How Ukraine Can Earn Billions from Its Geopolitical Position

Geography is a nation's destiny, and Ukraine's position is far from a disadvantage.
The country stands before a strategic opportunity: to connect China, the world’s largest manufacturing hub, with the European Union, one of Earth’s largest consumer markets, and to profit significantly from that role. But how can this be achieved? Let's explore the possibilities.

Yes, Ukraine is Europe. But is this the complete picture when viewed through the lens of metageographical positioning?

You’ve likely heard of metahistory, but what is metageography? It refers to a timeless, abstract, and generalized geographical positioning of a country. This is in the context of historiosophical, culturological, and even sacral processes that shape a nation's evolution within its broader regional context.

From a metageographic perspective, Ukraine isn’t only part of Europe but also embedded in the Eurasian Steppe Belt, a vast transcontinental corridor stretching from the Northern Black Sea and the Caucasus to Kazakhstan, Mongolia, and China.

A key historical detail: Ukraine stands as the only agrarian culture that was part of what was predominantly a nomadic socio-economic ecosystem within the Eurasian Steppe Belt. This unique position consequently explains why, following the collapse of Kyivan Rus in circa 1242, Ukraine’s agricultural society evolved without establishing its own sovereign political structures, instead developing within the frameworks of external imperial or colonial projects.

By contrast, stationary states based on agrarian cultures emerged either north or west of the Eurasian Steppe Belt, typically protected by natural geographic barriers. Ukraine, exposed on the edge of this great corridor, was left to adapt between sedentary and nomadic civilizational dynamics.

Ukraine’s loss of a position within the Eurasian Steppe corridor led to its rapid absorption, first by the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and subsequently by the Kingdom of Poland. This vulnerability weakened Ukraine’s geopolitical autonomy and exposed it to imperial encroachment.

The alliance between Bohdan Khmelnytsky, a 17th-century military commander, and Khan of Crimea Islam III Giray marked Ukraine’s first attempt to align with the Eurasian Steppe Belt system. And while this alignment was active, Ukraine successfully resisted Polish expansion and developed its sovereign statehood.

Conversely, Ukraine consistently lost its sovereignty and its ability to pursue a national project whenever it fell under the dominance of northern (Russian) or western (Polish) imperial formations, historical antagonists of the Eurasian corridor.

The Zaporozhian Sich, a proto-state, became the first link between the sedentary agrarian civilization and the nomadic steppe culture, forging a distinctive cultural archetype: the Ukrainian as both a farmer and a person of the steppe.

Many key figures in Ukrainian history recognized the importance of this "Eurasian openness."

Examining the concepts of renowned Ukrainian geographer Stepan Rudnytskyi and nationalist geopolitician Yurii Lypa reveals the following strategic insights:

First, the strongest natural barriers protecting Ukraine lie to the west, but they don’t serve a defensive function since Ukraine aspires to integrate into political Europe.

Second, for the same reason, these "natural barriers" in the west act more like a "speed bump" on the path of Asian empires into Western Europe.

Third, the Eurasian economic belt is unfolding within a geopolitical metaspace, one could say, "to the geographical stop," from China to the natural civilizational watersheds of Europe.

Thus, external invasions of Ukraine originating from the Eurasian steppe corridor (under the condition of being carved out from it), which have occurred over the past thousand years, are predictable and conditioned.

How Ukrainian Geopoliticians Planned to Address this Problem

In the 20th century, a concept emerged aimed at managing Ukraine’s Eurasian openness by forming an eastern flank through control over the North Caucasus, the Don River region, Kuban, the Azov Sea, and the lower Volga River.

In this framework, both Rudnytskyi and Lypa envisioned the Azov Sea as becoming Ukraine's “internal” sea.

However, establishing this eastern flank, as envisioned in these concepts, was only possible under the condition of Russia’s collapse, a collapse expected to result from a war in which major Western powers, such as Germany or the U.S., would side with Ukraine.

This geographical principle gave rise to two strategic doctrines. A civilizational confrontation with Russia, and the formation of a Baltic–Black Sea arc, or a “Black Sea Axis,” centered on Ukraine.

However, the linchpin of this concept, the mandatory condition of Russia’s collapse under Ukrainian pressure, became the weakest element of this geopolitical model, due to the excessively long-term and uncertain nature of that objective.

Multibillion-Dollar Corridor

Today, the situation has shifted decisively, primarily due to Kazakhstan's independence, China's rising power, and the active development of sovereign South Caucasus states such as Georgia and Azerbaijan. We must also consider Turkey's growing influence.

This constellation presents a unique opportunity for Ukraine to develop its own national, sovereign project, integration within the Eurasian Steppe Belt by establishing a corridor connecting Ukraine, the South Caucasus, Kazakhstan, and China. This concept could be provisionally named the “Ukrainian Parallel,” an East-West axis, or the “Eurasian Ukrainian Steppe Corridor.”

There is also the prospect of a “Ukrainian Meridian,” a North-South axis, along the Baltic–Black Sea axis: the Baltic states, Poland, Ukraine, Turkey, the Middle East, and India.

This isn’t about a “Ukrainian globe.”

