All this activity over there... Maybe Musharraf realized what Kerry would mean to him...
Kerry's pacifism and deceit scares me too.
I think Musharraf decided to put an end to the party in the border regions after the second assassination attempt.
Two things slowed him down.
One, the bad guys, the Chechens especially, fight pretty good and chewed up the Pak forces pretty good back in March.
Two, the Islamist's political forces put a lot of pressure on Musharraf over that offensive as well. The threat to place Karachi under martial law if there's any more significant terrorist attacks isn't idle chatter, and if that happens, civil war may not be far behind.
Notice that this time, Musharraf has his ducks all lined up. He just signed a record budget, with something like 30% extra funding for domestic infrastructure, he has allowed the tribal jirgas and the political efforts every chance to bring in the militants, much more chance than they deserved, and the talks with India over kashmir and nuclear detente are going very smoothly.
I don't want to comment on possible future operations, but I will say that the anvil best stand ready.