# Instability In Pakistan- Merged Thread



## 1feral1

Link to fol, just getting this on CNNI now.

Looks like the SHTF.

More to fol I am sure

Ok, Discuss....

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www.cnn.com

From CNN

Reports: Benazir Bhutto dies
Former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has died, according to media reports. Bhutto's husband was quoted by Pakistan's GEO TV as saying she suffered a bullet wound to her neck after a suicide bombing that killed at least 14 supporters at a rally today. developing story

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Well, its 2338h here, and I am off to bed. 

Looks like another phucked up day overthere, and lets keep it over there!


Cheers,

Wes





_Mod note: adjusted title._


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## IN HOC SIGNO

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071227/pakistan_sharif_071227/20071227?hub=TopStories

It was just a matter of time considering the foolishness going on in that country.


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## Jammer

The opening shot in a civil war???


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## 1feral1

IN HOC SIGNO said:
			
		

> http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071227/pakistan_sharif_071227/20071227?hub=TopStories
> 
> It was just a matter of time considering the foolishness going on in that country.



Too right! I am not suprised, they've nearly got her before. Now its done, and I would imagine this will cause a fair bit of 'fall-out' in that neck of the woods, and will bring out more violence I am sure. That hellhole is unstable as it is, and ya, they got the nukes.

Looks like democracy took a kick in the balls tonight, and the bad guys are smiling.

She was educated in the west, was pro-democratic, was an ally of the west, a woman in a culture where they put women at the bottom of the food chain, and she has paid with her life. I wonder if the upcoming election will be cancelled or postponed?? 160,000,000 people, and a country on the fringe of imploding. Lots there do bat for the otherside, and thats scary. 

Now I am off to bed, but with all the rain, and this bold bloody green tree frog barking out commands right outside the window, its pointless to sleep, but got to love the rain.

Cheers,

Wes


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## Franko

Seeing as they missed when she got back with the bombing it was only a matter of time.

Regards


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## 1feral1

Recce By Death said:
			
		

> Seeing as they missed when she got back with the bombing it was only a matter of time.
> 
> Regards



Meanwhile here on Bribie Island, its raining, and my beer has since got warm, here on a sticky wet tropical night.

Cheers,

Wes


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## tomahawk6

AQ/Taliban finally got her. It will certainly cause chaos which is a secondary goal of the terrorists.


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## dapaterson

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> AQ/Taliban finally got her. It will certainly cause chaos which is a secondary goal of the terrorists.



Or possibly their ally Musharraf.  He's hardly an innocent, and far from a democrat.


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## RHFC_piper

No good will come of this weather it was AQ/Taliban or Musharraf.   

Weather Pakistan stays the course with Musharraf, plunges into civil war between all the factions vying for power (Bhutto's people, Musharraf's people, AQ/Taliban)  or becomes more unstable due to AQ/Taliban activities, this will only strengthen AQ/TB's hold on the country, and give them a safer haven in Pakistan.  
Civil war between the party supporters will only take their eyes off of the AQ/TB who are slowly gaining support deeper into the country... which is why I say no good will come of this. (AQ/TB with nukes... scary thought) 
More instability in Pakistan = more instability in Afghanistan

But I guess all we can do is sit back and watch.


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## Mike Baker

Wasn't expecting to wake up to this today, even though I expected it to happen. Guess we will have to watch and waite, waite for something we may never expect.


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## Armymedic

Not good in any context.

We should be careful not to shoehorn the muslim extremists in Pakistan into the AQ/Tb shoe. There are so many allying factions in the country that no one of us has enough info to determine which faction is responsible. Pashtun tribes alone make up around 20 tribes in the NWFP area, and as we know not all support teh Tb or AQ.

It is also in Iran's and China's best intrest to have a destabilized Pakistan to keep the US off balance.


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## Greymatters

Quite a surprise to hear of an assassination of such a high level figure at this time of year.  Regarding AQ/Taliban, agree with St. Micheals, sounds like more of an extremist/fanatic act instead.


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## Flip

> No good will come of this weather it was AQ/Taliban or Musharraf.



Sad sad news.  I'd been hoping it would never come.

I worry that the "war on terror" just got a little harder 
and a little longer today.  I would bet that it's a sad day in India too.

Regards all.


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## Kirkhill

WRT Jammer's Civil War comment, my concern is that the "modernized" moderate, predominantly punjabi and eastern faction that supported Bhutto - lawyers and merchants - may not be up to the fight.  They have relied on the Army to keep them safe from the Hillmen while they make money.

Now they are threatened by both the Hillmen and the Army.


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## Greymatters

Kirkhill said:
			
		

> Now they are threatened by both the Hillmen and the Army.



Thats a rock and a hard place I wouldnt want to be between...


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## Kirkhill

The Punjabis have been there before:



> The founder of Sikhism was Shri Guru Nanak Dev Ji, (1469-1538) who was born in the Punjab area of what is now Pakistan. At Sultanpur, he received a vision to preach the way to enlightenment and God. He is responsible for the saying "There is no Hindu, there is no Muslim" which has since become one of the pillars of Sikhism. He taught a strict monotheism, the brotherhood of humanity. He rejected idol worship, and the Hindu concept of caste. Guru Nanak and Panth (his followers) later built the first Sikh temple at Katarpur.
> 
> A succession of nine Gurus (regarded as reincarnations of Guru Nanak) led the movement during the period from Guru Nanak's death until 1708. At that time, the functions of the Guru passed to the Panth and to the holy text, considered the 11th Guru.
> 
> Mogul emperors ruled a large area of South Asia from the 16th century until the end of the 18th century. They attempted to convert the Sikhs to Islam, but were unsuccessful. It has been said of one of the Sikh Gurus (considered by many Sikhs to have been the last guru) that "Had there been no Guru Gobind Singh, the entire country would have gotten circumcised" i.e. been converted to Islam.



The Punjab was the battleground between the Muslim Moghuls of Kabul and the Hindus across the Indus.  The Sikhs were the outgrowth of the local Punjabis that said a pox on both their houses and determined to defend their local "zone of tolerance" by resolving to use the steel symbolized in the Kirpan that the carry in place of the Crucifix.

The Punjab, divided by India and Pakistan in 1947 and, according to the Sikhs and many others, cleared of Sikhs, is the area that the Sikhs want as Khalistan.  Punjabi lawyers may not be up for the fight but as I think about this, perhaps the Punjabi Sikhs across the border in India would be.....and then the nastiness begins.


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## ModlrMike

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> AQ/Taliban finally got her. It will certainly cause chaos which is a secondary goal of the terrorists.



Or perhaps ISI. They've been known to act independently of the government and Musharif before.


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## 1feral1

I bet a yrs pay it was extreme islam which did the hit. It smells of AQ/Taliban. I Dont think the ISI would have a bar of this. Thats all getting conspiracy ideas 'mode', IMHO.

I do not know why she did not have hired some up-armoured SUV's, as she was totally soft skiined in that climate of of hatred, intimidation, threats and attacks. If she was in an up-armoured SUV, she'd be alive right now. Normally these can be provided worldwife for $600-800 USD per day. I am sure she could have afforded that for the interim period she was out campaining. Stupid move.

CNN claims it was one of Mr Kalashnikov's toys which did her in, then the shooter PBIED'd himself on top of that!

This incident will truly rock the boat within Pakistan's borders and around the world.

Another secuirty nighmare might be on the horizon, with the who's who of international guests attending her funeral, which will be within 24 hrs of her murder.


Cheers,

Wes


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## Mike Baker

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> I do not know why she did not have hired some up-armoured SUV's, as she was totally soft skiined in that climate of of hatred, intimidation, threats and attacks. If she was in an up-armoured SUV, she'd be alive right now. Normally these can be provided worldwife for $600-800 USD per day. I am sure she could have afforded that for the interim period she was out campaining. Stupid move.


Well, CNN said that Musharraf said she couldn't have them. But it seems that she was up, waving to the people, while out of the sunroof.



			
				Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> CNN claims it was one of Mr Kalashnikov's toys which did her in, then the shooter PBIED'd himself on top of that!


Pakistani News are saying that it was a pistol, and they showed it on Fox news, all around blood. Now, I am no weapons expert, but it looked sort of what I know as a Glock.



			
				Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> This incident will truly rock the boat within Pakistan's borders and around the world.


 Very much so. Hopefully it won't cause too much fuss in Afghanistan.


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## Greymatters

Mike Baker said:
			
		

> But it seems that she was up, waving to the people, while out of the sunroof.



Not the wisest of moves for someone who knew they were a likely target of attack...


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## Mike Baker

Greymatters said:
			
		

> Not the wisest of moves for someone who knew they were a likely target of attack...


Not at all. JFK anyone??


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## NL_engineer

Jammer said:
			
		

> The opening shot in a civil war???



If it is, this will be no ordinary Civil War.  If there is a Civil War, who ever can get control of the nukes, can cause massive damage to another country; or even worse, a nuclear holocaust.


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## Ex-Dragoon

Do you think India, China, Russia, and the US are going to sit idlely by and let things get that much out of control?


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## Greymatters

NL_engineer said:
			
		

> If it is, this will be no ordinary Civil War.  If there is a Civil War, who ever can get control of the nukes, can cause massive damage to another country; or even worse, a nuclear holocaust.



I think thats a bit overdramatic... they will be fighting over control of the country and none of them will want foreign interference by threatening to nuke everyone, or let it appear that that their weapons are uncontrolled...


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## Kirkhill

An alternate history of the region:  The Sikhiwiki Version

The facts are in dispute and the claim is not recognized. But what is important here is that one party to this unresolved dispute believes the facts and accepts the claim.

That claim, the land of the five rivers (Punjab) stretches from Rawalpindi to Delhi and from the junction of the Sutlej and Indus Rivers to the Tibetan border.  It is centred on Lahore in Pakistan and Amritsar in India. 

If Khalistan were to come into being as a separate state it would have minimal impact on India but would rip the heart out of Pakistan and leave it as an "alliance" of the Pashtun and the Baluchis.   

I wonder if India would be tempted to come to the "aid" of the Punjabis and support an autonomous/semi-autonomous Punjab/Khalistan.


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## NL_engineer

Greymatters said:
			
		

> I think thats a bit overdramatic... they will be fighting over control of the country and none of them will want foreign interference by threatening to nuke everyone, or let it appear that that their weapons are uncontrolled...



But can we take that chance.

EX-D, I don't think they will let it happen, but we do not know what intentions the parties.

I don't it will happen like that, but if you look at it from  the worst case, anything is better.


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## Cheshire

Greymatters...

Civil war or not.....there are those in that country who would love nothing more than to get control of a nuke, or it's payload and do some serious damage. One has to wonder who is overseeing the people with their finger on the trigger?


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## Greymatters

Cheshire said:
			
		

> One has to wonder who is overseeing the people with their finger on the trigger?



One can always speculate... who does one think should oversee the people and their fingers?


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## Cheshire

Well, I would say a democratically elected government, of the people, by the people, for the people.......


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## 1feral1

Mike Baker said:
			
		

> Well, CNN said that Musharraf said she couldn't have them. But it seems that she was up, waving to the people, while out of the sunroof.
> 
> -------------------
> 
> Could not have them as in the Pakistani government supplying them, or not be allowed to have them period.
> 
> I know she got it out of the sunroof, but some of the windows had been shot out, and there was bullet holes in the seats.
> 
> Thats the first I heard about the pistol. Bloody media seem to go more with rumours than facts.
> 
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Wes


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## tomahawk6

Musharraf didnt need to kill Bhutto to win the election - he could have stuffed the ballot boxes. The bad guys are very smart. Kill Bhutto and get people riled up against the government and its a win win for the islamists - divide and conquor.People are ignoring the near simultanous attack on another candidate today - that one failed.


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## tomahawk6

Thought provoking article.

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=MTExNmE0MzY3YjBlYWEwZDkzOThkMWJiM2JmZGQ2NDE

Benazir Bhutto
Killed by the real Pakistan.

By Andrew C. McCarthy
A recent CNN poll showed that 46 percent of Pakistanis approve of Osama bin Laden.

Aspirants to the American presidency should hope to score so highly in the United States. In Pakistan, though, the al-Qaeda emir easily beat out that country’s current president, Pervez Musharraf, who polled at 38 percent.

President George Bush, the face of a campaign to bring democracy — or, at least, some form of sharia-lite that might pass for democracy — to the Islamic world, registered nine percent. Nine!

If you want to know what to make of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto’s murder today in Pakistan, ponder that.

There is the Pakistan of our fantasy. The burgeoning democracy in whose vanguard are judges and lawyers and human rights activists using the “rule of law” as a cudgel to bring down a military junta. In the fantasy, Bhutto, an attractive, American-educated socialist whose prominent family made common cause with Soviets and whose tenures were rife with corruption, was somehow the second coming of James Madison.

Then there is the real Pakistan: an enemy of the United States and the West. 

The real Pakistan is a breeding ground of Islamic holy war where, for about half the population, the only thing more intolerable than Western democracy is the prospect of a faux democracy led by a woman — indeed, a product of feudal Pakistani privilege and secular Western breeding whose father, President Zulfiquar Ali Bhutto, had been branded as an enemy of Islam by influential Muslim clerics in the early 1970s.

The real Pakistan is a place where the intelligence services are salted with Islamic fundamentalists: jihadist sympathizers who, during the 1980s, steered hundreds of millions in U.S. aid for the anti-Soviet mujahideen to the most anti-Western Afghan fighters — warlords like Gilbuddin Hekmatyar whose Arab allies included bin Laden and Sheikh Omar Abdel Rahman, the stalwarts of today’s global jihad against America.

The real Pakistan is a place where the military, ineffective and half-hearted though it is in combating Islamic terror, is the thin line between today’s boiling pot and what tomorrow is more likely to be a jihadist nuclear power than a Western-style democracy.

In that real Pakistan, Benazir Bhutto’s murder is not shocking. There, it was a matter of when, not if.

It is the new way of warfare to proclaim that our quarrel is never with the heroic, struggling people of fill-in-the-blank country. No, we, of course, fight only the regime that oppresses them and frustrates their unquestionable desire for freedom and equality.

Pakistan just won’t cooperate with this noble narrative.

Whether we get round to admitting it or not, in Pakistan, our quarrel is with the people. Their struggle, literally, is jihad. For them, freedom would mean institutionalizing the tyranny of Islamic fundamentalism. They are the same people who, only a few weeks ago, tried to kill Benazir Bhutto on what was to be her triumphant return to prominence — the symbol, however dubious, of democracy’s promise. They are the same people who managed to kill her today. Today, no surfeit of Western media depicting angry lawyers railing about Musharraf — as if he were the problem — can camouflage that fact.

In Pakistan, it is the regime that propounds Western values, such as last year’s reform of oppressive, Sharia-based Hudood laws, which made rape virtually impossible to prosecute — a reform enacted despite furious fundamentalist rioting that was, shall we say, less well covered in the Western press. The regime, unreliable and at times infuriating, is our only friend. It is the only segment of Pakistani society capable of confronting militant Islam — though its vigor for doing so is too often sapped by its own share of jihadist sympathizers.

Yet, we’ve spent two months pining about its suppression of democracy — its instinct not further to empower the millions who hate us.

For the United States, the question is whether we learn nothing from repeated, inescapable lessons that placing democratization at the top of our foreign policy priorities is high-order folly.

The transformation from Islamic society to true democracy is a long-term project. It would take decades if it can happen at all. Meanwhile, our obsessive insistence on popular referenda is naturally strengthening — and legitimizing — the people who are popular: the jihadists. Popular elections have not reformed Hamas in Gaza or Hezbollah in Lebanon. Neither will they reform a place where Osama bin Laden wins popular opinion polls and where the would-be reformers are bombed and shot at until they die.

We don’t have the political will to fight the war on terror every place where jihadists work feverishly to kill Americans. And, given the refusal of the richest, most spendthrift government in American history to grow our military to an appropriate war footing, we may not have the resources to do it.

