In Moscow's Shadows 249: Pragmatism in Asia

After Putin's Beijing visit - long on rhetoric, short on results - I look more broadly as Asia: the limits of the "friendship with no limits" with China, heding with India, and the ebbing of hegemony in Central Asia. In short, everyone is a transactional pragmatist, behind the talk of "all-weather partnerships" and "eternal friendships." But then again, isn't everyone everwhere, these days?

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Transcript

Why Putin Loves Beijing Trips

MG 0:00

In the wake of the recent from um Putin visits to Beijing, but yes, it's like at least some in a Russian relationship. Let's look to Beijing. Hello, I'm Mark Galliotti, and welcome to my view of Russia in Moscow Shadows. This podcast of varying length, frequency and format, yet always reassuringly low production values, is supported by generous and perspicacious patrons like you, and also by the Crisis Exercise software company Conductor. Now I get why Putin travels to Beijing more often than he travels to, well, frankly, Russian cities these days. Lots of pageantry, lots of great footage of honour guards, crowds of chanting schoolchildren, all that kind of thing. He's meeting an ally. It demonstrates that he is not isolated in the world, and it's a chance to essentially renew Well, what is that relationship between Russia and China?

The Myth Of A Lockstep Alliance

MG 1:24

There's a lot of nonsense spoken about some kind of lockstep anti-Western alliance, the notion of the dragon bear or NATO Secretary General Mark Ruta's belief that Xi Jinping could, if he wants to distract the West in order to invade Taiwan, he'd ring up Putin and Putin would have no option or question but that he would immediately invade NATO. But no, it it's not this. And look, this is this is a drum I've been beating for quite some time. If you go back to In Moscow Shadows episode 209, back on the 20th of July of last year, I was essentially saying that this is a transactional, pragmatic, opportunistic relationship, and one in which they have every reason to play it up because they know that it bothers the West, it worries the West, it creates concerns about this alliance, it creates people thinking there is an opportunity here to uncouple Russia from China and so forth, which gives Russia a certain amount of leverage. I mean, this is the irony. Russia is now in some ways in the same position as China was back in the late Cold War days, in which it can actually try and play off the other two superpowers and see what it can be offered. So I mean essentially the foundations of the relationship are still the same as they were. But nonetheless, inevitably there is this shift of who is there, who is the big brother and who is the little brother. There was a rather lovely tweet that noted that Putin was presented with a painting while he was in China of him and Xi Jinping. And she is depicted as almost twice the size of Putin, walking ahead, while Putin is following behind and looking at him. And the comment is, and overall it makes it pretty clear who the big brother is and who the little brother is. And I think that that's perfectly true.

Power Of Siberia II Stalls

MG 3:24

In particular, I mean Putin was rather let down, to put it kindly, by the Chinese over this proposed new gas pipeline that would stretch all the way from the Yamal Peninsula up in the Arctic Circle into China, and would carry enough gas to, just to give a bit of context, essentially power all of the UK's needs twice over. So a very big deal, but for a long time the Chinese have been essentially stringing the Russians along. They don't want to become entirely dependent upon Russian energy. In fact, at the moment, in the current crisis, they're actually importing more American liquid natural gas to make up for what's not coming through the Straits of Hormuz. And also at the same time, they are playing very, very hard ball. Remember, they get a substantial discount on the hydrocarbons they buy from Russia compared with, say, Europe or most other buyers. So there is an element of that. But the point is Putin had actually whether it was because he was hoping to try and twist Xi's arm, which if so was a rather foolish tactic, or whether he genuinely believed it, he and his people have been talking up the prospects of an actual agreement on this Power of Siberia II pipeline while he was in Beijing, and he didn't get it, even though he brought a fairly big delegation from Russian business, including the energy sector. Nonetheless, all he got was essentially an agreement to keep on talking about it. So there, you know, again, we have a relationship which has reached a certain level. I wouldn't quite say plateauing, because if one looks at trade and the like, it continues to grow. But the point is, I think it's in some ways it's reached the stage it's going it's going to get to. There will not be some new breakthrough unless and until the Chinese absolutely start to turn the screws on the Russians.

