Great Game On: Shining light on the contest for Central Asia

AllAfrica

31-03-2025

The Founding Fathers advised Americans to steer clear of entangling alliances if they wished to preserve their newly acquired Republic. This may be news to some of our politicos but not to President Donald Trump. No US president has been leerier of the interventionist foreign policy bequeathed to us by Woodrow Wilson and Franklin Roosevelt than Trump.
Immune to the globalist enthusiasm for 'democracy building' and 'forever wars,' Trump lives in the realm of reality – not ideological pseudo-reality. Trump has had enough of the 'values-based' foreign policy that, in the matter of Ukraine, may have brought us closer to thermonuclear war than at any time since the Cuban missile crisis.
Unlike so many of his political adversaries, Trump is not indifferent to the negative impact a misconstrued foreign policy could have on ordinary people, families, the nation at large and, for that matter, the world.
With that in mind, and in view of the rising importance of Asia, Geoff Raby's new book – 'Great Game On: The Contest for Central Asia and Global Supremacy ' – is worth reading to get a better handle on the history and current state of great power dynamics in Eurasia and Central Asia. Raby served as Australian Ambassador to China from 2007 to 2011.
He has done a service by focusing on Central Asia in view of its considerable and growing importance. The region encompasses Afghanistan, Inner Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Xinjiang (China), and is more than 300,000 square miles larger than the continental United States. That's a big chunk of real estate which the US ignores at its peril.
Raby – a mostly non-ideological foreign policy practitioner – deftly describes not only the 19th century Anglo-Russian 'Great Game' but the emergent 21st century 'New Great Game,' i.e., the great power competition for influence over Central Asia between China, Russia and, to a lesser extent, the United States. As such, he delves into the respective geopolitical ambitions of China and Russia in Eurasia over the past 100 years with a spotlight on Central Asia.
Raby argues that 'Core Eurasia' – in other words, Central Asia – is 'the principal theater of contest' between the great powers and that 'the key pivots on the chess board are Afghanistan and Xinjiang.'
He has a point, but it's also the case that Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, with their massive reserves of natural resources, extensive trade routes – east-west and north-south – and welcoming attitude toward the outside world represent a stable setting in which the US can expand its economic ties. (See: Time for a US pivot to Central Asia )
To his credit, Raby eschews the moralism of so many foreign policy gurus (who rarely get around to considering morality). Raby, from all indications, is a proponent of the realist school of politics.
He is concerned about national self-interest, security and power relationships rather than presumed ideological imperatives as the principal drivers of inter-state relations.
Raby's treatment of the United States' presence in Central Asia is skimpy – but that is telling in itself: Washington pays Central Asia scant attention, so there's not much to write about. That should change under Trump.
Raby provides much-needed historical context without which it is impossible to understand the competition for influence in the region. He makes insightful, thought-provoking comments on the geostrategic thinking of the great powers in light of history – for example, Mackinder's 'Heartland' theory, i.e., 'whoever controlled Central Asia would be the dominant world power.'
Helpfully, the author provides the reader with maps to navigate a vast region that could easily thwart even adepts at world geography. Thus, the reader can easily find Türkmenbaşy, Kashgar and the Wakhan Corridor as well as inner Mongolia, various mountain ranges and rivers and myriad other places unknown to most people.
And having traveled extensively in Central Asia, Raby provides a store of anecdotes that helps demystify the inscrutability and romance of these far-off lands and peoples. The book is extensively researched and footnoted – a sign of the author's sober-mindedness.
Raby claims that China has emerged 'as the primary Eurasian power' in the new age of multipolarity that is upon us, an increasingly recognized reality.
The US, though, should take this state of affairs in stride and deal with it not through any form or degree of belligerence or aggressiveness and ditch its usual moral preachments that historically have been the stock and trade of USAID, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and other mouthpieces and instruments of liberal internationalist and globalist orthodoxy.
What Vice President JD Vance told the Munich Security Conference (see his speech) is also good advice for US policymakers: a little introspection is advisable.
Raby believes that 'Great Powers can find a strategic accommodation without going to war … Options for finding strategic stability … are still worth pursuing.'
Nicely put – a vision that Trump's State Department and the various Central Asian states share (see this author's Central Asian School of Diplomacy) i.e., diplomacy is the smartest, most cost-effective way to resolve conflicts, defend national interests and avoid armed conflict.
Raby has recently suggested that China, for the first time in its history, feels secure along its Eurasian land frontiers and is now free to project power globally, a matter of some concern for those in the neighborhood.
Having said that, one way to address China's resurgence, Raby suggests, might be for the West to engineer a so-called 'reverse Kissinger,' i.e., entice Russia to 'look West' and distance itself from China.
Only time will tell whether that is a real possibility; meanwhile, the West would be well-advised to understand Beijing's geopolitical mindset and history as it confronts its growing ambitions.
Raby reminds the reader that the West should stop framing the Great Game as a contest between 'democracy' and 'autocracy' or 'good guys vs bad guys.' Stated differently, the use of preachy, moralistic, diplomatic lingo is a non-starter. Certainly, it is a money-loser when dealing with China, Central Asia or most anyone else. Trump understands that.
Raby correctly states that 'Russia's trade with Central Asia is dwarfed by China's' and 'China has replaced Russia as Central Asia's major source of foreign direct investment.' He sheds light on contested matters such as the 'debt trap,' 'debt sustainability' and the Belt & Road Initiative.
But he might have pointed out that Central Asian governments are selective in their partnerships. They will not accept one-way investment deals that are perceived to have few long-term benefits for the country or, worse, inadvertently lead to geoeconomic subjugation.
To be sure, Central Asia wants win-win deals as well as free and fair trade – a mindset more in tune with Trump's than with that of much of the American foreign policy establishment.
In case anyone missed it, Central Asian governments – whether you like them or not – want investors – whether Chinese, Indian or American – to make sensible, non-ideological cross-border long-term economic commitments to develop smart infrastructure connectivity and integration and create jobs and decent wages for families and the region's growing populations. This vision is in line with Trumpian economic policy at home.
Without explicitly saying so, Raby does not appear to be optimistic about the US's long-term prospects in Central Asia since China's aim to absorb Central Asia – transform it into a veritable 'Sinostan' – 'is an advanced work in progress. But Russia and China will continue to look to each other for support in their contests with the United States and this will remain a strong point of convergence in their relationship.'
If true, all the more reason for the US government and business community to get in on the action in Central Asia, namely, expand trade relations and, more importantly, set up joint ventures that give US companies skin in the game. Toward this end, Trump's State Department should grease the wheels.
If Washington doesn't deliver soon on substance, Central Asians will continue to get the best infrastructure, logistics and mining deals (critical metals and oil & gas) that China, Russia and others have to offer. This would be only logical if the US were to remove itself de facto from the equation.
For those eager to understand the historical and present-day ins and outs of great power competition in Central Asia, they would be well advised to read ' Great Game On: The Contest for Central Asia and Global Supremacy.' This would include policymakers.
If American ingenuity and creativity were to be introduced into the arena shorn of hidden political and/or woke agendas and offered Central Asia attractive win-win economic arrangements, the US would stand a good chance of not only staying in the (great) game but prevailing.
Javier M Piedra has 40 years of international banking and finance experience and was former acting assistant administrator, Bureau for Asia, USAID (2018 – 21)
Alexander B Gray is former deputy assistant to the president and chief of staff, White House National Security Council (2019-21)