How Kazakhstan is Hedging Against a Russian Invasion

Key Takeaways:

• Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine has shattered assumptions about its strategic limits, showing that ideology and historical ambition can override logic.

• Moscow has sought to keep Kazakhstan as firmly within its sphere of influence as possible.

• Astana’s contingency planning against a potential Russian incursion has become a central pillar of its foreign policy. Kazakhstan has pursued a multivector approach, balancing ties with Russia, China, and the West.

• Factors such as geography, demographics, and logistical considerations make an invasion strategically feasible for Moscow.

During a radio speech in 1939, Winston Churchill once famously described Russia as “a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma”. Over 85 years later, his words still resonate, capturing the Kremlin’s enduring complexity. Before Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, many analysts assumed Moscow would never act, citing crippling Western sanctions, diplomatic isolation, and the risk of heavy military losses. However, as it transpired, ideology, nationalism, and historical ambition would prove enough for Moscow to invade anyway. With the war approaching its third anniversary, Western nations have grown increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress made concerning ceasefire talks. However, the fact remains that the conflict cannot last indefinitely. What will emerge when it does end remains the subject of intense debate. With Moscow demonstrating its preparedness to invade its neighbours, countries from the Baltic to Central Asia are unsurprisingly concerned that they could be next. Among them is Kazakhstan, which shares the world’s longest border with Russia. While an invasion remains a grim prospect, contingency planning is central to Astana’s foreign policy.

A number of factors suggest that a Russian invasion of Kazakhstan would be strategically feasible. With the countries sharing a 7,600-kilometre border across the flat Eurasian Steppe, Russia has plenty of flexibility concerning entry points and few natural obstacles to navigate. Additionally, Astana, the capital, lies isolated and relatively close to the Russian border, making it a potential early target. Infrastructural connections between the two countries, such as roads and railways, could function as supply lines for moving equipment, personnel, and provisions.

The proximity of Russian military bases could facilitate force projection along multiple axes. For instance, Airfields in the Central Military District, such as the Orenburg air base, Dombarovsky air base, and Chebeneki air base, could stage operations from the north. Bases in the Southern Military District, such as Znamensk, Astrakhan, and Volgograd, could support the deployment of forces from the west, including the Caspian Sea. Similarly, outposts in the Eastern Military District, such as in Ukrainka, Domna, Dzyomgi, Khurba, and Vozdvizhenka, would provide capabilities from the East. Facilities in Kyrgyzstan to the south, such as Kant, could potentially be used in a role akin to how Russian forces entered Ukraine from Belarus.

Demographic characteristics also line up in Russia’s favour. With a population of 20.8 million and the ninth largest land mass globally, Kazakhstan’s population density, at just eight people per square kilometre, sees it rank among the lowest in the world. Although Kazakhstan is undergoing urbanisation, with approximately 63% of the population residing in urban areas, the country retains a significant rural population. This reduces the likelihood of sustained resistance and gruelling urban combat as seen in Ukraine, where the urban population is just shy of 80% and the overall populace stands at 39 million.

Although Russia is a war-weary state, a knock-on effect from the ongoing war in Ukraine is that the economy is now firmly on a war footing. To support the war effort, Moscow has sharply increased defence spending and refocused factories towards scaling up the production of arms, ammunition, and military equipment. As a result, Russia is producing more weapons than at any point in its recent history, with  NATO General Secretary Mark Rutte stating that the country is “now producing three times as much ammunition in three months as the whole of NATO is doing in a year”. While the majority of this output is being funnelled to the frontlines, any pause or end to the fighting would enable stockpiles to be quickly replenished.

If the Kremlin assesses these structural economic changes as providing the capacity to launch an offensive that would rapidly deliver results, the temptation could prove irresistible. Given that it would be strategically problematic for Russia to open up a second front with Kazakhstan while still mired in a quagmire in Ukraine, in all likelihood, Moscow would wait until after the war in Ukraine has concluded. With it being difficult to envision the majority of Western nations welcoming Russia back to the international stage with open arms, if reintegration is judged to be past the point of no return, Vladimir Putin may double down on his expansionist tendencies.

Justifying the unjustifiable

Despite an invasion of Kazakhstan likely going down like a lead balloon domestically, that doesn’t count for too much in a country that suppresses dissent and doesn’t hold free elections. Even still, Russia would have to forward a narrative to justify such an operation to its people and the international community. Moscow’s propaganda machine could turn to the countries’ shared history to spin a tale portraying intervention as the restoration of historical unity. During the Soviet era, what was then the Kazakh Soviet Socialist Republic served as a centre for collective farming, industrial production, nuclear weapons testing, spacecraft launches, and forced labour camps for Russia.

