Posted on 03/04/2007 10:46:23 AM PST by Ernest_at_the_Beach
U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein says Pakistan should let U.S. troops into areas dominated by a resurging al-Qaida or send its own troops in to pursue terrorists.
Appearing on "Fox News Sunday," the California Democrat said she agrees with the Bush administration about the growing danger.
A rebuilt al-Qaida "can easily extend the terrorist arm into the European community and Great Britain. That's a deep concern, because then it's just (across) the ocean for us."
Pakistan says it will not allow U.S. or NATO troops into tribal areas where al-Qaida is believed to be recruiting and revamping its operations.
Feinstein said the Pakistanis "either have to let us go in or go in themselves when they have intelligence. And I think the kind of half measures that the Pakistanis have taken in that particular area don't stand us in good stead."
(Excerpt) Read more at playfuls.com ...
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March 04, 2007 at 9:50:4 PST
WASHINGTON (AP) -
Pakistan must do more to stem al-Qaida in its ungoverned territories amid growing signs operatives plan a spring offensive against allied forces in Afghanistan, lawmakers on the intelligence committees said Sunday.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Rep. Peter Hoekstra, R-Mich., also said the U.S. must work to ensure that North Korea sticks to its promise to limit its nuclear program. They complained that Congress still lacks meaningful intelligence about the world's hot spots.
"We still don't have the intelligence community overall to give us, as policymakers, the information that we need to make good decisions in North Korea, Iran and other places," said Hoekstra, the top Republican on the House intelligence committee. "We've been disappointed with the stand-up from the leadership in the intelligence community."
In response, National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell's spokesman said that intelligence has been strengthened by changes intended to identify gaps in intelligence and ensure analysts have the information they need. Chad Kolton said one of McConnell's priorities "is to build on those reforms by improving penetration of our hardest intelligence targets."
Feinstein, the No. 2 Democrat on the Senate intelligence committee, criticized what she called half-measures by Pakistan's president, Gen. Pervez Musharraf, at a critical moment for the United States and its allies. She said "pinpoint attacks" are needed against al-Qaida before a possible spring offensive.
"The Pakistanis either have to let us go in or go in themselves when they have intelligence," she said. "There's no question that there's going to be a spring offensive in Afghanistan, that they're trying to reach out, that training is going on, recruitment is going on."
Last week, McConnell told Congress that the U.S. is concerned that al-Qaida's top two leaders - Osama bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahri - may be hiding in the rugged frontiers of northwestern Pakistan and are attempting to establish an operational base.
McConnell's push for action along the Afghan-Pakistani border came after Vice President Dick Cheney met earlier in the week with Musharraf.
Hoekstra agreed that the Pakistan region was a growing threat but cautioned that a balancing act was required to ensure that Musharraf's government stays in power. Musharraf faces elections in September.
"We need stability in the regime. We need this regime to survive," he said. "The Pakistanis have been doing a number of things to help us go after al-Qaida."
On Iran, Feinstein said similar regional discussions are needed to stem that country's nuclear program. She said she believes the U.S. could exploit a leadership split in Iran's government to work out some agreement.
Hoekstra called Iran a very troubling area overall given its activities in Iraq and their relationships with Hamas and Hezbollah.
"This is not an ally in the war against militant radicalism. They're not an ally in getting us to be successful in Iraq," he said. "We need to focus on them and I think some of the changes and some of the steps that are being taken by the administration are very positive."
As for North Korea, Feinstein praised the country's initial steps to comply with the Feb. 13 agreement on its nuclear program. She stressed the need for cooperation from neighboring Asian countries.
"I don't think you can underestimate the value of China in keeping the North Koreans on track now in seeing that this plutonium-based program is disassembled and that North Korea is brought into the mainstream," Feinstein said.
Like Hoekstra, Feinstein was highly critical of U.S. intelligence efforts aimed at understanding North Korea, specifically the lack of information on how many nuclear devices North Korea has assembled and where that work is happening.
"North Korea is a long way from us, and the intelligence infrastructure is not that good, to be very candid with you," she said.
In the past week, considerable attention has focused on whether U.S. intelligence analysts have softened their assessments on whether North Korea is pursuing a uranium enrichment program. That effort would be happening alongside the North's plutonium program, which resulted in a successful test of a nuclear device last year.
But McConnell's office pushed back on the notion that spy agencies' views had changed.
In a statement Sunday, the director's mission manager for North Korea, Joseph DeTrani, said there has been "considerable misinterpretation" of the spy agencies assessments on the uranium program.
He said U.S. intelligence had strong information in 2002 that allowed analysts to make a judgment with high confidence that North Korea was acquiring a uranium enrichment capability. That view has not changed.