But we should at least stop fooling ourselves. Jihadists are not going to be wished away, rule-of-lawed into submission, or democratized out of existence. If you really want democracy and the rule of law in places like Pakistan, you need to kill the jihadists first. Or they’ll kill you, just like, today, they killed Benazir Bhutto.


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## a_majoor

Mark Styen on the situation:

http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=YTYyZDM1ZTJiYTEzMzM2ZDZjNTAxZWQ3MzMzODBmOTg=



> Benazir Bhutto   [Mark Steyn]
> 
> Benazir Bhutto's return to Pakistan had a mad recklessness about it which give today's events a horrible inevitability. As I always say when I'm asked about her, she was my next-door neighbor for a while - which affects a kind of intimacy, though in fact I knew her only for sidewalk pleasantries. She was beautiful and charming and sophisticated and smart and modern, and everything we in the west would like a Muslim leader to be - though in practice, as Pakistan's Prime Minister, she was just another grubby wardheeler from one of the world's most corrupt political classes.
> 
> Since her last spell in power, Pakistan has changed, profoundly. Its sovereignty is meaningless in increasingly significant chunks of its territory, and, within the portions Musharraf is just about holding together, to an ever more radicalized generation of young Muslim men Miss Bhutto was entirely unacceptable as the leader of their nation. "Everyone’s an expert on Pakistan, a faraway country of which we know everything," I wrote last month. "It seems to me a certain humility is appropriate." The State Department geniuses thought they had it all figured out. They'd arranged a shotgun marriage between the Bhutto and Sharif factions as a "united" "democratic" "movement" and were pushing Musharraf to reach a deal with them. That's what diplomats do: They find guys in suits and get 'em round a table. But none of those representatives represents the rapidly evolving reality of Pakistan. Miss Bhutto could never have been a viable leader of a post-Musharraf settlement, and the delusion that she could have been sent her to her death. Earlier this year, I had an argument with an old (infidel) boyfriend of Benazir's, who swatted my concerns aside with the sweeping claim that "the whole of the western world" was behind her. On the streets of Islamabad, that and a dime'll get you a cup of coffee.
> 
> As I said, she was everything we in the west would like a Muslim leader to be. We should be modest enough to acknowledge when reality conflicts with our illusions. Rest in peace, Benazir.


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## Mike Baker

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> Could not have them as in the Pakistani government supplying them, or not be allowed to have them period.
> 
> I know she got it out of the sunroof, but some of the windows had been shot out, and there was bullet holes in the seats.
> 
> Thats the first I heard about the pistol. Bloody media seem to go more with rumours than facts.
> 
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Wes


Well, from what I have seen, they would not let her have the armoured cars because they didn't see them as 'necessary'.

Funny, I never knew that some windows were shot out, nor bullet holes in the seats.

Yeah, and the worst thing is that after the guy blew himself up, the fire department came and hosed everything down, so there goes some much key information that could have pointed to the killers. 

There is something very strange about this....I wonder what will come out of it all.


ETA: Bhutto was killed by bomb shrapnel


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## Cheshire

Like I said, who is looking after those, who are looking after the nukes?

"Instability in Pakistan, which is due to hold a parliamentary election on Jan. 8, raises concerns over who has control of the country's arsenal of 50 nuclear warheads. There are also fears that turmoil in Pakistan could contribute to problems in neighbouring Afghanistan, where Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and other countries are fighting the Taliban to help shore up the government."

Taken from...

http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2007/12/28/bhutto-suspects.html


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## geo

Latest interesting but silly story out of CNN is that Ms Bhuto did not die from gunshots OR IED shrapnel.

Now someone is suggesting that she died from a cuncussion to the head as she was dragged down into the SUV.  She whacked her head on the roof frame & died from the concussion.

Bizzare & Bizzarer!


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## Kirkhill

More theories rumours:



> ....The attack yesterday at Rawalpindi bore the hallmarks of a sophisticated military operation. At first, Bhutto's rally was hit by a suicide bomb that turned out to be a decoy. According to press reports and a situation report of the incident relayed to The New York Sun by an American intelligence officer, Bhutto's armored limousine was shot by multiple snipers whose armor-piercing bullets penetrated the vehicle, hitting the former premier five times in the head, chest, and neck. Two of the snipers then detonated themselves shortly after the shooting, according to the situation report, while being pursued by local police.
> 
> A separate attack was thwarted at the local hospital where Bhutto possibly would have been revived had she survived the initial shooting. Also attacked yesterday was a rival politician, Nawaz Sharif, another former prime minister who took power after Bhutto lost power in 1996.
> 
> A working theory, according to this American source, is that Al Qaeda or affiliated jihadist groups had effectively suborned at least one unit of Pakistan's Special Services Group, the country's equivalent of Britain's elite SAS commandos. This official, however, stressed this was just a theory at this point. Other theories include that the assassins were trained by Qaeda or were from other military services, or the possibility that the assassins were retired Pakistani special forces....


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## Stoker

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

THE BHUTTO ASSASSINATION: NOT WHAT SHE SEEMED TO BE 

By RALPH PETERS 

December 28, 2007 -- FOR the next several days, you're going to read and hear a great deal of pious nonsense in the wake of the assassination of Pakistan's former prime minister, Benazir Bhutto.

Her country's better off without her. She may serve Pakistan better after her death than she did in life. 

We need have no sympathy with her Islamist assassin and the extremists behind him to recognize that Bhutto was corrupt, divisive, dishonest and utterly devoid of genuine concern for her country. 

She was a splendid con, persuading otherwise cynical Western politicians and "hardheaded" journalists that she was not only a brave woman crusading in the Islamic wilderness, but also a thoroughbred democrat. 
In fact, Bhutto was a frivolously wealthy feudal landlord amid bleak poverty. The scion of a thieving political dynasty, she was always more concerned with power than with the wellbeing of the average Pakistani. Her program remained one of old-school patronage, not increased productivity or social decency. 

Educated in expensive Western schools, she permitted Pakistan's feeble education system to rot - opening the door to Islamists and their religious schools. 

During her years as prime minister, Pakistan went backward, not forward. Her husband looted shamelessly and ended up fleeing the country, pursued by the courts. The Islamist threat - which she artfully played both ways - spread like cancer. 

But she always knew how to work Westerners - unlike the hapless Gen. Pervez Musharraf, who sought the best for his tormented country but never knew how to package himself. 

Military regimes are never appealing to Western sensibilities. Yet, there are desperate hours when they provide the only, slim hope for a country nearing collapse. Democracy is certainly preferable - but, unfortunately, it's not always immediately possible. Like spoiled children, we have to have it now - and damn the consequences. 

In Pakistan, the military has its own forms of graft; nonetheless, it remains the least corrupt institution in the country and the only force holding an unnatural state together. In Pakistan back in the '90s, the only people I met who cared a whit about the common man were military officers. 
Americans don't like to hear that. But it's the truth. 

Bhutto embodied the flaws in Pakistan's political system, not its potential salvation. Both she and her principal rival, former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, failed to offer a practical vision for the future - their political feuds were simply about who would divvy up the spoils. 

From its founding, Pakistan has been plagued by cults of personality, by personal, feudal loyalties that stymied the development of healthy government institutions (provoking coups by a disgusted military). When she held the reins of government, Bhutto did nothing to steer in a new direction - she merely sought to enhance her personal power. 

Now she's dead. And she may finally render her country a genuine service (if cynical party hacks don't try to blame Musharraf for their own benefit). 

After the inevitable rioting subsides and the spectacular conspiracy theories cool a bit, her murder may galvanize Pakistanis against the Islamist extremists who've never gained great support among voters, but who nonetheless threaten the state's ability to govern. 

As a victim of fanaticism, Bhutto may shine as a rallying symbol with a far purer light than she cast while alive. The bitter joke is that, while she was never serious about freedom, women's rights and fighting terrorism, the terrorists took her rhetoric seriously - and killed her for her words, not her actions. 

Nothing's going to make Pakistan's political crisis disappear - this crisis may be permanent, subject only to intermittent amelioration. (Our State Department's policy toward Islamabad amounts to a pocket full of platitudes, nostalgia for the 20th century and a liberal version of the white man's burden mindset.) 

The one slim hope is that this savage murder will - in the long term - clarify their lot for Pakistan's citizens. The old ways, the old personalities and old parties have failed them catastrophically. The country needs new leaders - who don't think an election victory entitles them to grab what little remains of the national patrimony. 

In killing Bhutto, the Islamists over-reached (possibly aided by rogue elements in Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence, one of the murkiest outfits on this earth). Just as al Qaeda in Iraq overplayed its hand and alienated that country's Sunni Arabs, this assassination may disillusion Pakistanis who lent half an ear to Islamist rhetoric. A creature of insatiable ambition, Bhutto will now become a martyr. In death, she may pay back some of the enormous debt she owes her country.


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## armyvern

Whoooaaa!!

No spin in that article eh?

I guess if Mr Peters was Pakistani, it's pretty obvious that the '_good__-but-hapless-dictator-General-who-just-can't-seem-to-package-himself-right_' would be getting his vote.

This is an ironic spin; Bhutto is an anti-democrat and the country is better off without her, yet a military dictatorship is, apparently, democraticly acceptable.

Sadly now, we'll never know how the people would have spoken -- and it still remains to be seen as to whether or not the _good_ general will actually allow them to speak or use this as another basis to clamp down and bring the Army back to the streets with a vengence ... all in the name of "stability."  :


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## Kirkhill

I've noticed that Ralph Peters seems to be doing a fair bit of "over-reaching" these days.  May be his readership numbers are down.


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## tomahawk6

Vern corruption is a way of life in that part of the world and Bhutto wasnt any different,thats not to say that she might not have been a capable leader. You have to remember that in their culture having a woman as leader would be anathema to the religious conservatives.Throw in her statements against AQ/Taliban and there was plenty of incentive to kill her. The plus from their standpoint is chaos in the political arena which may cause blowback to Musharraf. By trying to kill off the major competition the islamists might be looking for more gains in Parliament or even positioning a conservative politician to be in line to takeover.This is the Syrian modus operendi kill your opposition to improve the position of your chosen candidate.


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## Cheshire

T6,

So I would Imagine that the army on the streets IS a more stable alternative.

Sometimes I have often wondered what would Iraq be like today had Saddam not been removed. While he routinely thumbbed his nose at the west, and was a brutal dictator, he did keep that country and its population in line.  Brutal way of going about it, but in line. Now, AQ/Insurgents have the run of the place. A breeding ground for who knows what. 

Same thing I would apply to Pakistan. Not that the west would be interested in Musharraf's removal, but if somehow, he was assassinated, or stepped down, who would fill the void? Who would keep that population in check? With some of the stats posted on these news articles, over 50% of the population are anti American? 

I am being rather general with my opinion, but should that western backed government of Musharraf fall, what would we be facing? TO me, his only option IS to put the army on the streets. Democratic and free elections are going to have to wait.


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## armyvern

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> Vern corruption is a way of life in that part of the world and Bhutto wasnt any different,thats not to say that she might not have been a capable leader. You have to remember that in their culture having a woman as leader would be anathema to the religious conservatives.Throw in her statements against AQ/Taliban and there was plenty of incentive to kill her. The plus from their standpoint is chaos in the political arena which may cause blowback to Musharraf. By trying to kill off the major competition the islamists might be looking for more gains in Parliament or even positioning a conservative politician to be in line to takeover.This is the Syrian modus operendi kill your opposition to improve the position of your chosen candidate.



I agree with you 100% regarding the corruption and general cultural ideals at play. I STILL find it ironic that a reporter would argue a country better off with a military dicatator-general who loves to repress the population when it suits his agenda as better for democracy than someone who, although not perfect, did embrace the democratic process and allow the people to speak to it.

I'm quite convinced that her disclosure of being acceptable to allowing US forces to attack Al-Qaida encampments within Pakistan's borders provided a HUGE impetus in her assasination. Most of us _knew_ it was only a matter of time. 

I suggest that this reporter did as well. Why is it that? Why did we know that it was only a matter of time? Because, even with corruption allegations etc dodging her, she would have been a _more acceptable _ democratic alternative to the current regime who, admittedly, was quite willing to step up the fight against the Islamic radicals and terrorists who are currently being _harboured_ within Pakistan's borders.

Being female? Not so much I'd wager. It may have been a factor with the extremists, but not with the general population of Pakistan who have elected her twice before.

I wonder how many of the moderate Ismalics are today viewing her as a martyr? I'd wager quite a few million. Another ironic twist in the land of jihadi and Al-Qaida made martyrs -- for the opposite reasons.


----------



## tomahawk6

If Musharraf goes another General will takeover. If a civil war errupts I suspect that the radicals could come to power. For that to happen there has to be one central leader for all to rally around if that person emerges then the game could be over. Other than OBL I dont see one Mullah or politician with the street cred to pull it off, at this point in time. A plan is in place to prevent the nuclear arsenal from falling into the hands of the radicals and to destroy the ballistic missiles. There is a Plan B and a Plan C as well. India will not tolerate an islamist government in Islamabad. The fall of Musharraf could ignite war with India. I dont see many positives in the event that Musharraf is killed or flee's the country.


----------



## tomahawk6

The radicalization of Pakistan's youth has occured to a much greater degree since the last time she won an election. In today's climate I am not sure that she could have won with multiple candidates in the race.As for Musharraf being a bad guy because he is a dictator I dont buy it. A civilian couldnt run the country without the support of the military,which is also the same type of relationship between the Turkish political parties and the Turkish Army.The rise of the islamists in Pakistan is quite troubling and wont be going away without bloodshed.


----------



## armyvern

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> The radicalization of Pakistan's youth has occured to a much greater degree since the last time she won an election. In today's climate I am not sure that she could have won with multiple candidates in the race.As for Musharraf being a bad guy because he is a dictator I dont buy it. A civilian couldnt run the country without the support of the military,which is also the same type of relationship between the Turkish political parties and the Turkish Army.The rise of the islamists in Pakistan is quite troubling and wont be going away without bloodshed.



Well, as I said earlier ... we'll never know now will we?

As for Musharref ... yes he and his supporting military are doing a _lovely_ job dealing with Islamists, in that they aren't. Lots of aires about it though. There's a man that can speak out of both sides of his mouth simultaneously; leading to another irony in that, in a truley democratic world -- he'd have made a wonderful politician.


----------



## meni0n

They are doing quiet a bit of fighting against islamists lately, last month offensive had alot of casualties on both sides. There is just so much going on in that country it is hard to concentrate on one thing. Uprisings, securing cities and borders, Kashmir etc. 

Bhutto was very weak when she was prime minister before, don't forget the ISI supported the Taliban when she was in office on her second term. She was in self imposed exile for years, why would she be any stronger now than before? She would have been a bad replacement for Musharaf.


----------



## armyvern

meni0n said:
			
		

> They are doing quiet a bit of fighting against islamists lately, last month offensive had alot of casualties on both sides. There is just so much going on in that country it is hard to concentrate on one thing. Uprisings, securing cities and borders, Kashmir etc.
> 
> Bhutto was very weak when she was prime minister before, don't forget the ISI supported the Taliban when she was in office on her second term. She was in self imposed exile for years, why would she be any stronger now than before? She would have been a bad replacement for Musharaf.



I didn't mean to infer that she would be stronger than before IF elected again --

I did mean to infer that she expressed an open willingness to allow the US to attack Al-Qaida within Pakistan's borders (thereby giving that nation a much needed boost in assistance in addressing those very concerns about all the "stuff going on there" that you have mentioned above).

Musharraf ... he's had years now to do this ... but continues on his merry way with that "little bit of fighting" ... Yes, he does talk the good talk to both the East and the West out of both sides of his mouth. Every so often, he antes up a little attack upon a small portion of those being harboured within the borders for the benefit of the West -- doesn't equate to one actually trying to do something serious to address the problem. That just equals a game of cat and mouse which is entirely dependant upon whether he's concerned with what the West or the extremists think that day.


----------



## armyvern

And it begins ...

She's no martyr ...  it was just a purely coincidental bump to the head that killed her.

