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Erin: Welcome to T2A webchat for November 14th. We are meeting VOA Reporter Brian Padden as he investigates the Caspian Sea oil controversy -- and journalist Steve LeVine who covered this story for 11 years. They discuss the high stakes international politics surrounding the Caspian Sea oil pipeline, with strategic implications for Washington, Moscow and Tehran.

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Compaore Tewende Michel, Burkina Faso: I've Question For Mr. LeVine which are as follows: first: why are the US, Russia and Iran so interested in the Caspian Sea, is it the oil boom which attracts them? Second: does the Caspian Sea belong to Kazakhstan?

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Steve: Russia, the U.S. and Iran are all interested in controlling as much of the region's oil and natural gas as possible. As to the second question, Kazakhstan has claimed undisputed possession of the portion of the Caspian Sea off its shore to an agreed upon median line with other littoral states.

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Vielmini from Alma-Ata: Mr. LeVine, is oil really the prize? I mean, the Caspian battle was begun by the sudden interest of the U.S. since 1994-5 onward. Was this interest justified by oil or rather by the overall U.S. strategy toward post-Soviet-Eurasian space, with first of all concerns for justification of NATO's role in it?

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Steve: Overall U.S. interests in Central Asia and the Caucasus is to make them economically independent, and by extension politically independent, with the ultimate goal of preventing Russia from expanding back into this traditional colonial area when Russia got back on its feet. Oil and control of it has been the vehicle for achieving that strategy.

Brian: The whole competition for influence between Russia and the West in the Caspian Sea area is a good example of the convergence of both economic forces and political agendas, and certainly the countries such as Azerbaijan want to maintain a certain degree of independence in the post-Soviet era and try to increase their ties with the West to help support their independence and oil has been the means for which they can do that.

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Wondwossen, Ethiopia (email): Is the Caspian Oil issue more about supply and demand rather than politics or strategy?

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Steve: Politics and strategy; that is the reason for the geopolitical rivalry. If you're talking about the oil companies, then it's supply and demand.

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Erin: What type of political pressure do oil companies come under then?

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Steve: The companies since the 90's have been under pressure from Russia to ship their oil that direction and from the U.S. to ship their oil West through U.S.-supported lines, and to spend money to build pipelines to carry their energy West, not crossing Russia.  Then on top of that local political pressure to support homegrown projects like paying for the construction of Kazakhstan's new Capitol.

Brian: On politics versus the economic forces at play; what really came out of Steve's book as well as some of the interviews I've done is that the two cannot be divorced from each other -- that in some ways, in the early 90's Steve tells a remarkable tale about how the Clinton Administration pushed for the building of a pipeline from Azerbaijan to Turkey bypassing Russia, and this plan was opposed by many of the oil companies because they felt it wasn't economically feasible. Now in retrospect it looks like a brilliant economic plan for the oil companies themselves who in this case don't have to rely on Russia to get their goods to market, and therefore cannot be pressured by Russia or overly priced by Russia, so the political decision to push for economic diversification of the oil market, meaning not all oil from the Caspian Sea routed through Russia -- now makes good economic sense.

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A.K. Mehta, India (email): How much longer will the world oil and gas supplies last and what will happen after that?

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Steve: This is a good question that's in the newspapers and on television every day and is occupying some of the best economists around the world. It looks like oil in some form, whether within oil shale or in oil fields, will be with us for some decades to come. But countervailing that, there is rising concern about the price of this oil, the volatility of areas in which it's mostly located, and concerns about greenhouse gases, so one can expect in the coming decades for fossil fuels to come into competition with non-carbon based fuels, and for the balance of power within oil to shift from private companies to state-owned companies in countries like China, Russia, Venezuela, Iran and Saudi Arabia.

Brian: One example in Azerbaijan where the offshore oil that they started producing in the late 1990's, they expect for it to peak, meaning 120,000 barrels of oil a day production, they would reach that peak mark around 2011. Come 2023, that well will be close to dry. Now the world consumes 83 million barrels of oil a day which experts expect that number to rise over time, so while there are new reserves being found in places like Brazil recently, it is still a limited resource.

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A.C., India (email): Why does oil play such a big role in international politics?

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Steve: The short answer is it drives the whole world economy and it's located in countries with highly volatile politics. Where there are such high stakes, there is going to be very intense politics.

Brian: I wonder if sometimes the oil exacerbates some of these problems? You have such profits to be made and in many cases the discovery of oil greatly increases the disparity between rich and poor and creates an entrenched bureaucracy dependent upon it, that it almost creates the conditions for dramatic and extreme change. Here's an example; last Friday in Azerbaijan, in Baku, I went to a mosque area, which was filled mostly with young angry men. What is happening there are a growing number of people turning more to a religious faith, a good thing in many ways -- but I think it's in part due to a rejection of the materialism and the corruption that they see that surrounds them. So you are building almost opposing forces because of the oil.

Steve: Brian is raising the point of the so-called resource curse; for the reasons that Brian stated, the visible coming decline in Azerbaijan's oil production and failure to spread the current wealth evenly -- it's clear to me that Azerbaijan will be a victim of this curse, meaning that its current economic hey day will not last and there is a very pessimistic long-term outlook for its economy. Conversely, Kazakhstan's future, while burdened with some of the same problems, looks better because that country has much more oil and so much more room for error, and it's managing its wealth better.

