in the region at a time when disengagement with Central Asia was considered detrimental to American long-term security interests. At the same time, US strategic thinking was urged to be of a lower profile to avoid perceptions of the US as a regime patron. Western observers and governments have claimed that Russia, China and the former Soviet republics have used the language of the War on Terror to quash minority separatist movements as well as some religious groups. This was also done through a creeping increase in authoritarianism justified through the war on terror. Drug Trafficking The Silk Road which once brought prosperity to Central Asia in the silk trade is now a highway for drugs from Afghanistan to Russia that has contributed to economic, political and social problems in the region. The drug trade is proliferating in Central Asia because of the weakness of its nation-states and its pivotal geo-strategic location. The low volume of drug seizures (about 4 percent of the estimated total opiate flows) indicates the lack of state power to regulate Central Asian borders as well as the corruption of its officials. The propagation of the drug trade perpetuates the weakness of Central Asian states by destabilizing the region through the financing of militant Islamic groups’ campaigns, increasing drug abuse, and the spread of AIDS/HIV. Another large factor in the development of the drug trade in Central Asia is the region's geography. Three of Central Asia's southern states, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, share a collective border of about 3,000 km with Afghanistan, which produces about 70 percent of the world's heroin. An estimated 99 percent of Central Asia's opiates originate from Afghanistan. Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan share a border with the Chinese province, Xinjiang, through which drug traffickers access major opiate producers such as Laos, Thailand and Myanmar. Central Asia's proximity to these states makes the region a hub for the drug trade throughout the world. During the Soviet era, Central Asia's border to Afghanistan was mostly blocked off with little cross-border trade or travel. When Soviet troops invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the border began to open up. Veterans from the war started to bring back heroin in small quantities, but as soon as its potential large profits were realized, criminal groups took over the trade. Soviet Union created Central Asian states, often without ethnic or topographical considerations, causing them to be notoriously weak. With the