Paving the Silk Road‪.‬

Abstract: Since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, Central Asia and the Caucasus have become a focus of American foreign policy, and with good reason. This region stands to play a strategic role in developing the Silk Road - the cross-continental trade route between the far East and Central Asia, and Europe and the Middle east. The strategic implications of the Caucasus, a nexus between Russia, Turkey, and Iran, are complicated by a host of political, ethnic, and religious tensions. But the main threat to the development of the new Silk Road, an engine of regional economic growth, is posed by a potential wave of ethnic conflicts in failing states, militant Islamic involvement, and the potentially anti-Western policies of regional powers like China, Russia, and Iran.