SIGNIFICANCE OF THE GEORGIAN-SOUTH OSSETIAN CONFLICT FOR TURKISH FOREIGN POLICY
Abstract
In the 20th century, the world reconciled itself to the Soviet Union’s influence in the Cau-casus and the Central Asian Region. The West, particularly the U.S., wanted to be a major if not the main actor in this power game after the collapse of the Soviet system. Its first goal, certainly, was to gain control over the wealthy oil and natural gas reserves of the Caucasian and Central Asian nations, but its next goal was no less significant: diverting oil around Russia and preventing Moscow from reasserting its control over the Caucasus and Central Asia. Georgia was preferred as the primary pro-Western state for secure transportation of the huge oil and gas prosperity of the neighboring regions. So, when the main Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline for transporting oil through Georgia was completed in 2005, it was hailed as the most important success U.S. strategy had scored over Russia and helped to diversify its energy deliveries, given the instability of the Middle East.
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Chevron is the biggest investor in this venture.
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arrived in Moscow on 13 August and went to Tbilisi on 14 August, one day after French President Nicolas
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