Brooke: Russia’s future in Central Asia
Looking back 10 years from now, the most important news of Sept. 2013 may not be Moscow and Washington jousting over Syria’s civil war. It may well be China quietly locking down massive quantities of Central Asian oil and gas.
While the world worried about Syria, China’s President Xi Jinping deftly moved through Russia’s old imperial backyard, signing almost $100 billion in energy deals — $15 billion in Uzbekistan, $30 billion in Kazakhstan, and an estimated $50 billion in Turkmenistan.