A Study On Russian Geostrategy Toward Asia-Pacific Region In The Post-Cold War Era

The geostrategy refers to the strategy for a country to seek and safeguard nationalinterests by using the geopolitical relations and function rules. While the formulationof a national geostrategy requires this country to combine with its own uniquehistorical conditions and synthetically use political, economic, military, culture andother means to protect the interests of the country’s geopolitics according to the realityof geopolitics environment of this country. Because the geographical position andgeopolitical characteristics of different countries in the world are different, thegeostrategy pursued by each is also different; even in different historical periods ofthe same country the geostrategy may be taken in different due to the changes in itsterritory, the changes in comprehensive national strength, and the changes of thepower of the neighboring countries.Russia is a country across Eurasia. Its geopolitical characteristics determine thatRussia has the important geopolitical interests in the Western world and the Easternworld. While from the geopolitical space division of Russia, the major geopoliticalspace facing in the West is “Euro-Atlantic space”, and the major geopolitical spacefacing in the East is “Asia-Pacific Space”. The Asian-pacific region is one of Russia’smost important strategic directions, so the geostrategy facing to the Asian-Pacificregion must occupy a very important position in Russia’s foreign strategy. Historically,meanwhile, Russia is a country that places great importance on geopolitics andgeopolitical interests. The geostrategy always occupies a central position in Russia’sforeign strategy. Especially for today that the geostrategy space in Europe of Russiafaces the constant pressure from Western countries, carrying out actively geostrategy and diplomacy has a great significance on consolidating the national security anddevelopment of the Far East, expanding Russia strategic space and enhancing its greatpower status. Therefore, the thesis chooses the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia asthe research topic which is both for the investigation of the core geostrategy directionof Russia and for the expedition of the core strategic content of Russia. The concretestructure of the thesis is as follows:Chapter1, the Ideological Foundation of the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia:the Russian geopolitics thought. This chapter focuses on the internal factors offorming the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia after the Cold War: the Russiangeopolitics thought. The history of the production, development and formation of theRussian geopolitics thought is described in this chapter. The main content includessummarizing the basis of the Russian geopolitics thought from geographic, nationality,religious, historical and other aspects, as well as elaborating the evolution anddevelopment from Tsarist Russian to the time before the collapse of the Soviet Union,and emphatically introduces Russia’s three major geopolitics thought and genre afterthe Cold War: Atlanticism, Neo-Slavism, and new Neo-Eurasianism.Chapter2: the International Environment of the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy ofRussia: the changes of the geopolitical pattern after the Cold War. This chapterfocuses on the external factors for forming the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russiaafter the Cold War, namely what is the significant changes of neighboring geopoliticalpatterns and the geopolitical environment of the Russia after the Cold War. In thischapter, the Russia’s external geopolitical environment is divided into four levels: thechanges of the global geopolitical patterns, the changes of the geopolitical patterns ofthe former Soviet Union, the changes of the geopolitical patterns of the Europeanregion, and the changes of the geographical pattern of the Asian-Pacific region. Whilein the analysis of the specific content of the changes, it is divided into threedimensions: the changes in the geopolitical security patterns, the changes in thegeo-economic patterns, and the changes in the geopolitical cultural patterns.Chapter3, the Content of the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia. TheAsian-pacific Geostrategy of Russia actually contains what specific ideas and measures are provided in this chapter. In the comparison with the geopoliticalenvironment faced by Russia, the Asia-Pacific geostrategy of Russia also containsthree levels: the level of geopolitical security, the level of geo-economic and the levelof the geo-culture. According to the different environment faced by these three levelof Russia in the Asian-Pacific region after the Cold War, Russia has formulatedcorresponding Asia-Pacific geostrategy idea. Meanwhile, Russia’s post-Cold Wargeopolitics thoughts constantly affect the overall vision of the three levels. The authoranalyzes the changes and adjustments produced in the Russia’s geopolitical securityconcept, the geo-economical concept and the geo-cultural concept leading by differentgeopolitics thoughts.Chapter4, the Implementation Path of the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia.In this chapter, the author attempts to outline the implementation framework of theAsian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia, namely what means and paths used by Russia toachieve the idea of the geostrategy. In the Asia-Pacific geostrategy of Russia, thebilateral relationship is the most important driving force to support its forward.Therefore, Russia established a solid bilateral relationship with three fulcrumcountries of the Asian-Pacific region, such as China, India and Vietnam. At the sametime, Russia broadened its space of the geopolitical interest realization, and Russiaactively builds and participates the multilateral platform of the Asian-Pacific regionwhich mainly includes the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, APEC andRussia-ASEAN dialogue mechanism. At last, the author analyzes the two importantstrategic tools achieving effective interaction between Russia and those countries andmultilateral platform: energy diplomacy and military-technical cooperation. The“Fulcrum countries”,“multilateral platform”, and “effective means” constitute the“point”,“line”, and “surface” in the implementation path of the Asian-PacificGeostrategy of Russia.Chapter5, the Problems and Prospects Faced by the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy ofRussia. In this chapter, the author proposes the problem in the domestic level, regionallevel and global level of the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia. These problems areboth historic, such as the problem of defining the national identity of Russia, how to strike a balance by Russia above the three fulcrum countries, and realism, such as the“return to the Asia-Pacific strategy” of the United States and the influence for theRussian geostrategy after Russia access to the WTO. Then the author predicts thefuture prospects of the Russia’s Asia-Pacific geostrategy. At last the article exploresthat how the Asian-pacific Geostrategy of Russia will affect Sino-Russian relations.The author re-combs the basic analytical framework of the thesis in the conclusionpart, and thinks the circulation problems of the geopolitics thoughts in the history ofRussia which may impact the Asian-Pacific Geostrategy of Russia in the future, andpre intends the difficult problems which may faced by the thesis.