#5522
[Second Issue of the Day]
#6
The Russia Journal
November 2-8, 2001
PIPE DREAMS FOR GREAT GAMES -- WHO WINS KABUL WON'T WIN
THE CASPIAN
By John Helmer
One of the great tales of the great 19th century game between Russia and Great Britain is told of William Moorcroft, an Englishman who was sent to northwestern India in 1808 by his employer, the East India Company.
Moorcroft's job was to manage the stud operations of the company at a time when horses were the company's prime form of transportation, and when thoroughbreds were the equivalent of limousines. Moorcroft thought that somewhere in Central Asia he would find an especially fast and hardy breed of horse, which he needed to revitalize his employer's bloodstock.
It was in search of the phantom steed that Moorcroft discovered the tracks of something so threatening, he spent the rest of his short life tracking it down. Moorcroft had discovered that the Russians had beaten the East India Company into Central Asia. In his despatches to company headquarters, Moorcroft kept reporting evidence of Russians who had preceded him.
It was a contest for untapped markets, he warned. His employer should quickly make up its mind, and persuade Her Britannic Majesty, he argued, whether the natives "shall be clothed with the broadcloth of England", and whether they should buy "their implements of iron and steel from St. Petersburg or from Birmingham."
I'll skip 180 years of wicked history, badly told, and stupidly interpreted. Now that the British and American forces are once again banging on the gates of Kabul -- let's not forget the Australian diggers who are there to help their prime minister get re-elected on November 10 -- the question of who will win the treasure of Central Asia is once again being asked as insistently as Moorcroft's memoranda. And once again the answers are pipedreams, like Moorcroft's horse.
Some of the pipedreams are literally dreams of pipes -- oil and gas pipelines which, if Afghanistan falls into new hands, could be built across that territory to empty their black gold on the welcoming shores of the Arabian Sea. Serious US newspapers have resuscitated projects, including one by the US oil company Unocal to build a 1,000-mile oil pipeline across Afghanistan that dates from 1995. It was shelved by the oil company as the Taliban regime in Kabul became progressively more anti-American.
Then there is the wishful thinking of certain State Department officials and Washington consultants who have started circulating the idea that the attack on the World Trade Center and the war in Afghanistan will boost regional support for the trans-Caucasian oil pipeline between Baku, Azerbaijan, and Ceyhan, Turkey.
Russian thinking is bound to be different, not least of all because Russia's economic stakes tie Moscow much more closely to Iran than the US has been willing to tolerate -- at least until now. Now, you should notice, is when Iran is taking its revenge on the Talibans by helping the Anglo-American expeditionary force do their stuff.
Most Russian assessments of the Afghan conflict doubt that if the Talibans were to be toppled by the allied campaign, their successors would be stable enough to secure the risk of the investment required for a new pipeline. The same concerns for stability don't recommend the Turkish pipeline either.
On the other hand, Russian officials view Iran's contribution to the combat operations in Afghanistan as allowing a greater level of reasonableness toward the oil and gas transport options in the region, and opening the way for commercial concessions towards Tehran from Washington.
"There is a much more viable and secure alternative to Afghanistan," says Ilya Katsnelson, a director of Volgotanker, the Russian oil shipping company linked to Yukos, the Russian oil major. "This would be to make swap arrangements with Iran, delivering Caspian crude to Iranian ports, and shipping Iranian crude from Kharg Island. There are indications that our clients want this."
According to Katsnelson, the convergence of American, Russian and Iranian interests in the Afghan conflict is laying the foundation for a big boost in Caspian oil transportation.
At present, the National Iranian Oil Company has no tankers operating in the Caspian. Caspar, the Azerbaijan tanker operator, and Volgotanker dominate oil transport in the Caspian, but Caspar's fleet is older and less efficient. "We'd like to position ourselves as the best option for moving oil in the Caspian," Katsnelson reports.
Volgotanker operates 19 Volgoneft-type tankers in the Caspian during the winter; Caspar operates 33 tankers. According to Katsnelson, Caspar, which is a major contributor of revenue to the Azerbaijan state budget, benefits from protectionist measures in the port of Baku, which is all but closed to Volgotanker vessels. But Russian ports like Makhachkala impose no restrictions on loading or servicing Caspar tankers. Volgotanker is asking the Russian government to negotiate an agreement with Azerbaijan to end the Baku port restrictions, or impose reciprocal limits on Caspar.
In a few days' time, Azerbaijan will tell Russian officials at their annual economic commission meeting that they should sign an agreement allowing improved access for Azeri vessels to Russian waterways. The draft pact has been on the table since 1993.
Nagi Gurbanov, an Azeri envoy to Moscow on transportation issues, says the commercial fleets of both countries would benefit if Moscow would drop its bar on foreign use of the canal and river system that links the Caspian with the Black Sea.
In the Soviet period, Azeri vessels were actively used to supply the Russian Volga region with fruit and vegetables. Now, according to Gurbanov, the Azerbaijan government would like to negotiate, not only improved conditions for transit between the Caspian and Black Sea, but also access to import-export cargo transportation currently monopolized by Russian companies.
Alexander Filimonov, spokesman for the Ministry of Transport in Moscow, responds with a categorical nyet. "The Ministry is opposed to providing free access to internal Russian waterways until the year 2010, when the complex of measures preparing Russian waterways for foreign access is completed." For complex of measures, read strengthening of the competitive position of the Russian fleet.
Noone who ponders the meaning of the relationship between the US and Russia in Central Asia these days should imagine that the outcome from the Kremlin's point of view will be anything but a general strengthening of Russia's competitive positions. That's what great games are all about.
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