike Russia, 

which has been projecting its influence in and out of 

Central Asia for a century and a half, India is a late 

comer to the region’s 21st century “Great Game.” Unlike China, it is starting its ascendance from a lower 

base and at a lower rate, explaining its policy failures 

and Beijing’s policy successes around the world, including in Central Asia. Despite exhibiting a potentially equal or relatively larger economic and military 
31

base than China by 2050, today India is a cumbersome 

actor constrained by democratic yet highly bureaucratic politics at home and unstable security dynamics 

in Pakistan and Afghanistan. It does not share a border with Central Asia. Nor has it managed since the 

collapse of the Soviet Union to improve substantially 

its trade links with the region due to tensions with 

Pakistan and lingering instability in Afghanistan.61

Delhi views its presence in Central Asia as critical for 

ascendance to the ranks of great powers, but it cannot 

accomplish this task without resolving the security 

challenges limiting its ambitions. India will therefore 

remain largely confined to South Asia and the Indian 

Ocean in the intermediate term.

This is not to discount India’s plans to gain deeper 

foothold in Central Asia. In 2012, it launched the “Connect Central Asia” policy to link South and Central 

Asia via energy, trade, and transit corridors in what 

conceptually resembles the U.S. NSRS, designed to 

develop and position Afghanistan as a hub of Central 

and South Asian integration. While a latecomer in the 

region, India is not unwelcome among Central Asian 

countries that are eager to diversify their ties and secure 

access to the Indian sub-continent and Indian Ocean. 

According to Shri Ahamed, Indian Minister of State 

for External Affairs, the “connect” policy “is based on 

pro-active political, economic and people-to-people 

engagement with Central-South Asian countries, both 

individually and collectively.” As part of the policy, 

India plans to set 14 flight links with the Central Asian 

states, develop local information technology, energy, 

banking, and pharmaceutical industries, and to build 

energy infrastructure and e-networks linking Central 

and South Asia.62 India’s intent to build the NorthSouth Transit Corridor via Uzbekistan is crucial in 

this regard.
32

In Kazakhstan, Indian firms are actively involved 

in coal, oil, and uranium industries. As of 2014, India 

imported more than 3,500 tons of uranium from Kazakhstan since 2009. In Tajikistan, Indian companies 

are involved in a hydropower project, a reflection of 

importance India attaches to the region’s hydro-energy capacity for the CASA-1000 initiative bringing electricity from Central to South Asia. In Kyrgyzstan and 

Tajikistan, Delhi plans to open an Indian-Central Asia 

University and a military hospital, respectively.

In Uzbekistan, its companies are present in the 

pharmaceuticals, information technology, construction, energy, and mining sectors. As the world’s sixth 

largest energy consumer, it is also a major party to the 

Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas 

pipeline project, seeking an active role in the development of the region’s energy reserves to reduce its 

dependence on energy imports from the Middle East 

and meet its long-term economic growth projections. 

Delhi has recently expressed interest in building a gas 

pipeline from southern Kazakhstan to India, as well. 

However, instability in Pakistan and Afghanistan and 

the standoff between Iran and the West have impeded 

India’s efforts to import energy resources from Central Asia and Iran (via proposed Iran-Pakistan-India 

gas pipeline).63

India’s economy, projected to overtake that of 

China’s around 2050, requires access to vast energy 

resources of Central Asia, where China’s energy presence is more pronounced. In 2013, India failed to secure 

an 8.4 percent stake in Kashagan oil field, which Kazakhstan gave to China for the same amount of U.S.$5 

billion. The deal was one of about 20 agreements between China and Kazakhstan worth U.S.$30 billion. 

Beijing also outperformed Delhi in securing rights to 
33

develop the Galkynysh gas field in Turkmenistan and 

launching a pipeline in 2009 to supply Turkmen gas to 

China. India does have its hopes pinned on the long 

over-due construction of TAPI, which would boost its 

presence in the region’s energy market. But parties to 

the project have thus far failed to kickstart the project 

for financial and security reasons. The implementation 

of TAPI would not only serve as a milestone of India’s 

“connect” policy, but would also facilitate improvement in the Pakistani-Indian relations, as well as advance stabilization, development, and integration of 

Afghanistan with the broader region, enabling India to 

project a much more meaningful geopolitical presence 

in Central Asia. It would also challenge EU’s interests 

in accessing the Caspian energy resources, undermine 

Russia’s remaining control over the regional energy 

exports, and help the Central Asian states diversify 

their ties in order to balance China. 

But to gain unimpeded access to Central Asia, India has to ensure the development and integration of 

Afghanistan into the broader region—a critical component of India’s “connect” policy. Delhi plans to 

invest U.S.$100 million to develop the Iranian port at 

Chabahar and connect it to Afghanistan and on to India via railways and roads. It has already spent at least 

U.S.$136 million to connect the port with the “Ring 

Road” in Afghanistan, the deposits of which are estimated to range from U.S.$1-3 trillion. India has invested U.S.$2 billion in Afghanistan’s infrastructure over 

the last decade and sought to develop the country’s 

Hajigak and other deposits. The port would enable 

Delhi to access Central Asian markets without relying 

on Pakistan and position it favorably vis-à-vis China, 

which helped build a rival Pakistani port at Gwadar 

linking China and the Persian Gulf. The Chabahar 
34

port is but one link in the India’s North-South Transit Corridor connecting Indian-built Zaranj-Delaram 

highway in Afghanistan and providing an outlet for 

India’s goods to Central Asia. In case of entente between Iran and the West, the corridor would facilitate 

India’s trade with the region, expanding a north-south 

vector of the transcontinental trade.64 Besides its funding for roads, railways, medical facilities, power networks, and other socio-economic infrastructure, India 

helped Afghanistan become a member of the South 

Asian Association for Regional Cooperation to facilitate the country’s development and integration with 

the region. 

India’s involvement in Afghanistan and Central 

Asia is not confined to economic development priorities alone. India views Central Asia as a geopolitical 

prize in the contest for global primacy, perceiving 

China’s maritime and continental expansion as a 

double-threat to its plans to emerge as a global power. Just as China views the U.S. “Pivot to the Pacific” 

and military presence in Central Asia as containing 

China’s rise along its perimeter, so does Delhi consider China’s engagement with India’s neighbors as a 

stratagem to contain India. Beijing has been effectively 

building strategic ties with countries surrounding India, boosting cooperation with Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, and Myanmar to India’s northeast; Sri-Lanka, 

Thailand, and Malaysia to India’s southeast; Pakistan 

and Afghanistan to India’s northwest; and Central 

Asian states to India’s northwest. The 1962 border war 

with China and unresolved political tensions with 

Beijing have also driven this perception, making the 

emergence of a friendly “Chindia” capable of jointly 

reshaping the global system to suit the needs of the 

two giants a far-fetched scenario.65
35

To undermine China’s attempts to do so in Central 

Asia and achieve its other objectives, Delhi has cooperated with the regional states and Afghanistan against 

Taliban in the 1990s and after the events of September 

11, 2001 (9/11). It has developed a strong relationship 

with Uzbekistan as its major arms supplier, opened a 

mountain biomedical research center in Kyrgyzstan, 

sought rights to the use of the Ayni airbase in Tajikistan, assisted with training of the Kazakh Caspian 

Fleet, and has plans to participate for the first time in 

counterterrorism exercises with Kyrgyz special forces 

in Kyrgyzstan.66 However, India’s poor relationship 

with Pakistan—China’s ally in South Asia—and the 

volatile security situation in Afghanistan have prevented it from assuming an even more active military 

and security role in greater Central Asia, forcing it to 

apply more effort compared to China. 

Despite their somewhat tense relations, India and 

China have been notably improving their ties over the 

last 3 decades, with an increase in bilateral trade being a vivid demonstration of this development that 

may yet translate into more friendly relations. As Chinese Premier Wen Jibao remarked, India and China 

had conflicts only briefly in the 2,000-year history of 

exchanges, and the bilateral relations have been 99.9 

percent friendly.67 But the geography and projected 

geopolitical dynamics currently position the two powers as rivals, forcing India to rethink its long-standing 

grand strategy of pursuing a strictly autonomous role 

in world affairs. 

India’s positioning as an autonomous actor and unwillingness to be a perceived U.S. “pawn”68 has in part 

contributed to its limited role and presence in Central 

Asia. India’s trade with the region was just U.S.$500 

million in 2012, compared to China’s at U.S.$29 bil-
36

lion. In 2010, trade between Russia and Central Asia 

was € (euros) 7 billion, making Moscow the third largest trade partner after China and the EU. India gained 

an SCO observer status to enhance its regional influence, but it sees few prospects for productive interaction within the group. It perceives China as seeking to 

block its membership and prevent it from attempting 

an active engagement in Central-South Asia. India’s 

relative failure in projecting comparable influence in 

Central and South-East Asia, as well as concerns about 

China’s policy of containment, have prompted Delhi 

to start reconsidering its obsession with the nonalignment positioning in international affairs and enhancing strategic cooperation with the United States. In 

2015, Delhi and Washington concluded an additional 

deal on nuclear energy and are perceived as working 

together to keep China’s global rise in check.

India’s relatively limited global and regional roles 

also have to do with the fact that India is the last major 

Asian economy to join the Asian economic renaissance. 

Its latecomer status in part resulted from a skewed 

view of the leadership that considered the success of 

others “as largely irrelevant to its own future” and favored the “continuation of existing policies.”69 India, 

in the 1990s and 2000s, started advancing economic 

reforms with a view to unleash private forces to attain 

a more efficient economic development, but it did so 

a couple of decades after China, not to say anything 

about other South-East Asian countries. It did so in an 

external environment that saw the collapse of the Soviet Union, ever-expanding U.S.-led global economic 

integration, and the risk of “increasing marginalization” if it failed to reform. As one commentator put it, 

“We felt as though our second independence had arrived: we were going to be free from a rapacious and 
37

domineering state.” By the end of the 20th century, 

India had become one of the fastest growing economies, providing it with a platform to start projecting 

influence in post-Soviet Central Asia.70 Still, India’s 

more democratic system and favorable labor dynamics present it with a number of long-term advantages 

over China that could become obvious by 2050 or 

earlier.71 

On balance, India’s south-north “push” will continue to be less pronounced than China’s west-east 

geo-economic “pull.” India is in a tough rivalry with 

old and new players. However, Delhi has committed 

itself to enhancing the development and stability of 

Afghanistan and reconnection of Central and South 

Asia, undertaking major initiatives to achieve these 

objectives. The resolution of the security and economic challenges centered on Afghanistan and Pakistan 

would lead to a more active and influential regional 

role by India in the future. China’s interest in developing links between the Middle East and Central-South 

Asia and growing economic cooperation with India 

would, too, facilitate India’s regional policy if Delhi 

plays the Pakistan card right. To make its “push” 

deeper, India needs to enhance strategic cooperation 

with the United States and other actors in Central 

Asia, while better exploiting its long-term advantages 

over China. 

China’s Expansion vs U.S. Containment? 

China’s expansion into Central Asia puts a question mark on the U.S. status as a superpower and 

protector of the global order. Ironically, U.S. efforts 

to promote globalization and global order have facilitated China’s global rise ever since the signing of 

a Shanghai Communique in 1972, which facilitated 
38

China’s external integration and improved ties with 

Washington. Beijing has tapped into globalization 

ever since, leveraging its reforms to achieve for itself 

the status of the world’s second largest economy and 

biggest trading nation today. If no profound shifts in 

its socio-economic conditions put it off track, China 

is poised to overtake the United States as the world’s 

largest economy in the next few years in terms of total 

GDP. By around 2050, it may well overtake the United 

States as the world’s largest economy in terms of GDP 

per capita. 

China’s economic expansion has given it a sense of 

pride and opportunity to redress the “humiliation” it 

had suffered at the hands of Japan and Western powers 

in the previous 2 centuries. While it largely continues 

to “bide its time and capabilities” and pursue “peaceful development,” in recent years Beijing has occasionally displayed an assertive stance toward neighbors, 

as frictions have intensified with Japan, Vietnam, and 

the Philippines over contested ownership of islands in 

the South and East China Seas. Such posturing, while 

tempered down time and again, has evoked fears of 

China’s economic drive being complemented by China’s growing military prowess that some fear Beijing 

is expected to display more assertively when the period of its “strategic opportunity” ends. The Chinese 

leadership defines this period as the first 20 years of 

the 21st century, reflecting recognition in Beijing of a 

unique opportunity presented by external and internal environment for China to achieve major strategic 

gains in economic and military development.72 Specifically, by 2020 China wants to quadruple the GDP 

it had in 2000 and to become “a mid-level developed 

economy by 2050.”73
39

China is also making strides in the military field. 

Its defense spending is now the second-largest after 

the United States, measuring U.S.$106 billion in 2012. 

If all goes according to plan, China is likely to attain 

“moderate, evolutionary gains in the ability of air, 

ground, and maritime forces to conduct joint, offensive operations abutting China’s maritime and land 

borders” by 2020.74 In its 2010 report to U.S. Congress, 

the Department of Defense stated this about China’s 

military capabilities:

Earlier this decade, China began a new phase of military development by articulating roles and missions 

for the People’s Liberation Army that go beyond China’s immediate territorial interests. Some of these missions and associated capabilities . . . appear designed 

to improve the PLA’s [People’s Liberation Army] 

ability for extended-range power projection, although 

China’s ability to sustain military power at a distance 

today remains limited.75

The rise of China’s military follows its growing 

economic footprint, which forces readjustments in the 

military capabilities and missions to protect China’s 

interests. Given the country’s dependence on maritime 

domain for imports of strategically vital resources and 

exports of goods, China’s navy, rather than the army, 

is expected to “go global” first. At this stage, however, 

only the missile, space, and cyber capabilities enable 

China to project power globally.76 In his China Dream, 

PLA Senior Colonel Liu Mingfu sees a “grand goal” 

of China in “becoming number one in the world”—

a task requiring China to displace the United States. 

As China rises economically, he writes, it needs to rise 

militarily so as to win in a struggle over primacy.77 In 

response, nations from Vietnam and Japan to New 
40

Zealand and Australia have stepped up their cooperation with the United States, which remains committed 

to security of the global commons and its partners in 

the Pacific but has fewer resources to accomplish these 

objectives due to the shift in global power “from the 

West to the Rest.” This, in turn, has prompted fears in 

Beijing that Washington is seeking to contain China’s 

rise by revitalizing old and building new alliances. 

China’s ascendance is exerting tremendous pressure on the global economic and security system, 

forcing reconfiguration of international relations, especially in East Asia and increasingly Central Asia, as 

well. These developments have prompted efforts by 

Washington to “rebalance” to Asia as part of its “Pivot to Asia-Pacific” launched in 2012. From a policy of 

containment since 1949 and engagement since 1969, 

the United States has effectively pursued a China policy displaying elements of both containment and engagement since 1989. Some describe the U.S. current 

strategy toward China as “congagement,”78 which 

does not contradict the U.S. “pivot” strategy because 

Washington continues to engage Beijing. China has 

countered the U.S. “pivot” by initiating in 2013 its 

own “pivot” in the form of overland and maritime 

“silk road” initiatives in East and Central Asia79 and 

by enhancing pressures toward multi-polarity in the 

international system. With its BRIC (Brazil, Russia, 

India, and China) partners, China has been seeking 

to adjust or create alternative economic and security 

institutions, challenging the structure created by the 

West in the wake of World War II. 