The presence of ethnic Russian-speaking populations in Kazakhstan could also be strategically manipulated. With Putin repeatedly promising to protect the interests of Russian speakers around the world, political analysts have unsurprisingly suggested that Kazakhstan’s Russian population could be a geopolitical liability. According to Minority Rights Group, there are an estimated 3.8 million ethnic Russians in Kazakhstan out of an overall population of 20 million. In comparison, Ukraine has 7.1 million ethnic Russians out of an overall population of 39 million. The relatively similar proportions, coupled with Putin's portrayal of the invasion of Ukraine as an effort to protect ethnic Russians, will be alarming for Astana. Domestic efforts in Kazakhstan to pull away from its Russian heritage could further contribute to any narrative advanced by Putin. Nationalist groups in Kazakhstan have been pushing for a more aggressive promotion of the Kazakh language over Russian and there have been reports of Russians being sidelined from political decision-making.

However tenuous the narratives about protecting ethnic Russians abroad are, it is far more likely that the Kremlin would frame a war with Kazakhstan around them rather than acknowledge the more insidious motivations. One such driver is Kazakhstan’s abundance of natural resources. Kazakhstan’s resource wealth lies deep underground. In terms of fossil fuels, the country has extensive reserves of oil, natural gas, and coal. The country is also a world leader in uranium and has significant deposits of iron ore, manganese, chromite, copper, zinc, lead, and gold. Although resource endowments can be a blessing, they also leave countries vulnerable to interference from external actors which do not have the country’s interests at heart. This situation is often referred to as the “resource curse”. Avoiding it is difficult and only a minority of resource-rich countries manage to do so successfully.

Image showing the Kazatomprom Karatau uranium mine in Kazakhstan

A successful invasion could quench a thirst for righting perceived historical wrongs. The humiliating loss of the Cold War, coupled with the complete failure to integrate Russia into the liberal international order, has left a bitter taste for many in Moscow. Among them is Vladimir Putin, who famously called the collapse of the Soviet Union the “greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century”. Putin is known for having a deep personal interest in history and many analysts maintain that he harbours a desire to turn back the clock to the Soviet era, when Moscow dominated its neighbours and commanded regional loyalty. Although it is impossible to know exactly to what extent historical grievances motivated his decision to invade Ukraine, the evidence is compelling. While Russia’s narrative for the international community has often blamed NATO’s expansion eastward, justifying the war domestically has leaned into nationalist assertions surrounding the recovery of historic Russian lands. Other factors, such as shielding the authoritarian regime from pro-democratic spill-over from across the border, also likely factor into the equation. In the view of Professor Bjorn Alexander Duben: “His belief in the nationalist narrative of Ukraine being a historic Russian territory, rather than a nation-state of its own, appears to be genuine and deep-seated”. Many analysts argue that this perspective is part of a broader worldview regarding the post-Soviet space, potentially extending to Kazakhstan.

Caught Between the Bear and the Dragon: How Kazakhstan is Managing the Situation

The concept of a Great Game in Central Asia was popularised during the 19th and early 20th centuries to describe the geopolitical rivalry between Britain and Russia in the region. The great power strategic competition was centred on controlling resources, territorial security, and global prestige. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, analysts have floated the idea of a New Great Game emerging in Central Asia. This time, the players include Russia, China, and the West, squabbling over the coveted prize of controlling natural resources. At the centre of all of it is Kazakhstan, which must delicately navigate a strategic path that meets its own needs. The result has been a multivector strategic policy of geopolitical power balancing by Astana.

Despite Kazakhstan gaining independence after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the country remained within the Russian sphere of influence. Moscow has maintained a strong interest in maintaining as much continuity as possible under the circumstances. This has been particularly evident regarding the country’s resources. With Astana inheriting Soviet-era oil and gas pipelines and railways built to supply Moscow as a central hub, Kazakhstan had little option but to rely on Russia to administer these networks for exporting its hydrocarbon products to foreign markets. The country’s landlocked geography further constrained its options. In the early years of Kazakhstan’s independence, Russia consolidated its economic foothold by exerting political pressure to channel major new pipeline routes through its own territory. One major example is the Caspian Pipeline from Kazakhstan's Tengiz oil field to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. The pipeline carries approximately 72.5 million tonnes of oil per year from Kazakhstan, becoming the primary route for Kazakh oil exports.

Ultimately, Russia’s aggressive approach proved counterproductive. This is because the tighter the grip exerted by Moscow, the greater the impetus became for Astana to explore opportunities with other trade partners. To circumvent Russian overdependence and exploitation, Kazakhstan adapted its foreign policy, embracing foreign investment to establish alternative infrastructure routes and resource projects. With the need for diversification and economic leverage over Moscow, Astana turned to China.

