Admiral James Stavridis was 16th Supreme Allied Commander of NATO and 12th Dean of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He spent the bulk of his operational career in the Pacific, and is author of "2034: A Novel of the Next World War." For most of the 19th century, the Russian and British empires contended over Afghanistan in what was known as the Great Game. The geopolitical competition recognized the strategic position of Afghanistan, and its potential to influence what is today Pakistan and India. Both the Brits and the Russians, of course, were defeated over…