Having established the SCO in Central Asia, which 

excludes the United States, China seeks to create a 

new security architecture without U.S. participation 

in broader Asia. As Xi stated at a conference in 2014, 
41

“It is for the people of Asia to run the affairs of Asia, 

solve the problems of Asia, and uphold the security of 

Asia.”80 But it is in the economic area where it has most 

succeeded. Along with BRICS (BRIC plus South Africa) 

nations, China launched the New Development Bank 

(NDB) with the initial capitalization of U.S.$100 billion in order to level the playing field where the World 

Bank (WB), with capitalization of U.S.$223 billion and 

the International Monetary Fund (IMF) have traditionally reigned supreme. It also spearheaded the Asian 

Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with capitalization of at least U.S.$160 billion, which aims to have 

57 founding members by the end of 2015, challenging 

the Asian Development Bank led by the United States 

and Japan.81 Britain’s application in 2015 to join AIIB 

has displeased Washington, promoting a U.S. official 

to say that the United States is “wary about a trend 

toward constant accommodation of China.”82 China 

also issued U.S.$10 billion more in loans than the WB 

in 2008-10 through its China Development Bank.83 It 

also supported the Chiang Mai Initiative, which has 

challenged the position of the IMF by seeking to create a regional lender of last resort. To acknowledge 

China’s growing contribution to world economy, the 

IMF increased China’s voting share by 15 percent, and 

the WB appointed a senior Chinese economist as its 

chief economist for the first time.84

While these developments for the time being support Robert Kaplan’s conclusion that East Asia is generally all about business, China’s economic drive is 

bound to shift gears in regional capitals.85 True, economic imperatives have often prevailed over geopolitics in Asia in the last 3 decades.86 But this is about to 

change in the next 3, as China translates its economic 

capabilities into military power and prompts more 
42

focus on geopolitics in the neighborhood increasingly 

uneasy about China’s rise. Already, Japan is debating 

its self-defense clause, which may open the way for a 

more active security role by Tokyo. India, a member 

of the “nuclear club” but not of the Non-Proliferation 

Treaty, is starting to assume a role of Washington’s 

strategic partner in ensuring a peaceful rise of China 

and a stable global order. Delhi and Washington signed 

a Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement in 2006, and 

India may soon start importing nuclear reactors and 

fuel from the United States. The deal is critical because 

it enables Washington to help Delhi develop ballistic 

and anti-ballistic missile technology.87 Vietnam, no 

longer facing a full arms embargo by Washington, 

looks forward to U.S arms supplies, while relying on 

Russia as a major arms supplier and building stronger 

defense ties with India.88

While the relationships are important, it is the relationship between China and the United States that 

will be the defining factor in the transition of power 

away from the West and evolution of global order. 

One can describe the U.S.-China relationship as a 

“competitive co-existence,” with both countries suffering from the deficit of “strategic trust.”89 Should the 

United States contain or engage China? Unlike during the Cold War, when it misapplied the concept of 

containment developed by George Kennan to keep the 

Soviet Union in check, the United States today is in an 

intertwined economic relationship with China that enjoys strong and growing economic ties with U.S. allies 

in Asia and Europe. China is thus more likely to deflect than succumb to any U.S. containment.90 Washington would be unable to alter the balance of power 

and contain Beijing without undermining one’s own 

economic base. By the same token, any of China’s attempts to exclude the United States from Asia would 
43

face resistance from Washington and Asian states unwilling to see their region dominated by China.91 This 

does not mean that the former will not attempt containment or that the latter will not seek hegemony. As 

John Mearsheimer asserts:

It is clear from the historical record that American 

policy makers never tolerate peer competitors. Therefore the United States can be expected to go to great 

lengths to contain China and ultimately weaken it to 

the point where it is no longer capable of ruling the 

roost in Asia. In essence, the United States is likely to 

behave towards China much the way it behaved towards the Soviet Union during the Cold War. 92

China, according to Mearsheimer, in turn would 

likely follow in the steps of “all previous potential 

hegemons” and would “be strongly inclined to become a real hegemon,”93 developing its own Monroe Doctrine as another Asian power, Japan, once 

did in the 1930s.94 China’s experience of once being 

the predominant force in the world and Asia and its 

potential to emerge as the world’s largest economic 

force may indicate its intention to displace the United 

States from its position of leadership in Asia, if not the 

world.95 Ultimately, if neither the United States, nor 

China pursue an accommodation and peaceful power 

transition, the international system should ready itself 

for a collision of major magnitude. According to longcycle theorists, power shifts occur approximately every 100 years, with most power transitions leading to 

wars between the dominant state(s) and rising state(s) 

and, usually, resulting in the emergence of a new set 

of dominant states for the next century.96 Regardless 

of how the winner is in this scenario, the related repercussions for global development and security would 

be far-reaching. 
44

If one were to assume that Washington seeks to 

contain Beijing and the latter seeks to expand vis-à-vis 

the United States, one may conclude that “China has 

done better at constraining America’s response to its 

rise than America has done in transforming China.”97

Unlike China, the United States is short on financial 

resources, being forced as it is to cut defense spending to reduce its U.S.$0.5 trillion deficit and U.S.$18 

trillion sovereign debt. It cut its defense budget by 

U.S.$37 billion in 2013 and is expected to see a decline 

of 20 percent by 2022, which would further undercut the “pivot” strategy.98 Trillions spent on wars in 

Iraq and Afghanistan have aggravated the fiscal challenges. While Washington invested “blood and treasure” as part of these wars, China has been investing 

funds and importing oil and mineral resources from 

both countries, expanding its economic stake while 

Washington was doing the “heavy lifting.”99 To make 

matters worse, China is now the U.S. largest foreign 

holder of U.S. public debt (U.S.$1 trillion).100 Fixing 

the fiscal challenges is a now a major national security 

imperative for the United States if it wants to avoid 

the fate of other great powers—the Union of Soviet 

Socialist Republics (USSR), the United Kingdom (UK), 

Spain, and Rome, among others. 

With the U.S. “Pivot to the Pacific” and China’s 

expansion and consolidation of its strategic position 

in Asia, Beijing finds it timely to march westward 

through Central Asia in search of resources to equalize its internal development, expand its global economic footprint, and deflect U.S. pressure in the east. 

Unfortunately for Washington, its economic influence 

in Central Asia is insignificant and its regional military role is under question, as U.S.-led coalition forces 

plan to withdraw from Afghanistan by 2016. China, 

in turn, sees Central Asia as an outlet for its untapped 
45

development and expansion years after it has displayed a leading economic position in Southeast Asia. 

As one Chinese analyst noted, “If Southeast Asia is 

our front yard, then Central Asia is our backyard.”101

China is actively pursuing its “belt” initiative, which 

overshadows the NSRS in reach and commitment and 

ensures for Beijing a more lasting military presence.

While the “belt” feeds into U.S. strategy of enhancing global connectivity, it also serves to buttress the 

“comprehensive national power” of the country that 

may emerge as the world’s largest economic and military power by 2050 and 2100, respectively. Why is this 

all important? Central Asia is of strategic importance 

to U.S. allies in Europe and Asia and for the U.S. ability 

to sustain its leading position and global order amid 

the rise of new centers of power that are encroaching 

on Central Asia. Washington should be prepared to 

shape China’s ascendance and engage Beijing, while 

pushing forward on both fronts—in the Asia-Pacific 

and Central Asia. 

To preserve the sinews of the international system, 

the United States needs to involve China in adjusting 

the system, with or without prompting from Beijing. 

This requires that Washington increasingly engage 

China’s allies and potential challengers in institutional settings early on. Unfortunately, the U.S. record 

in building institutions and partnerships in East Asia 

is much more impressive than in Central Asia. As a 

sea-based power that defeated Japan in World War II, 

the United States is far more comfortable in the AsiaPacific where it has built a network of allies and shares 

much stronger economic ties. Since 1945 until today, 

no other Asian power, not even Japan, had questioned 

U.S. military preeminence in the region. To this date, 

Washington continues to support the pursuit of multilateral economic and military institutions in East Asia. 
46

In Central Asia, on the other hand, the U.S. institutional influence and country partnerships are weak. 

Even the collapse of the USSR and 9/11 may prove to 

be fleeting drivers of its presence in the region, where 

Russia’s predominant security role and China’s growing economic influence have impeded U.S. efforts to 

“grow roots” in Central Asia. Washington may not 

care much about its economic stake in the region, but 

it should surely be concerned about regional economic and military dynamics that impact its global position. Unlike China, which led the creation of the SCO, 

reinvigorated the Kazakhstan-initiated Conference 

on Interaction and Confidence-Building Measures in 

Asia organization, and launched the “belt” project in 

Central Asia, the United States has largely failed to 

create, sustain, or involve itself in new or reshaped 

regional institutions. Washington negotiated Trade 

and Investment Framework Agreements, advanced 

the TAPI and Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan (BTC) projects, 

and promoted NATO’s Partnership for Peace (PfP) 

programs. It has also advanced the Northern Distribution Network (NDN) running supplies to and out 

of Afghanistan, proposed the creation of a counternarcotics initiative, and launched the NSRS. Aside from 

the BTC and NDN, the other initiatives have either not 

materialized or failed to advance U.S. global interests 

effectively. The BTC and NDN have fostered the integration of the Caspian and Central-South Asia with 

the global economy, but the U.S. role in sustaining 

the NDN legacy and unleashing the NSRS potential is 

unclear after withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan. To shape China’s global rise, Washington needs 

to have a regional presence in Central Asia, where 

China’s “pull” is setting the direction for the reconfiguration of the region’s geopolitical space. 
47

CHAPTER II

RECONFIGURATION OF CENTRAL ASIA’S 

GEOPOLITICS

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold. . . .

 W. B. Yeats, 1919.102

Multidirectional “Push-Pull” Forces.

Forces exerted by major powers advance reconfiguration of Central Asia’s geopolitics at a pace and 

extent much more rapid and profound than was the 

case after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Russia today is a much stronger actor than the Russia in the 

1990s, seeking to revitalize its influence by absorbing 

post-Soviet states through the Moscow-led EU. The 

United States, which had been an outsider during the 

Cold War, successfully inserted itself into the broader 

region as a major military force after 9/11 and has 

been facilitating the opening up of economic corridors 

of Eurasia ever since. The EU has partially managed 

to reorient the Caspian states closer to Europe in the 

energy sphere. China has already significantly altered 

the region’s economic flows over the last 2 decades 

and is yet to reshape the region’s security architecture. 

India has finally awakened, pushing itself north as it 

seeks to connect Central and South Asia via Afghanistan. While still lagging behind China, it has committed to expanding its regional presence by launching 

its “connect” policy. Even Iran is now increasingly 

optimistic about its growing influence in Central Asia 

given hopes of improved relations with the United 

States. Other middle powers are also impacting the 
48

regional scene. Alas, the regional republics have, for 

the most part, acquiesced with proposed or imposed 

external visions, failing to advance their own vision of 

their own region in concert, despite clear benefits of 

intra-regional cooperation. 

All of these “push-pull” forces are simultaneously 

gluing and tearing the region apart, potentially creating conditions for uncontrolled geopolitical competition, arms race, militarization, and war. Russia drags 

the region north; India pulls it south; the EU, west; the 

United States, west and south; and China, east. At this 

stage, neither power is wielding an overwhelming 

influence across all domains, allowing Central Asian 

states to withstand pressures from any single power. 

But China’s rise today, and India’s ascendance in various dimensions of power and influence in the long 

term, are bound to transform the regional landscape 

beyond recognition if current dynamics hold. In this 

case, the failure of Central Asian states to organize 

collectively and promote intra-regional integration 

would prove an omission that had traditionally cost 

them dearly during imperial expansions by Russia 

starting in the 19th century and China under various 

dynasties. Only a strong center, a pole of intraregional 

organization, can withstand these pressures and mitigate the conditions that could lead to open external 

rivalries and internal wars. 

Of all these pressures, China’s rise is more multifaceted and powerful, promising to tilt the balance 

of power further in favor of Beijing, as neighboring 

China expands its global and regional footprint in the 

next few decades. Already, the region’s shifting economic flows—aid, energy, investment, transit, and 

trade—indicate that China’s “pull” on Central Asia is 

a stronger force, realigning the region along an east-
49

ern vector. China’s trade turnover with Central Asia 

stands at about 29.6 percent and is growing (compared to the EU’s at 26.4 percent and Russia’s at 18.3 

percent).103

In itself, China’s economic expansion is a boon for 

the Central Asian countries that necessarily should 

leverage China’s influence as they pursue their development and external economic integration. But an 

expanded economic influence of a neighboring power 

inevitably comes with economic, political, and security challenges. An expanded political and military influence of such power could threaten the sovereignty 

or make-up of the regional countries. It is this threat 

that should prompt regional actors, from both within 

and outside the region, to organize and shape China’s 

regional ascendance. As they do so, the Central Asian 

states and their partners should not contain but engage China in a set of institutions strong enough to 

check China’s ambitions for domination in check. This 

in part entails pursuing a policy of “multilateralism” 

similar to China’s own approach increasingly emphasizing “regionalism” and “multilateralism.” 

China’s involvement in regional institutions seeks 

to ensure that the United States does not contain China 

and that members of these structures are not concerned 

about China’s rise, while exposing U.S. alleged unilateralism and China’s contrasting approach of multilateralism in foreign affairs.104 By pursuing “multilateral 

regionalism,” China advances institution building,105

prevents or mitigates collective counter-response, and 

experiments with designs and leadership roles as it 

rises to the ranks of most powerful.106 Its track record 

of building or supporting the creation of regional institutions in Asia speaks for itself. China has successfully launched or supported the creation of SCO, Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) plus 
50

Three (ASEAN: Brunei, Cambodia, Indonesia, Lao 

People’s Democratic Republic, Malaysia, Myanmar, 

the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam; 

plus the People’s Republic of China, Japan, and Korea), ASEAN Plus Six (Australia, China, India, Japan, 

New Zealand, and South Korea), NDB, and AIIB.107

While these efforts demonstrate China’s intention to 

create alternative institutions, thereby challenging the 

established rules of the game, they also indicate China’s desire to be included rather than excluded and 

its plans to play a role of a common denominator in 

global and regional affairs. 

The Central Asian states and their partners should 

use the same trick on China; by organizing from 

within, and involving China in select existing or new 

institutions, they would make the reconfiguration of 

the region’s geopolitics a more balanced and stable 

process. This would help them advance multivector 

foreign policies, guard against external encroachments on their newly-found sovereignties, and facilitate their economic development. This would also 

serve China’s goal of making its rise less threatening, 

while committing Beijing to common rules of engagement in the rapidly changing region.108 This is critical 

because China’s rise will prompt other powers to respond to China’s advances, potentially exacerbating 

the already ongoing external rivalries over influence 

in the region. In the process, the Central Asian states 

should take advantage of the division of labor among 

external players to ensure that the region’s geopolitical reconfiguration is not a one-sided process driven 

by a single all-powerful actor, and that no need arises 

for a “second coming” (in case of a regional or global 

war starting out of Central Asia).
51

Division of Labor in Central Asia.

