In January 2022, at the height of violent nationwide protests against the government of Kassym-Jomart Tokayev in Kazakhstan, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO)sent 2,500 troops from its Peacekeeping Force to help stabilize the situation and preserve Tokayev’s power.1 The intervention was a frst for the military alliance, which was created in 2002 by Russia, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Members had called on the CSTO to intervene during ethnic unrest in Kyrgyzstan in 2010,2 during a border confict between Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan in 2022,3 and during the war in Nagorno-Karabakh in 2020, but in each case its leadership refused on various grounds. January 2022 appeared to signal a sea change for the CSTO, pointing to a more interventionist future.