_http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2007/12/28/vo.bhutto.gun.ptv_

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/asiapcf/12/28/pakistan.friday/index.html

Of course ... that _must_ be it.  :


----------



## The Bread Guy

And, as if we're not busy enough over there, shared with the usual disclaimer....

*Border duty could shift to NATO after Bhutto death*
Saira Peesker, CTV.ca, 28 Dec 07, updated 18:02 ET
Article link

Plunged into chaos after the assassination of Benazir Bhutto, NATO troops may soon be working double duty in the lawless border region between Pakistsan and Afghanistan.

Until now, the 41,700-strong NATO force fighting Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan has relied heavily on Pakistan's help to control the flow of insurgents over the lawless border between the two countries.

Prolonged instability following Thursday's assassination of the former prime minister could leave NATO's already strained forces with more responsibility in the dangerous region, says a former Canadian high commissioner to Pakistan.

"If the Pakistani government is occupied with trying to stay afloat, it will be much less concerned with the Taliban and the people in the tribal areas," Louis Delvoie, a former Canadian diplomat in Pakistan, told CTV.ca.

"For Canadians operating in Kandahar province, the solution is not going to come from Pakistan."

Pakistan has been rocked with chaos since the suicide attack on the moderate-leaning Bhutto, who died along with 20 others during a campaign stop leading up to the Jan. 8 elections.

President Pervez Musharraf will now likely turn his attention to regaining political stability -- away from quelling the flow of fighters, weapons and money towards the Taliban, the Islamist group struggling to regain power after being overthrown by a U.S.-led coalition in 2001.

Worry among the troops

Currently, about 100,000 Pakistani troops patrol the border, which at 1,500 kms. is approximately as long as the divide between the United States and Mexico.

According to CTV's Murray Oliver, who is stationed with Canadian troops in Afghanistan's Kandahar province, many soldiers believe border control could simply evaporate without Pakistani assistance.

"Behind the scenes, definitely there is a lot of worry, a lot of concern," Oliver told CTV's Canada AM on Friday.

"(The) Pakistani troops... are just about the only thing that manage to go keep al Qaeda and Taliban forces from moving freely back and forth into Afghanistan."

If things were to seriously escalate, Canada might even find its 2,500 troops stuck in Afghanistan, according to foreign affairs expert Eric Margolis.

"Pakistan is the world's staging area for military operations in Afghanistan and if things get too bad, these NATO forces could be isolated," he told CTV Newsnet on Thursday.

Insurgency could change focus

While many observers say the situation in Pakistan is bad news for Canadian troops, one retired general thinks otherwise.

Much like Pakistan's troops may be pulled away from the border regions, the insurgents may also be drawn into the fray in central Pakistan, suggested Canadian Maj.-Gen. (Ret.) Lewis MacKenzie -- one of the few experts predicting the threat to NATO soldiers in the region could actually decrease.

"If anything, I think it will be less threatening to our troops," he told CTV.ca on Friday.

"The folks up there on the northwest frontier enjoy killing infidels, but would enjoy a lot more taking over Pakistan. It's not going to happen, but I imagine it's their strategic intent."

MacKenzie said he expects many of the region's insurgents to be drawn into a war for power in central Pakistan, with the potential to reverse the direction of the flow of militants.

"It's fun running around Afghanistan taking on NATO, but it doesn't accomplish all that much for them," he said.

Musharraf seen as minimally effective

Despite the large number of Pakistani soldiers stationed in the border regions, international pressure has continued to rain on Musharraf to do more to quell the flow of fighters, who are often trained at facilities in Pakistan's lawless tribal regions.

Despite earning the support of the U.S. government in exchange for using Pakistan as a base for Afghanistan operations, the former army leader has continually failed to uphold his promise to stifle Taliban bases within Pakistan, said University of Toronto political science professor Aurel Braun.

"The government of Musharraf promised time and again they were going to both bring about democracy in Pakistan and fight extremism in Pakistan, particularly the lands adjoining Afghanistan," he told CTV Newsnet on Friday. "The Musharraf government has done neither.

"We have coddled a dictatorial regime in the hope they will be changed . . . What is very important here is... for the rest of us to learn the right kind of lessons. Among these lessons I would suggest is that we look for alternatives to dictators."

Protecting Canadian forces

Canada's military must prepare for a worst-case scenario, said Braun, something that may eventually involve pushing into Pakistan itself.

"At some point, NATO might have no choice but to act in a trans-border fashion in Pakistan in order to protect the emerging democracy in Afghanistan and to protect its own forces," he said.

That, however, would involve an increase in troops -- a long, labourious process that involves parliamentary approval and months of politics.

As far as MacKenzie is concerned, the current situation is only one of many worthwhile reasons that NATO countries should dedicate more troops to Afghanistan.

"If this doesn't stimulate them to commit more troops, nothing will," he said, noting there's little the current deployment of soldiers could do to prepare for an influx of insurgents.

"The consciousness of a possible increase in threat is probably keeping them busy, but there's very little they can do. They just don't have the resources... You don't talk about going on alert in a war zone, you're on alert all the time."


----------



## 1feral1

Me thinks AQ/TB forces seem to be gaining strength and momentum.

This war will be 7 yrs old in 2008, and it has not really even begun yet, IMHO anyways.

Pakistan is going to get worse. Ole Pervez has had AQ/TB attacks against him, as he is seen as a western sympathiser or puppet by many. 160,000,000 people, many already radicalised, now a power vacuum, and some bitter and beyond twisted feelings between many.

In deed, a very dangerous place, and not getting better. 

Yes, we should be concerned about the security of the +100 nukes these people have.

Regards,

Wes


----------



## Cheshire

So the best options for the west, for the war on terror, to maintain stability in the region..... is for Musharraf to maintain his power, put troops on the streets, or declare marshall law. For all the criticism from the west for him doing so a month ago, it seems to be what is needed. Failure to rein in the islamists through every means possible will only result in the fall of that government and a very big win for the terrorists, which, IMHO, who are winning the biggest aspect of this..... the propaganda war. After all, even if all the top AQ/Taliban leaders are caught or killed......how are we to stop the ideology of extreamism? We are powerless to stop it, IMHO.


----------



## armyvern

Cheshire said:
			
		

> So the best options for the west, for the war on terror, to maintain stability in the region..... is for Musharraf to maintain his power, put troops on the streets, or declare marshall law. For all the criticism from the west for him doing so a month ago, it seems to be what is needed. Failure to rein in the islamists through every means possible will only result in the fall of that government and a very big win for the terrorists, which, IMHO, who are winning the biggest aspect of this..... the propaganda war. After all, even if all the top AQ/Taliban leaders are caught or killed......how are we to stop the ideology of extreamism? We are powerless to stop it, IMHO.



I hope that you're not suggesting above that Musharraf is actually going to attempt "rein in Islamists through every means possible." I fail to see why he would start now.  His failure to seriously attempt to rein them in thus far is a big factor in why their radical ways are and have been spreading amongst the population.

The criticism in the west a month ago of his using the Army in the streets was exactly that he was using it _against_ the moderate population -- rather than _against_ the terrorists or Islamacists. I don't see him switching tactics to deal with Al-Qaida or Islamacists any time soon. Ergo, nothing will be solved. The moderate populace may indeed be "made stable" by the callout of the Army ... but you can bet your butt that Al-Qaida and their supporters aren't concerned with the Army holding down the moderates _for them _ while they continue with their actions in the border regions uninhibited.


----------



## Flip

> We are powerless to stop it, IMHO.



Powerless?  Unwilling, more like.

The whole thing will have to get alot more frightening
to the europeans before real progress is made.



> I fail to see why he would start now.



Good point Vern - maybe he'll run out of other options. >


----------



## tomahawk6

There are no good options. One of our democrat presidential hopeful actually suggested that we force Musharraf from power.Absolutely clueless. The one pro-islamist politician left standing is Nawaz Sharif. Anyone begin to see what is going on here ?


----------



## Flip

So Sharif's the guy to watch?

Pakistan's answer to Ahmedinejad?

I agree the Dems seem out to lunch.
When Nancy Pelosi took her new job she immediately
started making refence to the "Arab Nation".

Hand her a towel - She'll toss it in.


----------



## 1feral1

Flip said:
			
		

> So Sharif's the guy to watch?
> 
> Pakistan's answer to Ahmedinejad?
> 
> I agree the Dems seem out to lunch.
> When Nancy Pelosi took her new job she immediately
> started making refence to the "Arab Nation".
> 
> Hand her a towel - She'll toss it in.




 :rofl:

Very true Flip! Arab nation, ha!


----------



## Dog Walker

Here is an article from an Indian news outlet which makes for interesting reading. How much of this is accurate?

Monster she created came back to take her life
29 Dec 2007, 0424 hrs IST , Pradeep Thakur , TNN

NEW DELHI: It was the year 1996. Benazir Bhutto as prime minister of Pakistan had asked Pervez Musharraf, then her Director General of Military Operations, to rehabilitate Al Qaida chief Osama bin Laden in Jalalabad from Sudan. 

Bin Laden, who had shifted base to the African country after the Afghan war, had been thrown out by Khartoum after intense American pressure. Musharraf brought the Al Qaida mastermind to Jalalabad, a city in eastern Afghanistan, and rehabilitated him.

That — a decade later — Al Qaida should claim responsibility for Bhutto’s assassination marks not just a cruel irony, it also underlines once again the risk of Frankenstein’s monster turning upon the master. 

Bhutto’s return to Pakistan this year may have been marked with her claim to wipe out terrorism, but the fact remains that it was her interior minister, Major General (retd) Naseerullah Babar, who played a key role in raising the Taliban and consolidating Al Qaida in Afghanistan. The reason: a desire to secure strategic depth by controlling Pakistan’s western border, and to have a say in future Afghanistan affairs. 

The present day terrorism in India, and now turning on Pakistan, can, to an important extent, be traced to that fateful decision taken by the Bhutto government. 

Taliban soon became host to a menacing jihadi conglomerate — the Qaida-led International Islamic Front (IIF) — the components of which included anti-India gangs like Lashkar-e-Taiba, Harkat-ul-Mujahideen, which later became Jaish-e-Mohhamed, HuJI and others. 

The objective of the group was to establish Sharia rule in this important region of Asia, and it was determined to go to any length, even acquire weapons of mass destruction, to realise it. 

After the collapse of Taliban post-9/11, this terror infrastructure led by bin Laden moved to Pakistan, and has added to the radicalisation which has claimed so many innocent lives, including that of the former prime minister. A look at the history of militancy in the subcontinent also brings out the fact that Islamic fundamentalism is a direct result of the efforts of hardline Sunni groups to subdue Shias, Ahmadias and others. Fundamentalist Sunni outfits like Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP), which went after Shias, enjoyed the patronage of influential sections of the Pakistan establishment. 

There was an overlap of objectives, of course. Former Pakistan president General Zia-ul-Haq, follower of Deobandi sect of Sunnis, set up SSP in 1979 to not only counter the Shias but marginalised pro-democracy forces seeking an end of his brutal military regime. 

Some of the radical elements of the SSP parted ways and formed Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) in 1996. LeJ, which is suspected to have carried out the attack on Bhutto at the behest of Al Qaida, is nothing but the armed wing of SSP like Jaish-e-Mohamed and HuJI which had also branched out of SSP. The connections of all jihadi groups with each other are obvious whether they are fighting in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq or India.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/India/Monster_she_created_came_back_to_take_her_life/rssarticleshow/2659917.cms


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## armyvern

Well that's two mothers of the monster now.

Today it's Bhutto, on Wednesday it was the US due to their support of the mujahadeen during the Russian years.

We can spin anything to have it caused by anyone ... should we neglect the fact that circumstances were different then than they are now.

Perhaps, had the US' crystal ball been fully operational during the Russian years and they could see a couple decades into the future -- things may have been different. And, should Bhutto's crystal ball a decade ago been any clearer than that of the US, she may have made different decisions as well.

It is just so easy to sit back and armchair quarterback with the benefit of hindset revealed by the _future's_ actions.

Actually, let's just flip the blame for birthing the monster all the way back to the British Raj -- for if the Brits had never left ... we may not be where we are today. Now we're up to three mothers -- I'm quite sure there's more.

OBL is OBL -- he is his own beast -- plain and simple.


----------



## Edward Campbell

Cheshire said:
			
		

> So the best options for the west, for the war on terror, to maintain stability in the region..... is for Musharraf to maintain his power, put troops on the streets, or declare marshall law. For all the criticism from the west for him doing so a month ago, it seems to be what is needed. Failure to rein in the islamists through every means possible will only result in the fall of that government and a very big win for the terrorists, which, IMHO, who are winning the biggest aspect of this..... the propaganda war. After all, even if all the top AQ/Taliban leaders are caught or killed......how are we to stop the ideology of extreamism? We are powerless to stop it, IMHO.



Four items in today’s _Globe and Mail_ caught my eye:

1.	A lengthy “Essay” by Doug Saunders suggesting, correctly, I suspect, that we have very limited options in Pakistan – none of them very good;

2.	 An article by columnist Marcus Gee suggesting, again correctly, I think, that “we” (that Western “we” I often say doesn’t really exist) misjudged what Benazir Bhutto *might* accomplish in some sort of alliance with Musharraf – her credentials were suspect;

3.	 Another opinion piece, this one by Irshad Manji explaining in a bit more detail why Bhutto represnted the triumph of hope over experience; and

4.	Finally,  an unscientific poll showing that about ⅔ of the _Globe_ readers who bother to respond to such questions think (the nonexistent) Western “we” should stop giving aid to Pakistan. Saunders, in (1), above, explained why that’s a dumb idea.

I’m afraid that Cheshire is right: Musharraf *is* the _best_ choice – not an especially good choice, perhaps, but the best of a bad lot, all the same.


----------



## ModlrMike

E.R. Campbell said:
			
		

> Musharraf *is* the _best_ choice – not an especially good choice, perhaps, but the best of a bad lot, all the same.



And therein lie the challenges with the emerging democracies. We wring our hands over corruption, but endorse those who are by our own definition corrupt. We will always have to choose the "first among equals" in these situations. Graft and abuse of authority are a way of life in much of the developing world. The question is how much "corruption" are we willing to accept?


----------



## Mike Baker

Bhutto exhumation okay, Pakistan official says



> Sherry Rehman, Pakistan People's Party information secretary, said it was clear that the former Pakistani prime minister suffered bullet wounds to her head, contrary to a government report that she died because she hit her head on a sunroof lever.
> 
> Cheema noted that if Rehman -- as she said -- believes she saw bullet wounds that caused Bhutto's death, "We don't mind if the People's Party leadership wants her body to be exhumed and post-mortemed. They are most welcome, but we gave you what the facts are."


----------



## Kirkhill

The unpalatable truth is that as a self-governing entity our "interest" lies first in having order outside our borders. State's where leaders  and followers are in sync with each other are nice to have (unless they are both oriented against us).

Without order then we have to spend money on defending our borders just as Switzerland, Israel and all the Neutrals do.
With order then the threats become more identifiable and easier to counter and defence is less expensive.
With order then trade and money making can continue at least cost.

Imposing values is what gets us, and every other empire, into trouble.


----------



## Edward Campbell

Kirkhill said:
			
		

> The unpalatable truth is that as a self-governing entity our "interest" lies first in having order outside our borders. State's where leaders  and followers are in sync with each other are nice to have (unless they are both oriented against us).
> ....
> 
> Imposing values is what gets us, and every other empire, into trouble.



Bingo!

Democracy - liberal or conservative - is *not* the _natural_ order of things for at least 80% of the UN's members.

Democracy requires, above all, an understanding of and respect for the *rule of law*. In even the most _liberal_ (individualistic) democracy each citizen must accept that the most _conservative_ of all values - the collective good or the common wealth - must be protected, above all again, for our individual liberties to have any meaning or value.

The process of enshrining that respect for the rule of law took us, arguably, 2,000 years (250 BCE to _circa_ 1750 CE) to accomplish.

Liberal democracy is the product of only the past 250 years and some countries, Canada for example, are still _retarded_ in that respect - with horribly gerrymandered legislatures (where one Cavendish PEI vote is worth more than 3 Calgary or Toronto votes) and appointed legislative chambers.