Varying agendas and capabilities of great powers 

that underpin the “push-pull” forces in the region reveal a peculiar division of labor in Central Asia. It is 

peculiar, not because there is no single power wielding a comprehensive array of influences across economics, security, and military areas in the region. It 

is peculiar because China gradually emerges as the 

power increasingly projecting influence across all of 

these categories at the same time. China’s economic 

influence is already predominant in Central Asia, 

and its influences and roles in cultural, political, 

and security developments of the broader region are 

growing rapidly. 

Russia remains the guarantor of the regional security order, relying on the CSTO and bilateral ties to 

advance regional security and Moscow’s influence. In 

2012, it secured a deal with Kyrgyzstan to extend the 

lease of CSTO airbase in Kant for 15 years in exchange 

for writing off about U.S.$500 million of Kyrgyzstan’s 

debts. In addition to the CSTO base, Moscow operates 

a naval test site at Issyk Kul Lake in Kyrgyzstan, maintains its largest overseas base hosting up to 7,000 personnel in Tajikistan, and a space station at Kazakh city 

of Baikanur. In 2013, Moscow and Tajikistan agreed 

to extend Russia’s military presence at the base for 3 

decades. Russia also pursues growing defense ties focused on joint anti-missile defense with Kazakhstan, 

which it shares the world’s longest border.

But while Russia’s security role and presence are 

paramount, they are not unchallenged. Unlike Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, which are the largest recipients 

of Russia’s military aid in Central Asia, Uzbekistan 

and Turkmenistan shun Russia-led “collective” se-
52

curity institutions, “flirting” with the United States 

and China to offset Moscow’s influence. Uzbekistan 

and Turkmenistan are both members of the China-led 

SCO, which pursues a struggle against “three evils” 

and holds frequent military exercises. Both countries 

also purchased China’s first-ever anti-missile defense 

systems HQ-9 in early-2015, about the same time 

the United States announced a donation of approximately 300 armored vehicles to Uzbekistan. For China 

that has traditionally stayed away from providing 

sophisticated weaponry to the regional states, doing 

so today signals its growing confidence in enhancing 

its security and military role in Central Asia, even if 

one considers its actions as having Moscow’s “green 

light” and seeking to mitigate security risks emanating from Afghanistan. In 2007 and 2009, China offered 

U.S.$3 million in loans to Turkmenistan to boost its 

capability against militant attacks on energy infrastructure and U.S.$3.7 million to Uzbekistan to install 

mobile scanning systems at border crossings due to 

instability in Afghanistan.109

To fight the “three evil forces,” China even considered the possibility of having a military base in 

southern Kyrgyzstan in 2005110—5 years before Russia 

and the CSTO failed to respond to inter-ethnic clashes 

that displaced thousands and killed hundreds in Kyrgyzstan. It later emerged that, aside from Russia’s and 

CSTO’s own constraints, it was China’s and Uzbekistan’s objection to the presence of Russian troops close 

to their borders that prevented the deployment of 

Russia’s or CSTO forces during and after the clashes. 

China also had its eyes on the Karshi-Khanabad base 

in Uzbekistan, which the Soviet Union built to address 

potential threats from China during the Cold War,111

but has failed to secure it in part due to Moscow’s 

opposition.112
53

That China has publicly recognized Russia’s preeminent security and military role in Central Asia 

brings forth a few important points. First, China is interested, for the time being, in a strategic partnership 

with Russia to advance multipolarity and constrain 

the United States globally. Second, China wants to 

facilitate its economic expansion in Central Asia without drawing major opposition from Moscow, whose 

long-term economic influence is receding. Third, 

China understands its inability to assume the role of 

the region’s security guarantor, let alone pursue it effectively. With Afghanistan teetering on the brink of 

collapse and the need to secure Xingjian from militants, Beijing has no other way but to view Moscow 

and Washington as short-term partners. Finally, the 

very fact of the public acknowledgement reflects the 

increasingly wide and correct perception, especially 

in Kremlin, of Beijing’s growing security and military 

clout in the region.

Besides pushing aside Russia in the security sphere, 

China is also steadily stepping on the U.S. regional 

military role that has primarily focused on Afghanistan. Neither nearby Russia, nor neighboring China 

can currently assume this role. In fact, both Moscow 

and Beijing have been occasionally displeased with 

the planned withdrawal of U.S. forces from Afghanistan. They perceive the U.S. war effort as a failure 

that could lead to deterioration of regional security if 

Washington does not ensure a responsible conclusion 

of the military mission. They are specifically alarmed 

at the prospect of substantial destabilization of Afghanistan after 2016 and likely expanded inflows of 

refugees, militants, and drugs into Central Asia, Russia, and China.113 Reports of the Islamic State militants 

gaining foothold in Central-South Asia present additional security concerns. 
54

This is part why, after years of “free riding,” Beijing is stepping up its security role by training Afghan 

national police forces, working with Pakistan to bring 

mutually beneficial security outcomes, and boosting 

anti-terrorism cooperation and military sales to the 

Central Asian states bordering Afghanistan, where it 

has a growing stake in mineral deposits and transit 

infrastructure. Given its strong leverage on Pakistan 

and history of “quiet” cooperation with the Taliban 

in 1990s, China even proposed mediating between 

coalition forces and the Taliban.114

Despite these efforts, China’s military role in Afghanistan—in addition to its covert and overt role 

in the country in conjunction with Pakistan—is only 

starting to shape up. Unlike Central Asian countries, 

where China faces Russia as the major military actor, 

Afghanistan could present for Beijing an opportunity 

to experiment with its military designs due to planned 

withdrawal of U.S. forces from that country. At this 

time, China is more likely to entertain this possibility 

through its proxy, Pakistan, while increasing military 

aid to Kabul in the form of training, weapons, and intelligence sharing. This is because China is cautious 

not to aggravate the already tense relations with its 

strategic rival in the face of India and not to stir the nest 

of radicalism crisscrossing Pakistan and Afghanistan 

and inviting yet another historical struggle between 

an “infidel” empire and righteous “freedom fighters.” 

This is not to discount China’s interest in seeing the U.S. military in the region gone as far as the 

eye can see. From a longer-term perspective, Beijing 

views U.S. regional military activities as flanking and 

encircling China from the east and the west—a scenario its seeks to avoid by enhancing its security and 

military role in Afghanistan without committing to 
55

exceedingly costly endeavors just yet. Beijing therefore views with content the SCO’s decision in 2005 to 

call for withdrawal of U.S. bases from Central Asia; 

the closure of the U.S. base at Kharshi-Khanabad in 

Uzbekistan the same year following U.S. criticism of 

Tashkent’s crackdown in Andijan; and the recent termination of U.S. base operations in Kyrgyzstan, even 

if under pressure from Russia.

In addition to demonstrating its growing security 

and military influence vis-à-vis Russia and the United 

States, China is bringing competition to the EU’s development agenda and India’s energy forays in the 

broader region. With respect to the former, Beijing 

has substantially increased its aid inflows and investments into Central Asia without conditioning them 

on political or economic liberalization. What China 

wants in return is an opportunity to do business. The 

lack of transparency and checks and balances in Central Asian states, and in China itself, make Beijing’s 

approach to foreign assistance a relatively more effective tool, if not necessarily and always beneficial for 

the long-term economic and political development of 

the regional countries. 

Unlike India, China has attained a more demarcated role and meaningful presence in Central Asia. 

This is not to dismiss India’s decision to institutionalize its vision for the region through its “connect” 

policy, boost its military and economic presence by 

seeking to set up its first-ever overseas military base in 

Tajikistan, and launch the TAPI pipeline linking Central and South Asia. Of all these deals, Delhi has made 

more progress on TAPI, whose members are close to 

starting construction. But, unlike China, it has not yet 

spearheaded regional security and economic cooperation structures. Nor has it built for itself a comparable 
56

trade and energy investment profile in the region. 

However, India has a tremendous long-term potential for enhancing its regional status as a major trade, 

energy, and security player. This potential, similar to 

the one already being displayed by China, depends 

on India’s economic development and improvement 

in the regional security situation involving unstable 

Afghanistan and Pakistan. 

Comparatively speaking, China’s share of labor in 

the economic, political, and security areas is growing, 

redefining the traditional division of labor among external powers in Central Asia. If left unchecked, China 

could soon start assuming attributes of an emerging 

hegemon. This prompts an assessment, if not the 

forecast, of China’s potential role as a hegemon in 

the region.

Attributes of China’s Regional Hegemony.

We know we have to play the game your way now, 

but in 10 years, we will set the rules!

Chinese Diplomat, during China’s 

negotiations to join the WTO 

[World Trade Organization].115

Goldman Sachs predicts that China will be the 

largest economy by 2050, closely followed by the 

United States and India, while Russian, Mexican, and 

Indonesian economies will be larger than the German, 

French, and UK economies—a markedly reshaped 

global economic order.116 No one knows how China’s 

rise to the status of the world’s largest economy and 

its approach to global affairs will define the security 

and economic order of the world and Central Asia. 

As a Chinese scholar observed, at this stage “China is 
57

not prepared for world leadership.”117 It still views the 

outside world as a source of financial gains, making 

it unprepared for a global leadership role.118 Not yet 

clear about the need or desire to participate in global 

governance, China tends to display a “transactional” 

approach in its foreign relations, seeking to assess 

any move with a cost-benefit analysis more suitable 

to trading and narrow gain than to win-win approaches and outcomes.119 Deng Xiaoping even questioned the need for China to be a superpower. As he 

famously said:

China is not a superpower, nor will it ever seek to be 

one. If one day China should change its color and turn 

into a superpower, if it too should play the tyrant in 

the world, and everywhere subject others to its bullying, aggression, and exploitation, the people of the 

world should . . . expose it, oppose it and work together with the Chinese people to overthrow it.120

The year Xiaoping gave the speech, China was only 

starting its journey as an aspiring global power, and 

the statement reflected China’s frustration with the 

external environment and its inability to change much 

about it. Today, however, China is a transformed nation, poised to also transform the world. The question 

of its ambitions or potential to become a superpower 

and project hegemony is as relevant as never before. 

As Samuel Huntington observed:

China’s history, culture, size, economic dynamism, 

and self-image all impel it to assume a hegemonic position in East Asia. This goal is a natural result of its 

rapid economic development. Every other major power, Britain and France, Germany and Japan, the United 

States and the Soviet Union, has engaged in outward 

expansion, assertion, and imperialism coincidental 
58

with or immediately following the years in which it 

went through rapid industrialization and economic 

growth. No reason exists to think that the acquisition 

of economic and military power will not have comparable effects on China.121

An assertion by Beijing that “China’s peaceful 

development has broken away from the traditional 

pattern where a rising power was bound to seek hegemony”122 is therefore yet to be tested, even if one 

accepts a premise that a continued economic development is China’s way of fulfilling its international 

responsibility.123 A lot will depend on how the United 

States and its allies, among others, approach the issue 

of integrating China and helping it assume a peaceful 

and responsible role as a rising power. As Wang Jisi 

points out, “China can rightfully be expected to take 

on more international responsibilities. But then the 

international community should take on the responsibility of helping the world’s largest member support 

itself.”124

In the mid-term, China will continue adhering to 

the rules of the international system while seeking 

the creation of parallel rules and structures,125 undermining the U.S.-led system of global relations. After 

the 2008 financial crisis, for instance, China lectured 

Washington on malpractices that caused the downturn and emphasized government oversight in what 

some view is its effort to “reinvent capitalism rather 

than ruin it.”126 Just as other powers before it, Beijing 

will seek to offer its own narratives and concepts of relations among states, including principles such “unity,” civilization-state,” “tributary system,’ its unique 

view on race, and “centralization/decentralization.”127

These concepts will be pronounced in China’s inter-
59

actions with neighboring states, including in Central 

Asia, where attributes of its potential hegemony can 

be classified into security, political, economic, and 

cultural aspects of its predominance. 

The security aspects of such predominance in Central Asia are likely to hinge on China’s strong institutional basis that would downsize Russia’s security 

influence in the region. In this context, the SCO could 

well be a precursor to a substantially revamped SCO 

or another institution that afforded Beijing a role of 

the leader rather than a co-manager of regional security orders. If it fails to project its dominant security 

position via a regional security body due to strong 

resistance of external and regional actors, it would—

at a minimum—seek to build strong security and 

military ties with individual Central Asian republics. 

Once Beijing asserts itself as the largest economy, it 

will be more confident projecting its military role and 

presence worldwide, especially in its “periphery.” If 

Russia, the United States, and India have established 

or plan to set up military bases in Central Asia, why 

should it not be China’s mission, place, and time to do 

so? Ultimately, China will have to reevaluate the principle of noninterference when it confronts the need to 

deploy/use military force to protect its significantly 

expanded overseas interests.128

This poses a question of whether China will seek 

territorial expansion at the expense of Central Asia as 

part of its potential efforts to establish a military hegemony. In the contemporary context, and in the next 

15 years, the answer is likely to be a resounding “no.” 

First, China and the regional republics delimited their 

disputed borders, leaving no room for claims that 

could spark the territorial expansion. Second, China’s 

hegemony is likely to be economic in nature, in a way 
60

similar to the trade and finance-rooted imperial impulses historians have attributed to the United States 

after it emerged as the world’s economic leader. Third, 

the balance of power politics and involvement of other 

actors would work against such a possibility. Fourth, 

despite its territorial expansion throughout centuries, 

China has not followed (yet) Western nations’ practices of overseas expansion or colonization of large territories beyond adjoining areas.129 Fifth, the changing 

nature of power and the existence of nuclear weapons 

in the hands of several major actors would constrain 

an expansive military strategy by China. One already 

sees “diminishing returns” to conquest and territorial expansion; destructiveness of modern combat; the 

increased importance of legitimacy and other sources 

of power (such as cultural and economic); economic 

interdependence, etc., as factors changing the nature 

of power in the 21st century.130

Finally, the historical context and the issue of China’s strategic military culture are important. Originally and extensively based on farming and agriculture, 

Chinese civilization traditionally focused less on the 

use of military force in order to set an example and 

attract neighbors.131 Today, China is primarily leveraging its economic means and diplomacy in Central 

Asia. As Parag Khanna observed: 

China is winning the new Great Game because it is 

building the new Silk Road, taking the best of the British and Russian strategies from a century ago: preserving buffer states and allies like the former but without 

the abrasive conquest style of the latter.132

This is not to say that China’s territorial expansion 

into Central Asia is impossible, not given the events in 

Ukraine and Georgia, China’s history of expansions, 
61

border wars, and potentially critical regional developments. For over 2,000 years following the victory of 

Qin dynasty during the Warring States period, China 

expanded into south, north, and west to Central Asia, 

relying on conquest, wars, bribery, assimilation, and 

settlements. These experiences instilled a perception among Chinese that territorial expansion equals 

“unification,” not “conquest.” China has pacified and 

sought control of its periphery to secure its heartland, 

protect overland trade routes, and strengthen the 

hierarchical, sino-centric, Confucian regional order. 

