"Russian Bayonet, Chinese Yuan": Functional Asymmetry of Great Powers in Central Asia (1992–2022)

1. Introduction: The Phenomenon of Double Presence

Methodological note: this paper is a conceptual working paper (conceptual/think piece). Its task is to introduce an analytical formula, propose operationalizable indicators, and outline an agenda for subsequent empirical verification. The author deliberately avoids claims to an exhaustive explanatory model; contradicting cases are treated as necessary stress-tests, not refutations of the thesis.

Throughout thirty years — from the collapse of the USSR to February 2022 — Central Asia existed in a regime that can be defined as 'managed duality': the region was simultaneously under Russia's military-political umbrella and under growing Chinese economic influence. This coexistence was not accidental and was not the result of an explicit agreement between Moscow and Beijing. The strategic significance of Central Asia as a continental pivot had been identified well before the Soviet collapse (Brzezinski, 1997); what emerged after 1991 was not competition for that pivot but an informal functional division of it. It represented a functional configuration conditioned by the asymmetry of inherited resources and mutual tactical benefit.

This paper introduces the formula 'Russian Bayonet, Chinese Yuan' as a conceptual instrument for describing this configuration. The formula captures not a division of labor in the strict sense — which would presuppose coordination or contract — but a functional asymmetry: each power dominated in the niche where it possessed structural advantage, inherited from the Soviet past or forged in the course of post-Soviet expansion. Russia dominated in the security sphere; China — in the sphere of infrastructural financing.

It is important immediately to indicate the limits of the formula. It describes dominant roles, not monopolies. China throughout the entire period under review built up its military presence in the region — albeit in forms distinct from Russia's. Russia maintained significant economic influence through migration channels. There were periods of acute competition between the two powers — primarily in the energy sphere. The formula describes the macro-structure, not every episode of interaction.

The theoretical framework of the paper is the author's concept of Infrastructure Projection of Geopolitics (IPG; Rakhimov, 2026), according to which infrastructure is the primary instrument of geopolitical influence. Within this apparatus, 'Russian Bayonet' and 'Chinese Yuan' represent two different regimes of infrastructural projection: force-based (creating the security conditions necessary for investment) and economic (direct infrastructural expansion through financing).

2. Theoretical Foundations and Scientific Novelty

2.1. Position in Theoretical Discussion

The conceptualisation of the functional asymmetry of great powers in Central Asia draws on three theoretical sources, each explaining a separate aspect of the described configuration.

The first source is Morrow's (1991) theory of asymmetric alliances. The geoeconomic dimension of great-power competition in Central Asia also draws on the concept of statecraft-by-economic-means developed by Blackwill and Harris (2016), who demonstrate that infrastructural and financial instruments have become primary tools of geopolitical competition precisely in regions where direct military confrontation is structurally costly. Morrow showed that states enter alliances exchanging heterogeneous resources: one side supplies security, the other — autonomy, economic access, or political support. The key implication: stable alliances arise more often not between equals exchanging identical resources, but between asymmetric partners, each of whom possesses what the other lacks. Applied to the present study: the configuration 'Russian Bayonet, Chinese Yuan' represents an informal analogue of such an exchange — without contract, but with the same functional logic.

The second source is Farrell and Newman's (2019) concept of 'weaponized interdependence.' The authors show that economic and infrastructural networks — financial, digital, commercial — have become instruments of geopolitical pressure: powers controlling nodal points of networks can 'weaponize' interdependence, converting it into a lever of coercion. The present paper develops this logic in two directions. First, in Central Asia two actors simultaneously 'weaponized' different types of interdependence: Russia — security networks and migration corridors; China — infrastructural and credit networks. Second, their interdependencies did not compete but mutually reinforced each other — an anomaly relative to the Farrell–Newman model, which presupposes interstate rivalry for network nodes.