Consumer Ties And Cultural Friction

MG 5:21

Because there's certainly a whole wealth of smaller or kind of human-level ties. I mean, particularly massive influx of Chinese consumer goods into Russia, from clothes to cars to smartphones. I mean, brands like Xiaomi, Redmi, other Chinese ones, they now account for 85% of total smartphone sales in Russia. Chinese is the second most popular foreign language in the country to learn, training, obviously, as you'd imagine, English. And likewise, there's currently an estimated 120,000 Chinese students currently studying the Russian language. Again, more are taking English because that is the global lingua franca, but nonetheless it it does say something. I can't help but feel, and this is entirely subjective on my part, and again, if people have opinions out there, do let me know, if you happen to be, for example, living in China, um, that there is a sense of connection exactly drawn through the all these various goods, and there's also a whole variety of self-proclaimed Russian convenience stores in China, it's worth noting. I mean, they sort of popped up in in recent years, and they very much play on this sense that the Russians are, well, they they use slogans like fighting nation or hardcore products, and so the shelves are stocked with all kinds of frankly, I almost would say cliched goods in some ways like vodka and matryoshka dolls, but also chocolates and the like. So they they promise a slice of Russian culture, even though in practice, behind this blue and white decor and Russian branding, actually most of the goods come from China, Vietnam, or the or the like. And I think this is still uh something of a novelty for the young, and for the old it reflects a certain degree of nostalgia for the days of Sino-Soviet partnership. We'll have to see if it lasts. But nonetheless, this kind of consumer level penetration, I think is in is actually also more broadly important in that it gives people a sort of a sense of the reality behind the geopolitical. In other words, yes, there's no question but that the Chinese would describe or do indeed describe Russia as their closest ally, and likewise Russian attitudes to China the country have improved dramatically, especially as you can imagine, since 2022. China is seen precisely as them their most reliable ally. But that's that's on a country level, and it doesn't necessarily translate into a human level, particularly because all sorts of prejudices and racisms on both sides can actually and do actually sort of crop up. But through consumer goods, just like through culture. And I mean popular culture, not high culture, which tends to be much more likely just for the elites, and also in any case pushed by governments, so it may not reflect real tastes. But on that level, you know, it is clear there is a kind of a growing sense of of some kind of tie. There's more than 56,000 Chinese students taking degree programs in Russia, and if you add in sort of additional programs, academic mobility schemes and the like, probably it's about 70,000. But the interesting thing is there's only just over 20,000 Russian students currently studying in Chinese universities. So, you know, what we see, I think, is actually something that is still if the relationship on a state level, in terms of bilateral trade and the like, it has basically, I think, plateaued and reached the level it's going to in I don't want to say call them conceptual terms, but you know, we're not going to see a closer relationship, even if we let's say we see a bit more trade or something, there is still scope for a closer human-level relationship.

Russia’s India Counterbalance

MG 9:05

But it's worth also noting a comparison, because again, Russia, which in many ways is acting not like the great power that it claims to be, but as I've suggested, more of a middle power, trying to triangulate amongst other major players, is also having to balance its relationship with China with another one, its relationship with India. I mean, again, just simply take the education point. There's currently an estimated p about 32,000 Indian students studying in Russia, comparing to 56,000 Chinese in in Russia. Now, this population of students is on one level underperforming. I mean, if you think about it, basically speaking, India has a population that is just a bit bigger than China's, about 1.03 times China's. But on the other hand, it's only got about half the number of students in Russia. However, first of all, the trend. The trend is increasing much more dramatically and rapidly than the Chinese students in in Russia. Anyway, China has a larger university population. And also, the interesting thing is that what we're actually seeing is a pivot. Indian students are less likely to go to Western destinations these days. There's still a lot, but but they're less likely. Whereas the numbers in Russia have grown by about a third in recent years, in part because of simpler visa processes, lower costs, but also Indian students are reporting that they actually have a higher regard for Russian education, particularly technical, medical, engineering, that kind of thing. So, you know, even if this is just a very sort of micro-scale, but if one looks at the student level, you know, actually India is pivoting to Russia and Russia is looking to welcome them. Because this is part of a wider Russian approach. Because Putin very happily exalts the friendship with no limits that Russia has with China, though of course there are very, very sharp limits. And remember, everything Russia gets from China it has to pay for, whether we're talking in terms of hard cash or political capital. But it also has what it calls a special and privileged partnership with India. I wish in some ways there was some kind of formal scaling of the lexicon, so we would know whether a special and privileged partnership, how far it is above, below, or equivalent to a friendship without limits and such like. Anyway, but nonetheless, there is clearly a strong relationship with it with India. Foreign Minister Lavrov recently said that the bond was so deep that our paths diverging is unthinkable. Well, we'll have to see about that.

