Abstract
The Trans-Caspi-gas-Pipeline project, started in February 1999 with the strong support of the U.S., must have enabled its political purpose of reducing the Russian controlling power to the area, and Turkmenistan to secure the gas export route to far abroad. However, the project was deadlocked by Turkmenistan's resuming gas export to Russia via the existing route in 2000. As a reason of Turkmenistan's conversion, it is possible that Turkmenistan could expect Russia to relax the conditions for using the existing route with two factors: recent natural gas shortage in Russia, and its desire to revive political influence to the region. However, expansion of the gas export, through Russia exactly means continuation of Turkmenistan's dependence to it, so it is not regarded as strategically rational. Thus, since Turkmenistan, the country of prediction impossibility, is the main exporter of the area, the future of the natural gas export from the Caspian Sea to the world market is quite opaque.