The third source is Pierson's (2000) concept of path dependency. Pierson showed that historically established institutional configurations reproduce themselves even in the absence of objective advantages, since switching costs increase over time. Applied to this case: Soviet inheritance created the starting distribution of resources — military and institutional infrastructure went to Russia, markets and trade connections were opened to Chinese expansion. Path dependency explains why the configuration remained stable for 30 years: switching costs for both powers and for Central Asian states continuously grew.

2.2. Scientific Novelty

The contribution of this paper to existing literature consists in three interrelated theses.

First thesis: the concept of 'functional asymmetry of informal co-dominance.' Existing literature on Central Asia describes the relations of Russia and China predominantly in two registers — competition (Stronski and Ng, 2018; Cooley, 2012) or hierarchy (Russia's decline during China's rise). The present paper proposes a third register: functional asymmetry in which two powers simultaneously dominate in different niches without competing directly.

Second thesis: periodization of 1992–2022 as a unit of analysis. Most works consider either the post-Soviet transition (1991–2001), or the BRI period (2013–2022), or the post-Ukrainian reconfiguration (2022–). The present paper for the first time conceptualises the thirty-year period as a coherent configuration with an internal logic, reproduction mechanisms, and a structural fracture point.

Third thesis: the mechanism of mutual reinforcement as anomaly. The Farrell–Newman model presupposes rivalry for network nodes. In Central Asia two powers 'weaponized' interdependence not competitively but complementarily. The explanation of this anomaly — the difference in types of networks (security vs. infrastructure) combined with path dependency of post-Soviet resource distribution — is an original theoretical contribution.

2.3. Operationalisation of Variables

Dimension	Proxy-indicator 'Bayonet' (Russia)	Proxy-indicator 'Yuan' (China)
Military presence	Number of military bases / CSTO contingent strength	Number of joint exercises outside SCO; arms deliveries (USD)
Economic influence	Volume of migrant remittances (% of country GDP)	Accumulated FDI from PRC; Eximbank PRC credit portfolio (USD)
Institutional binding	CSTO / EAEU membership; share of officers with Russian training	Share of BRI projects in total state investment portfolio (%)
Energy binding	Russia's share in energy exports (% of total exports)	China's share in energy imports / transit dependence (%)
Technology standards	Soviet-legacy systems share in armed forces	Chinese technical standards in new infrastructure (%)

3. 'Russian Bayonet': The Security Architecture (1992–2022)

3.1. Institutional Framework

Russia's force presence in Central Asia was institutionalised through three primary mechanisms. First — the Collective Security Treaty (1992) and the CSTO established on its basis (2002), securing legal consolidation of Russian military presence and the function of 'last resort' in crisis situations. Second — bilateral base agreements: Russia's 201st military base in Tajikistan and the Kant air base in Kyrgyzstan formed outposts of direct military presence. Third — Soviet military heritage: the officer corps of Central Asian armies trained in Soviet educational institutions and technically dependent on Russian equipment and doctrine.

Critical is the nature of Russian force guaranteeing: it presupposed not only protection from external threats, but political guarantees of the stability of loyal regimes. The January 2022 events in Kazakhstan, when the CSTO secured the introduction of forces at President Tokayev's request, became the last demonstration of this function — however they should be interpreted with caution: several analysts (Marat, 2022) see in them not a demonstration of strength but evidence of vulnerability — Russia was forced to divert resources to saving a specific regime from an intra-elite threat.

3.2. Economics of Security and the Migration Corridor

Russia's force presence had an obvious economic dimension. Labor migration from Central Asia to Russia — the largest source of external remittances for Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan — functioned in part because Russia provided political predictability of the migration corridor. According to World Bank data (World Bank, 2021), on the eve of 2022 remittances constituted approximately 30% of Kyrgyzstan's GDP and more than 25% of Tajikistan's GDP. In IPG terms, this is a 'soft infrastructural binding': dependency is created not through pipelines, but through stable labor flows requiring the political goodwill of the receiving side.