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Turkay, Azerbaijan (email): During the first and second world wars, Azerbaijan was under Russian occupation, making it very easy for Russia to exploit the oil found in Azerbaijan. (Azerbaijani oil made up 80% of the oil Russia used in the wars.) The region is independent now and Russia has to fight with the US and other countries for oil access. Who do you think is more likely to control oil in Azerbaijan- Russia, the US, or some other country?

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Brian: Russia's influence in the region cannot be discounted. Ultimately Azerbaijan wants to control the oil that comes out of Azerbaijan. But Azerbaijan knows it is a small country and has tried to increase its economic ties to the West in order to prevent Russia's domination. Russia has been painted as this almost villain in this story because it sees Azerbaijan as its former state and believes that Azerbaijan should still act that way. But it is a delicate and tricky situation. I just talked to a Russia expert here in Germany. He said to me, 'Reverse the situation. Imagine Russia securing strong economic strategic ties with Mexico or Canada. That could threaten the economics of the U.S. and how would the U.S. feel about that?' So I'm saying is history, power and the close association of these two countries has to be taken into account in all of these discussions.

Steve: As Brian suggests, geography is the first and most important reality of geopolitics. Russia is and will always be the dominant power in that region. However, because of the Caspian nations' own national aspirations, they will seek their own leverage, which will continue to bring the West in as a force there and perpetuate the great power rivalry in the region.

Brian: Here's another point on Russia; Russia is not the Soviet Union. Russia is in many ways also dependent upon the West and interconnected with the West. If Russia tries to exercise its economic power too much, the West and other nations will go elsewhere for oil. So in that sense, Russia is part of the system and this is more an economic competition within the greater globalization capitalistic world we live in today.

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Anil, India (email): 1.What is happening with the India-Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline project that is squashed between India and Iran due to US pressure? The gas pipeline talks are now going on only between Iran and Pakistan.

Steve: You know the latest news, which speaks for itself. The pipeline is caught in multiple political strangleholds. As you suggest, India and Pakistan have to reach some agreement. The U.S. has got to reach an agreement with Pakistan on going forward with a line that would originate in Iran and the chances of these entanglements being resolved are very problematic.

Brian: Security issues may also be a concern in pipelines heading East. Steve tells a very interesting in his book about a proposed pipeline from Turkmenistan, through Afghanistan to Pakistan and it was an idea under discussion in the 1990's -- so my question, can you recap that part of your book?

Steve: The lesson of the Unocal attempt to build an oil pipeline through Afghanistan shows that you can't just look at a map to decide where to put a pipeline. The idea of shipping Central Asia's oil and natural gas straight south looks ideal on paper. But when Unocal tried it, it got bogged down in the long struggle amid tribes and clans and ethnic groups in Afghanistan, not to mention the rise of the Taliban and the growing influence at that time of Osama bin Laden. It eventually was abandoned and though some people still talk about that, Afghanistan is still highly unstable and pipeline-which should last for 40 years-is still not probable. The same set of circumstances should be used to examine the proposed gas line from Iran to India because it also would cross a troublesome area.

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Erin: Gazprom is already one of the largest corporations in the world. How would gaining control of Caspian oil boost this corporation’s ever-expanding influence in the oil world?

Steve: Gazprom is not seeking Central Asia's oil. It's seeking its natural gas, and this is the mechanism through which Gazprom is maintaining its current important role in Europe's natural gas supply. Gazprom supplies more than 30 percent of Europe's natural gas. Its current attempt to control more of Central Asia's supply is part of a grand strategy to gain more market share in Europe, which is making especially Eastern-Europeans worried.

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Erin: As the two countries with the largest proven oil and gas reserves, is there the potential of Russia and Iran becoming major competitors, possibly leading to future conflict? Or is it more likely that they will work together, creating a loose oil producers club?

Steve: Putin and Ahmadinejad have already formed an alliance of convenience on a couple of big issues, namely nuclear and demarcation of the Caspian Sea. This alliance is not one of friendship, but one of convenience and its entirely possible that they will find other grounds including the one you mentioned to be mutually advantageous in the future, especially if the U.S. continues to refuse even to speak to Iran.

Brian: Countries like Azerbaijan though will tell you that Russia is not a reliable partner. That is why they ultimately turned to the West and they cite some of Russia's recent bullying tactics. So how long and how deep a partnership between Iran and Russia will go is up to speculation.   I've been in the region the last couple of weeks but I've been using Steve's book called The Oil and The Glory as my guide and my background and my fact checker so I encourage everyone to go out and get that book to learn the entire story about oil development in the Caspian Sea and the really rich and varied characters who made it.

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Erin: That wraps today’s chat. Our thanks to VOA reporter Brian Padden and to journalist and author Steve LeVine, and to you for joining us. And to our participants, we will send you Steve's book! We hope you’ll come back tomorrow – Thursday (November 15th) at 1830 hours universal time to meet Darfur rights activist Dr. Mohammed Ahmed Abdallah. He is medical treatment director for Darfur’s leading indigenous human rights organization. The Amel Center for the Treatment & Rehabilitation of Victims of Torture works in Nyala, al-Fashir and the surrounding encampments of internally displaced people. Dr. Mohammed Ahmed is the 2007 recipient of the Robert F. Kennedy Memorial Human Rights Award. That’s a special edition chat Thursday, November 15th at 1830 hours universal time on voanews.com. See you then!