Afghanistan: Central Asia Takes Center Stage Again
With the Taliban having made Pakistan an insecure supply route for war materiel headed into Afghanistan, NATO and the U.S. are looking again to Central Asia for help.
Thom Shanker of The New York Times has filed a piece this morning detailing talks with Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan about serving as alternate supply routes. The talks also include Russia, which exerts considerable influence in the former Soviet region.
Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan were primary staging grounds for the 2001 dislodging of the Taliban from Kabul. Since then, the U.S. has created some distance from those regimes, in Uzbekistan's case because of its horrendous human rights record.
Look for Washington to argue that engagement is the best way to get some moderation in Uzbekistan. That will be no more true now than it was the dozen other times over the past decade and a half that the U.S. has employed that logic.
However, if the U.S. is intent on a surge of some 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, which appears to be its plan, fresh agreements may be the only way to supply them. Today, for instance, Pakistan itself closed off the Khyber Pass as it carried out a new offensive against militants based in the border area.
Thom Shanker of The New York Times has filed a piece this morning detailing talks with Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Azerbaijan about serving as alternate supply routes. The talks also include Russia, which exerts considerable influence in the former Soviet region.
Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan were primary staging grounds for the 2001 dislodging of the Taliban from Kabul. Since then, the U.S. has created some distance from those regimes, in Uzbekistan's case because of its horrendous human rights record.
Look for Washington to argue that engagement is the best way to get some moderation in Uzbekistan. That will be no more true now than it was the dozen other times over the past decade and a half that the U.S. has employed that logic.
However, if the U.S. is intent on a surge of some 30,000 troops in Afghanistan, which appears to be its plan, fresh agreements may be the only way to supply them. Today, for instance, Pakistan itself closed off the Khyber Pass as it carried out a new offensive against militants based in the border area.
Labels: afghanistan, nato, pakistan, Russia, tajikistan, uzbekistan
3 Comments:
What's interesting in Shanker's piece is the degree to which Russia and NATO work together on supplies bound for Afghanistan, especially the energy needs. I imagine most people don't realize this
Sounds like a good book, I recently finished a book with Corporate Corruption called The Worst Kind Of Lies.
The author, John Patrick Lamont, has 14 years experience in the insurance industry and whips up this book based strictly on fiction, of lies, schemes, murder, betrayal etc.
All the great things that makes a book amazing!
I'm looking forward to the sequels.
best way to have the central asian rulers support the alternate supply route is to give them the supply contracts as we did with the akaev's....it is like giving the afghan warlords viagra to get their support...
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