Events
The Global Policy Institute and Bay Atlantic University held a joint webinar on Wednesday, May 26, 2021, 11:00am – 12:30pm (EST) to discuss “Strengthening Stability in the Black Sea Region”.
Located at the intersection of the Western, Orthodox and Muslim worlds, the wider Black Sea Region historically has been a place for violent encounters. Thus, instead of a bridge between civilizations, it has been a barrier. In recent years, energy flow issues turned into geopolitical problems. The presence of oil and gas has thrust the region into the world’s view and contributed to the rush of external interest. Today, in an interconnected global economy, the region’s position as a producer and conduit for critically important fossil fuels makes it a valuable hub for oil and gas pipelines supplying the European market. Moreover, on account of the ongoing conflict involving Russia and Ukraine, the Black Sea Region is now a potential flashpoint between the West and Russia, while directly challenging NATO cohesion. Is the wider Black Sea Region destined for perpetual contention, or are there potential courses of action which can improve stability?
Full Video:
Event Summary:
Located at the intersection of the Western, Orthodox and Muslim worlds, the wider Black Sea Region historically has been a place for violent encounters. Thus, instead of a bridge between civilizations, it has been a barrier. In recent years, energy flow issues turned into additional geopolitical problems. The presence of oil and gas has thrust the region, a major transit point for energy flows from Russia and other countries into Europe, into the world’s view and contributed to increased external interest. Today, in an interconnected global economy, the Back Sea region’s position as a producer and conduit for critically important fossil fuels makes it a critically important hub for oil and gas pipelines supplying the European market. Moreover, on account of the ongoing conflict involving Russia and Ukraine, the Black Sea Region is now a potential flashpoint between the West and Russia, while directly challenging NATO cohesion. Is the wider Black Sea Region destined for perpetual contention, or are there potential courses of action which can improve stability?
Professor Yayci set the stage for the discussion by providing a comprehensive review of various, interconnected regional initiatives many of them led by Turkey aimed at lowering tensions among the littoral countries that include NATO members (Turkey, Bulgaria and Romania), as well as Russia, and two countries bordering Russia (Ukraine and Georgia) that have had and are having military confrontations with Russia. The aim of these regional fora, Yayci explained, is to lessen tensions while providing vehicles for exchanges of information among all the littoral countries. He also pointed out the complexities regarding the status of the Straits, Turkish sovereign territory, subject however to an international regulatory regime created by the 1936 Montreux Convention.
Assenova stressed the problem of Russian aggression to Ukraine, while it keeps pushing for the creation of more avenues for its oil and gas exports to Europe, trying this way to reaffirm itself as the preeminent energy supplier to Europe.
Dorondo pointed out that the region has become more strategically relevant for NATO, while also attracting the interest of states that are now participating in the Three Seas initiative, since some of them are Black Sea littoral countries, while most of them depended in varying degrees on Russian hydrocarbon imports.
Nussbaum argued that Russia is pursuing its traditional objectives in the region: strategic depth, having a “seat at the table” where it matters, and access to warm waters ports. It is clear that other countries in the Black Sea region perceive Russian goals as disruptive and destabilizing.
Dupuy also emphasized Russia’s goals as a major energy exporter while pointing out that NATO may not have the tools in place to counter Russian influence. Closer cooperation with the Three Seas member countries may offer new opportunities.
Overall, the panelist agreed that the Black Sea Region, notwithstanding efforts aimed at creating confidence-building measures, will remain a delicate spot and potentially a flashpoint for East-West confrontations. The Russia Ukraine conflict will not be resolved in a definitive way any time soon. Russia will not give Crimea back to Ukraine, while it will continue to exert influence, directly and indirectly, on littoral countries, notably Bulgaria and possibly Romania. Russian energy dominance could be lessened by exploring viable alternatives, including increased imports of Qatari, Azeri and US LNG. Increased cooperation between NATO and the European Union would strengthen Western cohesion while placing more obstacles for Russian ambitions.
