Sino-Russian Competition: Self-Inflicted Competition in Central Asia?

Authors: Sarah Canna (NSI, Inc.) and Eric Kuznar (NSI, Inc.)

This publication was released as part of the SMA project, “CENTCOM Regional and Population Dynamics in the Central Region.”  For more information regarding this project, please click here.

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China and Russia support each other’s political and economic objectives both globally and in the USCENTCOM area of responsibility (AOR) because, in part, of a strong mutual interest in weakening the United States’ geopolitical influence and power (Solomentseva, 2014; Lons, 2019). However, despite this cooperation, China and Russia do compete, especially in Central Asia where both have long-standing historical connections, manage competing economic initiatives, and seek to exert influence over regional governments (Laruelle, 2019; Ehteshami, 2019; McGlinchey, 2019; Weitz, 2020). In the future, competition between Beijing and Moscow in the Middle East over natural resources and economic opportunities may increase, as both become more economically involved in the region (Wormuth, 2019). However, both do benefit considerably from cooperation, and have diverse enough strengths to make direct competition costly. Furthermore, particularly in Russia’s case, there are no comparable strategic partnerships available to help balance United States and Western regional influence (Weitz, 2020). While there is a wealth of literature discussing how China’s and Russia’s activities affect the United States’ interests in the USCENTCOM AOR, the discussion on what the United States can do to create Sino-Russian competition is sparse and instead mostly focuses on actions to slow either China’s or Russia’s individual geopolitical growth.