4. 'Chinese Yuan': Infrastructural Expansion Through BRI

4.1. Stages of Chinese Penetration

Chinese penetration into Central Asia passed through three stages. First (1992–2001) — trade expansion and demarcation: border trade, formation of Chinese trading diasporas, border demarcation agreements as political 'entry fee.' Second (2001–2013) — energy infrastructure: the Turkmenistan–China gas pipeline (2009), oil pipelines in Kazakhstan, the first large credit packages. Third (2013–2022) — full-scale BRI: infrastructural projects in road, energy, and digital spheres; the SCO mechanism as a platform for legitimation (Laruelle, 2018).

4.2. BRI as an Instrument of IPG

From the perspective of Infrastructure Projection of Geopolitics, the Belt and Road Initiative represents the most large-scale realisation of IPG logic in contemporary history. Agreeing with Laruelle's (2018) observation that BRI is not a monolithic strategic project, IPG offers an explanation of why this circumstance does not cancel the structural effect: a totality of decentralised infrastructural investments creates systemic dependence, without requiring a unified governing design. In Central Asia this expressed itself in three patterns — a dynamic whose accelerating pace after 2014 has been linked to China's deliberate cultivation of relationships with Russian-aligned elites (Gabuev, 2016). The three patterns are: substitution (Chinese companies gradually displacing Russian competitors in Kazakhstan's oil sector, Kyrgyzstan's mining, Tajikistan's energy); credit binding (a significant portion of BRI projects financed through PRC Eximbank on terms creating debt dependence); technical standardisation (Chinese infrastructure carries Chinese technical standards, creating long-term technological binding).

4.3. China's 'Bayonet': Limited Military Presence

The thesis about China's exclusively economic role in the region requires a fundamental qualification. Throughout the period under review, China consistently built up its military presence, albeit in forms distinct from Russia's. According to researchers of Chinese presence in Central Asia (Yau, 2022; Pantucci and Lain, 2019), in Tajikistan's Murgab, since the mid-2010s, a Chinese military outpost has functioned, transferred to the management of Chinese security structures. China conducts bilateral military exercises with CA states outside the SCO format, delivers weapons — primarily UAVs and air defense system elements — to Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan (Eder and Mardell, 2022). The logic is obvious: protecting BRI investments and transport corridors from instability requires a force component. This circumstance does not destroy the formula, but clarifies it: the point is not that China has no 'bayonet,' but that its 'bayonet' was functionally different — it provided protection for investments, but did not claim the function of provider of regional order.

5. The Third Actor: The West as Structural Context of the Formula

The formula 'Russian Bayonet, Chinese Yuan' did not arise in a vacuum. Its emergence and reproduction were conditioned by the presence of a third structural actor — the Western bloc in its various institutional manifestations: NATO, the European Union, international financial institutions (IMF, World Bank), and the bilateral policy of the United States. It was precisely the Western vector that created the pressure converting the Russian-Chinese functional asymmetry from a coincidental convergence of interests into a structural necessity.

5.1. NATO and Eastward Expansion as Trigger of Russian Strategy

NATO expansion became the defining factor of Russian security policy in the post-Soviet space. For Moscow, the Central Asian 'bayonet' was not an end in itself, but part of a broader defensive logic: to preserve buffer states outside the Western orbit. NATO 'Partnership for Peace' programs, US military cooperation with Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan — including the American Manas air base in Kyrgyzstan (2001–2014) — were perceived by Moscow as direct geopolitical offensive. In this context, the CSTO and Russian military presence performed the function not simply of regional gendarme, but of counterweight to Western military penetration. Noteworthy is that the moment of maximum Western military presence in the region — the Afghan campaign period (2001–2014) — coincided with the period of most intense Russian institutional construction: the CSTO was created precisely in 2002, the SCO in 2001.

