Commentary Washington’s sudden withdrawal from Central Asia in August 2021 left the United States with no voice in the sudden transformation of Kazakhstan in the first days of January 2022. Unrest in the Kazakhstan capital, Nur-Sultan, and other Kazakh cities (particularly Almaty, the commercial capital) during the first eight days of January has broad implications for the security of Central Asia, Russia, and China. January’s events followed logically the security breakdown in Afghanistan, which interrupted a growing regional trend toward stability. Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev took so much advantage of riots over rising fuel prices that the events seemed to have been tailored by him. But Russia and the United States also had an interest in the strategic diversion that the sudden melee represented. The incident could be interpreted by the United States and NATO as a distraction of Russian policy interest away from its supposed military escalation against Ukraine …