In World War II, the oilfields were a strategic objective in Nazi Germany's campaign against the Soviet Union. The Caspian fields declined after the war, as the USSR concentrated on exploiting new resources in Siberia. In the late 1980s, however, expert estimates suggested that the Caspian still held somewhere in the range of 32 billion barrels of recoverable oil reserves. Only the reserves in the Persian Gulf are greater. Like the Nobels and Rothschilds before them, US oil companies were quick to appreciate the Caspian's potential.
Caspian oil is, however, a difficult commodity to bring to world markets.
The Caspian is a land-locked sea and transportation options inevitably lead across the territory of one the littoral states with a direct outlet to the major seaways. The Iranian route to Persian Gulf ports is blocked by the US veto on trade with Iran. From Baku, that leaves the Russian option, the traditional Nobel and Rothschild route inland across Georgia to its Black Sea ports, and a new complex of pipeline routes across Georgia and Armenia to Turkey and its Mediterranean ports. Russia was anxious to persuade the AIOC to favor its pipeline route across the Caucasus and Chechnya to the Black Sea port of Novorossiisk. In this context, Chechnya's declared secession from the Russian Federation became a major complicating factor.