Gulf Security and the U.S. Military: Regime Survival and the Politics of Basing.
He applied the “Page 99 Test” to his new book, To Rule Eurasia’s Waves: The New Great Power Competition at Sea, and reported the following:
From page 99:Learn more about To Rule Eurasia’s Waves at the Yale University Press website.Since the end of the Cold War, especially since the 2000s, Russia and Egypt primarily bonded over shared disagreement regarding U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East—from the first and second Iraq Wars to U.S. support for the Arab uprisings in Egypt and elsewhere. In fact, during the Gulf War of 1991, Russian sources arguably claim the war resulted in about $40 billion in political and economic losses. Russia also historically supported the Palestinian cause, in addition to fighting the spread of violent extremism and terrorism. Most importantly, Egypt is again at the geostrategic center of a competition between Russia, China, India, and the West in their attempts to influence or dominate the sea lanes of communication running through the Suez Canal. Egypt has welcomed the growing focus on its geostrategic location and is trying to leverage more of an “Egypt First” foreign policy that seeks greater independence while regaining its historic and regional prestige. Nonetheless, Russia is trying to demonstrate its utility and allegiance to Egypt. Similar to China, Moscow has growing geoeconomic interests and investments that, until recently, have focused mainly on Egypt’s energy sector and trade, but that is now morphing into a desire to bolster military and security ties.Readers who turn to page 99 do indeed get a good glimpse into the contours of the book’s larger arguments, albeit through the lens of one case. In this excerpt from chapter 4, “Anchoring the Seas of Southwest Asia”, one witnesses the burgeoning relationship between Russia and Egypt. I also cite the growing maritime competition between Russia, China, and India, which is the main thrust of the book. Geoeconomics is showcased here as well and throughout as a primary driver of this bigger maritime competition. The only thing where this test falls short, however, is in mapping out the growing navalism that we also see emerging across Eurasia’s strategic sea lanes of communication. This aside, Russia has only just started pushing farther south from Egypt into the Indian Ocean from the Suez Canal, but this is presumably a trend that will continue moving forward. Russia continues to bolster ties with Egypt, Sudan, Somaliland, and other Gulf nations. As it moves deeper into the Indian Ocean, Russia will no doubt be confronted with balancing against India and Pakistan, as well as China.
Beginning in 2014, President Putin and Egyptian president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi began discussions over their many shared interests. Since then, their bilateral ties have flourished across a multitude of sectors from energy to trade and national security. In 2017, Russia’s exports to Egypt hit a record high of $6.2 billion, compared with about $505 million in Egyptian exports to Russia. In the same year, Russian investments in Egypt totaled around $4.6 billion, including eighty Russian delegation visits to Egypt over the year. Of this number, about 60 percent fell under the oil and gas sectors.
Though this chapter focuses primarily on the Red Sea, Arabian Sea, and Persian Gulf, the rest of the book is one of the first to take a comprehensive look at Eurasia from a saltwater perspective. The book’s chapters are organized by regional seas, beginning first with the Baltic and Black Seas and moving from there to the Mediterranean, Indian Ocean, and Pacific Asia. The final chapter examines the northern frontier of the Arctic and the growing interests of both Russia and China. Even India has begun to point toward greater strategic assets in the High North. Though the United States, as an established global military and economic power, is not forgotten in the book’s larger analysis, the intent here is to provide a non-U.S.-centric worldview on the shifting seas of Eurasia, and thus the emergence of a new world order.
--Marshal Zeringue
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