Indian Workers And Russia’s Labour Crunch

MG 11:51

But one of the interesting recent developments is the growing flow of Indian workers heading towards Russia. Some slightly dated data, rather unfortunate juxtaposition of words there, from the Russian Interior Ministry, the Mbede, recorded about 56,500 work permits have been issued to Indian nationals, but this has actually steadily grown. And according to Viney Kumar, who's the Indian ambassador in Moscow, there's about 70 to 80,000 Indian citizens already working in Russia at the end of 2025. And at least 40,000 more are expected to come as workers in 2026. Now, these are largely low-skilled workers. They're concentrated in industries which require manual labor, but also sometimes technical expertise. So they're you know they're in farm work, they're in manufacturing, engineering, textile production, and also general city services. There's a recent, I think it was in Fontanka, talking about uh Indians uh working as street cleaners in St. Petersburg. The thing is, wages for low-skilled Indian workers in Russia are the equivalent of, well, more than $500 to more than a thousand dollars a month. Now that is definitely above what they would earn back home. So there is a price incentive for them. And also there was a nice line from an Indian diplomat that was quoted in Deutsche Vela. Russia needs workers. India needs to export unemployment. Remember, India has an unemployment problem. Russia has perversely an insufficient unemployment problem. In other words, its labor market is just too tight, and therefore it needs workers, particularly for lower skill, lower pay jobs. To this end, in December of last year, Putin and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Bodi signed a major labour modility deal. The idea is to sort of streamline and regulate temporary employment, and that that has led to considerable interest and indeed influx of economic migrants using official employment visas to come to Russia to work. And from Russia's point of view, there is an additional advantage. As I'll come to in a moment, at the moment the balance of trade between the two countries is very, very, very heavily skewed Russia's way. However, because of sanctions, what it means is there is an accumulation of Indian rupees, in effect. I mean Indian rupees that are essentially paying for India for Russian oil. But the point is they can't that money can't then be converted into anything. So what it can do is essentially pay these workers with the rupees that are accumulating in Russia that frankly otherwise can't get used. So on one level, this is this is free money, as it were, or at least money that can't be used in any other purpose. And there's also a racial slash religious dimension. One of the reasons why Russians currently are favoring the idea of Indian workers is because they see them, and again, this is an oversimplification, of course, but they see them precisely as Hindus rather than Muslims. And one of the reasons why they've been trying to scale back their use of Central Asian migrant labourers is precisely a concern that amongst them are sifted potential jihadist terrorists. Now, we have to be honest here, the number that it seems to be who are of potential security risk is microscopic compared to the overall flow. But there is no arguing with ethnic typecasting wherever it comes from. So, you know, from Russia's point of view, it has wanted to have Indian unskilled labourers, and now because of the crunch, it is also increasingly interested in Indian skilled labourers. So we're beginning to see, for example, Indians who studied medical um took medical degrees in Russia who were planning on heading back, but actually being seduced by the offers there and staying in Russia and working within the system if their their Russian commander of the Russian language reaches the appropriate level. Now, of course, look, there are naturally issues. I mean, the Indian government has actively warned its citizens against various deceptive schemes intended, particularly through recruitment agencies, which have duped Indians into fighting in the special military operation in Ukraine. I mean, so it's it's it's not all deceptive. I mean, there's about, I think, 126 was the last tally of Indians who were fighting in the Russian army, and at least 44 of those were there because they felt they had been conned into it, and at least 12 Indians had been killed. And I think 96 in total have been returned home. That was from the Indian Foreign Ministry. So there's a mix. You know, a few have actually volunteered, a few fewer or maybe an equivalent number were conned into it, thinking that they were signing contracts, which would mean they'd just be doing some kind of work well behind the lines. So there is an issue. Small in numbers, but politically, I would suggest over significant. But both sides are trying to play this down now that the Russians have said that they will make absolutely certain that you don't get more Indians serving in the in the in the special military operation on false pretenses, or maybe even just actually not accepting Indians at all. Because after all, both sides have political and in particular economic reasons to do so.

