Posted on 05/22/2007 4:35:12 PM PDT by Kitten Festival
War On Terror: The truce our "ally" Pakistan made last year with pro-al-Qaida elements has turned the region into one big terrorist recruitment camp. We warned of as much. Now what?
The Los Angeles Times reports that the CIA has observed an "alarming increase in the movement of al-Qaida operatives and money into Pakistan's tribal territories." It quotes U.S. intelligence officials who blame Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf's "withdrawal in September of tens of thousands of troops" from border areas where Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman Zawahri are believed to be hiding.
The truce reportedly included an underhanded deal to free jailed al-Qaida and Taliban operatives by the hundreds, with the promise not to arrest key al-Qaida figures. America's most wanted have been given a free pass to operate in the region, in effect making Pakistan the new Afghanistan.
Musharraf sold the truce to the White House as a way to stabilize Afghanistan, which had come under constant assault from Taliban and al-Qaida fighters based across the border in Pakistan. Tribal leaders protecting them pledged to stop the attacks.
(Excerpt) Read more at ibdeditorials.com ...
Declare Waziristan province to be open hunting field. Carpet bomb and strike indiscrimnately on terrorist targets, which means also all madrassas. Waziristan is the highest existant cocentration of Al-Qaeda and Taliban terrorists.
I don’t ever trust the LA Times, or their CIA moles leaking info to the world.
Oh BTW the headline is funny. We have already been betrayed by lots of Americans aswell.
Bush will never learn.
He probably needs those troops to defend the Presidential Palace against rampaging mobs.
In that case, he’s not going to waste them chasing around Waristan.
India was invaded long ago by moslem armies from foreign lands
and the Indian Muslim traditions took root under the sword.
At Independence from Britain no Pakistan should have been allowed to develope . It was the UN’s first HUGE mistake .
Along with hanging the people of Tibet out to dry and many others.
Now , to rectify this , in the future , India and the US coalition should ally to purge and remove the nation of Pakistan from existence and it should again become part of India. Regions or peoples of Pakistan that resist should be crushed as they will never ever assimilate.
This is about the only answer ,and especially so if the radical islamic hardliners ever grab power . And that could happen in almost any given week....
Hey!He looked Musharraf in the eye.
Pervez has to work to stay alive, much less go against his people by overtly supporting the United States.
We have already been betrayed by lots of Americans aswell.
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Yes, we have no shortage of traitors in America...between Washington and Hollywood, that pretty well wraps it up.
“I don’t ever trust the LA Times, or their CIA moles leaking info to the world.”
Yes I don’t trust anything that reports something I don’t agree with or hope isn’t true. That’s why I only rely on Newsmax and WND for my news. Until this is reported there, or at the very least Fox News, it isn’t true.
More power to ya!
And if you look at Palestine (what it was called) and the Sudan, the British didn't have such a great track record of giving their former colonies independence. They (some) make much ado about 'granting' their colonies independence peacefully. Actually, they simply were smart enough and not egotistical enough (as, type, the French) to realize that they couldn't keep their colonies by force post-World War 2, and colonies were hastily given their independence.
P.S. Singapore seceded from Malaysia, and Bangladesh from Pakistan, but those weren't as drastic as the Partition of India, the end of the British Palestine Mandate and the Declaration of Israel, and the north/south war in the Sudan, in which many, many people died due to shoddy work turning their possessions into viable states by the British when bugging out of their colonies.
As for India in particular, India has been more or less unified, and separated into a bunch of little Rajs for much of its history. Nor is it that similar to China which (with the exceptions of Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Xijiang, etc.) is much more unicultural, especially if Pakistan is considered a part of India.
I don’t believe that we’ve been brtrayed by Pakistan at all. They were given a choice in the beginning, help us or we’ll bomb you and change your government. They are reluctamt allies who will return to their old ways if they can. They’re an Islamic state always have been and always will. India would make a better partner and ally and we like them and they like us (except for a few muzzie malcontents.)
Time to implement Gen Billy Mitchell’s strategy. Carpet bomb the hell out of them.
We should do our utmost to spare women and children. Unfortunately “Stuff” happens.
The survivors may offer a complete and unconditional surrender. Oh, and those mountains offend me. We should level them.
To say we’ve been betrayed is to presume that we are allies to begin with.
