Musharaf will be turned out. The ISI will handpick the successor.
India will invade. Indian defence officials said Pakistan had deployed more than four divisions, about 100,000 troops, along the frontier of Jammu and Kashmir state, and were fortifying their positions. Indian forces, estimated to be 400,000-strong, have been on high alert in the border region since the attack on parliament. A cabinet meeting on security, chaired by the prime minister, took place yesterday, a day after Mr Advani hinted that the government could sanction "hot pursuit" operations against militants based in Pakistan. "Those who threaten our security will have to pay the price," Mr Advani said on Indian television yesterday.
Mrs. Rao then continued reading the statement, uneventfully, until she reached the sentence that said the ambassador to Pakistan was being recalled. Wire service reporters grabbed their cellphones and rushed for the door, note pads flapping, to call in the news.
Mrs. Rao resumed her briefing. She reported that India had summoned a senior Pakistani diplomat and offered to hand over the bodies of the five members of the suicide squad who were killed in a shootout outside Parliament. The men had called Karachi, Pakistan, presumably to talk to their families, the night before the attack. Investigators found the phone numbers in the mobile phones left on the bodies, they said.
"It has been conclusively established they are Pakistani nationals," she said. Pakistan has declined to accept the bodies, saying India's unilateral determination of their nationality was unacceptable and again asking for a joint investigation of the attack. India says it is sharing evidence about the attack with the United States, France, Britain and others, but not with Pakistan. The police here in the capital have arrested four suspects they traced through phone numbers in the cellphones found on the bodies of the attackers. One of them, Muhammad Afzal, was allowed to give a brief interview on Thursday to television news stations as policemen stood guard. He said that Jaish-e-Muhammad had carried out the attack, that the Pakistani Army had provided weapons and that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency had given logistical support and weapons.
India today recalled its ambassador to Pakistan and ended bus and train service between the two countries to protest what it called Pakistan's failure to shut down two Pakistan-based groups India has accused of carrying out a suicide attack on Parliament last week.
India last recalled its ambassador to Pakistan 30 years ago, when India and Pakistan were at war.
India last recalled its ambassador to Pakistan 30 years ago, when India and Pakistan were at war.
I was thinking about that, too; a truly worrisome development...
I am not a panicking type, but I am afraid WWIII is unfolding as we speak.