After publishing a paper pointing out the advantages of direct communication between Russia and China by Cape Horn and the Cape of Good Hope, he was appointed by Tsar Alexander I to make a voyage to the east coast of Asia to endeavour to carry out the project. Under the patronage of Tsar Alexander I, Count Nikolay Petrovich Rumyantsev and the Russian-American Company, Krusenstern led the first Russian circumnavigation of the world. The chief object of this undertaking was the development of the fur trade with Russian America. Other goals of the two-ship expedition were to establish trade with China and Japan, facilitate trade in South America, and examine California for a possible colony.