I was reading a blog entry over at Kotare (The Strategist) about the redrawing of borders, and about Jeffrey Goldberg’s hypothetical map of the new middle east (also discussed at Coming Anarchy):
Of course, this reminded me of Ralph Peter’s infamous map:
Ralph Peters, a retired US Army Lt.Col. and author, had written an article in Armed Forces Journal that included the above map. The article was met with the usual amount of skepticism and criticism that any proposed border redrawing proposal receives (including in the same journal). But the hypothetical redrawing was in the independent-private Armed Forces Journal and was written by a retired officer who is out of the loop. So what?
Well, the result was some serious paranoia on the part of some people in the middle east. Certain parties were sure that this was a signal of White House intentions and the borders were fiercely debated. I would say these people are taking things a little too seriously, but then again the establishment of the state of Israel and the war in Iraq were signaled well ahead of time as well. Of course, I consider this the musings of a bored old soldier. But the map was not redrawing any borders where I live.
Closer to my area of focus, there are private proposals for new borders that affect Afghanistan. To start with, here is a map of Pashtunistan:
Pashtunistan? Some people are very serious about Pashtunistan, including some people very close to Karzai. Notice how Afghanistan has consistently refused to recognize the Durand Line? The dream lives on.
The flag of Pashtunistan:
Some like to reminisce about the good old days of the Durrani Empire:
But realistically, they’ll settle for Pashtunistan plus the non-Pashtun areas of Afghanistan all rolled up into one state. Of course, this would require just a wee bit of extra effort. Might the government of Pakistan resist? Of course. Would the Baluchis and Dardic-speaking people up north be happy about being included in a Greater Afghanistan? Probably not. And how about Tajiks, Uzbeks, Hazaras, Turkmen, etc…? The new state would completely marginalize them demographically.
This is all speculation of course. But are some people in Afghanistan and Pakistan waiting, watching and hoping? Absolutely. And some of them are in Karzai’s inner circle. Stranger cartographic events have occurred.
