Examining the interplay between Caspian security and energy development, this comprehensive book offers important new findings about the relationship between competition for energy resources, political and economic development in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan, and the propensity for conflict in the Caspian region. The contributors, a leading group of scholars and policymakers, also explore the ways in which Russia, China, Iran, and Turkey are fighting to protect their energy interests in the newly independent states and how this rivalry influences regional security and U.S. policy.