5.2. EU, IFIs, and Competition of Development Models

Western presence in Central Asia was realised not only through military but also economic and normative instruments. International financial institutions — IMF and World Bank — promoted liberal models of economic transformation coupled with political conditionality: macroeconomic stabilisation in exchange for institutional reforms, transparency, rule of law. The European Union consistently implemented technical assistance programs and trade agreements. For Central Asian elites, Western conditionality represented a systemic threat: it linked economic assistance with political reforms undermining the foundations of authoritarian governance. The Chinese 'Yuan' — principally unconditional, not presupposing political reform — was for these elites not simply an advantageous alternative, but an instrument of protection from Western normative pressure. The formula 'Bayonet + Yuan' thus functioned as a joint response to the Western model: Russia's 'Bayonet' provided force independence from NATO, China's 'Yuan' — financial independence from IMF and EU.

5.3. SCO as Institutional Anti-Western Umbrella

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, created in 2001, became the institutional formalisation of this joint response. Unlike the CSTO (exclusively Russian security project) and BRI (exclusively Chinese economic project), the SCO represented a joint Russian-Chinese platform legitimising an alternative model of international order — without Western normative agenda, without conditionality, with emphasis on 'non-interference in internal affairs.' Precisely through the SCO the formula 'Bayonet + Yuan' acquired institutional form: the organisation provided diplomatic cover for bilateral Russian-Chinese co-dominance, giving it the appearance of a multilateral regional project.

6. Verification on Contradicting Cases

6.1. Energy Competition 2009–2014

The construction and commissioning of the Turkmenistan–China gas pipeline (2009) became a direct challenge to Russia's energy hegemony in the region. Before this moment, Russia acted as monopoly transit carrier of Central Asian gas to European markets. The Chinese pipeline created an alternative route and deprived Russia of its lever of pressure on Turkmenistan. In 2012–2014 competition intensified: Russia promoted 'South Stream' and sought to slow the Trans-Caspian Pipeline project, while China accelerated expansion of its pipeline system.

How does this case relate to the formula? At first glance — it contradicts it, since it demonstrates direct competition 'Yuan against Yuan': not 'Bayonet' and 'Yuan' in different niches, but two 'Yuans' in one niche. However, careful analysis reveals a more complex picture. Russia in energy competition acted primarily through political instruments — threat of revision of security agreements, pressure through CSTO and EAEU — i.e., converted the 'Bayonet' into economic positions. China acted exclusively through financial instruments. The case of 2009–2014 is thus not a refutation of the formula, but its stress-test, revealing the conversion mechanism: Russia used the force resource as a lever in economic negotiations.

6.2. Institutional Friction: EAEU and BRI

A serious challenge for the formula is the institutional conflict between Russia's EAEU project and China's BRI. Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, being EAEU members, are forced to balance between the supranational customs code of the EAEU, limiting their autonomy in trade negotiations with China, and Chinese pressure on market opening. This creates constant friction — not a 'division of labor,' but competition of institutional logics. EAEU–BRI friction testifies that the 'Bayonet' and the 'Yuan' function in the same space not without conflict. From a structural-realist perspective (Mearsheimer, 2001), such friction is expected: great powers competing for regional influence cannot sustain indefinite complementarity. The puzzle the formula addresses is precisely why this friction remained contained for thirty years rather than escalating into direct rivalry. The formula describes the dominant asymmetry at the macro-structural level, but does not deny the existence of zones of overlapping interests and competitive pressure.

7. Stability Mechanisms of the Functional Asymmetry

The stability of the formula over thirty years is explained by two mechanisms that must be clearly distinguished, since they operate at different levels and have different consequences for understanding its subsequent breakdown.

The first mechanism is external: Western pressure as trigger of the emergence and maintenance of the formula. NATO expansion, IMF and EU conditionality, the normative agenda of 'democratization' created for both powers and for Central Asian elites a stable incentive to reproduce the alternative configuration.

The second mechanism is internal: structural complementarity as a mechanism of self-reproduction. Once arisen, the formula began to reproduce itself independently of the intensity of Western pressure — through accumulation of switching costs (Pierson, 2000), through institutionalisation of roles in CSTO, SCO, EAEU, through BRI infrastructural bindings. This is precisely what explains why the formula did not fall apart under Trump (2017–2021), when Western pressure weakened: by that moment the internal reproduction mechanism was already working autonomously.