Oil Trade And Defence Deals

MG 17:32

Bilateral trade, as I mentioned, is about $70 billion a year, but deeply asymmetric. Russia exports to India over $60 billion of that, mainly crude oil and other petrochemical products, but also things like coal, fertilizer. And India exports less than $10 billion, it may be scarcely much more than $5 billion actually worth of machinery, pharmaceuticals, agricultural products, that kind of thing. Now the aim is to bring this total to at least $100 billion by 2030. But that's, I mean, that's still less than half of the Russo-Chinese trade last year, which was 227.6 billion. But still, again, the point is there is a trend, a growing sort of increase in bilateral trade, and there is a strong commitment by both governments not only to increase it in total terms, but also to actually try to address this asymmetry. In other words, more Indian goods imported into Russia. And of course, there's certain specific areas in which it matters. I've mentioned oil, and in this case, for example, when it comes to oil, when the Americans tried to bully the Indians through threats of further secondary sanctions to giving up or scaling down their use of cheap Russian oil, the Indians made it very clear that they weren't going to. They did a bit, to be honest, but nonetheless, some kind of a deal was arranged. It's also defence, though. Russia remains a primary supplier of defence kit to India, even though New Delhi is indeed trying to shift towards alternatives, towards domestic manufacturing and technology transfers. But still, you know, it's down from the more than 55% of the total Indian inventory about a decade ago. But still, over a third of the inventory of the Indian Armed Forces is Russian. And we're not just talking about old legacy systems that were bought back in the day and just simply happen to be in service. We're seeing more purchases of S-400 surface-to-air missiles. There's a huge order of AK-203 assault rifles. They're being built locally, but they are a Russian weapon. There's a recent big deal: $1.2 billion for long-range air-to-air missiles. And Moscow's also hoping to sell its Sukhoi 57E stealth fighter. But I must admit, I'm I'm sceptical about that one because I'm unfortunately for the Russians sceptical about the Sukhoi 57. But nonetheless, the point is again that this remains a powerful and important sort of sector. And remember, if you sell defence kit, you are also to a degree locking in a longer-term relationship because they'll need spare parts, they'll need maintenance, they'll need upgrades, all that kind of thing. And as if this were not enough, there's also growing amounts of direct business on the small to medium enterprise level. There was an interesting article in Vietnamisti this week, the remember Vietnamosti being a business newspaper, it focuses on such things. Saying that the number of companies in Russia founded by Indian citizens has tripled since 2022. Now more than a thousand. That said, despite the fact that India has become Russia's second largest trading partner, after of course China, companies with Indian involvement actually still account for just 1.6% of all foreign-owned companies in Russia. So it's starting from a low base, even though it is growing quite dramatically. Whereas companies with Russian participation, it's 22%. But on the other hand, that's not really growing particularly. And revenue for those companies with Indian participation has been growing quite substantially. I mean it's nearly doubled. It's about 200 billion rubles, that's 2.8 million dollars in 2025. But still, context is all. It's not just less than the Chinese factor. Companies with Turkish participation, for example, are more than twice as profitable. Well, no, correction, have up more than twice the turnover as those with Indians. So look, you know, this is this is clearly something that we shouldn't overplay. We shouldn't suddenly say, aha, the Indians have come. But nonetheless, it is an interesting. Sign that Indian business is become beginning to become more intertwined with the Russian. But the point is this. Is this because suddenly India is pivoting to Russia or that Russia is pivoting to India? Well, on one level, yes. But there is the huge but. At the same time, India has increased the amount of, well again, take the example of defense kit that it buys from the West. And in part that's because of higher tech and so forth, but it's also because it wants to diversify. It doesn't want to be dependent on the Russians. It is happy to defy America over sanctions to a degree, because it really does need that cheap Russian energy, but only to a degree. And it's not absolutely just sort of pushing against, it's certainly not, for example, endorsing Russia's invasion of Ukraine. India is hedging. Russia is hedging. China is hedging. You know, all three of these countries are essentially engaged in pragmatic relationships. And from Russia's point of view, one of the reasons I would suggest why there is more emphasis now on developing relations with India is actually being driven at a lower level than the president. Sure, Putin's very happy to do so, he seems to get on perfectly well with Narendra Modi and so forth. Noteworthy, though, that there was no Indian representation at the recent Victory Day parade. But on the other hand, beneath him, and again I banged on in the past about the degree to which the China relationship is one that creates has created a generational split within the Russian elite, in that for Putin and his fellow septigenarians, everything depends on the war in Ukraine. Their political future, potentially their actual future, certainly their historic legacy. And to that end, Putin is essentially willing to turn a blind eye to whatever concessions need to be made to China in order to keep China on side because he needs China. But the generation below who are thinking about Russia on a different time scale, they are thinking, well, what kind of a country will it be by the time we finally are in power? And how far will it have been sucked inexorably into China's orbit? They are looking for little ways in which they can minimize Russian dependence on China. And some of this is about domestic activity, some of this is also about trying to diversify as far as possible its political, its diplomatic, and in particular its commercial trade connections. So I think this is an area in which, and again, I've sort of had it's kind of semi-confirmed in some conversations with people who are in or connected to the Russian Foreign Ministry, that sense of there is more urgency on this within within Mead, within the Russian Foreign Ministry, but also within other parts of the Russian state, including the Ministry of Trade and Industry, than perhaps is coming down from the very top. So let's be aware that these are relationships, these are not alliances, they are essentially pragmatic things. And of course, from the point of view of the Russians, one of the reasons that they are increasingly interested in China is because they see China increasingly challenging them in areas that once upon a time they consider to be part of their sort of strategic sphere of influence, whether we're talking about in in parts of Latin America, parts of Africa, parts of Asia, or indeed particularly Central Asia. And if we're talking about Central Asia, well, the increased interest in Indian labour, as I mentioned, represents less of a desire, and this is actually, I think, a mutual thing, for migrant labour from Central Asia. So actually, if we're looking at this triangular relationship, it's worth placing Central Asia within that context. So after the break, let me talk about what's going on in Central Asia.

