Yes, But Will An Obama Visit Put the U.S. Back in the Great Game?
Posted by Steve LeVine President Obama has told a senior Kazakhstan official that he intends to visit the Central Asian nation, a senior American official has told me. The visit comes as Russia has...
View ArticleNabucco Hucksterism, Iran Pollyanishness, and a $5 Billion Bribe. The Oil and...
Posted by Steve LeVine On Thursday, a ceremony in the State Department will mark the retirement of Steven Mann, Coordinator for Eurasian Energy Diplomacy, after 32 years with the U.S. diplomatic...
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Labyrinth Out in Paperback
Posted by Steve LeVine The updated version of Putin’s Labyrinth is out today. It brings events in Russia up to date, including the collapse of the economic miracle with the plunge in oil prices and the...
View ArticleA New Age in Pipeline Politics?
Posted by Steve LeVine For the last decade and a half, the main theater for U.S.-Russian fireworks has been pipeline politics. Washington won the first battle with the construction of the Baku-Ceyhan...
View ArticleThe Balance of Power in the Former Soviet Union
Posted by Steve LeVine Moscow’s envoy to NATO has signaled that Russia is ready to resume the thaw in relations triggered last month in the G20 meeting in London between presidents Barack Obama and...
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Il Petrolio E La Gloria
Posted by Steve LeVine I’m thrilled that O&G’s Italian edition has come out, published by Sirente. Perhaps no other oil company has better capitalized on the Caspian era than Italy’s Eni, whose...
View ArticleExxon: Late, But Always the Bride
Posted by Steve LeVine Exxon was late getting onto the Caspian in the 1990s, but it still ended up with pieces of prime real estate. On the Baku side, deputy Energy Secretary Bill White interceded to...
View ArticleThe Oil and Glory Interview: U.S. Eurasian Energy Czar Richard Morningstar
Posted by Steve LeVine Richard Morningstar talks much about déjà vu. In the late 1990s, then-President Clinton appointed him as Washington’s first special envoy for the Caspian Sea. Against strong...
View ArticleBecoming a Central Asian Dictator: Family Helps; So Does Medical Training
Posted by Steve LeVine We have just a few examples of what it takes to assume control in one of the Caspian’s more serious dictatorships. One best way of course is to be the dictator’s offspring. But...
View ArticleNabucco and Trans-Caspian: Times Change, Pipeline Politics Goes On
Posted by Steve LeVine On one hand, Turkmenistan is in the catbird seat. Exxon, Chevron, BP and ConocoPhillips are salivating over the country’s onshore natural gas fields, in particular South...
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