Trans-Eurasian transport links in great and medium-size spaces of power

Abstract

This article describes the interests of two power centres of the global economy which are manifested in creating and operating rail corridors, logistics services and setting up routes between Europe and Asia since the beginning of the 20th century. Today it has been complemented by the interests of medium powers and of ethnic groups as well.

The Trans-Siberian Railway, constructed in the early 20th century, acted as the belt of the Russian Empire. It was designed to foster cohesion within the empire as well as to convert the state power previously established in Siberia into a highly efficient economic power. Apart from its economic-regional developmental effect the first trans-Eurasian railway often underscored its military strategic importance as early as 1904.

As an effect of the isolationist policy of the Soviet Union, the traffic of the Trans-Siberian Railway was limited to domestic and international import-export transports for half a century and became available for international transits only in the 1960s. Its container traffic had drastically declined since its 1989 peak only to regain considerable momentum after the year 2000, owing to Chinese cargo.

The termination of the Russian monopoly through the establishment of a second corridor across Central-Asia was in the interest of European, Central- and Eastern-Asian shipping companies alike. The opportunity to sidetrack Russia was formally grasped in 1990 through the connection of the (narrow-gauge) Chinese and the (wide-gauge) Kazakh railway networks. Recognising this potential, the corridor outlined in the 1993 TRACECA agreement – which was based on the common interest of Western-European and Central-Asian business groups – also included the Caspian Sea and the Black Sea which both would be crossed by train ferries.

In recent years, China has become interested in the “New Silk Road” initiative, launched by the USA in 2011, that would eliminate crossing inland seas which are increasing shipping time and costs. China proposed that it would ensure standard-gauge lines throughout the entire corridor for the benefit of interoperability (with the establishment of a new track in Central-Asia and the improvement of the standard-gauge tracks in Iran and Turkey).

The transcontinental transit performance of the TRACECA corridor is as yet very modest as a result of multiple gauge-changes and inland-sea ferry crossings, and the railway chain passing through Central Asia offers only a “quasi” match for the Trans-Siberian Railway. However certain stretches of the New Silk Road prove to be of outstanding significance in the bilateral transport relations of the middle powers (Kazakhstan, Iran, Turkey).