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MG 26:08

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Central Asia And The Near Abroad

MG 26:47

In some ways it's an odd relationship between Russia and Central Asia. Different from the ones you'd see elsewhere in that and this is a terrible term that the Russians still use, the near abroad. Really means the post-Soviet states with with the exclusion of the Baltic states. And it carries with it this rather imperialistic notion that somehow they're not the proper abroad. There's the far abroad, the real abroad, and then the near abroad that's not really that abroad at all. But actually, you know, there there is some some truth in that, although clearly there are fraught political relationships at times and economic disequilibria. But nonetheless, you know, there is one of one of the reasons why so many migrants, labourers went and still go to Russia is not just because it's a convenient place in which to go and work, but there are linguistic cultural historical ties. Russian remains of very sort of widely used lingua franca. And look, the experience of both czarist and Soviet colonization and imperialism was often thuggishly brutal and cack-handed, but also did bring with it that sense of a certain element of economic and political uplift. One may not particularly appreciate ghastly polluting industries, but nonetheless there was a lot of construction and so forth that went on. And to that end, there is a sense that this was a more complex relationship than a purely exploitative one. But as we'll as we'll come to in a moment, that view is now increasingly being relegated to a certain sort of proportion of aging nostalgics who still think of the good old Soviet days rather than necessarily being a contemporary one. And it was quite noteworthy that at the Victory Day parade that I mentioned this year's, only two leaders from Central Asia, Kasim Jomat Tokayev from Kazakhstan and Shavkat Mirzoyev of Uzbekistan, actually turned up, and they only turned up at the very last minute, so that their presence wasn't even sort of touted in advance. And I think this is symbolic of a wider issue as Russia is kind of losing Central Asia, insofar as it ever really had it, but in certainly in particular it's losing its capacity to exert authority as hegemon, and once again, as with all these other relationships, can only get the friendship, the loyalty, the support, and the assistance that it can afford to pay for.

Kyrgyzstan Pushes Back On Moscow

MG 29:24

And I mean I thought this was particularly symbolized by something that happened relating to Kyrgyzstan. Now, back in May, at a meeting of the Russian Military Historical Society, which it is worth remembering, was founded and is chaired by former Minister of Culture Vladimir Medinsky, who is one of the most sort of cringe-worthy exponents of a new Putinist form of history that essentially creates this unbroken line of Russian historical greatness and ascendancy. Anyway, at this meeting, some Russian historians from the Academy of Sciences proposed that Kyrgyzstan should actually remove the term colonialism from its school textbooks when talking about the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and its control over the region. And as you'd expect, Kyrgyzstan scholars duly refused, saying actually it was perfectly the right word for describing this the historical exploitation of their country. Now look, I don't want to overplay this too much as it was just a spat between academics, and we academics really don't matter. But I think it was significant as it was a symbol of growing irritants that we've seen. I mean, for example, we had Moscow re earlier raising objections to a new Kyrgyz law that mandated that state officials had to carry out their official duties in the Kyrgyz language, even though Russian remains a widely used general language. And also, Kyrgyzstan began detaining and prosecuting its own citizens for joining Russian units and fighting in Ukraine. You had a certain number of Kyrgyz who, you know, again, for the huge payoffs that were being offered, went and fought, and they're now being treated as essentially mercenaries fighting in a foreign war. That did not go down well in Moscow as you'd expect. Meanwhile, though, there are very strong practical relationships. Bilateral trade, more than four billion dollars annually. Russia is a key investor in Kyrgyzstan, and also there are still a lot of Kyrgyz migrant labourers and remittances sent back from Russia by them is actually a vital pillar of the Kyrgyz economy. And there's also a Russian military base there, Kant Air Base. The point is though, this is about identity, this is about perception, this is about a sense in Kyrgyzstan that Russia is no longer necessarily a useful ally, or even frankly often a useful friend. So there's this balancing act that emerges as Kyrgyzstan tries not to completely alienate Moscow while looking at its other options. And I think this was really very strongly demonstrated by what's happened recently on sanctions. In February, the EU sanctions envoy, David O'Sullivan, visited Bishkek, the Kyrgyz capital, and he did express well it was officially put as concern, but it was rather more than concern, about the fact that Kyrgyzstan is clearly a turntable, a place where restricted sanction technologies ostensibly bought for use in Kyrgyzstan actually are imported and then quietly re-exported into Russia as a way of getting around it. So you've got all sorts of European dual use technologies. Things like metalworking machines that can also be used to work on military kit, things like radio equipment and the like. According to the EU, the export of dual use technologies from its own area to Kyrgyzstan increased by nearly 800% since the invasion in 2022. While exports from Kyrgyzstan to Russia involving sanctioned technologies have grown by 1,200%. So it's not even just European Union kit, but nonetheless, it is fairly clear. And this is one of the reasons why, in its 20th sanctions package, the EU formally designated Kyrgyzstan a country of concern, which bans certain exports. And so what's just happened? Well, Kyrgyzstan's Justice Ministry has just suspended 50 companies that were flagged by the US and UK authorities for suspected involvement in bypassing sanctions. And this crackdown has extended to financial and crypto patterns. Because again, O'Sullivan did raise concerns that certain banks held what he called credible ties to Russian sanctions busting networks. So don't expect any sudden dramatic shifts. But this is quite a striking example of Kyrgyzstan deciding that it has to, at least to an extent, bend to the pressure from Europe because it doesn't want to completely close that door, even if it actually annoys Russia. So even Kyrgyzstan, which is generally regarded as the least of the Central Asian countries, I'm not saying that I endorse that view, but nonetheless, it is actually feeling that it must and that it can push back against Russia.

