fyi
The US doesn’t care as long as Pakistan’s nukes are pointed towards India and not towards the west. Enlightened self-interest in the short term no doubt.
A more sound vision, longer term and better suited to a historical perspective would be to nip in the bud any WMD attempts by authoritarian and/or islamic lands. No exceptions. Tie up with other pluralistic democracies (the genuine variety like Israel, India, Taiwan) and take on the bad guys. It has to happen sooner or later anyway.
Just my 2 cents.
This won’t change until the Taliban gets booted out of FATA.
...........Sad we have the means but a congress with no the guts. Somethings never change.
Immediately following the assassination of Bhutto, the Thai Embassy tried to notify some 4,000 "students" in Pakistan. The Saudi funded Mosques in the South send the young fanatics to Pakistan just as the Mosques in England send theirs. The inevitable results in both countries are suicide bombers, murderers, and assassins.
There is no way to keep track of thousands of passengers arriving from the United Kingdom every day.Sure there is. Just takes some backbone. "One way trip, sahib!" Thanks E.
He's a little bit off the mark on the Pakistani theater. Baitullah is the major clan leader of the Mehsud tribe, but here are many others. His influence like many clan leaders is very powerful where it exists, but not very far reaching. He's pals with Bin Hiden and it's the AQ Uzbeks that are the big problem in the FATA.
Maulana Fazlallah is still the major player in Swat, Mullah Omar in overall strategic command of the Taliban, and the Wazir tribes in S. Waziristan have their own jirga.
Politically it is a mess and our spec ops would be terminated quickly if we don't get some sort of tactical platform in Pakistan, in the FATA. Very difficult to translate DC political objectives into successful military tactics. No military force in history, not even the Paki's with a 30% Pushtun military have ever operated there effectively.
ping