The Confucian institutions and ideas underscored 

the internal order and stability over the conquest and 

expansion. Only once they ensured internal stability 

and order would most Chinese regimes start asserting 

claims over the periphery or “consolidating the territorial boundaries of the Chinese state at their maximum 

historical limits.”133 China’s expansion westward rested on a particular brutality and extended into Central 

Asian zones in Xingjian, prompting a conclusion that, 

“territorially speaking, China remains an empire.”134

Some Chinese scholars still consider the Ferghana 

Valley as Chinese territory, with a PLA publication in 

the early-1990s listing the eastern part of Kazakhstan 

as constituting China’s historical boundaries.135
62

Figure 2. China’s Wars against Periphery.136

Some further argue that the use of force is “endemic” in Chinese history. A Chinese military source 

indicates that China was involved in a total of 3,790 

internal and external wars between 1100 BC and AD 

1910.137 During the first 3 decades since its founding, China fought more border wars than any other 

state, which convinced authorities to launch a “good 

neighbor diplomacy” with periphery states to ensure 

a smoother rise to the ranks of most powerful.138 One 

should recognize, however, that China has been, in 

one shape or another, a civilization that has existed for 

at least 3,000 years, a period long enough to witness 

numerous wars. 

In critical circumstances, one could imagine a 

militarily powerful China conquering parts of Central 

Asia to address state failure, uproot militants, protect its citizens, safeguard energy corridors, or repel 

aggression of local, proxy, or extraregional forces. 

In 2009, a senior Chinese military leader declared a 
63

possibility of military intervention in Central Asia in 

case of destabilization caused by Islamists in the region.139 Meanwhile, the PLA plans “to forge a strong 

military force” for “important missions,” including 

those centered on the need to secure energy resources 

in Central Asia.140 It has been “significantly advancing 

its near-periphery power projection capability” and 

could use its military capabilities in Xingjian for contingency operations in Central Asia.141 Its helicopters 

are capable of electronic warfare operations, raids, 

precision strikes, and air assaults.142 At this time, however, China is unable to effectively deploy its forces 

for sustained periods or lead military missions on par 

with the United States or Russia. 

The political attributes of China’s potential hegemony present an equally complex case. On the one 

hand, we could expect China’s rise to entrench authoritarianism and corruption, which observers associate with Beijing’s foreign relations and the regional 

countries’ own practices. Already, China’s economic 

engagement is constraining the region’s “sustainable 

socio-economic development” by neglecting domestic 

reforms.143 Meanwhile, its reliance on “secret and illicit techniques” to expand influence along its “continental periphery” damage democratization prospects 

in Central Asia.144 On the other hand, China’s global 

economic expansion is likely to translate into political 

transformation of China and Central Asian countries, 

with potentially positive effects on the global wave 

of democratization. In China, many, including in the 

leadership, are publicly discussing the merits of political reforms and democratization of the governance 

system, albeit within limits that would ensure the 

survival of the communist party’s position and development of the country according to Chinese distinct 
64

way.145 Central Asia can thus remain authoritarian 

or become more democratic. The truth would likely 

lie somewhere in between, especially given unique 

aspects of global or regional hegemonies exercised 

throughout history and the Central Asian states’ own 

way of democratization and political development. 

Becoming a democracy is no guarantee for stability. Democracies may not tend to fight one another, 

but they do fight non-democracies. Studies also show 

that “states that make the biggest leap in democratization” are “about twice as likely to fight wars in the 

decade after democratization” than autocracies.146

According to Chinese political scientist Fei-Ling: 

A ‘democratic’ regime in Beijing, free from the debilitating concerns for its own survival but likely driven 

by popular emotions, could make the rising Chinese 

power a much more assertive, impatient, belligerent, 

even aggressive force, at least during the unstable period of fast ascendance to the ranks of a world-class 

power.147

The rise of Chinese nationalism as part of China’s 

democratization and the rise of Central Asian nationalisms (including as a response to China’s growing 

presence) could present major security risks. An attack on Chinese interests in Central Asia may well invite a military response by Beijing fueled by popular 

demand at home. 

In addition to democratization and nationalism, 

we should also consider China’s tribute system as a 

major political, economic, and cultural aspect of its 

conception of domestic and international orders. The 

tributary system was largely a “cultural and moral 

rather than administrative or economic system,” with 

non-Chinese rulers adhering to appropriate norms 
65

and ceremonies when being received by the emperor, 

even if the reasons for contact could be economic. According to the system, a proper tribute to the emperor 

suggests an acceptance of superiority of China’s civilization and, if accepted, would ensure noninterference 

in the domestic affairs by China.148 It historically emphasized China’s superior role, relegating to “barbarians” the role of inferior beings incapable of matching the sophistication of China’s political and cultural 

system.149

The Chinese regarded highly the principles of 

social order and equality promulgated by Confucius 

and other scholars and statesmen throughout history. 

But this they did within the Chinese society, while applying a stratified approach to classifying and treating 

foreigners. This is where cultural attributes of China’s 

hegemony become especially relevant in Central 

Asia—the region where China had actively interacted 

with both the native and other civilizations in the past. 

Will China’s political and social principles emerge as 

the dominant shapers of social norms and interaction 

in Central Asia? What impact will they have on the 

region’s cultural and political systems? After all, China is first likely to project its hegemony in economic, 

cultural, and racial terms, the latter being rooted in its 

rich history as a civilization and long-standing tradition of classifying peoples according to a hierarchy.150

Or, will the regional peoples absorb the blow of “superior” Chinese values, as they have repeatedly done 

vis-à-vis foreign cultures in the past?
66

Figure 3. The Ancient Chinese View of the World.151

While Central Asians have shown a remarkable 

ability to absorb foreign influences in the course of 

wars, victories, defeats, and colonization throughout 

history, a cultural interaction with the world’s largest 

economy is almost certain to translate into a Chinese 

cultural expansion shaping anything from cloth and 

eating habits to literature and socio-political organization of life. Already, more students learn Chinese 

and go to China than ever before. Chinese goods inundate regional markets. Chinese migrants, cars, and 

restaurants increasingly appear in regional streets. 

With China’s trade and investments come its growing 

cultural and political influence. The reverse process 

is true as well, but its magnitude is less profound or 

even sustaining at this point. 

China’s growing dominance in Xingjian is an important indicator of how Beijing is likely to treat Central Asia and its residents—an important question 
67

considering volatile socio-political dynamics in China 

proper. Xingjian is changing rapidly, as Han Chinese 

increasingly populate the area and authorities spend 

billions to develop the region. The Confucion idea that 

“humiliation stimulates effort” mobilized China’s attempts to address the wrongs of humiliation. But the 

amassed wealth and power have reinforced the rise 

of nationalism, inferiority complex, and poor treatment of its own citizens, especially in Xingjian, where 

tensions between Han Chinese and Uyghurs are running high and accompanied by repeated violence and 

clashes.152

While China’s power has grown, its “soft power” 

in Central Asia and the world has remained limited. 

The appeal of its culture or education in Central Asia 

lags behind Russia, Turkey, and the West, albeit 

growing rapidly.153 Aside from “peace and harmony,” 

China has few universally appealing “soft power” attributes. As David Shambaugh argues, “the question 

is not what is unique about China, but what is (potentially) universal about China. China’s universal “soft 

power” aspects emphasize democracy between rather 

than within states, appeal to the developing world, 

China’s economic growth model, and its opposition 

to global domination, especially following the global financial crisis caused by and blamed on the U.S. 

economic model.154

But Beijing offers few alternatives or solutions. As 

Chinese diplomat Wu Jianmin observed, China needs 

to concentrate on “reinventing” Chinese culture as it 

struggles with internal identity crisis and seeks to build 

a “mainstream culture.” Chinese leadership plans to 

invest a U.S.$7-10 billion annually into its “overseas 

publicity work” to boost its cultural presence and 

power.155 President Hu Jintao said this about China’s 
68

cultural presence and “soft power”: “We should bring 

Chinese culture to the world, develop cultural soft 

power compatible with China’s international standing, and increase the influence of Chinese culture in 

the world.”156 China plans to set up 1,000 Confucius 

Institutes worldwide by 2020 to help achieve this. In 

the United States, these institutes came on the Federal 

Bureau of Investigation radar because they may serve 

as intelligence collection sites.157

Ultimately, it is China’s economic dominance that 

will, first and foremost, define its hegemony in Central Asia. Beijing is already the region’s largest trading 

and investment partner, increasingly making the tiny 

regional economies revolve as satellites around the 

“Middle Kingdom.” Moreover, its global economic 

expansion resting on Central Asia is yet to result in 

its overwhelmingly dominant position in the region, 

despite Russia’s attempts to lock in the regional republics within the EU and keep China out. Beijing is 

up to the challenge, proposing in early-2015 to create 

a free trade zone with the union. As Beijing’s cultivates its economic partnerships with Central Asian 

states, it is likely to significantly upgrade existing or 

spearhead the creation of a new multilateral regional 

body focused on trade and investment, with or without Russia’s participation. China’s growing economic 

footprint would make other attributes of its projected 

regional predominance more pronounced, consolidating them into a multifaceted regional hegemony. In 

China’s eyes, a modernization rests on building “comprehensive power” as a distinguishing trait of previous empires, which had developed and prospered because they managed to attain power and influence in 

numerous domains.158
69

Before it comes to it, China has a long list of things 

to accomplish. While it is a growing and influential 

actor, at this stage it remains a “partial power,” projecting global influence only on trade, energy, commodities, real estate, luxury goods, and cyber hacking. First and foremost, China would need to address 

economic, social, and environmental challenges that 

impede its rise. It would also need to cultivate allies to 

lead in the global order. As Professor Zhu Feng at Peking University noted, “China is a rising, but a lonely 

power.”159 China may have a vision for the world, but 

it is still figuring out its contours and how to achieve 

it. The regional states and their partners therefore 

still have the time to shape dynamics and outcomes 

involving China’s rise. 

Indigenous Responses to Regional Change. 

The potential emergence and extent of China’s 

multifaceted hegemony depends on the resistance 

that the local countries and extraregional players put 

up to meet the challenge. While regional agendas of 

external players are a dominant component shaping 

Central Asia’s evolution, it is the “game by the indigenous actors—even if often passive—that will be monumental in influencing the direction of Central Asia 

and the extent of China’s regional influence. Overall, 

the Central Asian republics are weak economically 

and unstable politically due to their authoritarian systems of governance, which makes them less resourceful and less stable agents of geopolitical change. All of 

them would like to be subjects rather than objects in 

global affairs amidst geo-economic and geo-political 

forces sweeping through Central Asia. But instead of 

embracing openness and channeling it for long-term 
70

development and consolidation as full-fledged modern actors, the Central Asian regimes largely shun it 

to preserve their hold on power. 

Besides addressing domestic challenges as they relate to democratization of their political and economic 

systems, the Central Asian states need to carefully 

approach the issue of engaging external powers. On 

the one hand, by overengaging them, the regional republics may undermine their independence. On the 

other hand, by underengaging these actors as rising 

and status quo powers, they may miss the momentum of development and continue to largely serve 

external agendas. The best way for the Central Asian 

states to benefit from the ongoing transformation of 

the region’s geopolitics, to enhance their development 

and sovereignty, and to prevent or mitigate a potential multifaceted hegemony in the region by China, is 

to promote internal reforms, advance diversification 

of external ties, and undertake multilateral intra- and 

extraregional integration. 

So far, Kazakhstan has been the most successful in 

these areas. Its economy is larger than the four economies of the rest of the Central Asian states combined. 

Economic liberalization has enabled it to attract more 

than U.S.$180 billion in FDI since 1991. It has pursued 

a more stable multivector foreign policy, has long held 

a vision for Central Asia as an integrated region, and 

could emerge as its political leader in the longer term. 

Under the leadership of long-time President Nursultan Nazarbaev, Kazakhstan has actively proposed 

and supported Central Asian integration, including 

the original idea of an Eurasian union. However, 

Astana’s efforts have largely failed due to the newlyfound independence of the republics, resentments, 

and rivalries. 
71

Kazakhstan’s relationship with China is extensive, 

but is also balanced by Astana’s relatively successfully 

multivector foreign policy. China is Kazakhstan’s largest trade partner, with the parties planning to increase 

bilateral trade to U.S.$40 billion. In January 2015, they 

reached a preliminary deal to cooperate on projects 

worth U.S.$50-60 billion and now consider doing 

trade using national currencies.160 But as a neighbor, 

Kazakhstan is uneasy about China’s growing demographic and investment profile in its energy sector as 

well as China’s extensive use of water resources in 

neighboring Xingjian for oil field development that 

threaten the regional environment and strain Kazakhstan’s water resources.161 Kazakhstan’s leverage 

vis-à-vis China comes down to its massive energy 

resources, expanding transit potential, and strategic 

partnerships with other powers, especially Russia. In 

the years ahead, its biggest policy challenges are to ensure a peaceful and mutually beneficial co-existence 

of Russia and China in Kazakhstan and Central Asia, 

as well as promoting economic diversification and political liberalization at home. The issue of leadership 

transition (Nazarbaev is going to be 75 in July 2015) is 

going to be critical, given the need to either preserve 

or improve the current course of the country’s grand 

strategy. 

Unlike Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan has not fully leveraged its geopolitical position as the center of the 

region bordering all the Central Asian states plus Afghanistan. While its state-led economy grew rapidly 

in recent years, it has been relatively isolated from 

the regional markets, displayed major inefficiencies, 

and shunned intraregional integration initiatives 

proposed by actors inside and outside Central Asia. 

The regime of the long-time President Islam Karimov 
72

knows that economic liberalization is key to addressing the country’s development challenges but, as with 

other countries in the region, overlooks it to preserve 

its hold on power. In foreign policy, Uzbekistan has 

skillfully deflected pressure from Russia by suspending its CSTO membership, avoiding Moscow-led integration projects, briefly “flirting” with Washington, 

and looking east to Beijing. 

But Tashkent has also earned a reputation of an 

unstable partner after evicting the U.S. base in 2005 

and suspending CSTO membership. That said, China 

is happy to accommodate the unruly Tashkent, as it 

seeks to expand its regional stake. China now is Uzbekistan’s largest investor in the transit sector and the 

second-largest trade partner.162 To balance China’s 

growing presence in the national economy, Tashkent 

has looked to Southeast Asian countries, specifically 

Japan, South Korea, and Malaysia.163 Maintaining stability given the looming leadership transition (Karimov is 77 years old) and opening up its economy, 

including for neighbors, are major imperatives for unleashing a more dynamic regional role for Uzbekistan, 

especially given the growing strategic importance of 

Central Asia as a primary transit zone across Eurasia. 

A more dynamic, but regional, role by Tashkent would 

better help it preserve its independent course, while 

enabling Tashkent to unleash a more active economic 

force in the broader region.

Uzbekistan’s neighbor, Turkmenistan has been 

slowly opening up after the death of former President Saparmurat Niyazov in 2006. But it has a long 

way to go before its reforms assume any signs of even 

moderate economic and political liberalization. Under 

the new President, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, it 

has markedly moved from a dormant foreign policy 
73

to actively “neutral” foreign policy. It still adheres to 

“neutrality” in foreign affairs, avoiding post-Soviet 

economic and collective security institutions in the 

region at all cost. But it has effectively leveraged its 

energy resources to advance ties with China, Iran, 

the EU, and India, undermining Moscow’s grip on its 

energy resources and, by implication, Kremlin’s influence on its foreign policy course.164 Until 2009 Russia 

had been Turkmenistan’s major energy partner, but 

today this role belongs to China—a development that 

now increasingly prompts Ashgabat to look to India 

and the EU to balance Beijing. China has also become 

Turkmenistan’s largest trading partner. Ashgabat’s 

dynamic role hinges on the pursuit of much-needed 

economic and political reforms as well as diversification of its gas and cotton exports-dependent economy.