The distinction of two mechanisms has fundamental significance for explaining 2022: the formula began to break down not because Western pressure disappeared (on the contrary, it sharply increased), but because the internal mechanism was destroyed — Russia's 'Bayonet' turned out to be reoriented, switching costs for Central Asian states fell, and China did not compensate for Russia's force failure.

From the standpoint of each actor, the configuration gave more than its destruction. From Russia's point of view, Chinese investments in regional infrastructure raised the economic stability of states, reducing the probability of destabilising crises requiring costly Russian force intervention. From China's point of view, Russia's 'Bayonet' provided the predictable political environment necessary for long-term infrastructural investments. For Central Asian states, the configuration provided the possibility of balancing: relying on Russia's 'Bayonet' in the security sphere and China's 'Yuan' in the investment sphere, they retained room for manoeuvre, not becoming fully dependent on either power. Multi-vectorism as an official doctrine of Kazakhstan's foreign policy is the most consistent articulation of this logic (Peyrouse et al., 2012).

8. 2022 as a Point of Revision of the Configuration

The formula began to give failures before February 2022. The Karabakh war (2020) and the Kyrgyzstan-Tajikistan border conflict (2021) demonstrated the inefficiency of the CSTO as a real collective security instrument: the organisation was unable to prevent violence between its own members. This undermined the reputational resource of Russia's 'Bayonet' even before the start of the Ukrainian conflict.

2022 not only reoriented Russia's 'Bayonet,' but also radically changed the configuration of the Western vector. Western sanctions converted Central Asia into a zone of strategic choice: the region found itself under simultaneous pressure of secondary sanctions — from the US and EU demanding to stop circumventing restrictions — and Russian pressure demanding to circumvent them. The EU for the first time in thirty years institutionalised direct presence in the region through the format of 'CA – EU' meetings at the level of heads of state and a new Connectivity Package (Global Gateway). The US activated the C5+1 format. The Western vector from peripheral became central — which in itself meant a structural rupture: the formula worked precisely because the West remained significant but manageable pressure. When this pressure became unmanageable, the incentives for reproducing the formula changed sharply.

The key observation: 2022 did not destroy the configuration instantly, but launched the process of its revision. Central Asian states did not break with Russia, but undertook diversification in the security sphere — through activation of contacts with the US, EU, and Turkey. China did not immediately fill the emerging 'force vacuum,' remaining faithful to the strategy of economic, not military, presence. The intermediate zone of uncertainty is characteristic of transitional periods between configurational arrangements of regional order.

9. Conclusions

The formula 'Russian Bayonet, Chinese Yuan' describes not a contract and not a monopolistic division of spheres of influence, but a historically established functional asymmetry conditioned by the difference of post-Soviet resource inheritances of the two powers. Russia inherited military infrastructure and political ties; China arrived with large-scale infrastructural capital. For thirty years each power dominated in its own niche, and their interaction — despite periods of competition — reproduced a stable structure of regional order.

Stress-tests considered in Section 6 do not refute the formula, but clarify its sphere of applicability: it describes dominant positioning at the macro-structural level, not behavior in each specific episode of interaction. China's 'Bayonet,' built up since the early 2000s, remains functionally different from Russia's: it provides protection for investments, but does not claim the function of provider of regional order.

Theoretically the configuration confirms the central thesis of Infrastructure Projection of Geopolitics: infrastructure — physical, institutional, migrational — is the primary instrument of geopolitical influence, preceding military force and exceeding it in long-term stability of impact. China's Yuan, invested in pipelines and roads, turned out to be more structure-forming than commonly supposed; Russia's Bayonet, built into security institutions, turned out to be more fragile than assumed.

The present paper resolves a limited but fundamental task: to conceptualise the thirty-year period as a coherent configuration, introduce its analytical designation, propose operationalizable indicators, and outline an agenda for subsequent verification. Contradicting cases — energy competition, institutional EAEU–BRI friction, growing Chinese military presence — are not excluded from analysis, but included as an agenda for further research.