----------



## tomahawk6

Kirkhill said:
			
		

> The unpalatable truth is that as a self-governing entity our "interest" lies first in having order outside our borders. State's where leaders  and followers are in sync with each other are nice to have (unless they are both oriented against us).
> 
> Without order then we have to spend money on defending our borders just as Switzerland, Israel and all the Neutrals do.
> With order then the threats become more identifiable and easier to counter and defence is less expensive.
> With order then trade and money making can continue at least cost.
> 
> Imposing values is what gets us, and every other empire, into trouble.



We arent imposing values on anyone. Both Pakistan and India have British style parliamentry systems because they adopted their former colonial masters political system but adapted it to their culture. Greed and corruption are age old problems all over the world- not just a Pakistani problem. We see it in Mexico too. We see it all over the US as well. The problem that Pakistan has is that under the Zia government religious conservativism was intriduced to counter corruption. Unfortuntely that genie is out of the bottle and its very hard to get it back in. The jihadists are using the frontier areas as bases in their war against secular Pakistan. AQ and its Allied Movements have refocused their effort to seize power in Pakistan both as a base o operations but also because of its nuclear arsenal.


----------



## Kirkhill

T6 - we are exporting "western values".

Socialism and Communism are "western values".  Just as much as Capitalism, or Catholicism or Presbyterianism.  Or the cult of the "Big Mac".  We can't help exporting values.  

Some indigenous populations pick up on these exported values and interpret them in their local context and then try to bring them to their more "regressive, reactionary, conservative" countrymen.  That interplay is where the violence occurs.  

Our problem is that we feel tempted to jump into the discussion to support those that hoist our totems as rallying points, even though they may not understand the totems in the same sense that we do.  Consequently we are seen by the conservative elements as "imposing" our values on their society.  And unfortunately, when we do turn up on the winning side of the debate we often find out that the outcome is not what we expected.  Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia, not to mention India and Pakistan are most assuredly not the nations that the Manchester Christians had in mind when they started their reform movements in the 1830s.  Nor, I am sure, did Russia turn out the way Karl Marx intended.  And I think France was less than impressed with the results of their support for Ayatollah Khomenei when he was in exile.

What Edward has been harking on about lo these many centuries  ;D  is that in a civil war the right solution is to contain it and wait for the dust to settle and then make what deals are necessary/possible with the survivors..   We are interested parties in the dispute to the sole extent that the combatants choose to try and harm us or our interests - in which case we need to intervene to that limited extent necessary.  In my opinion blockade and bombardment is a legitimate option but only when the bombardment is focused on depriving the indigenous combatants the means to export their struggle.

On the plus side, I am optimistic that our example of what is possible, ie a secure, prosperous environment where people can pass on their genes with limited effort - an environment that is made possible because ultimately most of us don't care what party you vote for or what church you go to or whether you end up in my paradise in the hereafter - will continue to act as a magnet that will attract others and if not bring them over to our side at least cause them to align with us.


----------



## Kirkhill

And relative to "the plus side" there is this (via both RealClearPolitics and PrairiePundit).

Just to obfuscate further: sometimes it is in our national interests to transform societies - ie if followers and leaders are aligned against us.  In which case back to plan A and separate followers from leaders starting with those followers that are most disenchanted with the leaders.





> Lessons From the Surge
> By Michael Barone
> 
> *There are lessons to be learned from the dazzling success of the surge strategy in Iraq*.
> 
> Lesson one is that just about no mission is impossible for the United States military. A year ago it was widely thought, not just by the new Democratic leaders in Congress but also in many parts of the Pentagon, that containing the violence in Iraq was impossible. Now we have seen it done.
> 
> We have seen this before in American history. George Washington's forces seemed on the brink of defeat many times in the agonizing years before Yorktown. Abraham Lincoln's generals seemed so unsuccessful in the Civil War that in August 1864 it was widely believed he would be defeated for re-election. But finally Lincoln found the right generals. Sherman took Atlanta and marched to the sea; Grant pressed forward in Virginia.
> 
> Franklin Roosevelt picked the right generals and admirals from the start in World War II, but the first years of the war were filled with errors and mistakes. Even Vietnam is not necessarily a counterexample. As Lewis Sorley argues persuasively in "A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America's Last Years in Vietnam," Gen. Creighton Abrams came up with a winning strategy by 1972. South Vietnam fell three years later when the North Vietnamese army attacked en masse, and Congress refused to allow the aid the U.S. had promised.
> 
> George W. Bush, like Lincoln, took his time finding the right generals. But it's clear now that the forward-moving surge strategy devised by Gens. David Petraeus and Raymond Odierno has succeeded where the stand-aside strategy employed by their predecessors failed. American troops are surely the most capable military force in history. They just need to be given the right orders.
> 
> Lesson two is that societies can more easily be transformed from the bottom up than from the top down.  Bush's critics are still concentrating on the failure of the central Iraqi government to reach agreement on important issues -- even though the oil revenues are already being distributed to the provinces. We persuaded the Iraqis to elect their parliament from national party lists (reportedly so that it would include more women) rather than to elect them from single-member districts that would have elected community leaders more in touch with local opinion.
> 
> But the impetus for change has come from the bottom up, from tribal sheiks in Anbar province who got tired of the violence and oppression of al Qaeda in Iraq, from Shiites and Sunnis who, once confident of the protection of American forces and of the new Iraqi military, decided to quit killing each other. They did not wait for orders from Baghdad or for legislation to be passed with all the i's dotted and t's crossed.
> 
> Our own recent history should have taught us that bottom-up transformation, in local laboratories of reform, can often achieve results that seemed impossible to national leaders. At the beginning of the 1990s we seemed to have intractable problems of high crime and welfare dependency. Experts argued that we couldn't hope for improvement. But state and local leaders got to work and showed that change for the better was possible. They included Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson on welfare and New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani on crime control and many others, mostly Republicans but many Democrats as well. The federal government came charging in only after success was achieved in states and cities across the country. By now welfare dependency and crime have fallen by more than half, and they have virtually disappeared as political issues.
> 
> Lesson three is that it doesn't pay to bet against America. As Walter Russell Mead explains in his trenchant (and entertaining) "God and Gold: Britain and America and the Making of the Modern World," first Britain and then America have built the most prosperous and creative economies the world has ever seen and have prevailed in every major military conflict (except when they fought each other) since the Glorious Revolution of 1688. Many of those victories have been achieved in conflicts far more grueling than what we have faced in Iraq.
> 
> Some of George W. Bush's critics seem to have relished the prospect of American defeat and some refuse to acknowledge the success that has been achieved. But it appears that they have "misunderestimated" him once again, and have "misunderestimated" the competence of the American military and of free peoples working from the bottom up to transform their societies for the better. It's something to be thankful for as the new year begins.



Lesson 1 - a bit of allowable chest-thumping, although the type of thing where I find myself reaching for the nearest chunk of wood to knock

Lesson 3 - as I have said before, never bet against the Bank of England.

Lesson 2 - as noted: to separate leaders from followers start with those most disenchanted with the leadership, and as a corollary start with those that have their own following thereby increasing the rate at which separation occurs.

Lesson 2a - Proportional Representation and Party List sucks.   " We persuaded the Iraqis to elect their parliament from national party lists (reportedly so that it would include more women) rather than to elect them from single-member districts that would have elected community leaders more in touch with local opinion."  The key element in any system of governance is that sense of representation that comes from the direct connection between the followers and their chosen advocates, their leaders.  And if they feel that mortal combat is the way to choose a leader it is going to be very hard to convince them otherwise and have them accept some wimpy outsider preaching kubayahism as their representative.


----------



## Edward Campbell

I'm just reading God and Gold, now. Comments will follow when I'm on the ground in Texas for the winter.


----------



## 1feral1

Texas?

McAllen and South Padre Island?

Galveston?

Have fun.

Cheers,

Wes


----------



## Old Sweat

Wes,

ER is off to the DFW area. In another month we are also off to Texas; in our case we have reservations in an RV Resort in Mission for a month. I like the area; any place where a cashier asked me for proof of my age when I brought a case of beer to the checkout ain't going to be overrun with intellectuals. The free wifi, cable TV and phone calls within North America in the park are a bonus, as I can send and receive draft chapters at the speed of light.

By my reckoning you are down to the last 96 hours of your duty shift. Don't hurt yourself after you turn over the duty book, keys and whatever to the RSM's helper.


----------



## 1feral1

Not to hjack things too much....

I've been DO since the 24th, ha! TC on 02 Jan, but the poop is the Guard Comd (normally a CPL/LCPL slate) was pulled of duty, and with no one to replace him, I stepped up to the plate until Tuesday morning. So I am both the DO and GC, and I have two Diggers to task as required, currently its Sunday morning, and they are in bed watching TV, and you know what I am doing, I am on here.

Cheers,

Wes


----------



## tomahawk6

Pakistan has turned down foreign assistance investigating the Bhutto assasination. Musharraf would be smart to bring in Scotkand Yard as opposed to the FBI. Possibly fewer complications with a fellow Commonwealth nation.


----------



## Old Sweat

I suspect there is both face and the prospect of being seen to be in bed with infidels involved in the refusla of outside assistance in the investigation. Musharraf must be a very busy man and probably more than a little stressed by the torrent of events that could destroy his country and bring him to an untimely and unpleasant end. It may be, and I don't like myself for suggesting it, that the best course of events would be for the army to suppress everybody until heads have a chance to cool and some perspective applied. Fat chance?


----------



## tomahawk6

Picture of the man who is thought to be the suicide bomber/shooter.


----------



## Flip

I would suggest they need time to invent a Bhutto successor.

Perhaps her son?  Maybe more can be accomplished with a 
male heir to the martyr anyway.

I was once told I was an eternal optimist.
Probably true. 
 ;D


----------



## Flip

> OBL is OBL -- he is his own beast -- plain and simple.


+1

It's perfectly natural to throw blame around and invent reasons for why bad things happen.
I take Bhuttos assasination as her validation as a real threat to the Islamist agenda.

Their agenda will have other threats and the cycle will go on.
Nothing ends with Bhuttos death - not even Bhutto.


----------



## retiredgrunt45

Posted with all the usual disclaimers
*Nuclear al-Qaida Comes Closer*

http://www.newsmax.com/kessler/Nuclear_al-Qaida_/2007/12/27/60075.html



> Washington Insider with Ronald Kessler
> 
> Nuclear al-Qaida Comes Closer
> 
> Thursday, December 27, 2007 12:52 PM
> 
> By: Ronald Kessler  Article Font Size
> 
> Pakistan former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto arrives to address her last public rally in Rawalpindi, Pakistan, Thursday.
> 
> The assassination of Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto brings closer the nightmare of al-Qaida and its affiliates being armed with nuclear weapons, counterterrorism experts tell Newsmax.
> 
> 
> “The real danger for us now in the U.S. is that if this continues the way it’s going, the Taliban and al-Qaida could eventually have control of a nuclear arsenal,” says S. Eugene Poteat, a former CIA official. “And you know, we might not even know it. Because the way infiltration works by these people, you never know who they are.
> 
> 
> 
> "Al-Qaida or its affiliates could be in the military, they could be in control of a nuclear arsenal, and if they get it, we know one thing for sure is that it will be used one way or the other. They may not use it right away, but that’s the danger,” says Poteat, who is president of the Association of Former Intelligence Officers. “They’ve let it be known publicly what their plans are: their intentions are to kill us.”
> 
> 
> “The political dynamic was already unstable in Pakistan and is now even more so,” Lloyd D. Salvetti, a former CIA official who was a staff member of the 9/11 commission, says. “It raises the larger issue of Pakistan, not only in terms of governing, but in terms of its ability as an ally of the U.S. in the war on terror and its position with nuclear arms.”
> 
> 
> But Frederick A. Stremmel, a former FBI counterterrorism analyst, says Bhutto’s assassination could cut both ways.
> 
> On the one hand, Bhutto’s supporters may weave conspiracy theories pointing to Musharraf as being behind her assassination, he says.
> 
> “If one of them gets a voice on this, Musharref may have to go back to martial law and suspending the constitution,” Stremmel says. “This will make things more difficult for Musharraf, especially in the slum areas where she had her support,” Stremmel says.
> 
> On the other hand, the development could also “turn against the Sunni extremists — al-Qaida or its affiliates —who probably are responsible for her death,” Stremmel says. “People could get more angry at the extremists. There is a backlash going on against extremists. This may accelerate that backlash.”
> 
> Agreeing with that assessment, another well-connected terrorism expert says, “Since Bhutto’s arrival in Pakistan, I’ve felt that her days were numbered and that she didn’t much care because she viewed herself as a martyr. That’s why her arrival in Pakistan was staged so elaborately and was intended to be sabotaged by her opponents — to give her headlines.”
> 
> The question, he says, is whether her supporters will “go on a wild rampage against the government or innocent bystanders, or will they seek revenge against al-Qaida, the Taliban, and other Muslim extremists who wished her dead?”
> 
> Brad Blakeman, a former Bush White House aide who heads the conservative Freedom’s Watch, says the assassination is a reminder of the threat of terrorism. While terrorism has been receding as an issue in the presidential campaign, the Bhutto assassination could bring it back to the forefront, Blakeman says.
> 
> “It shows that we live in a world where terrorism is alive and well and that we have to stand up against it,” Blakeman says. “As President Bush has said many times, we have to protect ourselves not only at home but abroad.”


----------



## 1feral1

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> Picture of the man who is thought to be the suicide bomber/shooter.



He is clean shaven to meet his 70 virgins, however to me he looks more of middle eastern appearance than of Pakistani appearance, but it could just be the pic.

During our training for Ops in Iraq we were taught that most suicide bombers shave their beards off, wash, appear on edge, and might in fact be profusly sweating, and dressed in a manner to disguise or cover something (more noticable on a hot day), ha! So needless to say when outside the wire, we were observing many suspicious things, including the aforementioned.

He has the gun out in that pic, and those people around him would have been the first to absorb the blast of his bomb.


Regards,

Wes


----------



## Mike Baker

Flip said:
			
		

> I would suggest they need time to invent a Bhutto successor.
> 
> Perhaps her son?  Maybe more can be accomplished with a
> male heir to the martyr anyway.
> 
> I was once told I was an eternal optimist.
> Probably true.
> ;D




*Bhutto's son, husband to succeed her*
LINK


> NAUDERO, Pakistan - Benazir Bhutto's 19-year old son was chosen Sunday to succeed her as chairman of her opposition party, while her husband will serve as co-chairman, extending Pakistan's most famous political dynasty to another generation.



And Flip wins!


----------



## tomahawk6

Ya this is a winning ticket. ;D


----------



## armyvern

Flip said:
			
		

> Nothing ends with Bhuttos death - not even Bhutto.



I'm rather thinking that the age of Bhutto -- has just begun. The reprecussions of this assassination will be felt for years.

That's what my crystal ball is telling me ... and we know how predictable those are.


----------



## armyvern

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> During our training for Ops in Iraq we were taught that most suicide bombers shave their beards off, wash, appear on edge, and might in fact be profusly sweating, and dressed in a manner to disguise or cover something (more noticable on a hot day), ha! So needless to say when outside the wire, we were observing many suspicious things, including the aforementioned.



Ritual cleansing prior to meeting those 70 virgins is SOP. Right down to their feet.


----------



## midget-boyd91

> *19-year old son* was chosen Sunday to succeed her as *chairman of her opposition party,*



Oh yes. A teen-aged politician ruling a party in a powder-keg country that is on the verge of something very unpleasant, to say for the least. Wonderful idea. 

Maybe I should run for premier of Nova Scotia?


----------



## armyvern

uncle-midget-boyd said:
			
		

> Oh yes. A teen-aged politician ruling a party in a powder-keg country that is on the verge of something very unpleasant, to say for the least. Wonderful idea.
> 
> Maybe I should run for premier of Nova Scotia?



It's all in the name and the influence it pulls (or doesn't) ...

