This week Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and head of the Joint Chiefs Mike Mullen were whisked off to Pakistan to smooth over our relations with them. The nation of Pakistan plays a pivotal role in our master strategy to take out the leaders of Al Queda and the Taliban. Without Pakistan’s wholehearted support to root out the leaders and dedicated troopers of these terrorist organizations, we might as well pull up stakes and get the heck out of there and Afghanistan. If Pakistan is not going to watch the backdoor to Kandahar, our troops are at great risk as this allows the Taliban and their Al Queda cohorts to cross the Pakistan/Aghani border with impunity. This is akin to chasing the Viet Cong across the Vietnamese Highlands to have them cross borders into their sanctuaries in Laos and Cambodia.
Hillary is over there with Mullen to persuade the Pakistani leadership to continue their partnership with us in the battle against the Taliban. The President of Pakistan, Asif Ali Zardari, has put out some drivel about working with us towards peace in Afghanistan and cooperating in actions against “high value targets.” But at the same time he wants us to reduce the number of U.S. intelligence staffers/troops we have there. Currently that number is around 200.
Look at it from Asif Ali Zardari’s point of view, he has thousands of voters in the streets from Karachi to Abbotabad calling for the end of the relationship with the U.S. Well, actually they like to say “Death to America” and “Death to the Great Satan” when they protest the U.S. presence on their soil. Generally, the people of Pakistan have very little say in the management of their country as their country has been on a war footing for decades! Their military really runs the show there. If a president does not please the military, that president can rely on a short leash that will be pulled by a general.
Ever hear of Kashmir? I mean outside of the Led Zepplin song? It is a territory under Indian rule that Pakistan insists belongs to them and, of course, India believes they own it. Kashmir, the land of contention! Instead of placing a large troop presence in North Waziristan where they can root out the Taliban on their side of the border and force them like a hammer into the anvil of American fire power, the Pakistani military maintains the majority of their armed forces on the border with India fearing an invasion or at least another ramped up border conflict.
By the way, how tough is their military? This week, six terrorists took over a Pakistani Naval Air Station. They destroyed two surveillance aircraft, Lockheed Orions, and killed several Pakistani Naval guards. In the end, when the Pakistani security forces retook the base, 4 of the terrorists were killed and two got away. Yeah, they got away.
Is the Pakistani Army tough? Are they well trained? Can they even defend their own country from assholes within? No, they are a bunch of pussies. Looking back at the border wars they have fought with India, the Indian armed forces has kicked some ass.
Pakistan is a bad situation that is not getting better. Americans are coming out of the woodwork calling for an end to the foreign aid we give to them. You can’t blame them. Bin Laden lived in Abbotabad for several years and there is not a doubt in our intelligence community that Pakistani intelligence agents in their ISI, Inter-Service Intelligence Agency, knew precisely where Bin Laden was. Now it is a question of trust. How do you trust a partner who has harbored your most dangerous and evil foe?
Trust goes both ways. They no longer trust us to be upfront with them as we would not tell them we were going in after Bin Laden at his mansion. Why should we? They would have tipped him off and then Seal Team 6 would have looked like fools charging into an empty villa.
We provide Pakistan with $2 billion annually in foreign and military aid. Why? They have nukes, that’s why. We are trying to work with them to contain and maintain their nukes so they don’t fall into the hands of a terrorist organization. There is a radical islamist element in the ISI and there has been for years. The ISI has recruited and trained terrorists like the Lakosh to disrupt Indian control in Kashmir. The Lakosh was the group involved in the attack in Mumbai a few years ago. How do we know that a radical terrorist does not already have a nuke intended for us or maybe Mumbai or New Delhi?
The geopolitical situation in Pakistan and Afghanistan is not getting any better. The Pakistani government has started playing footsie with China and China is now providing aid to the Pakistani government. What kind of strings come with that aid?
