The Three Asias: Are They a Region?
Last updated: September 22, 2008
Published by Program in Arms Control, Disarmament, and International Security, University of Illinois
Swords and Ploughshares series
Vol. X / 1996-1997
Summary
The premise behind this collection of essays is that a new strategic region may be in the process of emerging. It is an area of the world where Americans have had the fewest contacts, yet where a number of issues of importance to the United States are increasingly evident. The region is the “Three Asias,” encompassing large portions of South, West, and Central Asia. Here, American security and nonproliferation interests reside in the shape of two emergent nuclear weapons states (NWS), India and Pakistan; one acknowledged NWS, Kazakhstan; and at least one incipient NWS, Iran. Here, American interests concerning human rights and democratization reside in the shape of the experiments in democracy in Pakistan, India, and some of the Central Asian states, and in the violations of human rights in countries such as Afghanistan and Iran. Here, in the Three Asias, one also finds the origins of some of the strongest Western fears about the contagion of a radical, politicized brand of Islam. Here, American economic and developmental interests are joined because the region is the source of much of the world’s oil reserves, contains many of its poorest people, and yet also has the resources to emerge as a significant market in a global economy. Finally, and not least, here is where American counternarcotics interests reside, within a region responsible for the world’s second largest supply of heroin.Contents
Introduction--The Three Asias: Security, Economic, and Cultural Linkages across Central, West, and South Asia 
[PDF]
The Three Asias: Are They a New Region? [PDF]
Conceptualizing the Three Asias [PDF]
Political Economy and the Three Asias [PDF]
Domestic Politics, External Linkages, and Security [PDF]
Russia and Central Asia under Yeltsin [PDF]
Kyrgyz-Uzbek Ethnic Relations in Osh [PDF]
Forces of Attraction and Repulsion in Central Asia [PDF]