Then there was Tut, and, of course, Henry VI who ascended the throne at the ripe old age of 9 months in not exactly stable times. Let's face it, NONE of these people "rule" alone; their names pull in the votes and their advisors do most of the nitty gritty work. I'm sure Nancy Reagan could confirm.

The ones who "rule" alone -- tend to be dictators vice elected.

Oh, and I wouldn't bother with running in Nova Scotia -- I don't think they'd recognize your name on the ballot.


----------



## tomahawk6

The kid has a clean reputation whereas the father has ethics issues.But I dont see anyone voting a 19 year old into national office.


----------



## armyvern

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> The kid has a clean reputation whereas the father has ethics issues.But I dont see anyone voting a 19 year old into national office.



Time will tell. _IF _ he lives long enough ...  

In the West, we tend to vote based on experience/platform. Not so over there ... Ghandi ... Bhutto ... it'll go on forever.


----------



## midget-boyd91

ArmyVern said:
			
		

> Then there was Tut, and, of course, Henry VI who ascended the throne at the ripe old age of 9 months in not exactly stable times. Let's face it, NONE of these people "rule" alone; their names pull in the votes and their advisors do most of the nitty gritty work.



The nitty gritty work may be done mostly by the advisors, but as the head of the party (suppose the party wins the election, then head of a nation) he will be looked at to be a leader. But do you really think that Pakistan wants to be lead by someone so young with so little experience in a time of crisis?



> Oh, and I wouldn't bother with running in Nova Scotia -- I don't think they'd recognize your name on the ballot.


Who said anything about a ballot? I was just simply going to run towards the office and try to bust down the door, thus becoming the Premier. Thats how it works isn't it?


----------



## Flip

The Bhutto dynasty might just land on it's feet here. 
Ya think Benazir knew her political a$$ from her elbow when she started?
I seem to recall a lot of reference to "Dad's" old notes.
There's a whole new chapter of notes now. The pile grows thicker with time.

A male heir, as I suggested, might just have broader appeal.
Frankly I don't think Pakistanis can be too choosy these days.


----------



## armyvern

uncle-midget-boyd said:
			
		

> The nitty gritty work may be done mostly by the advisors, but as the head of the party (suppose the party wins the election, then head of a nation) he will be looked at to be a leader. But do you really think that Pakistan wants to be lead by someone so young with so little experience?
> Who said anything about a ballot? I was just simply going to run towards the office and try to bust down the door, thus becoming the Premier. Thats how it works isn't it?



There has been many a young and charismatic leaders worldwide. This would not be precedent setting -- not even in the Islamic world.

Sure he'll be the head of the Nation if elected -- and will give the speachs etc that his advisors write for him on official matters. (Perhaps, one day -- even a speach that the CF has written for him!!  > So sayeth the NDP ...) 

His whole life has been that of politics -- lived on a daily basis by virtue of his parentage and grandparentage -- as in the case of the Ghandi's ... MANY people view this 'living in the shadow of such a name' as "experience enough" ... I don't think for a second that he's not aware of _how it works there_, and a couple million people would probably agree in that country. They do not work like we do, nor vote based upon the same value system that we use when we mark our ballots here.

I've already made my "crystal ball" call ... we'll see what happens ... if he lives long enough (and I suspect his life expectancy just went SEVERELY downhill).


----------



## midget-boyd91

I just can't see it turning into anything healthy for Pakistan. 
But of course, my crystal ball isn't as clear as yours.


----------



## armyvern

uncle-midget-boyd said:
			
		

> I just can't see it turning into anything healthy for Pakistan.
> But of course, my crystal ball isn't as clear as yours.



There's not too much healthy in Pakistan these days, nor do I see any healthy options in the foreseeable future.

It's all a case of "which devil is best at this time?"

We've yet to see whether or not the people are going to decide which devil they want to go with, or whether Musharraf is going to decide that for them.


----------



## tomahawk6

At least the Bhutto party will participate in the elections which will put the islamist candidate at a disadvantage.


----------



## 1feral1

uncle-midget-boyd said:
			
		

> Oh yes. A teen-aged politician ruling a party in a powder-keg country that is on the verge of something very unpleasant, to say for the least. Wonderful idea.



This must be cultural, remember the 15 yr old who was a CO of a rather outragous large amount of Northern Alliance troops in Afghanistan?
At 15, you have a baby's brain and a old man's heart - oops thats at 18.

At the best, whoever succeeds her, is at the mercy of AQ/TB supporters, and in a matter of time, Bhuttos' may have the same life expectancy as a politician as a WW1 fighter pilot - 6 weeks!


Cheers,

Wes


----------



## GAP

His father is tasked as co-leader....that's gotta have some bad implications....he's been dogged by fraud and theft charges for a variety of issues no matter where he goes.


----------



## tomahawk6

The son has stated that he will return to his studies which will leave his father in charge of the party. The only man that isnt corrupt ion that part of the world is one that has no job.


----------



## CougarKing

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> At the best, whoever succeeds her, is at the mercy of AQ/TB supporters, and in a matter of time, Bhuttos' may have the same life expectancy as a politician as a WW1 fighter pilot - 6 weeks!
> 
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Wes



Slight hijack: anyone, please correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the life expectancy of a USMC/US Army infantry platoon leader/2nd Lt. at the height of the Vietnam War even less? 2 weeks? I hope any one of Bhutto's moderate successors will last much longer than either life expectancy figure, that's for sure.


----------



## tomahawk6

The odds surely favor an assasin. Right now the Zardari's arent much a threat to the islamists. But if they were killed their party would have alot of haggling over who would assume the mantle of leader.


----------



## IN HOC SIGNO

I just can't see why this kid would want to accept the nomination. If it was me I'd be heading for the hills never mind school.


----------



## gordjenkins

Why ?

Answer simple

Because his name is* Bhutto!*

The Bhuto's are the Kennedy's of Pakistan.

Beside his Dad - Bhutto's Machiavellian husband -is or will be now
 power behind "_the throne _"

The question should be "_how long before Pakistan military steps in"!_!


----------



## Mike Baker

Here is a video of the attack that killed Bhutto*

*Please note that this video may be disturbing to some people.


Here is the article



> New videotape of Bhutto shooting emerges
> 
> NAUDERO, Pakistan (CNN) -- Dramatic new videotape of the assassination of former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto emerged Sunday, showing her slumping moments after gunshots ring out.
> 
> While the tape provides the clearest view yet of the attack, it doesn't appear to answer who was behind the assassination or how Bhutto died.
> 
> Bhutto can be seen standing up through her vehicle's sunroof. After the sound of three gunshots, her headscarf flaps up on her left side and she slumps forward and slides into the car.
> 
> The gunman, wearing sunglasses, appears to be in a black suit. The suicide bomber is seen dressed in white with his head covered.


----------



## armyvern

Here's another site hosting the video ... this one provides further commentary (the vid also seems to be clearer) and also shows footage of the vehicle that was taken the evening of the bombing -- inside and out.

Oh ... part of that footage taken of the vehicles's interior includes a very clear shot of the sunroof handle -- totally devoid of the blood which the Interior Ministry later claimed was upon it and which proved their theory that she dies as a result of impact on it.

In this clearer footage ... one can also see that she has already completely fallen within the vehicle ... before the bomb detonates.

It's the same video (with vehicle footage after the event), but it seems to have been enhanced to me to make it clearer.

Graphic content:

http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Video_The_most_conclusive_evidence_Bhutto_1230.html


----------



## TCBF

gordjenkins said:
			
		

> ...The Bhuto's are the Kennedy's of Pakistan. ...



- And just as flawed, if not more so.


----------



## Mike Baker

LINK



> *Police 'prevented Bhutto autopsy'*
> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Rawalpindi's police chief _stopped doctors at the hospital where Benazir Bhutto died from conducting an autopsy,_ [emphasis added] according to a lawyer on the hospital's board.
> 
> It was a violation of Pakistani criminal law and prevented a medical conclusion about what killed the former prime minister, said Athar Minallah, a lawyer who serves on the board that manages Rawalpindi General Hospital.
> 
> The revelation came on Monday after dramatic new videotape of Bhutto's assassination emerged, showing her slumping just after gunshots rang out.
> 
> The tape provided the clearest view yet of the attack and appeared to show that Bhutto was shot. That would contradict the Pakistan government's account.


----------



## tomahawk6

Another video of the shooting,looks like Bhutto was shot in the head.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92tNyM9ZUYA&eurl=http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/


----------



## Mike Baker

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> Another video of the shooting,looks like Bhutto was shot in the head.
> 
> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92tNyM9ZUYA&eurl=http://www.captainsquartersblog.com/mt/


That is what it looks like, doesn't it.


----------



## 1feral1

Defence won't let me peek at this video, so soon as I get home, I'll be chucking a 'sticky beek' at it.

Cheers,

Wes


----------



## Greymatters

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> Defence won't let me peek at this video, so soon as I get home, I'll be chucking a 'sticky beek' at it.



For those lacking the cultural knowledge of Australian terms, like myself, what is a 'sticky beek'?


----------



## 1feral1

Greymatters said:
			
		

> For those lacking the cultural knowledge of Australian terms, like myself, what is a 'sticky beek'?



Sticky beek just means to have a look


----------



## TCBF

That's what you get for having a bunch of transported convicts write your first national thesaurus.

 ;D


----------



## 1feral1

ya, slang is a way of life, took me a year to master it... 

Hey ahd a look at those videos, and ya, one can see her hair rise, etc.

The Pakistani government has created a real conspiracy. Shame on them. To think they have the nukes, well thats scary.

Too bad they did not come clean and be honest (lies and corruption are rife there as it is, so no suprise anyways).

Cheers,

Wes


----------



## Greymatters

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> Sticky beek just means to have a look



Thanks, Im always keen to learn new slang...


----------



## armyvern

Wesley  Down Under said:
			
		

> Defence won't let me peek at this video, so soon as I get home, I'll be chucking a 'sticky beek' at it.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Wes



Oh my Gawd ... PM inbound!!  :-X   ;D


----------



## observor 69

gordjenkins said:
			
		

> Why ?
> 
> Answer simple
> 
> Because his name is* Bhutto!*
> 
> The Bhuto's are the Kennedy's of Pakistan.
> 
> Beside his Dad - Bhutto's Machiavellian husband -is or will be now
> power behind "_the throne _"
> 
> The question should be "_how long before Pakistan military steps in"!_!



Exactly, that gets my vote. Mushraff is rapidly becoming toast but not to worry there are lots of Generals eager to step into his place.
I found this article by Gwynne Dyer very useful in looking at where things could go.

http://www.gwynnedyer.net/articles/Gwynne%20Dyer%20article_%20%20Bhutto%20Assassination.txt

27 December 2007
                                                     
Bhutto Assassination
                                                        
By Gwynne Dyer


----------



## Mike Baker

Pakistan elections postponed, sources say




> ISLAMABAD (CNN) -- The Election Commission of Pakistan will delay parliamentary elections for at least a month, sources in the commission told CNN Tuesday.
> 
> The delay comes amid unrest following the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
> 
> The government plans to make a formal announcement Wednesday, the sources in the commission said Tuesday. The elections, originally scheduled for January 8, will take place some time in February, they said.
> 
> Bhutto's party and another major opposition party had urged the government not to delay the elections.
> 
> But various provincial government representatives had suggested that the government hold elections after the Muslim holy month of Muharram, Commission Secretary General Kanwar Dilshad said at a press conference Tuesday. The holiday, which follows a lunar calendar, will begin around January 9 and end about February 6.
> 
> Before news broke of the delay, Bhutto's husband, Asif Ali Zardari, told CNN's Wolf Blitzer that he is confident the Pakistan People's Party -- which he has taken control of since Bhutto's death -- will be victorious in the parliamentary vote. His party urged that the government go ahead with elections on January 8.


----------



## NL_engineer

> *Pakistan asks Scotland Yard to help probe Bhutto's death*
> 
> Pakistan has asked Britain's Scotland Yard to help investigate the killing of Benazir Bhutto, President Pervez Musharraf said Wednesday, hours after officials announced a six-week election delay because of turmoil caused by her death.
> 
> President Pervez Musharraf delivers his televised address Wednesday in Islamabad, announcing that he had requested Britain's Scotland Yard to assist an investigation into the killing of Benazir Bhutto.President Pervez Musharraf delivers his televised address Wednesday in Islamabad, announcing that he had requested Britain's Scotland Yard to assist an investigation into the killing of Benazir Bhutto.
> (Pakistan Press Information/Associated Press)
> 
> The parliamentary election originally planned for next Tuesday will be postponed to Feb. 18.
> 
> Opposition parties condemned the delay, but said they would still participate in the vote.
> 
> "We have decided to take part in the election," said Asif Ali Zardari, Bhutto's husband and now the leader of Bhutto's Pakistan Peoples Party. "People should be peaceful and express their anger through their ballots."
> 
> In a televised public address, Musharraf said British Prime Minister Gordon Brown accepted his request to send a team of investigators to Pakistan immediately to assist local officers.



More on LINK


----------



## Cheshire

I should look, but I cannot be bothered right now. Didn't someone say they should bring in Scotland Yard a few post's, days, ago?????

http://www.thestar.com/News/World/article/290406

Someone around here has a crystal ball. Must have.  ;D


----------



## Mike Baker

Cheshire said:
			
		

> I should look, but I cannot be bothered right now. Didn't someone say they should bring in Scotland Yard a few post's, days, ago?????
> 
> http://www.thestar.com/News/World/article/290406
> 
> Someone around here has a crystal ball. Must have.  ;D


Uhh, look at the post right above you...


----------



## Cheshire

I saw that. I was talking about a post made a few days back where someone suggested the FBI or New Scotland Yard do the investigation. It might not have even been this thread, but I know it was mentioned well before this annoucment by the Pakistani Government.


----------



## tomahawk6

Yes I mentioned it in this very thread.


----------



## Mike Baker

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> Yes I mentioned it in this very thread.


You win!  ;D


----------



## tomahawk6

http://forums.army.ca/forums/threads/69230/post-654774.html#msg654774

Every so often a blind squirrel finds a nut. ;D


----------



## Cheshire

T6....buy you a pint mate. Good call. ;D


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Back on topic folks.....


----------



## Mike Baker

Pakistan opposition leaders urge Musharraf to resign



> Pakistan opposition leaders urge Musharraf to resign
> Updated Thu. Jan. 3 2008 7:30 AM ET
> 
> The Associated Press
> 
> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan -- Pakistan's U.S.-allied president must resign before next month's elections or the country could risk slipping into civil war, opposition leaders and a leading independent research institute said Thursday.
> 
> The calls came after the government pushed back polls to Feb. 18 from the planned Jan. 8 date due to unrest following the assassination of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto.
> 
> Bhutto's death in a suicide bomb and gun attack plunged already volatile Pakistan deeper into crisis and stoked fears of political meltdown as the nation struggled to contain an explosion of Islamic militant violence.
> 
> The government -- which had initially ruled out the need for foreign involvement in the assassination probe -- has been criticized over its security arrangements for Bhutto, who had claimed elements in the ruling party were trying to kill her. The party vehemently denies such a plot.


----------



## tomahawk6

Kind of expected really.First the opposition wanted Musharraf to retire as a condition for being President. He did so. Now they want him to leave the Presidency. Musharraf leaving office is not good for the West nor is it good for Pakistan - unless you want an islamic takeover.


----------



## NL_engineer

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> Musharraf leaving office is not good for the West nor is it good for Pakistan - unless you want an islamic takeover.



I can think of a couple countries that may want that, Iran being on  the top of the list


----------



## geo

was listening to the news today,  it would appear that even Musharaf in not happy with the report on Bhutto's assasination.... wonder if he's just rolling with the punches OR been blindsided?


----------



## tomahawk6

It was a stupid report that couldnt pass the smell test and only made the government look more culpable.


----------



## TCBF

NL_engineer said:
			
		

> I can think of a couple countries that may want that, Iran being on  the top of the list



- Nothing would drive Iran to develop nukes faster than an Al Quaeda influenced government in Pakistan.  Iran has 70,000,000 people and most are under thirty.  They surf the web.  They blog.  They are literate.  They do NOT want to return to the dark ages of yesteryear.  They will wait out their current tormentors, then there will be no holding them back.