Kazakhstan’s History Fight With Russia

MG 34:33

Then we can look at Kazakhstan. Now back in January 2022, there was a weird kind of mix of local unrest and also clearly a political power struggle between Tokayev and the man who had actually elevated him to power. His predecessor, Nursultan Nazarbayev, who had kind of retired but still maintained a position as chair for life of the powerful Security Council. Tokayev had clearly had enough, frankly, of being in Nazarbayev's shadow. He had a face down with him, and the Russians actually mobilized a force drawn from the sort of wider forces of the CSTO military alliance, but very much this was Russian-coordinated, Russian-led. I mean the Russians provided the planes that the force came on, not really to send in a combat operation, but to send in some troops, peacekeepers, quote unquote, as a symbolic gesture of support for Tokayev, who won. One should never, though, rely on the gratitude of autocrats. Tokayev has, after all, since then criticized Russian conduct in Ukraine and the SVO, the Special Military Operation, publicly expressed support for Ukraine's territorial integrity, which is quite a big deal. Now, as to Russia's annoyance, even as Kazakh scholars have been backing their Kyrgyz counterparts in supporting this idea that yes, the term Russian colonialism and imperialism ought to be being used, Tokhaev is also trying to take on the mantle of successor of the Mongol Empire, the Golden Horde. Even while rejecting the idea that what he called one of history's great civilizations was a colonizing empire. Now look, let's be absolutely clear. It was absolutely imperialist. It wasn't necessarily colonial, simply in the sense of that it wasn't actually trying to move people and establish colonists. But the point is it was a efficient, ruthless, very, very ruthless, and when it felt it needed to be extraordinarily brutal imperial power. That definitely stamped its boot on the neck of subject nations, which included the Russians for a long time. Now, yes, so the history of the Golden Horde, it was a complex one. And while Tokhaev said it shouldn't be flattened into a simple story of conquest, yeah, okay, it's not only that, but it is that. But the point is Tokhaev also made this into a very explicit rebuke of the idea that history belongs to the powerful. He said, The principle that only the strong make history and the victors write it is anti-scientific in nature. Small and medium-sized countries, especially those defeated on the battlefield in the past, would then have to settle for the role of historical backbenchers. Russian commentators were actually really quite angry, and indeed so too is Moscow. Why? Well, let me first of all just give you a sense of the Russian pushback. I mean they very much called this an attempt to sort of seize a multi-ethnic empire for Kazakhstan's own benefit, to push Russia aside, to rewrite history under Western and Turkish influence, which maybe is perhaps why. I mean, entertainingly enough, the left nationalist website Svobodnaya Pressa quoted one Sergei Balmasov, who was an expert at the Institute of the Middle East and also at the Russian International Affairs Council. Anyway, he said, Strangely enough, this is the result of direct British influence on Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. Advisers of all kinds, like Tony Blair, we all knew that anything bad had to involve Tony Blair, began as far back as under Nazarbayev around 2012, to work on the population of Kazakhstan over its identity and its unlikeliness to Russians. And now we have the anti-Russian vector of Astana is starting to show ever more clearly and to progress faster. So okay. I mean this is clearly another manifestation of the malign Machiavellianism of Foggy Albion, though in fairness Balmasov also does blame Turkey. But the point is it's being presented as this growing trend in which actually Kazakhstan is being seduced away from its proper place looking to Russia. Better said, so why does this matter? Well obviously this is about geopolitics and about identity again. Russia doesn't want to position itself as the heir to the Golden Horde. I mean that's actually often an idea mobilised by its critics, not least Ukrainians and their cheerleaders, who want to other Russia and say, well, no no no, that's essentially a Mongol dominated political culture. And that way we can draw a boundary to European culture and values along Russia's western border. Now look, of course, Russia, and indeed much of Ukraine, was indeed influenced by a couple of centuries of political domination by the Mongols, just as Romans, Norsemen and Normans left their mark on British culture, language, politics, and the like. So what Russia wants to do with the Golden Horde is a complex one. In many ways, it actually is a hostile force because it wants to present itself as his heroically throwing off the Mongol yoke. But on the other hand, it doesn't like the Kazakhs, in effect, laying claim to a polity which did dominate Russia, particularly in the context of the increasing cultural conflict between Russia and Kazakhstan. Remember Putin's obsession with history? His use of it to try to justify his invasion of Ukraine and generally his view that Russia has a blood right to a great power status. So, from Putin's point of view, at least, it's one of the few things in which I can endorse him for, history matters. And in this context, it's not just about who gets to control the Golden Horde. It's about Muscovite or Russian dismay at discovering that the little brothers of the near abroad have and seek to assert agency. That they actually seek to basically define themselves in ways that may well be uncomfortable for Russia, but they don't care. So it's quite interesting that on a variety of levels, other than the straightforwardly sort of trade in geopolitics, because Russia is still a major trading partner of Kazakhstan and so forth, nonetheless we are seeing signs of increasing independence of mind. Now Kyrgyzstan was once celebrated as the island of democracy in Central Asia, but under the current president Sadir Chaparov, it's increasingly a so-called hybrid regime, which let's be honest, that means an increasingly authoritarian regime, but not quite there yet. Likewise, Kazakhstan is an authoritarian, semi-presidential constitutional republic, but no one would call it a democracy. By Central Asian standards, though, these two countries are the best of the batch. If one looks at the Economists' Democracy Index, which has its critics, but nonetheless I think it's a fairly useful benchmark, Kyrgyzstan is one hundred and sixteenth globally, Kazakhstan 123rd. These are not great, but if one thinks of the other three Central Asian states, Uzbekistan 146th, Tajikistan 155th, and Turkmenistan 160th.

