No big winner in wrestle for Russia's oil pipeline
Last Updated(Beijing Time):2005-01-10 15:57
On the last day of 2004, Russia finally decided to route its oil pipelines in the Far East to the Pacific. It signifies the failure of the Angarsk-Daqing pipeline, which connects to China's Daqing, and the success of the Tayshet-Nakhodka pipeline, which leads to the Pacific.
In the past year, the oil pipeline, which is designed to carry 80 million tons of oil a year, churned the geoeconomic strategy in the entire East Asia region, triggering fierce triangle wrestling between China and Japan, China and Russia, as well as Japan and Russia in energy and political relations. Although the Tayshet-Nakhodka pipeline scheme finally won, as the fate of the oil pipeline, which will not be put into commercial operation until 2010, is determined, the wrestle for Russia's Far East oil has actually become a tie, without a big winner.
In Putin's pragmatic diplomacy, Tayshet-Nakhodka is Russia's trump card to gain political and economic interest in the Pacific region with oil. The card is not given to Japan or China. Russia kills four birds with one stone - Tayshet-Nakhodka. First of all, it balances oil interest between the three economic powers in East Asia - China, Japan and South Korea. Since everyone needs the pipeline, Russia's Pacific coast will become brisk like Persian Gulf after having been quiet for many years. Secondly, Tayshet-Nakhodka is also attractive to Americans as it may supply oil to the West Pacific regions of the U.S.
Last year, Japan joined the wrestle for Angarsk-Daqing pipeline in a high-profile manner, which just raised the price of Tayshet-Nakhodka pipeline. Even so, pursuing pragmatic diplomacy, Putin does not want to stake on merely the China market or merely the Japan market. He wants to tie at least four nations' interest with the pipeline.
Although it kills four birds with one stone, Russia is not the biggest winner either.
After Tayshet-Nakhodka became an international "political pipeline", its does not hold as much value to China as Angarsk-Daqing. In fact, Russian oil's significance to China has reduced dramatically.
Preparations were made for Angarsk-Daqing for ten years. In the beginning, it was an oil pipeline between China and Russia, and the two sides put eggs in each other's basket, and they could have become political and economic allies with highly reliance. However, due to Russia's hesitation, Kazakhstan won China – the biggest customer like lightning. Last year, China and Kazakhstan decided to build the China-Kazakhstan pipeline, which has a delivery capacity of 50 million tons in the future. Thus, China will obtain oil from the second Persian Gulf - Caspian Sea in Central Asia.
The China-Kazakhstan pipeline arguably has substantially reduced the strategic value of Russian oil to China. Now, for the Far East oil pipeline concerning China, there is only one card left, namely whether to dig an opening leading to China's Daqing on the pipeline. This is a secondary chip for Russia, and there is not much pressure for China, either.
As oil price drops and China launches its 90-day strategic oil reserve initiative, China will have greater composure in international wrestling for oil. While searching for oil inshore and on land, it is purchasing oil from all over the world.
Don't put your eggs in one basket – this is consensus shared by people worldwide. In the Chinese's words, that is you cannot tie yourself utterly to one tree in seeking overseas oil interest.
Source:CE.cn
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