----------



## IN HOC SIGNO

TCBF said:
			
		

> - Nothing would drive Iran to develop nukes faster than an Al Quaeda influenced government in Pakistan.  Iran has 70,000,000 people and most are under thirty.  They surf the web.  They blog.  They are literate.  They do NOT want to return to the dark ages of yesteryear.  They will wait out their current tormentors, then there will be no holding them back.



If they are so intelligent and wordly why are they allowing themselves to be governed by the mental midgets who currently call the shots there?


----------



## George Wallace

A corrupt Religious/Political regime.  The combination/partnership of Political bullies and fanatical Religious mullahs have taken over the State.  The people have taken the low ground and are waiting it out.


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

IN HOC SIGNO said:
			
		

> If they are so intelligent and wordly why are they allowing themselves to be governed by the mental midgets who currently call the shots there?



I hardly think the Iranian people have the market cornered on this.....


----------



## TCBF

IN HOC SIGNO said:
			
		

> If they are so intelligent and wordly why are they allowing themselves to be governed by the mental midgets who currently call the shots there?



- For the same reason we did?


----------



## geo

TCBF said:
			
		

> - For the same reason we did?



$hit happens?


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## tomahawk6

Another candidate for a Hellfire missile.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080118/ap_on_go_ot/us_pakistan

WASHINGTON - The CIA has concluded that a Pakistani tribal leader's network was behind the assassination of former Pakistan Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, according to a U.S. intelligence official. 

The tribal leader, Baitullah Mehsud, is an extremist with strong ties to al-Qaida and an alliance with the Taliban. He heads up a network in South Waziristan, a lawless border region abutting Afghanistan. He has been blamed for an organized campaign of assassinations of Pakistani officials and suicide bombings in the country.

The CIA concluded that Mehsud was behind the Dec. 27 killing of Bhutto shortly after it occurred, according to an intelligence official who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

The Washington Post first reported the CIA's take on Friday, in an interview with CIA director Michael Hayden. "This was done by that network around Baitullah Mehsud. We have no reason to question that," Hayden told the newspaper.

The intelligence official said Mehsud, believed to be in his early 30s, is a "committed jihadist" who recruits and trains suicide operatives for the Taliban and al-Qaida. His network carries out suicide attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan, primarily along the border. The attacks have stretched from Nuristan province in northeast Afghanistan to Helmand province in the south.

He has bragged of having 3,000 would-be suicide bombers. His suicide squads have taken credit for attacks against the military and police in northwestern Pakistan, as well as bombings at a hotel in the capital of Islamabad that killed a security guard and at the Islamabad international airport.

Mehsud's men kidnapped nearly 250 Pakistani soldiers in August and held them until November, when he negotiated the release of two dozen jailed tribesmen, a group that included extremists and would-be suicide bombers.

Mehsud's forces also are believed to be behind an attack Wednesday on a Pakistani army fort near the Afghan border that left at least 22 soldiers dead or missing. The insurgents later abandoned the fort.

Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf has blamed Mehsud's movement, Tehrik-e-Taliban, for 19 suicide attacks that killed more than 450 people over the last three months.

Mehsud, whose tribe of the same name is the most violent in South Waziristan province, signed a peace pact with Pakistan's army in February 2005. In it, he promised to deny shelter to foreign al-Qaida fighters in exchange for an end to military operations in the region and compensation for tribesmen killed by the military.

"It was a disaster for the U.S. The bad guys had more operational freedom," said Rep. Mike Rogers of Michigan, the senior Republican on the House Intelligence subcommittee on terrorism. Rogers has made more than a dozen trips to Pakistan and Afghanistan in the last two years.

Al-Qaida has since re-established its headquarters in the sanctuary of the tribal area, and suicide bombers and Taliban fighters are believed to cross into Afghanistan regularly to attack civilians and U.S. and Afghan forces.

Mehsud fought in the late 1990s for the Taliban against the Northern Alliance in Afghanistan, according to U.S. intelligence.

The Musharraf government fingered Mehsud for Bhutto's death in December, but some members of her political party and her family have questioned those assertions. There have been complaints that the government failed to provide her adequate security and vague allegations that elements within the government might have been involved in the assassination.

In December, the Pakistani government released the transcript of a purported conversation in which an al-Qaida operative reported to Mehsud that his men carried out the attack on Bhutto.

Rogers, who receives frequent intelligence briefings on Pakistan, told AP he has not seen definitive proof Mehsud's organization carried out the attack.

"We had good information that he was at least making the attempt to do it. If his folks were the first ones to do it, I haven't seen that yet. I do believe he had every intention to kill Bhutto. I don't think you can say (he did it) that definitely."

Bhutto was a secular politician popular in the U.S. and other Western countries for her opposition to hard-line Islam. Mehsud has denied involvement in her death.


----------



## PMedMoe

Pakistan security forces arrest teen suspect in Bhutto's assassination.

Article Link from Canoe News

A 15-year-old detained near the Afghan border has confessed to joining a team of assassins sent to kill Benazir Bhutto, officials said Saturday, announcing the first arrests in the case since the attack that killed the opposition leader.


----------



## gordjenkins

Tuesday, January 22, 2008   


What can Scotland Yard contribute - the victim is buried - the crime scene completely disturbed - no wonder they have quietly gone back to UK. Why were they sent in first place?- PR? politics??
            
_*Three more Scotland Yard officials leave for UK*
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Daily Times Pakistan

RAWALPINDI: Three more members of Scotland Yard (SY) team probing into Pakistan People’s Party (PPP) Chairwoman Benazir Bhutto’s assassination left for Britain on Sunday, leaving only one member back in Pakistan, police sources told Daily Times. Six members of the team had left for home on Jan 15. The sources said that the British investigators would re-examine the video footage of the attack and the evidence collected from the crime scene soon. The team would compile a report on their preliminary investigations in the UK, they said. During their stay in Pakistan, the SY team had examined the crime scene four times. The British investigators would soon get back to submit a detailed report on their investigations to the Pakistani Government. staff report_http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\01\22\story_22-1-2008_pg7_51


----------



## tdr_aust

_(Not sure if I have put this in the correct thread)_

The concepts presented in the part article below indicate an interesting conceptual operational development toward both Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and specifically their, (Taliban and al Qaeda), operation within the borders of Pakistan in the SWFP.
Add to this the various comments that presidential hopeful, Obama has placed in his Speech on Counter-Terrorism Strategy in August 2007. Here he did suggest US forces enter Pakistan ‘when the Pakistan Army was not able to deal with the situation’. The speech does put this in a better way but it comes to the same point.
I used Obama here as I suspect he has a better chance of getting the hot seat compared to his rival based on current voting.
The article is long and some points raised seem to be in place at present. US forces providing training to Pakistan SF. 

The following comes from
http://www.india-defence.com/reports-3714


> *US, NATO poised to move against Al Qaeda and Taliban in Pakistan*
> Dated 30/01/2008
> (Strategic Intelligence Estimates.com) Our intelligence analysts have observed several trends and occurrences that indicate the United States and its NATO allies may be preparing to take significant action against the Pakistan-based al Qaeda Central (AQC) and Taliban in 2008 and beyond. In the following estimate, we have outlined these trends and occurrences, along with the US and NATOâ€™s likely courses of action.
> 
> II. The following attitudes among American and NATO leadership lead our analysts to conclude that the allies will be more aggressive in targeting AQC and the Taliban within Pakistanâ€™s borders:
> 
> A) Many in Washington have become increasingly impatient with the Musharraf government because of: a) its lack of progress in battling these Islamist terrorists; and b) its increasing unpopularity among pro-democracy moderates; both of which have lead to increased instability in the nuclear state. Musharraf will soon travel to meet with the leaders and representatives of the leading NATO powers such as the United States, Britain, and France. These NATO leaders will likely pressure Musharraf to allow a greater NATO presence in his country, and to more aggressively pursue democratic reforms.
> 
> B) Many NATO policymakers have also become increasingly concerned about the threat posed by AQC, the Taliban, and other Salafi terrorists that are using Pakistan as a base of operations. All of the major terrorist attacks against the US and Europe starting with the 9/11 can be traced back to Pakistan. Almost all the recently foiled plots in the West can also be traced back to Pakistan, including the British Airline Plot, the shoe-bomb plot, the attacks on US military bases in Germany, and several other recently thwarted attacks. Pakistan also serves as a launching point for the Talibanâ€™s insurgency in Afghanistan.
> 
> C) Many American politicians, including several the Presidential candidates from both major parties, have called for a greater US presence in Pakistan's tribal areas. These comments almost certainly reflect the advice these politicians are receiving from their foreign-policy and national-security advisors, thus indicating many American policymakers view the current situation in Pakistan as a major strategic concern.
> 
> III. These following events indicate the US and NATO are preparing to take more aggressive in Pakistan.
> .....


Continues at above link (but is not the whole article)

*A full complete text is found here*
http://www.strategicintelligenceestimates.com/pakistan2.html
3 pages long..


Much will also depend on the stability within Pakistan as the elections there get closer, what happen re NATO and more troops in the south of Afghanistan and the ongoing behaviour of the Afghan Taliban


----------



## CougarKing

tdr_aust said:
			
		

> _(Not sure if I have put this in the correct thread)_
> 
> 
> Add to this the various comments that presidential hopeful, Obama has placed in his Speech on Counter-Terrorism Strategy in August 2007. Here he did suggest US forces enter Pakistan ‘when the Pakistan Army was not able to deal with the situation’. The speech does put this in a better way but it comes to the same point.
> I used Obama here as I suspect he has a better chance of getting the hot seat compared to his rival based on current voting.
> The article is long and some points raised seem to be in place at present. US forces providing training to Pakistan SF.



This possibility is also explored in the ff. commentary link by William Arkin:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/earlywarning/2007/08/obama_attacks_pakistan_pakista.html?nav=rss_blog



> Obama Attacks Pakistan; Pakistan Retaliates
> This week saw the unusual spectacle of a foreign government criticizing a U.S. presidential candidate. The government is Pakistan and the candidate is Sen. Barack Obama -- and while such criticism is rare, Obama's remarks were pretty strange, too.
> 
> Speaking at Woodrow Wilson Center on Wednesday, Obama said that, as president, he would not hesitate to order unilateral military action against al-Qaeda inside Pakistan if he had intelligence information that warranted a strike. Pakistani Foreign Minister Khusheed Kasuri called his remarks "very irresponsible." Sher Afgan, minister for parliamentary affairs, said it was a matter of "grave concern that U.S. presidential candidates are using unethical and immoral tactics against Islam and Pakistan to win their election."
> 
> The relevant portion of Obama's speech is as follows:
> 
> "There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al Qaeda leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will."
> 
> Obama focused on Pakistan and the war in Afghanistan, and generally his position is that withdrawal from Iraq will facilitate a shift in counterterrorism to this part of the world and a refocus on al-Qaeda central. The United States should not "repeat the mistake of the past, when we turned our back on Afghanistan following Soviet withdrawal."
> 
> It's an interesting reading of history -- and a strange view of U.S. foreign policy, especially for someone who is essentially arguing that America should turn its back on Iraq.
> 
> First, some history: When Mikhail Gorbachev decided to give up the Soviet fight in Afghanistan, the U.S. government was quick to abandon its efforts there. Of course one of the reasons it could walk away was that Pakistan had actually done most of the work on the ground to organize the mujahadeen to fight the Soviets. Pakistan subsequently supported the Taliban, which in the mid-1990s welcomed Osama bin Laden and his Arab fighters back to the country. Afghanistan by then had returned to being a backwater in American foreign policy, as so many countries are.
> 
> I'm not defending anything about the George H.W. Bush's or Bill Clinton's priorities, but come on, Obama: Would you really have stayed in Afghanistan in 1989? Al Qaeda didn't even exist then. After Desert Storm, Bin Laden returned to his native Saudi Arabia (where he became aghast at the U.S. military presence in the center of Islam).
> 
> So, historically speaking, it is a strange statement. The United States turns its back on countries all the time. Another way of putting it is that it sets other priorities and moves on. In fact, Obama himself is now arguing we should do the same in Iraq today. Whether he is right or wrong, the point is that right now, Iraq is just as important as Afghanistan was in 1989. We've created a mess, and turning our back on it (as much as I support an orderly withdrawal) would be foolish.
> 
> Obama says that "Pakistan must make substantial progress in closing down the training camps, evicting foreign fighters, and preventing the Taliban from using Pakistan as a staging area for attacks in Afghanistan." He also says the United States must not "hesitate to use military force to take out terrorists who pose a direct threat to America." The U.S. must "recruit, train, and equip our armed forces to better target terrorists, and to help foreign militaries to do the same."
> 
> "Substantial progress"? The phrase sounds familiar. It will just prompt a debate about whether the progress is substantial enough. That's Washington in a nutshell. In the end, Obama's perspective is a confused muddle that sounds to me a lot like the policies of the Bush administration -- and is no different than the "Bush-Cheney Lite" Obama has accused Sen. Hillary Clinton of pursuing.
> 
> I know, I know, Obama will bomb the world with American values and slay the planet with his eloquence. But as long as he fails to challenge the basic premise of U.S. national security today -- that the threat of terrorism is the only threat, and that it is so grave it demands preemptive and unilateral American action -- he is just sewing his own straitjacket.
> 
> By William M. Arkin |  August 3, 2007; 8:12 AM ET



If Obama would actually authorize such an action into Pakistan to flush out Al-Qaeda, it would prove that some US Democrats are also willing to make a "unilateral military action" that a number of them later criticized Bush for doing when he sent US forces into Iraq. Well it's good that Obama is willing to act, though Pakistan seems to be its own can of worms, as discussed before on the Bhutto assasination thread.


----------



## geo

Unilateral decision to Invade Pakistan is just gonna create a situation where the Muslim world will declare a global JIHAD against everyone else....


----------



## CougarKing

geo said:
			
		

> Unilateral decision to Invade Pakistan is just gonna create a situation where the Muslim world will declare a global JIHAD against everyone else....



I think what Obama meant by intervening in Pakistan, he meant just placing troops in the Waziristan region and also possibly also helping in the training and equipping of the Pakistani Army to combat Al-Qaeda and Taliban elements there; I don't think he meant occupying the whole of Pakistan, but that's just what I conclude from this article; however, whether or not Musharraf or his successor will allow such an intervention is another story altogether.


----------



## midget-boyd91

Midget's take on 'possible' happenings:
Invade Waziristan? Can 'o worms would be the understatement of the year for that one. The Muslim world declares war on us (the Muslims and their leaders anyways. Muslim _state_ leaders likely wouldn't have their nation declare anything other than condemnation) and Pakistan falls deeper into turmoil. Depending on who is head of state and head of the military at the time, Pakistan's military could very well oppose the U.S/NATO move.

Pakistan in turmoil, and the bulk it's military fighting in Waziristan, India could very easily come barreling across the Line of Control/seperation into Kashmir's Northern Areas region "once and for all." I don't imagine China would take too kindly to that, but I also don't imagine they'd be willing to get themselves into a fight where the U.S/NATO is a potential combatant.
Like I said, that's just my take on dim possibilities. Go ahead and pick away, I'll probably learn something new. 