Kyrgyzstan is by far the least authoritarian state in 

Central Asia and, in the long run, may emerge as the 

first democratic state in the broader region after Mongolia. Two of its former strongmen, Askar Akayev and 

Kurmanbek Bakiyev are no longer presidents, having 

been forced to flee to Russia and Belarus following 

anti-government protests in 2005 and 2010. Despite 

the struggle of factions over power being a cause of 

the protests, the cases show a wider room for popular participation and political mobilization, a scenario 

deemed unthinkable in neighboring countries. Kyrgyzstan also has a relatively vibrant and open political and media environment. The incumbent President 

Almazbek Atambayev succeeded the country’s firstever female president, Roza Otunbayeva in 2011. But 

any democratization successes in the country have 

been accompanied by poor economic performance and 

instability. Kyrgyzstan is one of the poorest republics in the region, with no major resources. Suffering 
74

from uneven economic development, it has struggled 

to preserve social stability, as the inter-ethnic clashes 

revealed in 2010. 

Bordering China, Kyrgyzstan is in a unique position to leverage the rise of China to advance its 

economic development while seeking political and 

security reassurances from Russia and the United 

States. China has growing investments in Kyrgyzstan 

and Tajikistan’s mining sectors, looks to import their 

electricity to meet the growing demand in Xingjian, 

expand the use of agricultural lands, and has either 

started or considers building refineries in both countries, which should alleviate these countries’ dependence on fuel from Russia.165 Going forward, Bishkek 

should lean on external parties to develop east-west 

and north-south connections to ensure a more even 

economic development. It should also seek to retain 

its role as a re-export post for China but necessarily 

start building a new role as an intraregional trade conduit for Central Asian states and India. It should thus 

look beyond Russia and China when participating in 

initiatives proposed by regional and external players. 

All these measures should ensure it does not become 

a tiny satellite orbiting the second largest planet in the 

galaxy next door, also known as China. 

Of all countries in Central Asia, Tajikistan faces 

the most severe political, economic, and security challenges. It suffers from the legacy of the civil war in 

the 1990s, with authorities unable to uproot Islamic 

radicalization and consolidate control over parts of 

the country dominated by Islamist militants and remnants of opposition. Led by Emomali Rahmon since 

the collapse of the Soviet Union, Tajikistan is known 

for a tightly controlled political system that has marginalized opposition groups and contributed to the 
75

Islamic radicalization and emergence of the only Islamic party in the region. Authorities have also failed 

to resuscitate its relatively isolated economy overly 

dependent on aluminum and cotton exports and ever-expanding drug flows from neighboring Afghanistan. The downstream Uzbekistan has occasionally 

imposed transport blockades on Tajikistan, impeding 

the import of construction materials intended for the 

construction of water dams and thereby contributing 

to the isolation of the country’s economy. Dushanbe 

looks to China, Iran, and Afghanistan to break the 

isolation, in part by expanding electricity exports and 

seeking to position itself as a transit corridor along the 

southern edge of Central Asia. As far as its security 

ties, Dushanbe largely relies on Russia, which has a 

base in Tajikistan, for security of its southern perimeter, military assistance, and security guarantees. 

As a country bordering China and Afghanistan, 

Tajikistan could benefit from policies of these actors 

seeking to enhance interregional connectivity. It especially looks to China to develop its transit infrastructure—a major imperative considering the currently 

low level of trade between China and Tajikistan and 

the related potential for the two countries to bring 

their economic relationship to new heights. As one 

Tajik soldier remarked, “We border China and Afghanistan, not Russia anymore. Without these roads 

the Chinese are building, we couldn’t even get around 

our own country.”166 To better take advantage of external and domestic opportunities for the purposes 

of coping with its economic and security challenges, 

Tajikistan would need to improve public institutions, 

curb narco-trafficking, reduce corruption, diversify 

the economy, improve relations with Uzbekistan, and 

pursue trade links with India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, 

and Iran. 
76

Cooperation with China is key for more rapid development of all the regional countries, which looks 

forward to maximizing related benefits by pursuing 

infrastructure development and trade cooperation 

with Beijing without compromising—to an extent 

possible—their territorial integrity and independence. 

But despite these benefits, all the Central Asian states 

resent Han migration, inundation of cheap Chinese 

products that drive out local businesses, and China’s 

overall economic expansion.167 Of the Central Asian 

states, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan are especially vulnerable. Unlike Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, which either do not border China or have 

pursued more independent foreign policies, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in the future might have to substitute Russia as their security and economic protector 

from China.168

The Central Asian states may attain a number of 

benefits from their existing or potential memberships 

and participation in the EU or the “belt” initiative. 

But these benefits would be larger and the negatives 

would be fewer if they learned to turn to one another 

rather than look beyond each other. Harnessing regional change is not easy for these small actors, not 

when the big players are in large part driving the 

change and impacting the evolution of the region. 

Only by standing together—creating an intraregional 

platform of genuine cooperation—will they achieve 

more security and prosperity in the face of external 

pressures exerted by established and aspiring powers. 

The Central Asian states should leverage the regional 

designs of these actors to build this platform, but they 

should be cautious not to give up too much for too 

little. Deepening cooperation with actors situated outside Central Asia, such as India and the United States, 
77

will remain critical for the regional capitals. Advancing ties with these relatively distant balancers will enable them to survive the global power shifts and the 

age of the rising powers.
78

CHAPTER III

ADVANCING U.S. 

“PIVOT TO EURASIA”

If we shrink from the hard contests where men must 

win at hazard of their lives and at the risk of all they 

hold dear, then the bolder and stronger peoples will 

pass us by and will win for themselves the domination 

of the world.

 Theodore Roosevelt169

The United States need not, as some fear, leave 

its fate to “chance and globalization.”170 China’s possible replacement of the United States as the strongest 

power requires that Washington apply more effort to 

steer the global system and its relations with key partners to ensure that: 1) this scenario does not happen; 

or 2) it unfolds peacefully. The reliance on the military 

will be important to the U.S. primacy, but the overall 

appeal and effectiveness of the military in retaining 

and promoting global influence has been declining. 

As Geoff Dyer aptly stated: 

The most influential state will be the one that is best at 

setting agendas, mobilizing support, and which comes 

across as the more reasonable. . . . A quest for continued military dominance will not do the trick: Washington needs to enlist new partners.171

The United States and its allies should therefore 

initiate a “structural adjustment to globalization,”172

focusing on revitalization of their economies and 

adjustment of the global economic and security architecture in concert. The domestic economies lack 

competitiveness, while the post-World War II archi-
79

tecture requires the involvement of aspiring powers to 

sustain itself and the position of the United States as 

a leading actor of the international system: As Parag 

Khanna observed:

without a new division of labor, Western institutions 

will diminish with America’s power, leaving only 

classic geopolitical competition without even the veneer of diplomatic coordination. If the superpowers 

do not choose adaptation over fundamentalism, they 

will miss a chance to keep history permanently in the 

past.173

Because of Central Asia’s centrality to the U.S. 

mission to shape the global order, the United States 

should launch another pivot, this time to Eurasia, by 

boosting its long-term military and economic engagement in the region and partnering with other actors in 

ensuring a peaceful rise of China, and safe evolution 

of the regional and global security and economic orders. Pursuing a regional policy that is not hostage to 

reactions from Russia or China and increasing direct 

cooperation with individual republics is the most effective way of shoring up U.S. regional influence and 

sending a message to the regional states and external 

parties about U.S. interest and commitment to the development and stability of the region in the coming 

decades. This need is becoming greater by the year due 

to rapid emergence of China as the leading economic 

force in Central Asia and its projected ascendance as a 

major regional military power, as well. 

The conflicts in Ukraine and South China Sea have 

accentuated the need for Washington to reinforce its 

support for allies and partners in the post-Soviet space 

and East Asia. They have also demonstrated a need 

for its allies to assume a greater share of responsibility 
80

for collective defense by relieving the global U.S. military burden. This imperative is acute, given the rise 

of potential military challengers, internal and external 

opposition to overseas U.S. military presence, and 

projected cuts in U.S. defense spending. Washington 

should encourage its allies to contribute a larger share 

of resources for their own defense, NATO, and protection of global commons. This would help the United 

States save resources and focus on military deployment, either planned or in response to conflicts, in areas that are critical to its interests but that are lacking 

adequate security infrastructure for such deployment, 

as is the case in Central Asia.174 The military component of cooperation with allies should go in parallel 

with joint economic efforts to promote development 

and safe integration of Central Asia into the global 

economy. 

The U.S. role as a balancing force from a distance is 

a welcome tool for the Central Asian states seeking to 

strengthen their independence. But the Central Asian 

republics, among others in the broader region, may 

choose accommodation and bandwagoning to deal 

with the rising China.175 This could be the case if these 

actors had no committed partners to balance Beijing. 

Hence, it is important that the U.S. regional influence 

is palpable, direct, and extended, enabling it to build 

solid and deep connections with individual Central 

Asian states. In the succeeding pages are recommendations—presented as components of the proposed 

U.S. “Pivot to Eurasia”—for the United States to steer 

the geopolitics of Central Asia in order to ensure a 

leading global position of Washington for decades to 

come and evolution of stable global order amid the 

rise of China. 
81

Boosting Military Engagement in the Region. 

On the military front, Washington must ensure it 

builds on the legacy of its military presence in the region and takes its withdrawal from Afghanistan as an 

opportunity to devise a more Central Asia-specific military policy in Eurasia that would ensure a long-term 

U.S. regional military presence. The United States is 

unlikely to secure a heavy or permanent military presence in the region any time soon given the objections 

of Russia, China, Iran, and some elites in Central Asian 

countries. Any such presence could contribute to the 

militarization of an arms race in the greater region 

bordering four nuclear-armed powers (potentially 

five if Iran “goes nuclear”). But the United States must 

have a military role and presence sufficient to discourage attempts at military domination and protect the 

region’s push for inclusion into the global economy, 

while retaining flexibility to choose whether to intervene in any particular situation or conflict in the 

region. 

The military policy should focus on: 1) continuing 

to support counterterrorism, anti-drug trafficking, and 

special operations capabilities of the regional states as 

ends in themselves and as a platform for more substantive military cooperation in the future; 2) arranging for temporary and permanent basing rights; 3) 

advancing reforms of local armed forces and interoperability as part of NATO PfPs and bilateral ties; 4) 

boosting military-to-military and civilian-to-civilian 

contacts and cooperation in the area of defense and 

emergency management through education programs 

and military exercises; 5) capitalizing on the NDN 

achievements to promote partnerships; 6) preventing further militarization and arms race, especially 
82

in the Caspian to the west and the Fergana Valley to 

the south; 7) encouraging indigenous approaches to 

managing collective security and related institution 

building as pillars of regional and global stability; 8) 

cultivating ally and partner military ties with all major players for confidence-building purposes and contingencies that may require a joint military action in 

support of U.S. security interests. 

Washington should use some of the resources 

freed up after the disengagement from Afghanistan 

toward building more sustained military-to-military 

and civilian-to-civilian partnerships and institutions 

with regional counterparts. This imperative is critical 

because the U.S. withdrawal is expected to undercut 

the already low-level of military and nonmilitary aid 

to Central and South Asian states and undermine the 

perceived importance of the broader region for U.S. 

security interests, policymakers, strategic planners, 

and even U.S. allies and partners. Washington should 

see it through with its Central Asia Counternarcotics Initiative and create new or significantly enhance 

its present military and security institutions with the 

Central Asian states. Building a web of institutions 

in military and security area is critical to ensure U.S. 

long-term position in the region and its ability to 

prevent or mitigate swings in foreign policy by the 

regional capitals.

While it is inevitable that the United States would 

deepen its military ties with select Central Asian countries, it should advance its partnerships with all the 

regional states and in a way that builds multilateral, 

intraregional initiatives, relationships, and dynamics. 

This is critical as Washington seeks to promote winwin outcomes as part of the NSRS and prevent regional militarization. The U.S. military role should culti-
83

vate a durable and long-term institutional security 

infrastructure by fostering multilateral partnerships 

with countries in and outside the region, encouraging 

the regional states to pursue collective solutions to the 

management of common security challenges. External 

rivalries and intraregional conflicts without a durable 

institutional framework in place (not imposed, but 

inclusive and collective) is a recipe for disaster of continental proportions, which the U.S. military policy 

should seek to avoid. 

Upgrading U.S. New Silk Road Initiative. 

The lack of commitment to the NSRS by Washington reveals a low priority the United States assigns to 

the region, regardless of theoretical arguments that 

otherwise require a deeper and more substantive U.S. 

engagement in Central Asia. While sustaining a military role in the region is important to ensure a more 

seamless integration of Central and South Asia into 

the global economy, having no substantial economic 

stake in the region puts the United States at a disadvantage in its nascent but increasingly important strategic relationships with Central Asian states. 

The United States needs to support the engagement 

of American and Western businesses; enhance investments; encourage diversification of energy, trade, 

and transit links; and advance reforms to boost the 

region’s economic development potential. Providing 

economic aid will remain crucial, but helping advance 

institutional capacity and private sector engagement 

should form a durable, long-term, and self-sustaining 

approach to regional development. If it decides to 

treat the NSRS as its long-term economic strategy, it 

should focus on the following points.
84

First, Washington needs to pursue a more concerted effort to realize the vision of the NSRS, which 

requires more financial resources, commitment, leadership, and coordination. Instead of just “cobbling 

together existing programs”—as was reportedly the 

case—and allocating real funding for the initiative—

which reportedly was not done—the United States 

should come up with financial resources to implement 

existing and new projects.176 Actors view the NSRS as 

a substitute for the military disengagement from Afghanistan, but do not find it resourceful, especially as 

the military pullout threatens to undermine the NDNgenerated business activity. 

Second, Washington should develop a “software” 

component of the NSRS with a view to improve the 

business climate and expand international economic 

flows of the regional countries. This entails reducing tariff and nontariff trade barriers as part of Trade 

and Investment Framework Agreements framework, 

which should be closely integrated with the NSRS, and 

working with development and financial institutions, 

nongovernmental organizations and the WTO. Improving governance and transparency would be key 

to reduce corruption and promote efficient economies 

and accountable governments in the region. As part 

of the “hardware” component of the NSRS, Washington should provide more direct support to TAPI and 

CASA-1000, as well as allocate funding for specific energy, trade, and transit regional and interregional infrastructure projects. The U.S. direct engagement will 

be a signal for other actors who may be interested in 

such projects but have security concerns to participate 

in them.

Finally, just as it promotes free trade and other economics agreements and partnerships with Asian and 
85

European nations, Washington should spearhead such 

arrangements in and with Central and South Asian 

states as a way to lock in its long-term economic presence. The institutionalization of its economic presence 

would project an image of the United States as a more 

committed and reliable partner. It would also provide 

additional incentives to nurture direct U.S. economic 

engagement with the Central Asian economies for 

the longer haul, while providing options for the regional states to lessen their economic dependence on 

China and Russia. The current NSRS does not achieve 

this for the aforementioned reasons. It also does not 

have a strong institutional underpinning as far as 

the responses and participation of individual Central 

Asian countries or the region as a collective body are 

concerned. Addressing these deficiencies would substantially enhance the U.S. economic presence in the 

region, either as part of a revitalized NSRS or a new 

initiative, but necessarily in the framework of the U.S. 

“Pivot to Eurasia.” 

Advancing Cooperation with Key Partners. 