In Pakistan’s case, its a bit more complex than that. Keep in mind that the Taliban was their creation, and that a Pakistani who was the godfather of nuclear weapons programs in several enemy states is a hero there.
Our biggest source of influence in Pakistan is our ability to play good cop to India’s bad cop (and kudos to India for occasionally playing along). Beyond that we don’t have much stroke there, from out of that milieu Musharraf is as good as it gets (and for being less than fanatically anti-American he faces weekly assassination attempts).
He plays the same game the Sauds play, in that they can both believably say that, however bad we think they are, what comes after them will only be worse. And since this is probably very true, we look the other way while they play both sides of the street, working with our military and police agencies to hunt down the baddies while also protecting, training, inspiring those very same baddies.
Then there is Waziristan, an area that is effectively independent of Pakistan, but because we all pretend it is part of Pakistan we do not dare to enter it lest we violate Pakistani sovereignty in a region that is beyond Pakistani sovereignty. When Pakistan sends its troops into Waziristan, it has to “invade”, it is under hostile fire the entire time, which should tell us all we need to know about Waziristan.
So we are left to try and negotiate with the tribes, to try and develop working relationships with them over time. For the moment we are working through the Pakistanis, which is a bit like letting Pakistan be our go between to the Taliban prior to the war. We should probably be building an Afghan intelligence capability and using them to make contact directly with the tribes, bypassing Pakistan altogether. That, and working with Indian intel to achieve the same purpose. Maybe its time for us to discover that we have a passion for Waziri independence.
1) Everyone lies about everything, and everyone knows everyone else is lying.
2) You make friends with your enemies to betray them. You have no need to make friends with your allies, because that is redundant.
3) Power is subdivided. The ruler only rules because he leads the most powerful minority faction.
Now, into this longstanding stew, the Bush administration entered, with tactical and strategic notions far beyond anything ever seen in such places. Chess masters entering a game of experienced, but less skilled opponents.
We embraced the leader, Musharaff, and persuaded him that with our help, his dreams would come true, and we would get what we wanted as well. Carefully, we explained the strategy to him, and he was wise enough to understand and agree.
His goal is to unite and pacify his fractured nation under his rule, and the rule of the non-Islamist leaders of his political faction. As dangerous and difficult an undertaking as any "Damocles" leader has ever attempted. But if he succeeds, his nation will be strong and wealthy.
To do this, he must slowly and methodically take down his numerous opponents. To weaken them, to sap their strength, and concurrently, to strengthen his own position. And he must do so subtly enough so that they do not band together to overthrow him.
At the beginning, he was truly alone. His government was filled with Islamists, as was his military and secret police, the ISI. It only ruled the center of the nation, the rest of Pakistan subdivided into autonomous enclaves, treacherous and disloyal.
At first he purged his military and the ISI of some of the worst of the Islamists. Their reward for this was to be given better arms and equipment, courtesy of the US.
Next, he became overly ambitious, invading the Waziristan enclaves, which was too much, so he had to withdraw his forces after a punishing fight.
He then gambled in politics, supporting very popular laws that forced the Islamists in government to oppose him and what the public wanted. They were punished in the polls for this, and his faction became stronger.
Then, a successful military push, into another enclave, called Baluchistan. This time his military thumped the violent opposition, and handed him a victory.
Not too long ago, he then did something for which he was roundly condemned in the West, because they did not understand his logic. He made a treaty with the Taliban in South Waziristan. And oh, how he was railed at for doing that. That he had betrayed America, etc.
But then what happened? The Taliban did indeed take over the place, but they promptly turned their guns on the worst of the foreign al-Qaeda killers, the Chechens who had long lived in South Waziristan.
They purged their enclave of the deadliest of the al-Qaeda killers! And having no place to go, they went into the deadly arms of the NATO forces in Afghanistan. And *this* is why there was an upsurge of violence. It was Musharaff's indirect gift to us, forcing the killers into the kill zone.
So tell me again how Musharaff has betrayed us?
With every success, he becomes stronger in his nation, as do those who back him. And his numerous enemies become weaker. Soon, he will be at the game again, picking his next battle, always with his goal in mind, and with the discreet advice of the US.
It is never linear, rarely obvious, and seems terribly inconsistent if looked at as discreet events. But, hopefully, in the long run he will get what he wants, and so will we.
If we are patient.
Yes. Ever since they started to kiss the Red Chinese’ rear ends way back when. It only got worse from there.
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