While deepening ties with Beijing has been a multi-decade process that started in the years immediately following independence in 1991, relations intensified in the 2000s. The country’s signed a strategic partnership in 2005 and China began to make significant investments in Kazakhstan’s energy sector, developing the country’s oil and gas resources. The first oil pipeline between the pair, the Atasu–Alashankou pipeline, was completed in November 2005 as part of a joint venture to feed China’s growing economy. The success of that project, coupled with the enduring need for Kazakhstan to reduce reliance on Russia, stood the country out as a prime participant in China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).

The BRI was initially conceived as a “Silk Road Economic Belt”, loosely following the geographic path of the historical trade route of the same name. This made Kazakhstan a key transit corridor for the initiative, linking China with Central Asia and Europe. The BRI has since undergone a significant expansion to every corner of the world. Kazakhstan has attracted $23 billion in the first six months of 2025 alone as part of the strategy. President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has repeatedly emphasised Kazakhstan’s commitment to BRI, asserting during a May 2023 summit that: “As China’s closest neighbour and reliable partner, we will continue to actively participate in the joint construction of the Belt and Road”.

BRI projects include a 4.5GW coal-fired power station being built to supply energy to a sprawling complex that includes 11 bauxite and coal deposits in the cities of Kostanay and Aktobe, as well as a mining and processing plant that will handle 6 million tonnes of raw material per year, and an electrolysis plant that will produce 3 million tonnes of aluminium annually. Chinese firms have invested significantly in Kazakhstan’s tungsten resources, with a $300 million project launched at the Boguta deposit in the Almaty region. Interest in the lithium sector is also growing, with talks held between Chinese company Zhicun Lithium Group and Kazakhstan’s state-owned investment agency, Kazakh Invest. Another flagship initiative was the China-Central Asia natural gas pipeline, a 1,300-kilometre venture that has transported over 500 billion cubic metres of natural gas since it was launched in December 2009. Chinese companies are also playing a leading role in Kazakhstan’s renewable energy initiatives. Examples include Universal Energy’s 100-megawatt Kapshagay Solar Park, which generates enough power for approximately 50,000 households annually, and the 100-megawatt Zhanatas Wing Power Plant.

As a key transit hub for BRI routes connecting China to Europe, Kazakhstan’s transport network has also benefited heavily. Three out of the BRI routes pass through Kazakh cities; two routes connect to Europe, while the third transits through Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan to connect to Iran and West Asia, as well as to India using Iranian ports. According to a 2020 World Bank report: “The completion of BRI transport projects will lower Kazakh shipment time and increase FDI, non-oil exports and GDP”. Examples of BRI transport projects include the Khorgos Gateway dry port on the Kazakhstan-China border, which connects China to central Asia and Russia, and the logistics base that connects Kazakhstan to China’s port city of Lianyuangang. There have also been efforts toward new and upgraded rail lines between the two countries, including projects to build a new 272km third rail link called the Bakhty-Ayagoz railway line. There is also the Western Europe-Western China International Transit Corridor, a major highway project connecting China to Europe via Central Asia, which set out to upgrade and modernise roughly 2,800 kilometres of roads.

The significance of these projects concerns conflicting interests in Kazakhstan. The more adept Astana becomes at diversifying its alliances and infrastructure, the harder it is for any single power to dictate the country’s fate. As a result of Russia becoming increasingly isolated from the world stage since launching its invasion of Ukraine, Moscow has sought to deepen its ties with Russia economically, militarily, and diplomatically. However, with the balance of power between the pair very much weighted toward Beijing, China increasingly dictates the pace and direction of their cooperation. Consequently, China’s expanding economic interests in Kazakhstan serve as a deterrent against a potential invasion by Russia. If Moscow were to threaten stability in the region and compromise Chinese interests, Beijing could leverage Russia’s dependence on Chinese trade and energy markets, especially as Moscow faces reduced access to Western buyers.

Risk and Reward: How Geopolitics Shapes Business in Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan’s position at the intersection of major powers carries tangible risks for businesses operating in the country. Potential Russian aggression, combined with the influence of China and lingering reliance on Russian infrastructure, could disrupt supply chains, energy exports, and foreign investment flows. Companies face uncertainty over regulatory changes, resource access, and operational continuity should geopolitical tensions escalate. However, the clear opportunities presented by conducting business in Kazakhstan must also be acknowledged. Despite the country’s geopolitical challenges, an invasion is not imminent or likely under the current circumstances. Global Situational Awareness’s scenario planning and strategic advisory services are supporting clients across a range of sectors in protecting their operations in Central Asia.