I've been using this slide for two years in the brief, and made the argument in "Great Powers."
Similar minds reaching similar conclusions: Central Asia hands at Johns Hopkins, as cited by David Ignatius in a recent WAPO column, sent on to me by Our Man in Kabul.
See if this sounds familiar: a regionalization strategy that emphasizes economic connectivity over kinetics.
From Ignatius:
The most useful analysis I've seen recently is "The Key to Success in Afghanistan: A Modern Silk Road Strategy." It was prepared by the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. It also had major input from the U.S. Central Command, which oversees the war.
The Silk Road study tries to visualize the kind of Afghanistan that might exist after U.S. troops begin coming home in July 2011. Instead of being a lawless frontier, this post-conflict Afghanistan would be a transit route for Eurasia, providing trade corridors north and south, east and west.
To make this transport-led strategy work, Afghanistan would need to build more roads, railways and pipelines. A hypothetical railway map shows routes that connect Iran with India, Russia with Pakistan, China with the Arabian Sea. It knits together the rising powers of this region and makes Afghanistan a hub rather than a barrier.
I first heard discussion of this modern Silk Road idea from Ashraf Ghani, a former Afghan finance minister. He made a powerful analogy to America's own development: What secured our lawless Wild West frontier was the transcontinental railroad in 1869. With trade and economic growth came stability.
Comparing nation-building in Afghanistan to the settling of the American West? Who comes up with such crazy stuff!
You know, when I first started briefing that Wild West stuff about five years ago, people just shook their heads like it was nonsense to compare the integration of the United States to the integration of globalization.
Now it's the smartest analysis seen in a while by someone as astute at Ignatius.
I love the report from Johns Hopkins, which comes with a dedicating quote from Petraeus.
I mean, check this out from the table of contents:
III. What the United States Should Do Now: An Initiative to Reconnect Afghanistan with East and West .............................................................................. 32
Promoting Afghanistan‘s Role in Road Transit and Trade ........................ 33
Connecting Afghanistan by Rail ................................................................... 37
Connecting Afghanistan through Information Technology ..................... 40
Reconnect east and west, promote road transit and trade, connect by rail, connect by IT.
Smart stuff indeed. We can only hope Petraeus gets the freedom and resources and time to make it happen to whatever extent is possible.