At the time, the CIA found that North Korea secretly had purchased centrifuges and other equipment needed to construct a large-scale enrichment facility. The U.S. confronted North Korea with that information.
Since then, DeTrani said, "all intelligence community agencies have at least moderate confidence that North Korea's past efforts to acquire a uranium enrichment capability continue today."
Feinstein and Hoekstra appeared on "Fox News Sunday."
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Associated Press writer Katherine Shrader contributed to this report.
"Feinstein says Pakistan should let U.S. troops into areas dominated by a resurging al-Qaida..."
Yup... Of course, if Bush sent US troops into Pakistan, Feinstein would be among the first to call for his impeachment.
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feinstein advocates we leave al qaeda iraq in order to concentrate on al qaeda in pakistan?
she is nuttier than a jar of skippy
Dianne Swine-stein can bitch all she wants about Pakistan. The fact of the matter is that the leader of that government is cooperating with us to a realistic extent in getting rid of terrorists.
The leaders of the Democrat party are NOT cooperating with our Commander in Chief in an effort to get rid of Al-Qaida in Iraq or America!
They've opposed the war in Iraq and they've opposed the Patriot Act (remember Hairy Reed happily saying "We killed the Patriot Act"?. Iraq to some degree AND the Patriot Act to a greater degree were efforts to thwart Al-Qaida and like-minded groups...AND DEMOCRATS OPPOSED BUSH'S EFFORTS TO STOP AL-QAIDA.
In fact, the ONLY real effort Democrats backed fully was the war in Afghanistan. And yet these DOLTS fail to realize that Iraq will be Afghanistan II if we don't support freedom there.
Democrats are idiots, pure and simple. Swine-stein's words only show the extent to which Democrats blame everyone else but fail to change themselves. They are TRUE narcissists.
Hell, even President Bush has been willing to change tactics and strategies--but the liberals continue to point outward, in a sickeningly self-righteous way.
To think I used to be one of them...it makes me shudder.
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WASHINGTON — Just hours after floating the idea of cutting $20 billion from President Bush's $142 billion request for military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan next year, Senate Budget Committee Chairman was overruled by fellow Democrats Thursday.
"It's nothing that any of us are considering," Senate Majority Leader , D-Nev., told reporters.
Conrad's trial balloon to cut war funding would have affected the budget year beginning Oct. 1 and was separate from the ongoing debate over Bush's $100 billion request for immediate supplemental funding for and .
Even the Pentagon acknowledges that its $142 billion 2008 war funding request is simply a best guess of Iraq and Afghanistan costs, and Conrad's proposal didn't earn rebukes from Budget Committee Republicans.
But the speed with which it was rejected by his colleagues seemed to reflect Democrats' sensitivity to any accusations of giving shortshrift treatment to funding for troops in battle.
"Our caucus feels strongly that we should go with the president's numbers" on 2008 war costs, Conrad said. He spoke just hours after floating the idea of curbing Bush's request for next year's war budget.
I'm all for Feinstein heading a fact finding mission to Wazeristan prior to inserting our troops there. Perhaps she should take Murtha, Kennedy, Reid, Biden and Kerry with her.
Oh yeah...and that dip shiz that heads the Intelligence committee. Maybe he could ask an al Qaeda member if hes Shia or Sunni.
I'm all for Feinstein heading a fact finding mission to Wazeristan prior to inserting our troops there. Perhaps she should take Murtha, Kennedy, Reid, Biden and Kerry with her.
Oh yeah...and that dip shiz that heads the Intelligence committee. Maybe he could ask an al Qaeda member if hes Shia or Sunni.
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"Send us soldiers: NATO soldiers," said a Pakistani Pashtun tribal leader, who said the ISI is arming and supporting the Taliban. The Afghan Army fired at a Pakistani military post in Mohmand agency, which triggered skirmishes.
Funny. How does she know that Bush isn't "lying" to her again, trying to goad her to support an invasion?
Pakistan must do more to stem al-Qaida in its ungoverned territories
If areas are ungoverned then what does Pakistan have to say about it?
And some of the Dems are starting to TRY and extract themselves from the anti-war crowd's bandwagon...
So Di, your party is in power now, what are you going to do about it. How about you send a letter to the President and back him on bombing the crap out of our enemy there whether the Pakistani leaders like it or not.
Feinstein and her fellow DemoSocialists want to undermine our troops in the Iraq war, which is central to the war on terror. Now she's trying to trick her constituents into thinking she's a hawk. The DemoSocialists must be worried that voters don't like their "non-binding" resolutions.
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