Another Great Game in Central Asia?

▪ 1997

Introduction

      by Bess Brown

 The Central Asian republics gained their independence in the collapse of the U.S.S.R. at the end of 1991. There was considerable disquiet in Western foreign ministries at the time over the possibility that a power vacuum had been created and that these brand-new states would attract the political, cultural, economic, or religious ambitions of the key powers in the region: Iran, Turkey, Russia, and China. Of special concern were, on the one side, Iran, ruled by the ayatollahs, and, on the other, Kazakstan, which was being billed in the world press as the first nuclear-armed Muslim state.

      Worries about Kazakstan may have been premature. In fact, Kazakstan had little or no control over the nuclear weapons left on its soil when the Soviet Union disintegrated; the warheads remained in the hands of Russian army units stationed in the newly independent state, and, while the Kazaks were traditionally Muslims, they made up less than half the country's population. Most of the remainder was Slavic. In the name of interethnic peace, Kazakstan had little choice but to follow the path it took, which was to become and to remain uncompromisingly secular while tilting politically toward Russia. Other states in the region found themselves in a different sort of cross fire.

Turkey.

      Even though the Central Asian leaders repeatedly said that secular Turkey was a more attractive development model for them than was Iran, during the first postindependence years Western officials still felt the need to urge the Central Asians to follow the Turkish model. Western journalists, who remembered the "Great Game" played in the Central Asian region between Russia and Great Britain in the 19th century, speculated on the outcome of a new Great Game between Iran and Turkey. The Turks themselves, delighted at the appearance in the international arena of five new Turkic-speaking countries (Kazakstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan in Central Asia, plus Azerbaijan in the Transcaucasus), set out to provide economic assistance and develop close cultural ties with their new brother countries. Even Tajikistan has been the recipient of Turkish support and encouragement, although it is not part of the Turkic family.

      The Turks' initial excitement soon palled, however. Businessmen found that in most Central Asian states, ventures were complicated by attitudes deeply ingrained from the Soviet period. The Turkish aspiration to create a more or less unified Turkic cultural sphere was hailed as a desirable goal by most Central Asian intellectuals but was stymied by a rapidly developing sense of national identity in the new countries of Central Asia. Kazakstan's Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev commented, for example, that the Central Asians did not propose to exchange one "big brother" (Russia) for another (Turkey). Turkish-led efforts to standardize the scripts used by all the Turkic states on the basis of Turkey's modified Latin alphabet were accepted by the Central Asian heads of state—but each then went ahead and introduced his own different Latin alphabet.

      As the Central Asian states celebrated the fifth anniversary of their independence, their relationship with Turkey was still close, with Turkish businessmen and aid projects much in evidence and hundreds of Central Asian students studying in Turkey, but the post-Soviet euphoria had disappeared. Turkey and the four Turkic-speaking states of Central Asia recognized that they were part of a family, but it was increasingly a family of equals.

      Early Western alarm about developments in Central Asia might have been greater had it been remembered that Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan had been part of the Persian cultural sphere for centuries. Even before the U.S.S.R. fell apart, Tajikistan, the one Central Asian republic that is Iranian-speaking, was developing close cultural ties with Iran and even described its own language as Farsi (Persian) rather than Tajik in official documents. These relationships did not extend to religious affairs, however. When the then leader of Tajikistan's official Muslim establishment was asked if he did not fear the spread of Iranian-style revolutionary Islamism in the republic, he replied that the Shi'ite fundamentalism of Iran had no attraction for the Sunni Muslims of Tajikistan. During Tajikistan's civil war, which started in mid-1992 and has continued sporadically since that time, Iran's cultural influence there declined, but during 1996 Iran began again to encourage the study of Farsi, for which it provided textbooks.

Iran.

      Iran had never disappeared from the scene in Turkic Central Asia either, though in the immediate postindependence years, it was a fairly minor player in the region. Iranian officials visited the Central Asian states, seeking to develop commercial ties, but they made no obvious effort to become involved in local politics or to encourage Islamic fundamentalism. The United States was concerned about Turkmenistan's close ties to Iran and pressured Kazakstan to give up plans for an oil pipeline through Iran to Persian Gulf ports, but most Central Asian countries sought to keep their relationship with Iran, if not particularly close, at least on a friendly footing. The exception was Uzbekistan, the only state in the region that supported the U.S. embargo against Iran.

Russia.

      By 1996 the most influential foreign power in the Central Asian region was, not surprisingly, Russia. In differing degrees, the Central Asian states looked to the Russian Federation for trade, development funds, and help in setting up their own military forces. Socially and politically, several decades of Soviet assimilation policies are not easily undone, and Russian remains the language in which most Central Asians communicate with the outside world, though English is making inroads in the area. Moreover, Kazakstan and Kyrgyzstan joined a customs union with Russia and Belarus that caused disquiet in international lending organizations.

      While the Central Asians recognized that geography and history dictated that they maintain close relations with the Russian Federation, the upsurge of Russian nationalist rhetoric, particularly during parliamentary and presidential election campaigns, alarmed Central Asians, and many of the region's leaders went on record as decisively rejecting a restoration of Russian dominance.

China.

      The other neighbouring nation that has been felt as a major presence in the Central Asian region is China. The Chinese leadership cannot have been happy about the independence of the Central Asian states, because of what it might suggest to the Turkic-speaking Uygur of Xinjiang, among whom a desire for independence had been stirring even before the breakup of the U.S.S.R. China has been careful to cultivate good relations with the new states. The Central Asians have remained suspicious of Chinese intentions, though the flood of Chinese consumer goods into the new countries has been warmly welcomed. Kazakstan and Kyrgyzstan, in particular, feared that China might have designs on their territory, though both countries hailed the 1996 Shanghai treaty ratifying existing borders as having put their earlier fears to rest.

      The first five years of independence were characterized by shifting outside influences in Central Asia. Given the continuing uncertainties in the former Soviet states of the region—especially Tajikistan—and the upheavals in Afghanistan, it may be expected that the next five will see a continuing interplay involving the same actors, with perhaps greater roles being played by countries such as Pakistan and India, both of which have been showing an increasing interest in their neighbours to the north.

      Bess Brown is human dimensions specialist with the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe's Liaison Office for Central Asia.

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