Shift to ‘Coopetition’ in the U.S. Central Asia Strategy complements US Indo-Pacific Strategy

At the core of the strategic rivalry between the United States and China lies China’s heavy dependence on maritime trade routes. As of early 2025, about 57.3% of China’s foreign trade transited by sea, with exports reaching nearly $325 billion in June alone. This maritime reliance underscores the economic dominance of China’s eastern coastal regions—Beijing, Shanghai, Guangdong, Jiangsu, and Shandong—which together generated over $5.1 trillion in GDP in 2024. These provinces thrive on export-oriented manufacturing and port infrastructure, while inland regions such as Wuhan and Chengdu, despite faster population growth and rising consumption, continue to lag economically, with GDP per capita roughly half that of the coastal hubs in 2023. This stark regional disparity creates a national imperative for Beijing to rebalance economic development toward the interior, driving China’s strategic expansion into Central Asia.

China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) Central Asian corridors play a crucial role as an economic equalizer by channeling trade, investment, and infrastructure into inland provinces, thereby reducing coastal dominance and maritime dependency. Through integrating overland logistics networks—like transnational railways and highways—China empowers inland cities with direct access to global markets. This strategy not only lowers transportation costs and diversifies export routes, but also fosters industrial growth in the interior, fundamentally altering China’s economic geography. Consequently, a rising share of China’s foreign trade is shifting from sea-based routes to land-based networks, narrowing regional economic gaps and significantly lessening China’s vulnerability to maritime chokepoints and external disruptions.

The traditional Indo-Pacific Strategy, which has historically emphasized maritime dominance, now faces a critical gap as China diversifies its export and investment pathways toward Eurasia. To effectively counter China’s expanding multi-vector influence, the U.S. must broaden its policy beyond maritime competition, deepening strategic engagement with the Eurasian landmass by integrating economic, political, and security dimensions across the continent. This calls for a shift toward fostering a more resilient and interconnected regional framework.

Fostering Competitive Cooperation to Reflect Realpolitik in Central Asia

Building on this strategic imperative, America should actively promote the development of an open, resilient, and inclusive regional economic ecosystem in Central Asia. The crucial insight is that by enlarging the overall economic “pie,” greater opportunities emerge for meaningful engagement and dynamic interactions among all regional actors—including Russia, China, Turkey, and other ambitious players. By fostering sustainable development and deeper integration, the U.S. can establish itself as a constructive yet strategically savvy partner, cultivating a competitive environment that deliberately harnesses the region’s natural rivalries as a strategic advantage.

This model of competitive cooperation—or “coopetition”—creates space for emerging and increasingly influential actors to contribute to regional development while preventing any single power from achieving dominance. Turkey, for instance, has rapidly expanded its economic footprint, with exports to Central Asia reaching $12 billion in 2022 and bilateral trade with Turkmenistan hitting $2.5 billion in 2023. Ankara’s influence is strengthened not only by trade and defense partnerships—including UAV cooperation with Kazakhstan—but also by deep linguistic and cultural ties to Turkic-speaking populations.

While enlarging the economic pie through engaging diverse actors is crucial, the U.S. must exercise necessary caution in this approach. Critics rightly warn that deepening economic ties with authoritarian-leaning states such as China risks entrenching illiberal governance models across Central Asia. Infrastructure investments and expanded trade may strengthen state capacities for surveillance and repression as much as for development. This tension is particularly evident in the record of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, where investment often advances without governance conditions, effectively decoupling growth from liberal reform and potentially undermining democratic development.

Therefore, as the economic pie grows, U.S. engagement—especially in coordination with the European Union—must move beyond mere commercial diplomacy. Any strategy for economic integration should embed robust mechanisms that promote transparency, accountability, and meaningful participation by civil society. Without addressing these governance dimensions proactively, growing economic interdependence risks solidifying authoritarian resilience, thereby limiting the U.S.’s ability to advance long-term democratic governance and human rights in the region. This governance-conscious approach ensures that economic expansion serves not just growth, but also the development of more open and accountable political systems.

The U.S. Needs to Strategically Leverage Regional Rivalries to Diversify Supply Chains in Central Asia

With this long-term framework in mind, the U.S. should remove Cold War-era constraints on Central Asian countries, most notably by repealing the Jackson-Vanik Amendment. According to a 2025 Atlantic Council report, this outdated provision denies permanent normal trade relations (PNTR) to several Central Asian nations that have already met original human rights criteria, resulting in higher tariffs and reduced investment that directly impede U.S. influence and limit economic engagement with the region. The bipartisan efforts led by Senators Marco Rubio, Steve Daines, Chris Murphy, and Todd Young to eliminate this barrier represent a crucial first step toward unlocking trade, infrastructure investment, and cooperation in critical sectors such as rare earth minerals and counterterrorism. Repealing Jackson-Vanik would bring U.S. policy into alignment with current geopolitical realities, enabling more substantial partnerships that promote development grounded in human dignity and democratic accountability.

Building on this policy foundation, the U.S. short-term strategy should adopt a complementary two-pronged approach. First, it must strengthen its institutional toolkit by expanding the role of the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC) to effectively “coopete” with the region’s multipolar actors. This involves promoting private investment and the development of high-quality infrastructure to advance economic diversification and regional connectivity, while enforcing rigorous environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards to support transparent and sustainable growth, along with facilitating the entry and expansion of U.S. companies in competitive markets.

Second, the U.S. should prioritize diversifying trade routes and supply chains by actively engaging both the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) and the Trans-Siberian Railway (TSR), thereby capitalizing on the ongoing China-Russia rivalry for strategic advantage. This dual-corridor approach helps ensure reliable transportation of natural gas to EU allies while securing access to critical minerals in Siberia, reducing dependence on any single transport pathway or political arrangement.

The strategic logic behind reinforcing these complementary infrastructure corridors lies in fostering a competitive dynamic between China and Russia in Eurasia that ultimately serves U.S. interests. The TITR serves as a vital energy corridor that allows Central Asia to reduce dependence on Russian-dominated supply chains while countering China’s growing influence in regional energy exports. In 2023, freight volumes along the TITR increased by 63.7%, with Kazakh exports surging by 122%, highlighting its rising prominence as an alternative to Russian-controlled transport routes and demonstrating its potential to reshape regional trade patterns. This development systematically diminishes Moscow’s leverage while strengthening regional economic autonomy and diversification.

Simultaneously, the TSR remains crucial for Russia’s mineral exports, underpinning its economic strength despite recent fluctuations in transit volumes due to geopolitical tensions. By ensuring Central Asia maintains access to viable alternatives to both Chinese and Russian transport monopolies, the U.S. empowers the region to enhance its economic sovereignty and alleviate authoritarian pressures from any single dominant power. Together, these competing yet complementary transport corridors promote a balance of economic interdependence and healthy rivalry, bolstering regional bargaining power and allowing U.S. firms to secure strategic resources within politically neutral environments that are not dominated by adversarial powers.

By advancing a pluralistic transport network centered on both the TITR and TSR, the U.S. pursues a sophisticated strategy of competitive cooperation—encouraging diverse connectivity options that simultaneously challenge and engage regional powers constructively. This nuanced approach ultimately supports the development of a stable, multipolar, and rules-based economic order in Central Asia that prevents hegemonic dominance while fostering prosperity and development that aligns with American values and strategic interests.

Source: https://foreignpolicyblogs.com/2025/08/08/shift-to-coopetition-in-the-u-s-central-asia-strategy-complements-us-indo-pacific-strategy/