The Taliban's Nuclear Threat [on verge of seizing Pakistan's nukes]

Daily Beast ^ | 4/22/2009 | Gerald Posner

[Velveeta]

As insurgents close in on Islamabad, The Daily Beast’s Gerald Posner reports that Taliban forces are on the verge of seizing Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal—which has the capability to hit India, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

This morning Taliban units took control of the Buner region of Pakistan, bringing their burgeoning insurgency within 60 miles of the capital city of Islamabad. The government called the advance a breach of a recently-signed peace agreement. But what did they expect? Any store owner who has ever faced ever-increasing protection payments to local gangsters could have told the Pakistanis that their recent string of capitulations to the Taliban—striking peace deals and ceding territory—was doomed to failure.

You think the stock market looks bad over the last two years? Let a Taliban spokesman announce that Mullah Omar has his finger on the Islamic Bomb.

[JimSEA]

You look aback at any great calamity of the last couple of hundred years and think, how could they have been so utterly stupid to have let that happen. Try it. The great depression, WWI and WWII. You can usually point back and say, "If only someone had stood up and done xyz."

To me, there seem to have been a lot of that kind of critical or tipping points just lately.

[aeonspromise]

Yep here is how it goes:
taliban: Mrs Clinton, we want to cut off your head..
Clinton: well thats not nice
taliban: we will cut it nicely, how is that
Clinton: Thats progress, lets talk more..

[massatoosits]

Kerry was never the Mass. AG. County DA, never AG.

[angkor]

>>>> Kerry was never the Mass. AG. County DA, never AG. <<<<

Slip of the tongue.

You’re correct, he was DA of Middlesex County, where I lived for 10 years..

[darth]

India and Pakistan have been incredibly close to nuking each other a couple of times in the past. If the Taliban take over Pakistan I don’t see how India has any choice but a massive first strike. Like I said before, get your potassium iodide and calcium pills NOW. Don’t forget guns & groceries.

[massatoosits]

I believe he might have been 1st assistant DA before leaping at the chance to be LT. Gov.

[angkor]

Whatever.

Trivial point.

[B-Chan]

The SEALS and Delta boys had better already be en route. If those Bronze Age nutjobs get a nuke, we’re boned.

[massatoosits]

Sorry if you take offense. None intended.

[swarthyguy]

The political capital that Pakistan built up over the years as a faithful ally in the ColdWar seems to have run out.

Not only the Soviet Jihad, but the flight to Mao and Beijing by Kissinger, U2 flights from Peshawar(Gary Powers took off from Kohat), and even as Hessians to the Arab countries in their wars against Israel, pilots mainly, not necessarily to help America, but to show their Islamic solidarity.

Of course, the US also paid them beaucoup bucks for the help.