On the western flank of Central Asia, Washington 

should encourage the EU to play a more assertive role 

in the security sphere, including through NATO PfP 

programs and bilateral relations of its members. A 

possible full military withdrawal by the United States 

from Afghanistan and the region only accentuates 

this objective. Engaging the EU and its member-states 

would help the United States deflect otherwise more 

vocal opposition from China and Russia to increased 

military collaboration between NATO states and Central Asian countries. It would also help Washington 

reduce costs associated with its global military burden 
86

and contribute to any security arrangements that will 

be in place in the region after the withdrawal from 

Afghanistan. From border management to conflict 

prevention, the EU’s regional engagement is critical 

for Washington. The U.S diplomacy should do a better 

job persuading the EU to assume an expanded regional security role. The Russian-Georgian War and the 

war in Ukraine, which occurred on the EU’s doorstep, 

and the possibility of an interstate conflict in Central 

Asia, provide sufficient grounds for developing and 

pursuing a more active security role by the EU. 

Both Washington and Brussels should also significantly increase their economic presence in the region. 

Besides being one of the region’s largest trade partners, the EU is a source of substantial development 

assistance in a wide range of areas important for 

economic and political development of the regional 

republics. While the development of Central Asia’s 

energy resources to enhance the European energy 

security should remain a paramount objective of the 

U.S.-EU regional engagement, Washington and Brussels should take long-term policy precautions in light 

of the growing regional energy profiles of China and 

India, which are already diverting energy resources 

in substantially larger volumes than anticipated and 

in a way that may fully sideline Russia and the EU 

as the region’s main energy partners. Replacing one 

dominant energy actor in the region with another is 

not a solution; developing a multivector orientation 

of the regional capitals is. This is a key to the future 

of Central Asia as an integrated region of free states. 

Washington and Brussels should be more creative in 

advancing regional integration and developing the 

westward vector of the region’s energy, trade, and 

transit development. 
87

Both the United States and the EU need to be more 

patient and flexible with conditions for political and 

economic liberalization when engaging the regional 

counterparts. The regional presence and heavy security and state-led economic roles of authoritarian Russia and China require a more integrated approach to 

regional democratization. Washington and Brussels 

should join forces and emphasize China’s and Russia’s opaque approaches to economic cooperation, 

while promoting fair standards of conducting business relations.177 A more integrated democratization 

agenda would enhance U.S. efforts aimed at advancing transparent governments and open societies in 

Central Asian countries, which require profound economic and political reforms to become full-fledged 

and peaceful multi-ethnic states. Finally, both should 

consider using the EU experience with regional integration and governance, which in some respects could 

serve a model for the region178when promoting intraregional institutional development. 

On the northern flank, Washington has no other 

way but to engage Russia given China’s regional designs and the possibility of confrontation emerging 

between Moscow and Beijing over influence in Central Asia decades ahead. While it should not overlook 

Russia’s imperial advances in the region, it should 

pursue a more nuanced and delicate approach to 

Moscow’s initiatives and agenda that may serve U.S. 

interests of preventing a global domination by Beijing 

and providing more breathing space for Central Asian 

republics. Some portray Russia as the “ultimate swing 

state” in the future struggle over primacy in Eurasia, 

making bets on whether NATO, CSTO, or the SCO 

will have an upper hand in Central Asia. It is not inconceivable that the time will come when the United 
88

States will have to repeat the historic moment of opening up China with Russia in order to save Moscow and 

itself from Beijing’s global domination.179 Of course, 

the United States should have no illusions about Russia’s own goals. However, if the current development 

trajectories of great and aspiring powers hold, Russia may be lucky to have Washington as a partner 

in shaping the evolution of what may well become a 

post-Russian space.

In the meantime, cooperating with Russia as the 

major regional security actor is important for the 

United States in order to ensure regional stability, 

and the United States should continue advancing cooperation in counterterrorism, anti-drug trafficking, 

and counterproliferation, while starting to promote 

confidence-building measures as part of a broader 

regional security agenda due to the rise of China. Advancing cooperation on these issues—necessarily in 

the context of implications brought about by the rise 

of China in Central Asia—will gradually help build 

mutual confidence and allow Washington to pursue 

policies toward Central Asia that are not hostage to 

Russia’s objections or interference. On the economic 

front, Washington should seek to shape Russia’s participation in regional projects promoting north-south 

or south-north connectivity, provided such participation involves multilateral cooperation and is as less 

politicized, imposing, and one-dimensional as possible. In the current climate of strained ties, doing so 

may be more difficult than anticipated despite longterm trends suggesting more room for a more constructive partnership between the United States and 

Russia. Moscow views Washington as a spoiler after 

a decade of war in Afghanistan that has left behind 

instability and security risks in the form of expand-
89

ed drug trafficking, refugee flows, and cross-border 

militancy. Russia also objects to the U.S. Central Asia 

Counternarcotics Initiative, viewing it as a tool to augment U.S. regional military presence in Central Asia 

and gather military intelligence on CSTO members.180

On the southern flank, the United States should develop a long-term partnership with India, especially as 

it concerns Central Asia’s evolution. For both Washington and Delhi, reconnecting Central and South Asia 

is imperative because it would boost India’s energy 

deficit-stricken economy, ensure the development of 

Afghanistan, strengthen India’s position relative to 

China, and promote India’s expanding trade via Central Asia to European and Middle Eastern markets. 

India’s rise is set to expand Central Asia’s southward 

vectors of connectivity. With time, the Central Asian 

states will seek to deflect the pressure from the east 

(China) by cultivating closer ties with India, as they 

pursue an efficient and secure way of connecting with 

the world. But Delhi is a relative latecomer to the renewed version of the “Great Game” unfolding in Central Asia, making it imperative for the United States to 

develop and pursue with India a more robust, direct, 

integrated, and long-term strategy of engagement focused on the region. The U.S. role will be critical for 

expanding Delhi’s regional presence given similarity 

of regional goals expressed in the Indian “connect” 

policy and the U.S. NSRS, as we all have their shared 

apprehension about Russia’s and China’s dominant 

military and economic positions. 

India is further an important military and economic partner for Washington in rebuilding Afghanistan and could become a major partner in managing 

China’s rise on both the land and the high seas. It can 

be a greater source of counterterrorism capabilities for 
90

Central and South Asian states. Its democratic political 

tradition and economic success as a developing nation 

is an asset, which both Delhi and Washington should 

utilize to improve regional political and economic 

systems. While emerging slowly, India’s regional economic presence is set to grow considerably over the 

next decades if India’s upward growth dynamics do 

not falter. India’s involvement in the region would be 

pronounced in the energy sphere if TAPI, CASA-1000, 

and other interregional projects materialized and expanded. The substantial presence of Russia and China 

in Central Asia, the uncertainty surrounding the war 

in Afghanistan, and the region’s potential to serve as 

a transcontinental trade, energy, and transit hub point 

to the benefits of the United States and India working 

together to advance development and stability in the 

broader region. 

On the eastern flank of Central Asia, the U.S. engagement with China will be critical for the future of 

Central Asia and the long-term positions of both powers. This engagement—already the most critical of all 

bilateral relationships—is set to grow in importance 

as China’s interests spread globally and interact with 

the interests of the still strongest power. The United 

States should start pursuing a memorandum of understanding with China on Beijing’s growing presence 

in Central Asia. This memorandum should serve as a 

component of its overarching memorandum regarding China’s global rise and must not compromise the 

sovereignty of the Central Asian states. In the process, 

the United States should be guided by the need to 

manage China’s rise on two major flanks: the east and 

the west. While it launched the “pivot” to the Pacific 

to do the job in the east, it failed to initiate a credible 

“pivot” to Central Asia to do so in the west. Instead, 
91

it is pursuing a “U-turn” given its plans to withdraw 

from Afghanistan. 

If Washington views the NSRS as part of the proposed “pivot” to the region, it should ensure that the 

initiative rests on a solid commitment, sufficient resources, and worked-out mechanisms of interaction 

with China’s “belt” initiative. Otherwise, the NSRS 

may become a smart concept that China is implementing in practice. As it considers a credible “pivot” to 

Central Asia, Washington should assess the merits 

of promoting a consortium of connectivity initiatives promoted by all external players and necessarily supported by the Central Asian states. It should 

thus closely watch China’s proposal for a free trade 

zone with the EU because China is seeking an intraregional trade zone based on local currency convertibility, which would accelerate the internationalization 

of Chinese currency and conflict with the U.S. trade 

policy based on convertibility of local currencies to 

an international standard, such as the U.S. dollar.181 In 

the security field, the United States should seek ways 

of cooperating with the SCO to advance regional stability182 and prepare the ground for likely regional

military expansion by China.

Cooperating with China is absolutely critical for 

the global stability and the future of the broader region, given Beijing’s rapidly growing economic presence; expanding global trade profile; and the need 

for the United States to encourage China-led energy, 

trade, and transit connections in all directions to shrink 

Central Asia’s connectivity gap and enhance regional 

development. China’s economic role is also important 

for the evolution of Afghanistan and Pakistan. China’s 

growing investment in the countries is important for 

the long-term stability, development, and integration 
92

within and between Central and South Asia. As part 

of its engagement with China, Washington should 

encourage Beijing’s push for advancing Central and 

South Asia’s connectivity with the global economy. 

But just as in the case with Russia, the United States 

should discourage any of Beijing’s attempts at economic and military domination in the region and promote, to the extent possible, the economic and security engagement of Central Asian actors with actors 

as diverse as India, Turkey, and, with time, even Iran. 

This would provide Central Asian states with more 

options for advancing development and stability and 

for maneuvering on the global stage. 

Shaping China’s Global Ascendance. 

Washington should approach the objective of shaping China’s rise with a particular attention. China’s 

experiment, if unsuccessful, would have disastrous 

consequences for the entire world, including the United States itself. Unlike the Soviet Union then, China 

today is integrated with the global system, and its 

success is closely linked with the success of the global 

economy and projected global economic convergence. 

Implosion of China could well usher in the age of disunity and encroachments on China’s sovereignty183

and increased risk of collisions among great powers 

that could cause collateral and permanent damage 

for small states—a scenario all too familiar to history. 

The mission of the U.S. statecraft vis-à-vis China is as 

simple as it is complex; supporting conditions for a 

peaceful rise of China that would not threaten U.S. 

fundamental interests of leading the global order and 

protecting the global commons. 
93

A subtext of this mission is the need for the United 

States to ensure a smooth power transition from the 

“West to the Rest.” Ideally, this power shift would 

see China emerge as a democratic and prosperous 

nation working in partnership with the United States 

and its partners in leading the global security and 

economic order. Washington should start pondering 

formulas enabling China and India to participate in 

the management of global order today.184 The earlier it 

starts, the better. If China succeeded in becoming the 

strongest power without Washington shaping China’s 

rise in process, the consequences for the U.S. global 

standing would be disastrous. 

While both the United States and China are integrated economically, they have different goals, interests, and views on global affairs. What they need is a 

solid platform of bilateral engagement to help cultivate “strategic trust,” common objectives, and shared 

interests.185 Such a platform would need to ensure that 

the parties eventually reach the stage of comfortably 

discussing and addressing respective concerns about 

interference in internal affairs and lack of democratization. The United States should seek to institutionalize its relationship with China early on as part of an 

overarching memorandum with Beijing, perhaps by 

giving a chance to the proposed G-2 model or working on global warming challenges before plunging to 

other, more sensitive areas.186

This is critical because Chinese leaders are often silent on the question of what China wants, what strategies it seeks, what alternatives it offers, and what it 

envisions its global and regional role and presence to 

be.187 On this issue, the United States should encourage a transparent dialogue with China, making Beijing 

more vocal and clear about its priorities. This would 
94

allow Washington to hold Beijing accountable to a 

proclaimed policy direction and help Beijing cultivate 

for itself a responsible role in world affairs seeking 

win-win outcomes. Pursuing the institutionalization 

of this relationship by spearheading multilateral structures involving both parties could serve as a precursor 

to the emergence of such a platform in the future. 

As it pursues this goal, the United States should 

pay attention to the “normative dimension of China’s 

integration” into the global economic and security 

system, an integration that remains “limited” despite 

Beijing’s growing global footprint. This means more 

training, education, and capacity-building programs 

aimed at developing common understanding of the 

rules of the game.188 These rules inevitably concern 

the domestic political situation in both countries, and 

the United States should continue efforts aimed at advancing democratization of China. As 2010 Chinese 

Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiabao stated on the 

issue of governance in China: “. . . We would rather 

have two mutually balancing devils than one angel 

with absolute power.”189 A change in the political system, decades after successful changes to the country’s 

economic system, would assure the rest of the world 

about China’s peaceful emergence as a great power. 

As Henry Kissinger observed, “. . . peace with China 

is less a matter of strategy than of change in Chinese 

governance.”190 The United States should closely work 

with a fifth generation of Chinese leaders since the 

creation of the People’s Republic of China, who were 

not exposed to Mao’s Cultural Revolution and are enjoying the benefits of a rapidly-modernizing China.191

But Washington should be under no illusion that a 

democratized China may emerge as a much more formidable power in economic and military terms than 

an authoritarian China could ever be.192
95

Finally, Washington should engage as many partners as possible in shaping China’s rise. The key relationships in this regard are with India in South Asia, 

Russia in Central Asia, Japan in East Asia, and the EU 

in the Caspian. In case of improved ties with Iran in 

the years or decades ahead, Washington should find 

in Tehran an important pillar of its regional policy 

vis-à-vis China. The idea behind such multilateral cooperation on the issue of China’s rise is not to punish, isolate, or contain Beijing. Rather, the goal is to 

engage China on multiple fronts to make its stake in 

this ever-expanding web of relationships more obvious, precious, and self-sustaining. This would demonstrate the importance of China to the global stability and the importance of global stability to China’s 

evolution as a great power. If Beijing indeed seeks a 

peaceful development and is adamant about its ability to rewrite history by ensuring a peaceful power 

transition, it should be willing to pursue some form 

of accommodation vis-à-vis the “ruler” and the “rules 

of the game.” Whether China does emerge as a global 

power in all dimensions, of course, remains to be seen. 
96

CONCLUSION

If China Succeeds or Fails: The Future of 

Economic and Security Order in Central Asia.

China’s rise has prompted some to quip that “BC” 

and “AC” should now represent the period of history

before China and the period of history after China, 

and that the year 1978 when China undertook reform 

should mark “the great watershed” separating the two 

eras.193 China already once was the largest economy 

in the 19th century. Attaining this position again in 

the 21st century should not be new to Beijing. Chinese 

leadership views the country’s rise as enabling Beijing 

to reclaim its status of a great and central power. Productive capacity of any aspiring great power is instrumental for becoming a great power in all dimensions 

and projecting a global hegemony, with the United 

States representing the latest, although probably not 

the last, example of a great power harnessing its economic capacity for purposes of alleged global expansion. If there is another state close to repeating this experience any time soon, it is China.194 In a reversal of 

its centuries-long tradition, China today significantly 

relies on the external system of economic relations to 

facilitate its internal development and is profoundly 

integrated with the global economic system. Rather 

than viewing the system as a threat, China has embraced it, catapulting itself into the ranks of fastestgrowing economies and being poised to overtake the 

U.S. economy in terms of total GDP in the next few 

years and in terms of GDP per capita by about 2050. 

