Russia’s invasion of Ukraine: The geopolitical significance of the war’s impact on regional supply chains

Given the size of Russia and the centrality of logistics in the war effort, this line of reporting boosted morale with some analysts deviating towards misplaced triumphalism.25 It has been frequently reported that the Eurasian land bridge is effectively closed or “inoperable.”26 In an interview conducted by author with the former senior advisor of Iran’s Khodro Industrial Group in the summer of 20. [...] Reports of free-floating mines suggest shipping conditions are not conducive to a diversion of trade through the Black Sea.40 Indeed, even as traffic through the ports of Romania and Georgia increases, overall container traffic in the Black Sea is subdued; this maritime route is not a viable diversion from the Northern Corridor.41 36 Nigar Jafarova, The rise of the Middle Corridor, Frontier View,. [...] While there has been substantial investment in rail connectivity across the Caucasus, the Ro-Ro vessel fleet servicing the Caspian Sea cannot meet throughput railway capacity on either side.42 More broadly, there is a strategic impediment to the development of the Middle Corridor as a rail freight diversion to the Northern Corridor. [...] Extending the Trans-European Transport Networks (TEN-T) policy to encompass Central Asia is a policy pursued by Brussels since the early 1990s in one form or another.53 The most recent incarnation of this vision invests in local ownership of transport networks and specifically the Middle Corridor, with a view to securing EU market access and building viable value chains in the Caucasus and Central. [...] For Turkey, the Middle Corridor is an opportunity to consolidate its own sphere of influence through the OTS, filling the Russian geopolitical vacuum without necessarily antagonising the Kremlin.59 For Central Asian states, particularly Kazakhstan, the Middle Corridor is a piece in the puzzle in its broader ‘Bright Path’ multi-vector policy, which seeks to counterbalance the overwhelming economic.