Speakers
Margarita Assenova, Senior Fellow, Jamestown Foundation
Margarita Assenova is a Senior Fellow at the Jamestown Foundation in Washington DC. She is a regular contributor to its flagship publication Eurasia Daily Monitor covering security, politics and energy. Since 2006, she has taught area studies courses on the Balkans, Caucasus and Central Asia at the Foreign Service Institute, U.S. Department of State. Assenova is a recipient of the John Knight Professional Journalism Fellowship at Stanford University for her reporting on nationalism in the Balkans. She has authored book chapters and reports published by CSIS Press, Brassey’s, Freedom House, Bertelsmann Foundation Publishers, CEPA and the Jamestown Foundation. Her recent books include Eurasian Disunion: Russia’s Vulnerable Flanks (with Janusz Bugajski) (2016), a critical study on Russian subversion in Europe, Eurasia and Central Asia, and Azerbaijan and the New Energy Geopolitics of Southeastern Europe, Ed. (2015). Her reports “Nord Stream 2: Myths, Reality, and the Way Forward” (2018) and “Bulgaria’s Ambitions for a Balkan Gas Hub” (2018) exposed Russian energy ambitions in Europe.
Rear Admiral (Rtd) Assoc. Prof. Dr. Cihat Yayci, Head of BAU Maritime and Global Strategies Center (Istanbul)
Rear Admiral (UH) CİHAT YAYCI, Assoc. Prof. was born in Elazığ in 1966. He graduated from the Naval High School in 1984 and the Naval Academy in 1988.
Yaycı earned a master’s degree in Management of Human Resources at Marmara University, and later in Physics Engineering and Electronics Engineering at the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS) in California/ USA. He obtained his PhD in International Relations at Istanbul University.
He has written books and articles published in national and international academic journals.
Daniel Nussbaum, PhD, Chair, Energy Academic Group (EAG), Naval Postgraduate School
Dr. Daniel Nussbaum is currently the senior member of the EAG and a faculty member in both the Operations Research Department and the Business School at Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). Dan provides several critical functions across the NPS campus, including teaching courses in cost estimating and analysis, mentoring students throughout their graduate coursework, including their master’s theses, and providing leadership in graduate-level energy education, research, and outreach to support advancing operational energy initiatives across the Navy, Marine Corps and broader DoD organizations.
David R. Dorondo, Associate Professor, Department of History, Western Carolina University
David R. Dorondo earned the degree of B.A. with honors in history from Armstrong State College in 1980 and the M.A. in German and European diplomatic history from the University of South Carolina in 1984. From 1984 to 1987, he was a member of St. Antony’s College, Oxford and was admitted to the degree of D.Phil. from the University of Oxford in 1988. While earning his doctorate, he also served as a Fulbright Graduate Research Fellow at the Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg in the Federal Republic of Germany in 1985-1986, having already spent the year 1981-1982 at the same university as a graduate exchange student.
Since 1987, Dorondo has been a member of the Department of History of Western Carolina University. There he teaches both graduate and undergraduate courses in modern European military and political history and the history of international relations. He is a member of US Strategic Command’s Academic Alliance and has served as a subject-matter expert for, and contributor to, the US Joint Staff DDGO J-39 Strategic Multilayer Assessment (SMA). He has written or translated four books on modern German military and political history and has contributed to numerous journals, military encyclopedias, and periodicals.
Arnold C. Dupuy, PhD, Senior Policy Analyst, SAIC
Retired from the United States Army after 25 years of both active and reserve component service. In 2016, Dr. Dupuy completed a Ph.D. in Planning, Governance and Globalization at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech). His dissertation title is: “Changing Patterns of Regionalism and Security in the Wider Black Sea Area: The Transformative Impact of Energy.”
Dr. Dupuy is currently a SAIC employing providing contract support to the Joint Staff J7’s Joint Professional Military Education effort. Separately, he is Chair of the Systems Analysis and Studies (SAS) 163, “Energy Security in the Era of Hybrid Warfare,” a NATO Science and Technology Organization program to study hybrid warfare’s impact on energy security and Alliance cohesion. Other topics of interest include geo-political aspects of energy security within the Trans-Atlantic Alliance, as well as the INDOPACOM area of responsibility. He is an adjunct professor of political science at Virginia Tech and George Mason University.
Moderator
Paolo von Schirach, GPI President, and Chair Political Science and International Relations, Bay Atlantic University