China’s ongoing emergence as a global power has 

questioned the position of the United States as the 

strongest power and the future of the Washington-led 

global security and economic order. But achieving the 
97

status of a truly global actor welding influence in all 

dimensions of power would require China, among 

other things, to leverage its regional influence in Central Asia—a region representing its western leg of 

economic expansion and development, which is assuming a growing strategic importance for Beijing. It 

is also a region that should be of greater importance to 

Washington seeking to preserve its leading position 

in the international system and ensure China’s peaceful integration in the global political, security, and 

economic architecture. 

Viewed in this light, the question of future economic and security order in Central Asia is of paramount importance to global stability. The region is 

experiencing constantly shifting “push-pull” forces 

exerted by external powers, which advance agendas 

often conflicting with those of other powers or the 

views of the Central Asian states, increasing the risk of 

regional or global conflicts. Russia “pulls” the region 

north; the EU, west; the United States, west and south; 

India, south; and China, east. While none of them yet 

wield an overwhelming influence across all categories of power, it is China that is already projecting the 

strongest economic presence and has the potential to 

build “comprehensive influence” (economic, cultural, 

political, and military). 

We cannot know what China’s hegemony will look 

like. China is silent on its vision for the world or the 

region, let alone its potential hegemony that it claims 

it does not seek. In the early-1990s, Chinese leadership 

warned against assuming leadership in global affairs 

and show restraint for fear of threatening other actors 

and its own development. But Beijing has gradually 

been shedding off this guideline as its economic profile has been consistently on the rise.195 If it came to 

pass, China’s regional hegemony would probably rest 
98

on an overwhelmingly strong economic, demographic, and cultural presence. The philosophical underpinnings of China’s hegemony would draw on the mix of 

China’s modernity with contemporary and universal 

characteristics and its rich Confucius tradition and the 

tributary system that emphasizes Chinese superiority over the “barbarians.” The net effect would be a 

more enhanced economic development of the regional states, which are connected to the global system 

through China as its most dynamic center of economic 

activity, but are also subordinate to China’s economic 

and cultural paradigm. The regional states would lose 

their political and economic independence, while preserving their territory and struggling to retain their 

rapidly changing cultural make-up.

While China is also likely to expand its military 

influence in the region, including by establishing military bases, depots, and logistics centers, it is unlikely 

to project its hegemony through territorial expansion 

or acquisition by force. The presence of other actors, 

the existence of nuclear weapons in the hands of its 

strategic rivals, and the changing nature of power in 

the 21st century conditions would work against this 

scenario or, at a minimum, constrain China’s use of 

the military in the region as an occupying force. These 

factors, however, leave the possibility of China using 

force to seize parts of Central Asia to repel aggression against its own territory, protect its threatened 

economic assets, and pursue militants in case of state 

failure in the region. 

Other scenarios are also possible. If it attained the 

status of the world’s strongest economic and military 

power, China could display an even more assertive 

stance in foreign affairs. It has already started doing 

that in Asia vis-à-vis Vietnam, Japan, and the Phil-
99

ippines, drawing on both the reality and perception 

of its growing national strength. A collision with the 

United States, for example, could spark proxy wars, 

with Washington and Beijing supporting respective 

parties196—a situation that would almost surely involve Central Asia. As Russia before it, China may 

well seek to cave out for itself a zone of special influence in Central Asia. Or, as it had itself done earlier, 

China could simply devour the tiny republics through 

enhanced Han migration, economic flows, and military expansion, essentially subjugating the region. On 

the other hand, the region’s economic and security 

order under a China’s hegemony need not be bloody 

or rest on China’s military subjugation or domination. 

China already surprised the world with its impressive, 

decades-long economic growth, and may do so again 

if its follows through on its declaration to ensure a 

peaceful transition of power by way of its peaceful development. Viewed through this prism, China’s global 

and regional hegemony may turn out to be benevolent and conducive to continued global and regional 

economic development and stability, with especially 

strong benefits for China’s neighbors in Central Asia 

that need to catch up fast with the world. 

But China’s hegemony may never pass. China 

faces numerous socio-economic, environmental, and 

political challenges that could derail or delay its rise to 

the ranks of global or regional hegemons. The wealth 

China has amassed has made the internal social dislocations and inequality more pronounced, exposing its 

economic model and making it vulnerable to external 

influences. This has prompted some in the leadership 

to be concerned about China’s external engagement 

and steer it into the direction of an inward-looking 

country with a strong coercive state apparatus and 
100

“accelerated efforts to develop the capabilities” needed to “control the periphery.”197 More generally, China’s economy is in the process of readjustment, which 

is slowing down its growth rate from double digits in 

the previous decades to single digits today and years 

ahead. As a popular observation goes, China will 

“also get old first before it gets rich.” Some therefore 

argue that China is a “partial” global power that is 

pursuing an “Empty Fortress” stratagem in Central 

and South Asia. Specifically, the argument goes, it has 

been seeking to position itself as a strong and rising 

power when, in reality, it is facing major challenges 

constraining its global rise.198

Unless it implements profound economic and political reforms, and lessens its vulnerability to “exogenous developments” (e.g., excessive dependence on 

trade), China may not make it as the global hegemon 

or a “comprehensively” great power. To translate 

its “economic weight into power and influence” will 

require Beijing to embrace the same or similar concepts and modes of operation pursued by the United 

States,199 even if with Chinese characteristics. Latest 

plans unveiled by the leadership indicate that China 

is already moving in this direction. Beijing seeks to 

modernize its financial system, enhance labor mobility, reduce corruption, and advance sustainability and 

governance mechanisms.200 Once China achieves its 

“comprehensive national power,” it is likely to change 

its current strategy seeking to tap into external environment to generate internal development.201 It is at 

this point that the choice of its strategy toward neighbors and the world will be of paramount importance. 

How Beijing handles the restive Xingjian will show if 

Beijing seeks to or will inflame or stabilize the broader 

Central Asia.
101

Regardless of whether China’s hegemony ultimately emerges in Central Asia, the United States, its 

partners, and the regional states need to be prepared to 

face an even more assertive China in the years ahead. 

This is because Central Asia affords Beijing more room 

for “offence,” given a lower level of “strategy rivalry” 

in the region than China confronts in East Asia.202

Washington needs to launch a credible “Pivot to Eurasia” by boosting military engagement, upgrading its 

NSRS, advancing cooperation with key partners, and 

shaping China’s global ascendance, including in the 

framework of its relations with Central Asian states. 

This would mitigate China’s possible hegemony and 

the negative effects of its growing influence on the cultural, economic, political, and military independence 

of the Central Asian states, helping the United States 

retain its leading position and role in managing the 

global order. This is salient because Washington is 

withdrawing from Central Asia, raising the question 

on how to shape the region’s evolution and geopolitics 

on terms favorable to the United States. It has done 

a lot to open China, Central Asia, and South Asia to 

the outside world. But unless it implements the previously discussed steps, Washington risks forgoing benefits of the region’s rise as a connectivity platform in 

Eurasia and risks losing an opportunity to shape Beijing’s rise and the global order out of the region that is 

becoming of rapidly growing strategic importance to 

its main partner and challenger—China.
102

ENDNOTES

1. David Shambaugh, China Goes Global: The Partial Power, 

Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2013, p. 317.

2. Minghao Zhao, “March Westwards and a New Look on 

China’s Grand Strategy,” presented at Workshop IV of the Peking University - University of Chicago Summer Institute on International Relations Theory and Method, August 18-22, 2014, 

Beijing, p. 2.

3. Aaron L. Friedberg, A Contest for Supremacy: China, America, 

and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia, New York: W. W. Norton & 

Company, 2011, p. 33.

4. Wojtek M. Wolfe, “China’s Strategic Hedging,” Orbis,

Foreign Policy Research Institute, Spring 2013, p. 313.

5. Zhou Huasheng, “China’s Central Asia Policy,” Charles 

Hawkings and Robert Love, eds., The New Great Game: Chinese 

Views in Central Asia, Fort Leavenworth, KS: Foreign Military 

Studies Office, 2006, p. 21.

6. Vladimir Mikhaylovich Blinkov, “Izmenenie ekonomicheskoi modeli razvitiya Kitaya I ego vliyanie na kitayskuiu vneshneekonomicheskuiu politiku” (“China’s Changing Model of Economic Development and Its Impact on China’s External Eocnomic 

Policy”), Russian Institute of Strategic Studies, June 30, 2014.

7. Ibid.

8. Martin Jacques, When China Rules the World: The End of the 

Western World and the Birth of a New Global Order, New York: The 

Penguin Press, 2009, p. 276.

9. Li Limin, “Global Geopolitical Changes and China’s Strategic Choices,” Xiandai guoji guanxi, No. 4, April 2010, pp. 1-10. 

Also see Mathieu Duchatel, “China’s Strategic Choices” in “

Geopolitics on Chinese Terms,” China Analysis, pp. 5-7.

10. Jason Young, “Asia Rising to the China Challenge,” in 

“2010 Australia-China Futures Dialogues, Emerging Leaders 
103

Dialogues,” Regional Outlook Paper No. 27, Brisbane, Australia: 

Griffith Asia Institute, 2010, p. 21.

11. Lee Kuan Yew, “China’s Growing Might and the 

Consequences,” Forbes, March 9, 2011. 

12. Henry Kissinger, On China, New York: The Penguin Press, 

2011, p. 499.

13. Minghao Zhao, p. 5.

14. Stephen Blank, “China’s Silk Roads and Their 

Challenges,” Central Asia-Caucasus Analyst, January 7, 2015.

15. Flynt Leverett, Hillary Mann Leverett, and Wu Bingbing, 

“China Looks West: What is at Stake in Beijing’s ‘New Silk Road’ 

Project,” The World Financial Review, January 25, 2015.

16. Geoff Dyer, The Contest of the Century: The New Era of Competition with China—and How America Can Win, New York: Alfred 

A. Knopf, 2014, p. 229.

17. Shambaugh, pp. 174, 178, 181.

18. Taken from Ibid., Leverett.

19. Quoted in Roman Muzalevsky, “China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan Railway Scheme: Fears, Hopes and Prospects,” Eurasia 

Daily Monitor, Vol. 9, Issue 102, May 30, 2012. 

20. Roman Muzalevsky, Central Asia’s Shrinking Connectivity 

Gap: Implications for U.S. Strategy, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies 

Institute and U.S. Army War College Press, November 2014, p. 33.

21. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 163.

22. Li Sing and Wang Changsing, “Strategiya Energeticheskoi 

Bezopasnosti Kitaya v Zentral’noi Azii” (“China’s Energy Security Strategy in Central Asia”), Sravnitel’naya Politka, Vol. 2, No. 

12, 2013.

23. Ibid., Dyer, p. 29.
104

24. Christopher D. Yung and Ross Rustichi, with Scott Devary 

and Jenny Lin, “Not an idea We Have to Shun: Chinese Overseas 

Basing Requirements in the 21st Century,” China Strategic Perspectives No. 7, Washington, DC: Center for the Study of Chinese 

Military Affairs, Institute for National Strategic Studies, National 

Defense University, October 2014, pp. 5-8.

25. Liyan Hu and Ter-Shing Cheng, “China’s Energy Security and Geo-Economic Interests in Central Asia,” Central European Journal of International and Security Studies, Vol. 2, Issue 2, 

2008, p. 52.

26. Aleksandra Jarosiewicz and Krzysztof Strachota, China VS 

Central Asia: The Achievements of the Past Two Decades, No. 45, Warsaw, Poland: Center for Eastern Studies, October 2013, pp. 47, 51.

27. Pan Guang, “China and Central Asia: Charting a New 

Course for Regional Cooperation,” China Brief, Vol. 7, Issue 3, 

February 7, 2007.

28. J. Peter Pham, “Beijing’s Great Game: Understanding 

Chinese Strategy in Central Eurasia,” American Foreign Policy 

Interests, Vol. 28, No. 3-67, 2006, p. 58.

29. A. E. Mal’tsev, “Osobennosti Politiki KNR v Tsentral’noi 

Azii v Otsenkakh Rossiiskikh I Zapadnykh Utchenykh” (“Aspects of PRC’s Policy in Central Asia in Assessments of Russian 

and Western Scholars”), Sravnitel’naia Politika, Vol. 4, No. 10, 

2012, p. 21.

30. Parag Khanna, The Second World: Empires and Influence in 

the New Global Order, New York: Random House, 2008, p. 87.

31. Ibid.; Muzalevsky, Central Asia’s Shrinking Connectivity 

Gap, pp. 34-35. 

32. Andrew Scobell, Ely Ratner, and Michael Beckley, China’s 

Strategy Toward South and Central Asia: and Empty Fortress, Santa 

Monica, CA: RAND, 2014, p. 57.

33. Michael Clarke, “China’s Strategy in Greater Central Asia: 

Is Afghanistan the Missing Link?” Asian Affairs: An American 

Review, Vol. 40, No. 11, 2013, pp. 13-15.
105

34. Zhao Huasheng, “China’s View of and Expectations from 

the Shanghai Cooperation Organization,” Asian Survey, Vol. 53, 

No. 3, May-June 2013, p. 454.

35. Ibid., Shambaugh, pp. 201-202.

36. Sarah Lain, “China’s Strategic Presence in Central Asia,” 

IHS Jane’s, August 2014. 

37. Yuri Chernogaev, “Orizhie ‘made in China’,” Ankhor.uz, 

February 3, 2015.

38. Niklas Swanstrom, “China and Central Asia: A New Great 

Game or Traditional Vassal Relations?” Journal of Contemporary 

China, Vol. 14, No. 45, November 2005, p. 582.

39. Scobell, Ratner, and Beckley, p. 41.

40. David M. Finkelstein, China and Central Asia: Enduring Interests and Contemporary Concerns, Washington, DC: CAN 

Corporation, pp. 9-10.

41. China’s Central Asia Problem, Asia Report No. 244, Brussels, 

Belgium: International Crisis Group, February 27, 2013, p. 5.

42. Ibid., Shambaugh, pp. 35-36, 81-83.

43. Ibid., China’s Central Asia Problem, p. 9.

44. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 86.

45. Odd Arne Westad, Restless Empire: China and the World 

since 1750, New York: Basic Books, 2012, p. 378.

46. Ibid., Kissinger, p. 546.

47. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 19.

48. “Clinton Calls Eurasian Integration An Effort To 

‘Re-Sovietize’,” Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, March 9, 2015.
106

49. Alina Terekhova, “Moskva distantsyruetsya ot kitayskogo proekta novogo Shelkovogo puti” (“Moscow Distances Itself from China’s New Silk Road Project”), Nezavisimaya Gazeta, 

January 20, 2015.

50. Wang Shuchun and Wan Qingson, “The Silk Road Economic Belt and the EEU: Rivals or Partners?” Central Asia and the 

Caucasus Journal of Social and Political Studies, January 3, 2014, p. 7.

51. Ibid., Scobell, p. 44.

52. Taken from “Gazprom rezko sokraschaet ob’yemy zakupok prirodnogo gaza v Turkmenistane I Uzbekistane” (“Gazprom 

Sharply Reduces Natural Gas Purchases from Turkmenistan and 

Uzbekistan”), Fergana News, February 3, 2011.

53. Chernogaev. 

54. William Dalrymple, “Afghanistan: As China Forges New 

Alliances, a New Great Game has Begun,” The Guardian, March 

18, 2014.

55. Ibid., Jarosiewicz, p. 22.

56. Quoted in David Kerr, “Central Asian and Russian Perspectives on China’s Strategic Emergence,” International Affairs, 

Vol. 86, No. 1, January 2010, pp. 146-148.

57. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 104.

58. Larry M. Wortzel, “PLA ‘Joint’ Operational Contingencies in South Asia, Central Asia, and Korea,” Beyond The Strait: 

PLA Missions Other Than Taiwan, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies 

Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2009, p. 361.

59. Ibid., Scobell, p. 30.

60. Ibid., p. 65.

61. Ambrish Dhaka, “Factoring Central Asia into China’s Afghanistan Policy,” Journal of Eurasian Studies, Vol. 5, 2014, p. 101.
107

62. Ibid., Muzalevsky, Central Asia’s Shrinking Connectivity 

Gap, p. 37.

63. Ibid., p. 38.

64. For more in-depth discussion on this, see Roman Muzalevsky, From Frozen Ties to Strategic Engagement: U.S.-Iranian Relationship in 2030, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, U.S. 

Army War College Press, 2015.

65. For more on the term, see Zhao Gancheng, “The Rise of 

Chindia and Its Impact on the World System,” in Roy Huisken, 

ed., Rising China: Power and Reassurance, Canberra, Australia: The 

Australian National University Press, 2009, pp. 65-77.

66. Yu Jianhua, “Competition for Caspian Energy Development and Its Relationship with China,” Charles Hawkings and 

Robert Love, eds., The New Great Game: Chinese Views in Central 

Asia, Fort Leavenworth, KS: Foreign Military Studies Office, 

2006, p. 149.

67. Ibid., p. 72.

68. For growth comparisons, see Sandy Gordon, “Sino-Indian 

Relations and the Rise of China,” Roy Huisken, ed., Rising China: 

Power and Reassurance, p. 59.

69. Aaron L. Friedberg, A Contest for Supremacy: China, America, and the Struggle for Mastery in Asia, New York: W. W. Norton & 

Company, 2011, p. 25.

70. Ibid. for quote and this statement, p. 26.

71. Ibid., Gordon, pp. 52-6. Also see Westad, p. 461.

72. Ibid., Kissinger, pp. 497-498. Also see Friedberg, p. 147.

73. Xia Liping, “How China Thinks about National Security,” 

Roy Huisken, ed., Rising China: Power and Reassurance, pp. 65-77.

74. Michael D. Swaine and Ashley J. Tellis, Interpreting China’s Grand Strategy: Past, Present, and Future, Santa Monica, CA: 

RAND, 2000, p. 164.
108

75. Ibid., Shambaugh, pp. 274, 281.

76. Ibid., pp. 289-294.

77. Ibid., Kissinger, pp. 506-507.

78. Ibid., Friedberg, pp. 58-59.

79. Ibid., Leverett.

80. Elizabeth C. Economy, “China’s Imperial President Xi 

Jinping Tightens His Grip,” Foreign Affairs, November 2, 2014.

81. “Why China Is Creating a New “World Bank” for Asia,” 

The Economist, November 11, 2014.

82. Nicholas Watt, Paul Lewis, and Tania Branigan, “US 

anger at Britain joining Chinese-led investment bank AIIB,” 

The Guardian, March 12, 2015.

83. Ibid., Zhao, p. 2.

84. Fred Bergsten, Charles Freeman, Nicholas Lardy, and 

Derek Mitchell, China’s Rise: Challenges and Opportunities, Washington, DC: Peterson Institute for International Economics and 

Center for Strategic and International Studies, 2008, p. 224.

85. Robert Kaplan, Asia’s Cauldron: The South China Sea and the 

End of a Stable Pacific, New York: Random House, 2014. 

86. Zhiqun Zhu, “Zhu on Kueh, ‘Pax Sinica: Geopolitics and 

Economics of China’s Accidence,’” Review on H-Diplo by Zhiqun 

Zhu of Y.Y. Kueh, Pax Sinica: Geopolitics and Economics of China’s 

Accidence, Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2012.

87. Ibid., Gordon, p. 60.

88. Carl Thayer, “The Philippines, Malaysia, and Vietnam 

Race to South China Sea Defense Modernization,” The Diplomat, 

January 23, 2015.

89. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 74.
109

90. Ibid., p. 77. Also see Wang Jisi, “China’s Changing Role in 

Asia,” Kokubun Ryosei and Wang Jisi, ed., The Rise of China and a 

Changing East Asian Order, Tokyo, Japan: Japan Center for International Exchange, 2004, p. 17.

91. Ibid., Kissinger, On China, p. 526.

92. Quoted in Hao Qi, “The Rise of China and Its Uncertain 

Implications for Asia,” in “2010 Australia-China Futures Dialogues, Emerging Leaders Dialogues,” Regional Outlook Paper No. 

27, Brisbane, Australia: Griffith Asia Institute, 2010, p. 16.

93. John Mearsheimer, The Tragedy of Great Power Politics, New 

York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2002, p. 400.

94. Quoted in Qianqian Liu, “China’s Rise and Regional Strategy: Power, Interdependence, and Identity,” Journal of Cambridge 

Studies, Vol. 5, No. 4, p. 79.

95. Ibid., Swaine and Tellis, p. 3.

96. Ibid., p. 1.

97. Ibid., Friedberg, p. 183.

98. Ibid., Zhao, p. 7.

99. Roman Muzalevsky, “The Economic Underpinnings of 

China’s Regional Security Strategy in Afghanistan,” Eurasia Daily 

Monitor, Vol. 7, Issue 75, April 19, 2010.

100. “China’s Global Influence,” Global Issues in Context Online 

Collection, Detroit: Gale, December 14, 2014.

101. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 37.

102. Quoted from W. B. Yeats, “The Second Coming,” a poem 

written in 1919 following the devastating World War I. 

103. “Tsentral’naya Aziya: bezopasnost’ na fone geopolitiki” 

(“Central Asia—Security in the Backdrop of Geoplitics”), Veceherniy Bishkek, February 12, 2015.
110

104. Friedberg, p. 53.

105. Shambaugh, p. 37.

106. Kevin Sheives, “China Turns West: Beijing’s Contemporary Strategy towards Central Asia,” Pacific Affairs, Vol. 79, No. 2, 

Summer 2006, p. 207.

107. Bergsten et al., p. 220.

108. Tang Shiping and Zhang Yunling, “China’s Regional 

Strategy,” David Shambaugh. ed., Power Shift: China and Asia’s 

New Dynamics, University of California Press, 2005, p. 7.

109. Sebastien Peyrouse, “Military Cooperation between China and Central Asia: Breakthrough, Limits, and Prospects,” China 

Brief, Vol. 10, Issue 5, March 5, 2010, pp. 10-12.

110. Axel Berkofsky, “China’s Strategic Involvement in Central Asia’s Strategies, Results, and Obstacles,” Institute of International Political Studies, No. 128, July 2012, p. 5. 

111. Ivan Safranchuk, “China’s Stakes in Central Asia,” Asia 

Security Briefing, No. 3, July 2012.

112. Jacques, p. 337.

113. China’s Central Asia Problem, Asia Report No. 244, 

pp. 27-28.

114. Khanna, p. 110.

115. Quoted in ibid., Bergsten et al., p. 9.

116. Ibid., Jacques, p. 3.

117. Professor Yan Xuetong, quoted in Tania Branigan, “China’s Foreign Policy Is Playing Catch-up with Its New Status,” The 

Guardian, March 22, 2012.

118. Professor Jin Canrong, Renmin University, 2010, quoted 

in ibid.; Shambaugh, p. 13.
111

119. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 155.

120. Deng Xiaoping, speech at the UN General Assembly, 

April 1974. 

121. Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of Word Order, New York: Simon and Schuster Paperbacks, 

2003, p. 229.

122. Full Text of White Paper on China’s Peaceful 

Development, Xinhua, September 6, 2011.

123. Quoted in ibid., Shambaugh, p. 121.

124. Wang Jisi, “China’s Search for a Grand Strategy: A Rising 

Power Finds Its Way,” Foreign Affairs, March-April 2011.

125. Sebastian Heilmann, Moritz Rudolf, Mikko Huotari, 

and Johannes Buckow, “China’s Shadow Foreign Policy: Parallel 

Structures Challenge the Established International Order,” China 

Monitor, No. 18, Mercator Institute for China Studies, October 

28, 2014.

126. Ibid., Westad, p. 446.

127. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 362, 369-370.

128. Bernardo Mariani, “China’s Role and Interests in Central 

Asia,” Safeworld, October 2013, p. 17.

129. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 270-271.

130. Swaine and Tellis, pp. 193-196, 223.

131. Xia Liping, “How China Thinks about National Security,” in Roy Huisken, ed., Rising China: Power and 

Reassurance, pp. 115-117.

132. Khanna, p. 115.

133. Ibid., pp. 25-34.
112

134. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 237-240.

135. Adiljan Umraov and Dmitriy Pashkun, Tensions in Sino-Central Asian Relations and their Implications for Regional Security, Watlington, Oxford, UK: Conflict Studies Research Center, 

January 2006.

136. Taken from ibid., Swaine and Tellis, p. 48.

137. Ibid., pp. 46-47.

138. Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 60.

139. Peyrouse, p. 13.

140. Martin Andrew, “PLA Doctrine on Securing Energy 

Resources in Central Asia,” China Brief, July 9, 2006.

141. China’s Military Power: Shadow Over Central Asia, Arlington, VA: Lexington Institute, August 2006, pp. 5-8, 15.

142. Larry M. Wortzel, “PLA ‘Joint’ Operational Contingencies in South Asia, Central Asia, and Korea,” in Beyond The Strait: 

PLA Missions Other Than Taiwan, Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies 

Institute, U.S. Army War College, 2009, p. 345.

143. Luba v. Hauff, “A Stabilizing Neighbor? The Impact 

of China’s Engagement in Central Asia on Regional Security,” 

DGAPanalyse, No. 3, April 2013, p. 9.

144. Ibid., Friedberg, p. 171.

145. Ibid., Bergsten, p. 37.

146. Edward D. Mansfield and Jack Snyder, “Democratization 

and War,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 74, No. 3, 1995, p. 80. Also taken 

from ibid., Swaine and Tellis, p. 172.

147. Yong Deng and Fei-Ling Wang, eds., In the Eyes of the 

Dragon: China Views the World, Oxford, UK: Rowman & Littlefield 

Publishers, Inc., 1999, p. 35.
113

148. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 13-16, 274.

149. Ibid., Swaine and Tellis, p. 14.

150. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 270-271.

151. Taken from Ibid., Jacques, p. 242.

152. Orville Schell and John Delury, Wealth and Power: China’s Long March to the Twenty-First Century, New York: Random 

House, 2012, pp. 396-401.

153. Aleksandra Jarosiewicz and Krzysztof Strachota, China 

VS Central Asia: The Achievements of the Past Two Decades, Paper 

No. 45, Warsaw, Poland: Center for Eastern Studies, October 

2013, p. 74.

154. Ibid., Jacques, p. 354.

155. Ibid., Shambaugh, pp. 207, 212-213.

156. Hi Jintao, Speech at Meeting Commemorating the 90th 

Anniversary of the Founding of the Communist Party of China, 

July 1, 2011, quoted in Ibid., Shambaugh, p. 207.

157. Ibid., Shambaugh, pp. 245-246.

158. Ibid., pp. 5-6.

159. Ibid., pp. 7-8, 307.

160. Zhanara Abdulova, “Eurasian Economic Union for Both 

Region and China, Beijing Envoy Says,” The Astana Times, January 

28, 2015.

161. Ibid., Khanna, p. 88.

162. Martha Brill Olcott, “China’s Unmatched Influence in 

Central Asia,” Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, September 13, 2013.

163. Ibid., Jarosiewicz and Strachota, p. 29.
114

164. Roman Muzalevsky, “Turkmen Energy Initiatives 

Cripple Russia’s Status as an Energy Superpower,” Eurasia 

Daily Monitor, Vol. 7, No. 213, November 30, 2010.

165. Ibid., Jarosiewicz and Strachota, pp. 42, 52, 54.

166. Ibid., p. 97.

167. Nargis Kassenova, “China as an Emerging Donor in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan,” Russie.Nei.Visions, No. 36, Russia/NIS 

Center, January 2009, p. 23.

168. Mark Burles, Chinese Policy Toward Russia and the Central 

Asian Republics, Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1999, pp. 52-55.

169. Theodore Roosevelt, “The Strenuous Life,” 1899, quoted 

in Dambisa Moyo, Winner Take All: China’s Race for Resources and 

What It Means for the World, New York: Basic Books, 2012, p. vi. 

170. Khanna, p. 333.

171 . Dyer, p. 15.

172. Laurent Cohen-Tanugi, The Shape of the World to Come: 

Charting the Geopolitics of a New Century, New York: Columbia 

University Press, 2012, pp. 110-111.

173. Ibid., Khanna, p. 339.

174. Lynn Davis, Stacie Pettyjohn, Melanie Sisson, Stephen 

Worman, and Michael McNerney, U.S. Overseas Military Presence: What Are the Strategic Choices? Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 

2012, p. 29.

175. Friedberg, pp. 201-203.

176. Stephen Blank at the Hearing on China’s Political and 

Economic Advances in Central Asia and Russia before the Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia, and Emerging Threats of the Committee of Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, 113th Cong., 

First Sess., April 16, 2013, Serial No. 113-22, pp. 53-54.
115

177. Richard Boucher, “China’s Backdoor Breakout: As 

China Flexes Its Muscles in Central Asia, Will the United States 

Have Any Influence after It Leaves Afghanistan?” Foreign Policy, 

December 12, 2013.

178. Ibid., Cohen-Tanugi, pp. 113.

179. Ibid., pp. 71-75.

180. Roman Muzalevsky, “Why Is Russia against the US’s 

Central Asia Counter-narcotics Initiative?” Eurasia Daily Monitor, 

Vol. 9, Issue 88, May 9, 2012. 

181. Olcott.

182. Richard Hu, “China and Central Asia: the Role of the 

Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO),” The Mongolian 

Journal of International Affairs, November 11, 2004, p. 151.

183. Ibid., Jacques, pp. 226-227.

184. Ron Huisken, “The Outlook for US-China Relations,” in 

Roy Huisken, ed., p. 17.

185. Henry Kissinger, On China, New York: The Penguin 

Press, 2011, p. 513.

186. Bergsten et al., pp. 4-7.

187. Ibid., Friedberg, pp. 156-157.

188. Shambaugh, p. 315.

189. Westad, p. 381.

190. Ibid., Kissinger, p. 520.

191. Ibid., p. 512.

192. Robert Kaplan, “The Geography of Chinese Powers: 

How Far Will China Reach on Land and Sea,” Foreign Affairs, Vol. 

89, No. 3, 2010.
116

193. Jacques, p. 185.

194. Ibid., pp. 5-6.

195. Tang Shiping and Zhang Yunling, pp. 1-3.

196. Noah Feldman, Cool War: The Future of Global Competition, 

New York: Random House, 2013, pp. 162-163.

197. Swaine and Tellis, p. 148.

198. See Scobell, Ratner, and Beckley, pp. xii-xiii.

199. Dyer, pp. 276-277.

200. Minghao Zhao, p. 3.

201. Ibid., Swaine and Tellis, pp. 152-153.

202. Mingjiang Li, “China’s Participation in Asian Multilateralism: Pragmatism Prevails,” in Roy Huisken, ed., p. 161.
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