Uzbekistan Tajikistan Turkmenistan Hedge

MG 42:15

And what's the common denominator of these last three? They have rather more cordial relations with Moscow. Moscow is after all the autocrat's friend, but only up to a point. In fact, the more one digs, the more clear it is that all of these countries maintain what someone's called a multi-vector foreign policy. In other words, they want to rely least less on Russia and more on whoever is convenient at the moment. So let me just very briefly look at these three countries. Uzbekistan. It may not be quite as authoritarian as it used to be, which may well sound like I'm damning with the faintest praise, but quite frankly is definitely a step forward. And there have been some social and economic reforms under President Mirtiev. But it is still a consolidated authoritarianism without genuine political opposition or free and fair elections. And yeah, exactly, coincidence, I don't think so, has a reasonable relationship with Moscow. It's growing bilateral trade. Russia remains one of Uzbekistan's top two trading partners. Guess who the other one is? And there's a reasonable amount of Russian investment. There's also continued security cooperation. Main supplier of weapons to Uzbekistan's military is Russia. Their regular joint exercises, especially counter-terrorism drills focused on the Afghan border and the concern of sort of jihadist penetration therefrom. But for all that, again, there's this multi-vector foreign policy, euphemism for being open to the highest bitter. Uzbekistan, which left the Moscow-led CSTO, the Collective Security Treaty Organization, hasn't rejoined it, and it has also refrained from condemning, but also backing the special military operation. And well, in 2024, Mirzi Yoyo visited Beijing and concluded what was called an all-weather comprehensive strategic partnership for a new era. As I say, I wish we actually had a rating. How many stars has an all-weather relationship? I don't know. And I mentioned that, as I say, Russia was one of the top two trading partners. Well, China is the main one. It has surpassed Russia as the main trading partner, commanding approximately 19% of Uzbekistan's total trade turnover. And this is increasing. Similar pattern in Tajikistan. Again, strong economic and security cooperation. Moscow and Dushanbe have nearly phased out the US dollar for bilateral trade, making it much less vulnerable to secondary sanctions. Russia continues to be Tajikistan's leading economic partner, and indeed primary foreign investor, and Russia maintains there what certainly used to be, until 2022, its largest overseas military facility there, the 201st military base, which again is there primarily to secure against jihadism. But, well, there's a lot of strain caused by the greater pressure on Central Asian migrants, in particular the social backlash that followed the 2024 Crocus City Hall terror attack. There's been deportations, there have been sort of vigilante attacks on Central Asian migrants, pressure on them to volunteer for fighting in Ukraine. But again, while it's easy to have missed it in the shadow of the Trump and Putin visits, Tajik President Emomali Rachmon had a recent state visit to China, signed 31 agreements and a treaty of eternal friendship and good neighbourliness. Again, is eternal friendship as good as an all-weather strategic partnership? Who knows? Tajikistan matters to China after all, particularly because of the trade routes flowing through it, but also its border with Afghanistan. Remember the Chinese are very worried about Xinjiang, the Uyghur population there, the Muslim Uyghur population, who are under phenomenal security controls. And the constant nightmare there is of jihadist penetration and support which will radicalize Uyghurs. And finally, Turkmenistan. Again, trade, cooperation, bilateral trade is growing. Still, the recent annual turnover, I mean, the big deal was made of the fact it went over 2.5 billion. Well, I mean, yeah, that's that's big in context, but not in the grand scheme of things for Moscow. Turkmen tomatoes are very welcome in Russian supermarkets and cotton in its factories, but no one's really paying too much attention. Meanwhile, Russia exports technological equipment to Turkmenistan, big players like Gazprom, Tatneft, Kamaz, truck manufacturer, they're all active there. Turkmenistan's official policy is of what it calls positive neutrality. But yes, of course, that means it's willing to play Moscow against Europe and indeed China for, to give the obvious example, access to the country's massive hydrocarbon reserves. It's amazing how if you have oil and gas, you have friends. That's pretty much guaranteed. Just ask the Azeris. Putin has talked up the relationship as, quote, a bright example of how partner relations should be built in the modern multipolar world. Yeah, blah blah blah. The bottom line is that, well, firstly that Turkmenistan makes Russia look positively liberal. You've got this very thuggish personal dictatorship under President Serdi Mukhamedov and his dad, former President Gurbanguli Berdi Mukhamedov. It's nice to keep things in the family. But guess what? Gurbanguli recently visited Beijing too, and she has expressed a willingness to come to Ashkabat. God knows they they will already be thumbing the thesaurus for new terms to describe whatever deal is struck there. So look, what can one say overall? I mean this is a story of the ebbing of Russian hegemony over the region, in part because of practical pressures. It just doesn't have the economic clout, and it no longer has the capacity to be the credible security guarantor, which it was in Central Asia, and frankly was quite well regarded for it. It was relatively effective and reliable. But the point is if you can't rely on the Russians, you have to look for someone else. And this happens at a time when there is the rise of rival powers who are also interested in Central

