Want to keep this link handy, an article by George Monbiot who seems a reliable source of info:
But Afghanistan’s strategic importance has not changed. In September, a few days before the attack on New York, the US Energy Information Administration reported that “Afghanistan’s significance from an energy standpoint stems from its geographical position as a potential transit route for oil and natural gas exports from Central Asia to the Arabian Sea. This potential includes the possible construction of oil and natural gas export pipelines through Afghanistan.” Given that the US government is dominated by former oil industry executives, we would be foolish to suppose that a reinvigoration of these plans no longer figures in its strategic thinking. As the researcher Keith Fisher has pointed out, the possible economic outcomes of the war in Afghanistan mirror the possible economic outcomes of the war in the Balkans, where the development of “Corridor 8”, an economic zone built around a pipeline carrying oil and gas from the Caspian to Europe, is a critical allied concern.