Midget


----------



## Mike Baker

Two confess to roles in Bhutto killing



> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- -- Two suspects arrested last week confessed to a Pakistani judge Wednesday that they helped arm the suicide bomber blamed for assassinating Benazir Bhutto, an Interior Ministry spokesman told CNN.
> 
> The two men -- identified as Hasnain Gul and Rafaqat -- told the judge in a court appearance that they provided Saeed Bilal with a house, transportation, a pistol, and the suicide jacket he allegedly used in the December 27 attack that killed the opposition leader and nearly two dozen others, spokesman Javed Iqbal Cheema said.
> 
> Pakistani authorities have said Bilal fired a gun on Bhutto before detonating his suicide jacket as she left a political rally in Rawalpindi.
> 
> Pakistani and British investigators concluded that Bhutto died when the force of the suicide blast caused her to slam her head onto an escape hatch on her SUV.
> 
> Bhutto's family has dismissed the government's assertion that she was not shot by an assassin's bullet, but the family has refused to allow an autopsy on the slain opposition leader.
> 
> The two suspects were arrested last Thursday in Rawalpindi, the headquarters of Pakistan's military leadership outside Islamabad, where Bhutto was killed, Cheema said.
> 
> Police are still holding Aitzaz Shah, 15, and Sher Zaman, who were detained last month in Dera Ismail Khan in Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province.
> 
> Pakistani officials have been vague on Shah and Zaman's links to Bhutto's killing, and have said they have not been named as official suspects.
> 
> Pakistan's government has concluded Bhutto's assassination was orchestrated by Baitullah Mesud, the leader of the Pakistani Taliban who has ties to al Qaeda -- a conclusion the CIA supports.
> 
> Two recent nationwide polls in Pakistan found a majority of Pakistanis believe President Pervez Musharraf's government had a role in her killing.
> 
> At a news conference Tuesday, Cheema pointed out that the government does not deny someone fired a shot toward Bhutto before detonating his explosives, but added that person did not act alone.
> 
> "You will get to know there were other people in the area," Cheema said. "It was not just a single person."
> 
> He said Pakistani investigators "have made very good progress" in determining who planned the assassination.
> 
> "We are going to break the whole chain and we are confident we're going to reach the perpetrators," Cheema said. "We will exactly tell you who are the people behind this unfortunate incident."


----------



## a_majoor

The relativism around this issue is just amazing. It is not ok to invade Pakistan to take out a very dangerous international terror and crime network, but it is (seemingly) ok to invade the Sudan for humanitarian reasons? (Correct answers, yes, and no).

Unless Pakistan either invites ISAF, NATO or the United States to come on in, or the government of Pakistan collapses (or a Taliban like group overthrow the government of Pakistan and take military or quasi military action against the West), there is *no* legal reason for us to intervene. Even if these conditions are met, this is still a very momentous decision, since the resources needed to do the job will be vast and the stakes very high.

Even very "selective" targeting by SOF teams and UAV's would still have the potential to go horribly wrong, no matter how effective it potentially might seem at first.


----------



## Colin Parkinson

I suspect the play will be tell Pakistan to live up to it's responsibilities to prevent people from crossing it's borders, likely some pressure through the UN in this regard. If the Taliban get to cocky they might just do something stupid like declare themselves and the tribal areas as a Independent state (they are for all intents and purposes) This would open up the area for a response, measured of course, likely cruise missiles, air strikes arty and SF. You might see limited ingress in hot pursuit or to secure a strategic point along the supply routes. The area is also not made up of one group but of many and it is likely the focus of NATO would be keeping the passes open and they would encourage the tribes in those areas to come to a understanding. These are the same area with the most infrastructure to lose as well, so they might decide that it is better to deal with the devil and live in comfort rather than fight a holy war in -20 with no where to live.

If NATO hardens up and they maintain an active presence in Afghanistan then the ANA will continue to grow and increase in effectiveness. The ANP and the government will hopefully both get their act together in that time to exploit the gains made by the ANA and NATO.


----------



## geo

In the BBC news tonight - they have two people who have admitted to providing pistol and vest to the Kamikaze who "did" Bhutto.  They are saying the suspects claim it has to do with the Gov't assault on the Red mosque last year


----------



## gordjenkins

May be Scotland Yard did contribute after all ?

-----------------------------------------------------------------

*Bhutto assassins say attack was revenge for Pakistani mosque siege
By Indo-Asian News Service on Wednesday, February 13, 2008
*

Two Pakistani militants arrested in connection with the assassination of Benazir Bhutto have confessed that were seeking revenge for the death of a comrade killed in a commando assault on Islamabad’s Red Mosque in July 2007, a police official said Wednesday.

The confessions of Hasnain Gul and Rafaqat, who were arrested last week and admitted planning the gun and suicide bombing attack on Bhutto Dec 27 in the city of Rawalpindi, calls into question government claims that the attack was ordered by a Taliban commander in north-west Pakistan allegedly linked to Al Qaeda.

In the most detailed account of an assassination that rocked Pakistan to its core, Abdul Majeed, head of a Pakistani police investigation team, told a press conference late Wednesday that Gul had been in close contact with militant friends in Pakistan’s volatile North-West Frontier province (NWFP) since last summer.

Gul volunteered to organize attacks on government and military targets in Rawalpindi, a garrison city near Islamabad, after learning that a fellow militant was killed in the Red Mosque incident, Majeed said.

Gul then organized a team including two suicide bombers to kill Bhutto after learning she would be addressing an election rally in Rawalpindi’s Liaquat Bagh.

“The motive for carrying out the suicide attack on Bhutto was because she was returning to Pakistan with the support of a foreign power,” Majeed told reporters, apparently referring to the US, which helped broker the deal with embattled Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf on Bhutto’s return home from self-exile.

Majeed said Gul posted bombers on the park’s two main gates, one of whom, identified for the first time as Balil, got close enough to Bhutto to fire three shots at her with a pistol before blowing himself up within two metres of her vehicle.

British investigators have concluded that Bhutto, who was standing through the vehicle’s rooftop escape hatch and waving to supporters, died from cracking her skull after recoiling from the blast.

The other bomber, who Majeed identified as Ikram Ullah, did not blow himself up as the initial attack was successful. Ullah fled Rawalpindi and went to the NWFP’s tribal areas, where the Taliban, Al Qaeda and local militant groups have safe havens.

Majeed said Gul had organized at least two other suicide attacks on Pakistani military targets in 2007, one of which killed 11 people.

He also said Gul provided both bombers in the Bhutto assassination with suicide vests, and personally gave Balil the pistol and a pair of dark sunglasses. Video footage and photographs clearly showed the attacker wearing dark sunglasses and pointing a pistol at Bhutto.

But Majeed declined to answer when asked whether Gul confessed to planning the attack under the orders of Taliban commander Baitullah Mehsud, who Musharraf and US intelligence officials have claimed was behind the hit.

“We are still investigating this,” he told reporters. “As soon as there is some progress, we will share information with you.”

Bhutto’s assassination has been mired in controversy because of conflicting government accounts of how she died and who was responsible.

Her family and political supporters claim that rogue elements within Musharraf’s government killed her to prevent her from winning an unprecedented third term as prime minister in elections now rescheduled for next Monday.

Musharraf insists that Mehsud ordered Bhutto’s assassination and said the Taliban commmander had trained hundreds of suicide bombers at his base in the tribal areas to target the government, military and political figures.

In late January, authorities arrested a would-be teenage bomber, along with his handler, who reportedly confessed to being the next in line to attack Bhutto had she survived the Rawalpindi attack.


----------



## daftandbarmy

My God. Does anyone else think that this is going to be a problem for Afghanistan, and elsewhere? The place will likely turn into a massive Jihadi Generator...

Pakistan Asserts It Is Near a Deal With Militants

A 15-point draft of the accord would lead to the gradual withdrawal of the Pakistani military from part of the tribal region of South Waziristan.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/25/world/asia/25pstan.html?th&emc=th


----------



## The Bread Guy

:tsktsk:

*ISAF attacked by cross-border artillery fire*
ISAF news release PR# 2008-277, 21 Jun 08
News release link

KABUL, Afghanistan - An ISAF forward operating base (FOB) and an Afghan National Army compound in north-eastern Paktika Province were attacked with indirect fire from across the Afghanistan-Pakistan border today.

Three rounds of indirect fire landed in the vicinity of the ISAF FOB and three rounds landed inside an Afghan National Army compound.

ISAF forces determined the origination of the rounds to be in Pakistan and returned artillery fire in self-defence.

The engagement started at approximately 5:15 p.m. local and the Pakistan military was immediately notified when ISAF forces came under fire.

No casualties have been reported.


----------



## GAP

Kinda a dumb way for retaliation.....they gotta know that return azimuth fire is gonna come back to haunt them, among other things....


----------



## Old Sweat

This probably isn't the start of the Third World War version 2.1, but it ain't a good sign. It is may be retaliation for the hit on positions inside Pakistan, but that's a guess. As long as this shooting back and forth stays low key, both sides' face is saved. If it escalates is a different matter.


----------



## TangoTwoBravo

Regarding the thread title, do we know for sure that it was Pakistani artillery that fired across the border?  The three rounds of "indirect fire" could have been fired across the border by agencies other than the Pakistani Army.

Perhaps I am being obtuse or naive, but I didn't see that the new release stated that it was Pakistani artillery (it may well could have been, but I am just throwing that out there).


----------



## tomahawk6

I wonder if the Pakistani government is losing control of its troops.


----------



## Scoobie Newbie

Well we all know how accurate the press is when they call LAV's tanks so perhaps as T2B hinted, it could have been Taliban mortar men.


----------



## Bruce Monkhouse

Changed the thread title to go with T2B's observation.


----------



## The Bread Guy

Good point, all - thanks Bruce for the edit.

First the "tit", now a bit more on the "tat", shared in accordance with the "fair dealing" provisions, Section 29, of the _Copyright Act._

*NATO Returns Fire Following Attack From Pakistan*
NATO forces return fire across Afghan border at insurgents in Pakistan
AMIR SHAH, Associated Press, 22 Jun 08
Article link

NATO forces returned fire across the Afghan border at attackers in Pakistan, officials said Sunday, an incident that could stir tension between Washington and Islamabad over the response to militants in the lawless border region.

NATO said three rounds of "indirect fire" landed near an alliance outpost in Afghanistan's Paktika province Saturday afternoon. Three more landed in an Afghan army compound. No casualties were reported.

A NATO statement said its forces determined that the rounds were fired from inside Pakistan and returned artillery fire "in self-defence."

Pakistan's military was notified immediately after the initial attack, it said.

Afghan and U.S. officials blame surging violence in Afghanistan in part on efforts by the new Pakistani government to make peace with militants on its side of the mountainous frontier....

_More on link_

Here's all I could find in PAK media so far....

*Nato-Taliban border clash*
Dawn, 21 Jun 08
Article link

MIRAMSHAH, June 21: Tension gripped Miramshah in N. Waziristan on Saturday after clashes broke out between Nato forces and the Taliban in Afghanistan near the Pakistan border.

Sources said the gunbattle took place near the Ghulam Khan checkpost and the area reverberated with loud explosions. They said that artillery shells had landed near the mutual territory which triggered fear among area people.—Correspondent

AFP adds: A spokesman for the Nato-led forces in Kabul said that one of its bases and a local army compound had been attacked from across the border with Pakistan.

_- edited to add PAK media story - _


----------



## kilekaldar

Pakistan bombards suspected Taliban hideouts

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080628/pakistan_afghan_080628/20080628?hub=TopStories

Updated Sat. Jun. 28 2008 8:37 AM ET



KHYBER AGENCY, Pakistan -- Pakistani forces bombarded suspected militant hideouts with mortar shells Saturday as the government launched a major offensive against Taliban fighters threatening the main city in the country's volatile northwest, officials said.

The offensive in the Khyber tribal region marked the first major military action Pakistan's newly elected government has taken against the militants operating in the tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan.

The government had said it preferred to try to defuse tension with the groups through negotiations, but with threats by Islamic militants to the city of Peshawar growing in recent weeks, the military decided to take action. Khyber also is a key route for moving U.S. military supplies into neighboring Afghanistan.

By Saturday afternoon, the paramilitary Frontier Corps began shelling suspected militant hideouts in the mountains in Khyber, said local official Muhammad Siddiq Khan.

Fasih Ullah, a police officer in Khyber, said 700 Frontier Corps. troops moved into Khyber late Friday for the operation.

A round-the-clock curfew was imposed in the Bara area bordering Peshawar, and heavy contingents of troops blocked the main road into Khyber, said Mujeeb Khan, a senior local official.

"All bazaars are shut and residents have been asked not to come out of their homes," he said.

Tauseef Haider, a top official with the Frontier Constabulary, said his forces had brought in reinforcements and heavy weapons to protect Peshawar and its more than 1 million residents from insurgents who might try a counterattack.

"Since the operation is going on in the tribal area, that is why we have to be extra cautious," he said from the constabulary's brick outpost in Shahkas, on the edge of the tribal area just outside of Peshawar. "We have increased our strength we will not let any militant come this way."

Across from the outpost was an expanse of flatland covered in bushes and foliage in front of undulating hills that turned into mountains.

In a sign of expected resistance, a Taliban-linked group said an offensive in the area will only create more problems.

"If the government thinks there is any issue to address, that should be resolved through talks, not by the use of force," said Munsif Khan, spokesman for the Vice and Virtue Movement. "We are ready for talks with the government."

Vice and Virtue, led by militant leader Haji Namdar, is suspected of carrying out operations against coalition soldiers across the border in Afghanistan. Namdar has sought to impose his own strict brand of Islamic law in the region. However, he is at odds with Baitullah Mehsud, who is seen as the leader of the Taliban in Pakistan.

Menghal Bagh's fighters have waged attacks in Peshawar in what provincial officials say was an attempt to intimidate the population and show the group's ability to wield influence outside the tribal regions. Bagh's followers have also been blamed for threatening convoys of supplies bound for coalition forces in Afghanistan.

Mahmood Shah, a former security chief in Pakistan's tribal regions, said the Taliban control the country's entire tribal belt and "everyone now is waiting for some action from the federal government."

"The situation is such that (the Taliban) are all around Peshawar. They are on our doorstep," Shah said. "The situation is like water flowing into a field and until you have some obstruction to stop it you will drown. We are drowning."

Two weeks ago, a Taliban force from Khyber sent its militants into Peshawar and kidnapped 16 Christians who were later released.

Misrri Khan, who works for a tribal paramilitary force that patrols Khyber, said the militants kidnapped 16 of his fellow officers and threatened to behead them -- and then take more captives -- if they did not abandon their checkpoints in the area. Khan said the force refused.

February elections brought a new civilian government to power, eclipsing former army strongman and staunch U.S. ally President Pervez Musharraf. In a shift in policy, the new administration has supported peace efforts with Taliban militants to try to curb an explosion in violence in the northwest over the past year.

But Pakistan's Western allies are increasingly concerned that easing up military pressure on the militants has given them more space to operate -- letting them strengthen their position in Pakistan's border regions and giving them more freedom to attack U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani was in Peshawar on Saturday on a trip he said was unrelated to any impending operation.

In a brazen show of force Friday, a group of militants in the Bajur region executed two men accused of spying for U.S. forces in front of 5,000 residents.

The body of a third accused spy was discovered riddled with bullets at the side of a road in Bajur, said Fazal Rabbi, a security official in the area. A note attached to his body said anyone else involved in spying would meet the same fate, he said.

At meetings in Peshawar on Friday, federal and provincial representatives hammered out the details of the Khyber operation. They also discussed the situation in the restive Swat area, where the provincial government has signed a peace deal with a radical pro-Taliban cleric, provincial officials said.

Afrasiab Khattak, chief negotiator for the provincial government, told the AP that the province is considering a second military operation in Swat, where militants forced out by an army offensive last year are now regaining a foothold.


