US Troops in Pakistan have had an increasingly difficult time getting supplies through Pakistan to troops along the Afghan/Pakistan border. This is a very interesting new idea for doing that, something that comes with a whole new set of things to ponder on.
The
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/31/world/asia/31military.html?_r=1&hp">New York Times reports on efforts to go through Central Asia to route supplies.
U.S. to Widen Supply Routes in Afghan War
By THOM SHANKER
Published: December 30, 2008
WASHINGTON — The United States and NATO are planning to open and expand supply lines through Central Asia to deliver fuel, food and other goods to a military mission in Afghanistan that is expected to grow by tens of thousands of troops in the months ahead, according to American and alliance diplomats and military officials.
The plan to open new paths through Central Asia reflects an American-led effort to seek out a more reliable alternative to the route from Pakistan through the strategic Khyber Pass, which was closed by Pakistani security forces on Tuesday as they began an offensive against militants in the region.
The militants have shown that they can threaten shipments through the pass into Afghanistan, burning cargo trucks and Humvees over recent weeks. More than 80 percent of the supplies for American and allied forces in Afghanistan now flow through Pakistan.
And the demands made on supply routes are expected to increase greatly as heavy materials are moved to Afghanistan to build the structures needed for an expanded American presence.This was speculated about in the
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/South_Asia/JL20Df01.html">Asia Times 2 weeks ago:
All roads lead out of Afghanistan
By M K Bhadrakumar
The measure of success of president-elect Barack Obama's new "Afghan strategy" will be directly proportional to his ability to delink the war from its geopolitical agenda inherited from the George W Bush administration.
It is obvious that Russia and Iran's cooperation is no less critical for the success of the war than what the US is painstakingly extracting from the Pakistani generals. Arguably, Obama will even be in a stronger negotiating position vis-a-vis the tough generals in Rawalpindi if only he has Moscow and Tehran on board his Afghan strategy.
But then, Moscow and Iran will expect that Obama reciprocates with a willingness to jettison the US's containment strategy towards them. The signs do not look good. This is not only from the look of Obama's national security team and the continuance of Robert Gates as defense secretary.
On the contrary, in the dying weeks of the Bush administration, the US is robustly pushing for an increased military presence in the Russian (and Chinese) backyard in Central Asia on the ground that the exigencies of a stepped-up war effort in Afghanistan necessitate precisely such an expanded US military presence. 
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