China Gets Pulled Into Regional Security

MG 48:38

Asia. China, the European Union, the United States, which for a while was seemed to be forgotten this bit of the world, is now back on the map. Even countries like India and Turkey are increasing their footfall here. But of course, it is particularly China. And the interesting thing is what's happening now is that the Chinese are experiencing what the Russians experienced, and which every single wannabe imperial power finds itself experiencing, which is the power of the subaltern. Which is that actually you may think that your empire and your expansion of your interests is very much just for your good, but you will often find yourself being exploited by your notional subordinates. And in particular, we see this on security cooperation, is that the Central Asian countries can turn to the Chinese and say, look, the Russians are no longer able to help us defend against jihadists. We would love to do so because of course if we fall to jihadism, then it will infect Xinjiang too. But oh, we're just not weak, not strong enough. What is a poor Central Asian country to do? So and what they're looking for is handouts in terms of kit and training, and they're getting it. And ideally also certain bases. It's noteworthy that in Tajikistan there is a Chinese base of sorts. It's really a I'm gonna call it a police station. That underplays it. But anyway, it is a police rather than a military base. But we're beginning to get facilities being established which would form the locations at which they could be Chinese military deployments. Is this because China is thinking, oh, we want to send troops to Central Asia? Hell no. It is because essentially they are being sucked into it. So Russian hegemony, I mean arguably it's it's withdrawal from this area, which is really just simply because Putin doesn't have the bandwidth, he doesn't have the resources, and he well, and Russia is losing face, and face matters in international politics. But actually in the long term I would suggest it's no bad thing for Moscow. It can just be a pragmatic partner trading, doing whatever it needs to do, but not with any kind of expectation of a wider political dominance. Of course, the more oppressive the relation the the country, often the fewer options. It gets a little bit harder dealing with the Europeans and the West as a whole. I mean, look, we are pretty cynical, but even within our cynicism, there is a certain sense that it matters just how ugly a regime you're dealing with. But there's still China and there's still Moscow. So this is all about transactional pragmatic relationships.

Transactional Politics In A Multipolar World

MG 51:20

Everyone is dealing with everyone else. And in this respect, actually, this is not just simply a metaphor for Russia's relationship with India or China. This is Russia's relationship with everybody, and I would suggest increasingly everybody's relationship with everybody else. We are entering not so much the multipolar world, and there was this huge, pompous 47-page declaration about the emergence of the multi, you know, a new international order that Putin and Xi signed. Yes, it's a multipolar world. It's no longer even under the pretense of being dominated by a single superpower. Just ask the Iranians if they feel dominated by the United States. But I would suggest that actually the corollary of that multipolar world is precisely that everybody's relationships with everybody's else are becoming more openly pragmatic and transactional. And for example, the sooner Britain learns that its special relationship is just a comforting lie it told itself, and not regarded as anything more than that, well then maybe the better Britain will be for it. But likewise, it actually represents the end of empire for Russia. Russia will continue to be a significant force in its strategic neighbourhood, because Russia has resources, it has troops, it has economic mass, it has all kinds of goods that people want to buy, whether it's cheap oil or high-tech military equipment, though probably not those stealth jets, I still think. But that is different from being a hegemon. That is different from having some kind of culturally institutionalized dominance over a region. Those days, I think, ex with the exception perhaps of Belarus, are gone. And good riddance. Thanks for listening.

Final Thoughts And Sign Off

MG 53:10

Well, that's the end of another episode of the In Moscow Shadow Podcast. Just as a reminder, beyond this, you can follow my blog, also called In Moscow Shadows. Follow me on Twitter at MarkGaleotti or Facebook, MarkGaleotti on Russia. This podcast is made possible by generous and enlightened patrons, and you too can be one. Just go along to my Patreon page, that's patreon.com slash in Moscow Shadows, and decide which tier you want to join, getting access to exclusive materials and other perks. However, whether or not you contribute, thank you very much indeed for listening. Until next time, keep well.