{"id":768,"date":"2026-05-05T13:18:41","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:18:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/?p=768"},"modified":"2026-05-05T13:18:42","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T10:18:42","slug":"the-proposed-trans-caspian-pipeline-is-shaping-up-to-be-a-flashpoint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/2026\/05\/05\/the-proposed-trans-caspian-pipeline-is-shaping-up-to-be-a-flashpoint\/","title":{"rendered":"The Proposed Trans-Caspian Pipeline Is Shaping Up To Be A Flashpoint"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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The Turkish Energy Minister revived talk of the long-discussed Trans-Caspian Pipeline in early April in a live interview with local media where he spoke about his country\u2019s regional pipeline plans, which the Middle East Eye drew attention to here<\/a>. Their report about this followed New Rules Geopolitics<\/a>, the X account of the podcast<\/a> by Sputnik\u2019s Dimitri Simes Jr., presenting his proposals as their own. In any case, these reports drew attention to the Trans-Caspian Pipeline, which is anathema to Russia\u2019s interests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was warned here<\/a> in early August after the announcement of the \u201cTrump Route for International Peace and Prosperity\u201d (TRIPP) that this US-controlled corridor across southern Armenia might embolden Azerbaijan and Armenia to defy Russia<\/a> and Iran by building this pipeline. Last month, it was also assessed that \u201cIsrael\u2019s Strikes Against Iran\u2019s Caspian Fleet Might Be Driven By Post-War Energy Geopolitics<\/a>\u201d, namely neutralizing Iran\u2019s ability to impede this project that could later supply Israel among others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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About that, Israel already receives around 40%<\/a> of its oil from Azerbaijan through a pipeline that transits Georgia and Turkiye, so gas exports along this route or TRIPP (which is shorter) are possible. Even though this would increase Israel\u2019s strategic dependence on Turkiye, whose Foreign Minister recently warned<\/a> that Israel might recast his country as its new regional adversary after Iran amidst their<\/a> escalating<\/a> rivalry<\/a>, it\u2019s difficult to imagine either party passing up this opportunity to advance their respective interests.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As for the US\u2019 interests, the expansion of Western influence across the South Caucasus, Caspian Sea, and Central Asia via TRIPP would come at Russia\u2019s expense since this area encompasses its entire southern periphery, with political and military influence following economic influence. After all, Russia is expected to oppose the Trans-Caspian Pipeline since it\u2018ll lead to Turkmenistan\u2019s currently Chinese-centric gas exports<\/a> challenging its own on the global market, ergo the need for NATO member Turkiye to deter it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To that end, TRIPP is expected to serve the dual purpose of a military logistics corridor, and the US\u2019 planned dispatch of an undisclosed number of patrol boats<\/a> to Azerbaijan that was announced during Vance\u2019s visit<\/a> in February represents the implementation of this strategy. Even though Turkmenistan is a constitutionally neutral country, it too is expected to expand its \u201cquiet U.S. military ties<\/a>\u201d as is Kazakhstan, which dramatically announced its plans last December to produce NATO-standard shells<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Russian government is aware of TRIPP\u2019s abovementioned military purpose as suggested by Deputy Foreign Minister Alexei Overchuk condemning this project<\/a> that\u2019s hitherto been conspicuously<\/a> ignored<\/a> by his country\u2019s expert community. Putin also very strongly implied<\/a> that the moment of truth in Russian-Armenian relations is arriving during his latest meeting with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. The Turkish Energy Minister\u2019s Trans-Caspian Pipeline plans are therefore expected to meet fierce Russian resistance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s unclear what form this will take, and no one can say for sure whether Russia would launch another special operation to stop this project, but that scenario can\u2019t be ruled out either. The strategic stakes are simply too high as NATO encroaches on Russia\u2019s entire southern periphery via TRIPP and Turkiye just revived talk of the Trans-Caspian Pipeline. Russia is therefore either forced to accept these plans with all that entails for its security or somehow stop them since the West won\u2019t voluntarily abandon them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This article was originally published on\u00a0Andre Korybko<\/a>\u2018s Substack account and is republished with the author\u2019s permission.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Turkish Energy Minister revived talk of the long-discussed Trans-Caspian Pipeline in early April in a live interview<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[283,248,62,249,85,284,77,151,22,150],"class_list":["post-768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-opinion-analysis","tag-caspian-sea","tag-caucasia","tag-energy","tag-nato","tag-oil","tag-pipeline","tag-russia","tag-trump","tag-turkiye","tag-us"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=768"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":771,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/768\/revisions\/771"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesilknews.com\/en\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}