The $35 billion New Kabul master plan, in which the city is expected to expand north towards Bagram Air Base. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
English: DUSHANBE. With President of Afghanistan Hamid Karzai. Русский: ДУШАНБЕ. С Президентом Афганистана Хамидом Карзаем. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
English: Afghan President Hamid Karzai at a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Tashkent, Uzbekistan (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
SCO summit, Yekaterinburg, Russia, 2009. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
English: Russian President Vladimir Putin with representatives from Iran and Mongolia, observers in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
BEIJING, CHINA - JUNE 06: Chinese President Hu Jintao shakes hands with Uzbekistan's President Islam Karimov during the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit at the Great Hall of the People on June 6, 2012 in Beijing China. Central Asian leaders are visiting China for a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a Central Asian grouping headed by Beijing and Moscow, with discussions focusing on approaches to Syria, Iran and the influence held by the United States in Asia. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)
BEIJING, CHINA - JUNE 06: Iran's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (C) attends a meeting with China's Premier Wen Jiabao on during the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit at the Great Hall of the People on June 6, 2012 in Beijing, China. Central Asian leaders are visiting China for a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), a Central Asian grouping headed by Beijing and Moscow, with discussions focusing on approaches to Syria, Iran and the influence held by the United States in Asia. (Image credit: Getty Images via @daylife)
By occupying the Central position (Afghanistan) in the region the US had intended to contain China, sit at the under belly of the Central Asian Republics (CARs) and by implication Russia's and deny them all an approach to oil rich Iran, the ME, the Arabian Sea and the Persian Gulf. By its departure by 2014 these grand objectives will go even further beyond reach. The US has also failed to install India as its regional plenipotentiary in Afghanistan! The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation - SCO, will thus get enough breathing time and space to organize and exert itself as a viable and competing pole to the US in the region. This will reduce the US footprint and effectiveness in the region too with very far reaching geopolitical implications.
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