It is about a geopolitical point of intersection between two key axes, the Eurasian and the Baltic–Black Sea, forming within Ukraine. This serves as a metageographic guarantee of preserving our sovereignty in the long term.

Thus, the “Ukrainian Parallel” leverages the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, a relatively non-confrontational international project. A vision of a world without wars, where a nation grows wealthier year by year through logistical rent, profiting from the flow of goods, energy, investment, and technology.

The Route and Ukraine's Advantage

In southwestern Kazakhstan, on the Mangyshlak Peninsula, lies the country's only major port on the eastern shore of the Caspian Sea, the Port of Aktau. With an annual cargo throughput of up to 20 million metric tonnes, it serves as a key link in the Trans-Caspian Transport Corridor, which connects China with the EU while bypassing Russia. (see diagram)

It is important to note that China is interested in developing at least two such alternative trade routes. Both pass through Central Asia: one leads to Iran and then to Turkey, while the other passes through the South Caucasus.

The Port of Aktau is designed for the international transportation of dry cargo, crude oil, and petroleum products. It is connected to the western shore of the Caspian Sea by a ferry line to the Port of Alat (a suburb of Baku, Azerbaijan). This transport link forms part of the international “New Silk Road” project (Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China), which bypasses Russia. Notably, several of these countries were members of the GUAM regional group, originally initiated by Ukraine.

Furthermore, Aktau also has an airport, and Ukraine possesses significant potential in the development of cargo aviation. Kazakhstan plans to build three more airports, including an air hub in Aktau. Ukraine could likewise develop a hub in Uzyn and link it with Aktau’s, forming part of an EU-China air transport corridor.

Integrating with China's Belt and Road Initiative

China has intensified the implementation of its logistics projects in the South Caucasus, with a particular focus on Georgia. As part of the Belt and Road Initiative, China Communications Construction Company has launched the construction of a new deep-water port in Georgia. The project involves an investment of $600 million and is expected to offer a storage capacity of up to 600,000 containers.

Ukraine has a strategic opportunity to integrate its own geopolitical initiative, the Eurasian Ukrainian Steppe Corridor, with China’s Middle Corridor, under the broader umbrella of the New Silk Road. This could be achieved by expanding Ukraine’s port infrastructure along the Danube River through dredging operations and by establishing a regional free trade zone in Odesa, modeled on the porto-franco system, a type of special economic zone.

Such integration could fully restore Ukraine’s position as a critical transit hub between Europe and Asia, enhancing its role in global supply chains.

A key advantage of this corridor for Ukraine is its passage through countries that are either neutral or friendly toward Ukraine: Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, and Georgia. All three have consistently supported Ukraine’s territorial integrity on the international stage.

The proposed Eurasian Ukrainian Steppe Corridor coincides almost entirely with China’s Middle Corridor under the Belt and Road Initiative. This route traverses Kazakhstan, crosses the Caspian Sea via regional ports, and continues through Azerbaijan and Georgia.

The corridor offers three potential directions further: Romania (via the Port of Constanța), Bulgaria (via the Port of Burgas), and Ukraine (via Odesa and the Danube ports). Throughput capacity currently stands at up to 10 million metric tonnes annually, with scalability to 25 million metric tonnes.

Here, Ukraine’s Danube ports and Romania’s ports are direct competitors, particularly in the context of positioning as a regional logistics hub.

Why can Ukraine win the competition with Romania for the right to host the Middle Corridor? Besides the Danube ports, Ukraine has the powerful ports of Odesa Oblast.

Moreover, Romania is bound by EU restrictions, which, after the Montenegro case, informally discourage its member states from launching joint infrastructure projects with China. Ukraine, on the other hand, currently faces no such limitations.

Therefore, it can offer China transport integration into the Middle Corridor through the Danube and Odesa Oblast ports, dredging of the Danube Delta, and the construction of a new railway line with a European gauge from Odesa to the western border.

Given the prospect of a simplified customs transit with the EU, Ukraine could establish a multimodal logistics and customs hub in Odesa that would receive maritime cargo and forward it to the EU in transit, requiring customs inspection only once at the port, rather than again at the Ukrainian-Polish border.

If realized, Odesa and the Danube ports could emerge as the Eastern Gate of Europe, mirroring the role Belgium’s Antwerp played as the Western Gate.

Such transit functionality could, in the future, foster the emergence of a new kind of “development capital” in Ukraine, similar to what Belgium experienced in its time.

Learning from Past Initiatives

Ukraine had previously attempted to develop its geopolitical project in the Black Sea region through GUAM, a regional initiative conceived as an alternative for countries seeking cooperation outside Russia’s influence. At various times, this proto-cluster included Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, and Moldova, with potential energy projects serving as one of its driving forces.

However, geopolitical paternalism and the populism of political elites defeated the bloc’s individual geopolitical energy. Obviously, 'no man ever steps in the same river twice.' The GUAM project is dead.

Yet, there remains a window of opportunity to launch a successor initiative: the Eurasian Ukrainian Steppe Corridor, linking China and the EU.

Ukraine still has a chance to tap into the immense flow of goods moving from China to the EU, over 260 million metric tonnes annually, and to participate in the infrastructure investment flows that exceed $500 billion each year.