Here’s an idea: Let’s try reducing the supply of insurgency in Afghanistan rather than reducing the demand for it. This notion—potentially as important an insight as the Laffer curve—comes from a 41-year-old book by a retired RAND Corporation scholar now entering his ninth decade, Charles Wolf Jr.

Supply-side economics focuses on increasing the supply of goods and services, famously by lowering tax rates, rather than the often-impossible task of moving the demand curve. But looking at supply rather than demand management may be worth applying in our counterinsurgency in Afghanistan as well. The current policy debate is stuck among a few old ideas—negotiating with the Taliban, more “counterinsurgency,” more drone strikes—so a fresh approach is worth considering.