One of the maxims I try to follow in life is "Hope for the best, prepare for the worst". Most of this preparation is mental, and I feel it tempts fate mightily to say things are ever as bad as they can get.
That said, I do engage in a fair bit of worst-case type projection, and this seems a good place to try a bit. There are elements in the current Iraq/Iran/Afghanistan/Pakistan/Kashmir/India/China/Russia arena that could indeed spin wildly out of control if too many things go wrong, with a reasonable chance of some domino action. I don't see things degenerating into a World War level of widespread conventional and/or nuclear warfare, but there are some things which are starting to show up that portend some more trouble at least.
Pakistan has been to put it mildly a weak link in the GWoT to date. I am not alone in going so far as to say they have done us at least as much harm as good. The pragmatist in me can understand Gen. Musharraf's reluctance to really lay the smackdown on the ISI and the other elements in Pakistan that support the Taliban. After all, a lot of these same factions are what keep him in power, and from our perspective, it's important to realize that these "extremists" would most likely take control of the country outright were he not there.
Now these guys are fed up with Musharraf's balancing act, and are putting the pressure on. This is either good news for us or bad, completely dependant on who comes out on top. If the good General's side does, the actions required to do so will have shorn off the Talibani elements, and forced his interests into closer accord with ours. If not, then our ground supply route to Afghanistan will be hopelessly compromised, if not just plain cut.
Without getting into something so wide-ranging that it escapes the scope of this post, I will mention one thing that could get out of hand with potential to destabilize the whole area. This is, of course, Pakistan's relations with India.
These have been improving of late, but if someone with less restraint than Gen. Musharraf were to take control of Pakistan, more specifically its' military, India may (with good reason) feel itself compelled to do something aggressive. Another Indo-Pakistani war could now involve nukes on both sides, and in the best case it REALLY complicates things for NATO and the USA in that region. We have a de-facto alliance with Pakistan, but our long-term interests line up much better with those of India.
So, things going even more downhill in Pakistan will hamstring NATO's supply situation In Afghanistan, possibly giving the Russians more leverage if we suddenly needed to shift our stuff through their territory/sphere of influence. I don't know how vulnerable our logistics operations are through Pakistan, but we may yet find out the hard way. Any significant war between India and Pakistan for whatever reason has the possibility of completely screwing our operations in that region, plus complicating our life diplomatically.
Lots of fun. Well, that's enough of a scratch of the surface for the moment. If anyone has anything to add or call me on, the opportunity is always there.
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