----------



## McG

> Pakistani forces take control of area in Khyber
> Updated Sun. Jun. 29 2008 8:48 AM ET
> The Associated Press
> 
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Paramilitary troops returned Sunday to posts they had been forced to abandon and Pakistani forces widened their offensive against militants operating in a volatile tribal area along the Afghan border, an official said.
> 
> The government launched the operation Saturday because the militants in the Khyber region presented an "immediate problem," Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said. The militants began threatening the nearby city of Peshawar and ambushing supply convoys bound for U.S.-led coalition troops in Afghanistan.
> 
> The military operation appears to be a shift in strategy by Pakistan's new government, backing its calls for peace deals in the tribal areas with the threat of forceful action against militants who get out of line.
> 
> The United States has criticized the move for peace deals, saying it gives militants the freedom to regroup for attacks on U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.
> 
> Speaking to reporters in Lahore, Gilani defended the peace deals, but warned that authorities will resort to force "if (the groups) backtrack from their agreements and damage state property."
> 
> Troops from the paramilitary Frontier Corps, backed by tanks and armored personnel carriers, quickly cleared militants out of the Bara region, said Muhammad Siddiq Khan, a local official.
> 
> A tribal paramilitary force that had been forced to abandon its posts in the region several months ago returned to the checkpoints Sunday, he said.
> 
> The Frontier Corps met no resistance as it moved into other areas outside Bara, destroying militant bases along the way, he said.
> 
> On Saturday, authorities shelled militant hideouts and blew up the headquarters of militant leader Menghal Bagh, who had apparently fled. Another possible target was Haji Namdar's Vice and Virtue Movement, which is suspected of attacks against coalition soldiers in Afghanistan.
> 
> Officials in Kabul welcomed the operation in Khyber and reiterated their suspicion that a surge in violence in Afghanistan was partly due to the lack of pressure on militants in Pakistan's tribal areas.
> 
> "We endorse this operation, we want this operation to be continued and we want this operation to be successful," Afghanistan's Defense Ministry spokesman Gen. Mohammad Zahir Azimi said.
> 
> NATO spokesman Brig. Gen. Carlos Branco said "everything that can minimize the threat in Afghanistan is good for us."
> 
> "We know that as long as insurgents can operate safely on the Pakistan side of the border, then there cannot be security in Afghanistan," said Mark Laity, another alliance spokesman.
> 
> Baitullah Mehsud, the top Taliban leader in Pakistan, said he was suspending talks between his allies and the government in the wake of the offensive and implied his forces could cause trouble in Pakistan's main cities.
> 
> Maj. Gen. Alam Khattak, head of the Frontier Corps, hinted this would not be the only operation against militants and other officials said the volatile Swat region could be next.
> 
> On Sunday, a remote-controlled bomb blast killed two soldiers on a foot patrol in Swat's Matta area, a former militant stronghold, army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said.
> 
> Pro-Taliban fighters have battled security forces in Swat in recent months, despite a peace deal between militants and the new provincial government.


http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20080629/pakistan_border_080729/20080629?hub=TopStories


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Does Pakistan have any regular troops in the area? My understanding is they are all Frontier scouts, a lightly armed para-miltary organization. I don't think they have any heavy weapons.


----------



## tomahawk6

The government still holds their high value prisoners after the seige.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20080710/wl_sthasia_afp/pakistanunrestnorthwestpolice

PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) - Pro-Taliban militants ended their siege of a police station in restive northwest Pakistan when troops arrived early Thursday, police said. 

Police said they requested reinforcements after around 200 militants surrounded a police station in the Hangu district of Northwest Frontier Province late Wednesday to demand the release of seven suspected extremists.

"The Taliban ended the siege of the police station around 3:00 am (2100 GMT) when troops started arriving," local police station chief Jehangir Khan told AFP.

An intelligence official said the detainees were among the close circle of tribal warlord Baitullah Mehsud, who has been accused of plotting the assassination of ex-premier Benazir Bhutto. Mehsud denies the charge.

Authorities have imposed a curfew in the area and troops were patrolling the streets, residents said.

Hangu district, which has a history of violence between minority Shiite and majority Sunni sects, is close to tribal areas bordering Afghanistan where pro-Taliban militants are active.

Separately, the government signed a truce agreement with Islamic militants in Khyber tribal district late Wednesday after a 10-day paramilitary operation in the area, officials said.


----------



## tomahawk6

Pick your poison.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122031186647388745.html?mod=rss_opinion_main

Pakistan's Next President 

Is a Category 5 Disaster
September 2, 2008
If there's a case to be made against democracy, few countries make it better than Pakistan.

On Saturday, Pakistani legislators will elect a new president to replace Pervez Musharraf, the general-turned-strongman who resigned the office last month.

In one corner there is Mushahid Hussain Sayed, a former journalist and one-time political prisoner of Mr. Musharraf who is nonetheless running as the candidate of the general's old party. Mr. Mushahid, probably the best of the bunch, stands next to no chance of winning.

In another corner there is Saeeduzzaman Siddiqui, candidate of former Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's party. Mr. Sharif -- whose record includes bankrupting his country, presiding over a disastrous military campaign against India, and attempting to implement Sharia law while awarding himself near-dictatorial powers -- has made it clear he intends to gut the powers of the presidency should he return to office.

And then there is Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of slain former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and leader of the Pakistan People's Party. Mr. Zardari, who has compared himself to Jesus (an innocent accused of crimes he did not commit), is easily one of the most notorious figures in the long parade of horribles that make up the country's political history. He is, of course, expected to win Saturday's ballot handily.

Just how bad is Mr. Zardari? It would be a relief if it were true that he was merely suffering from dementia, a diagnosis offered by two New York psychiatrists last year. But that diagnosis seems to have been produced mainly with a view toward defending himself against corruption charges in a British court.

Mr. Zardari -- who earned the moniker "Mr. 10%" for allegedly demanding kickbacks during his wife's two terms in office -- has long been dogged by accusations of corruption. In 2003, a Swiss magistrate found him and Mrs. Bhutto guilty of laundering $10 million. Mr. Zardari has admitted to owning a 355-acre estate near London, despite coming from a family of relatively modest means and reporting little income at the time it was purchased. A 1998 report by the New York Times's John Burns suggests he may have made off with as much as $1.5 billion in kickbacks. This was at a time when his wife was piously claiming to represent the interests of Pakistan's impoverished masses and denouncing corrupt leaders who "leave the cupboard bare."

It's an open question whether Mr. Zardari will be more or less restrained in his behavior if he's elected: His return to politics has meant the dropping of all charges against him and the release of millions in frozen assets. (The presidency will also confer legal immunity.) That may make him one of the few men in Pakistan to get richer this year: The economy, which grew in an unprecedented way under Mr. Musharraf, has tanked under civilian management. The Karachi stock exchange has lost about a third of its value and the currency about a fifth in recent months. Markets often have better memories than voters.

It's also an open question whether Pakistan's increasingly dire security outlook will focus Mr. Zardari's mind on the urgent tasks of governance. Mr. Zardari has sought to parley himself internationally as a pro-Western candidate, and maybe he is. Yet over the weekend the Pakistani government agreed to stop its air strikes on the Taliban, in exchange for which Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam, a religious party, agreed to throw its support to Mr. Zardari. The Taliban has used previous cease-fires to regroup and re-arm for operations against both Afghanistan and Islamabad.

Then there is al Qaeda, now openly endeavoring to use its last redoubts in Pakistan to take over the country. Last month, Ayman al-Zawahiri issued a long broadcast (in English, no less) denouncing Mr. Musharraf as an American tool and calling on Pakistan's army to come over to his side.

That call was unlikely to be heeded against Mr. Musharraf, who could count on the loyalty of his troops. But Mr. Zardari is a caricature of everything that's morally bankrupt with the country's Westernized elite, and thus an inviting propaganda target for al Qaeda and the Taliban. It doesn't help, either, that they are working fertile political soil: 71% of Pakistanis oppose cooperating with the U.S. in counterterrorism, and 51% oppose fighting the Taliban at all, according to a June poll.

Al Qaeda and the Taliban feed on chaos, and a Zardari presidency will almost certainly provide more of it. For Pakistanis, this is a self-inflicted wound and a rebuke to their democracy. For the rest of world, it's a matter of hoping that Pakistan will somehow muddle through. For now, however, this looks like a Category 5 hurricane, dark and vast and visible just offshore.


----------



## tomahawk6

Source: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/...n4409288.shtml

"Pakistan's top security officials on Wednesday were searching for clues that a "moderately important terrorist target" may have been hit when U.S. and/or NATO forces attacked three houses in a remote part of the country's border region with Afghanistan. 

As many as 15 people were killed in the early morning strike Wednesday. 

The operation took place near the village of Angor Adda in Pakistan's South Waziristan region - a notorious sanctuary for al Qaeda and Taliban militants. Eyewitnesses said the strike involved helicopter gunships. 

South Waziristan and the adjoining North Waziristan regions are known to harbor fighters who routinely cross the border into Afghanistan to attack U.S. and other Western troops then return to the relative security of Pakistani soil. 

Wednesday's attack was unusual in that it involved Western ground forces, a Pakistani security official told CBS News on condition of anonymity 

Previous attacks on the Pakistani side of the border are believed to have been carried out primarily by CIA pilotless drones armed with hellfire missiles. 

The reported use of ground troops prompted speculation that the attack was aimed at an important terrorist target. 

"I don't know if there were any top targets. But there could well be moderately important terrorist targets," the security official told CBS. "If there was deployment of grounds troops, which involved a greater risk than sending in a pilotless drone, that suggests the attackers were probably looking for a specific terrorist target." 

In Islamabad, a senior European diplomat from a NATO member country said initial information led him to believe the attack was carried out by a joint team of U.S. Special Forces and NATO troops based in Afghanistan, thought he could not immediately confirm the presence of ground forces. 

The diplomat, who also spoke to CBS on condition of anonymity, said "the use of ground troops must be to either capture or kidnap someone important." 

The CIA and other Western intelligence agencies are known to have scrutinized intelligence coming from North and South Waziristan in the past in their searched for some of al Qaeda's top leaders; most notably Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahri. 

The Pakistani security official who spoke to CBS News said Pakistani military and intelligence forces in the region had also carried out an intense search for al Qaeda's leaders as recently as last month, based on "information which provided to us with some new clues." 

The Pakistani official refused to elaborate on the nature of that information but said "the situation in Waziristan remains of immense interest to all of us."


----------



## The Bread Guy

As usual, Bill Roggio has some good stuff, too, shared in accordance with the "fair dealing" provisions, Section 29, of the _Copyright Act._

The US military, with the possible cooperation of the Afghan military, may have conducted a special operations air assault across the border into Taliban-controlled South Waziristan on Wednesday, according to unconfirmed reports from Pakistan.

The initial report from a Geo TV correspondent indicated the casualties were taken after US helicopters launched missiles at three homes in the Barmal area of Angorada late at night.

The report later changed when the correspondent claimed the helicopters landed and troops dismounted, who then began searching homes. One witness told The Associated Press that "American and Afghan soldiers starting firing" on one family outside of their home. Soldiers then entered the home and others, and killed 15 people, including women and children. The raid was reported to have occurred in the village of Musa Nikow.

The Pakistani military confirmed an attack occurred in the region, AP reported but did not provide details. Two anonymous Pakistani intelligence officials said the attack occurred and claimed 19 were killed. The US military in Afghanistan said its forces were not involved, and the US embassy in Pakistan did not comment.

A rare raid

The US military command in Afghanistan can plausibly deny its forces were involved in such a raid, as the operation have been carried out by Special Forces teams. Task Force 88, the hunter-killer teams assigned to take down al Qaeda and the Taliban's command structure, does not report to the conventional command in Afghanistan.

A raid of this nature - the insertion of US special operations team inside Pakistani territory - is rare. This would be only the second reported raid of this nature since 2006. Nearly every other attack was conducted by unmanned US Predator aircraft or missile strikes from Afghanistan.

US special operation teams raided an al Qaeda camp in Danda Saidgai in North Waziristan in March 2006. The camp was run by the Black Guard, the al Qaeda elite praetorian guard for Osama bin Laden, Ayman al Zawahiri, and other senior al Qaeda leaders.

The air assault resulted in the death of Imam Asad and several dozen members of the Black Guard. In addition to being the camp commander, Asad was a senior Chechen al Qaeda commander and associate of Shamil Basayev, the Chechen al Qaeda leader killed by Russian security forces in July 2006.

The insertion of US soldiers inside Pakistan is a risky venture. If this raid indeed occurred US intelligence must have believed that a senior-most al Qaeda or Taliban leader or leaders were present.

Increased activity

If confirmed the assault in South Waziristan would be the fourth cross-border attack since Aug. 20 and the 10th confirmed attack this year. Only 10 such strikes were recorded in 2006 and 2007 combined.

Four safe houses have been hit in South Waziristan, three have been hit in North Waziristan, and two have been targeted in Bajaur this year.

Three senior al Qaeda operatives have been killed in this year's strikes. Two Canadians of Arab origin were killed in a strike in strike in South Waziristan last weekend.

Abu Khabab al Masri, al Qaeda's bomb expert and weapons of mass destruction chief, was killed South Waziristan on July 28. Abu Sulayman Jazairi, al Qaeda's external operations chief, was killed in Bajaur on May 14. Abu Laith al Libi, a senior commander in Afghanistan and the leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, was killed in North Waziristan on Jan. 28.

While the strikes have disrupted al Qaeda's senior leadership, they have done little to disrupt the growth of al Qaeda and the Taliban in northwestern Pakistan.

The Taliban, al Qaeda, and allied terrorist groups have established 157 training camps and more than 400 support locations in the tribal areas and the Northwest Frontier Province, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal.

The Taliban has organized some of its fighters into military formations. Al Qaeda has reformed the notorious 055 Brigade, the Arab legion of al Qaeda fighters that was destroyed during the initial US assault in Afghanistan in late 2001. Additional al Qaeda brigades have been formed, intelligence officials informed The Long War Journal.

Foreign al Qaeda fighters have flocked to the Pakistani border regions. On July 23, Pakistani Prime Minister Gilani and his cabinet were told that more than 8,000 foreign fighters were operating in the tribal areas.


----------



## tomahawk6

Staff we may need to merge these threads on raids into Pakistan because I think they are going to continue.

http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/09/us_airstrike_killed.php

US airstrike kills five al Qaeda operatives in North Waziristan
By Bill RoggioSeptember 5, 2008 8:38 AM 

The US has conducted yet another cross-border strike in the badlands of Pakistan's tribal agencies. In the fifth cross-border strike in six days, unmanned aircraft operating from Afghanistan struck an al Qaeda safe house in the village of Gurwak in Taliban-controlled North Waziristan.

Five to seven people have been reported killed in the strike. AFP reported five "foreign militants" - a term used to describe al Qaeda operatives, were killed. The identity of those killed has not been disclosed as Pakistani security forces are attempting to reach the scene of the attack. Geo TV reported that four children and three women were killed in the strike.

The village of Gurwak is in territory run by the powerful Haqqani family. The Haqqanis are closely allied with the Taliban and al Qaeda. The Haqqanis run a parallel government in North Waziristan and conduct military and suicide operations in eastern Afghanistan. Siraj Haqqani, the son of Taliban leader Jalaluddin Haqqani, has close ties to Osama bin Laden and is one of the most wanted terrorists in Afghanistan.

Cross-border strikes increase during 2008

The US has stepped up its attacks against al Qaeda and the Taliban's networks inside Pakistan over the past year. There have been 13 confirmed cross-border attacks by the US in Pakistan this year [see list below]. Five safe houses have been hit in North Waziristan, six have been hit in South Waziristan, and two have been targeted in Bajaur this year. Only 10 such cross-border strikes were recorded in 2006 and 2007 combined.

The attack tempo has intensified over the past week. The US has conducted five cross-border attacks inside Pakistan since Aug 31. Three of the strikes occurred in North Waziristan, and two in South Waziristan.

On Aug. 31, US forces conducted two attacks. Five al Qaeda and Taliban fighters, including two Canadians of Arab origin, were killed in an airstrike near Miramshah in South Waziristan. That same day, a strike on a Taliban safe house in North Waziristan killed six. Another attack on a home known to shelter al Qaeda operatives in North Waziristan on Sept. 4 killed four.

The most controversial strike involved special operation teams inserted by helicopters in a village in South Waziristan just one mile from the Afghan border on Sept. 3. This is the second recorded incident of the direct involvement of US ground troops in a raid inside Pakistan since 2006. 

Background on this year's attacks

Three senior al Qaeda operatives have been confirmed killed during this year's cross-border strikes in Pakistan. 

Abu Khabab al Masri, al Qaeda's bomb expert and weapons of mass destruction chief, was killed South Waziristan on July 28. Abu Sulayman Jazairi, al Qaeda's external operations chief, was killed in Bajaur on May 14. Abu Laith al Libi, a senior commander in Afghanistan and the leader of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group, was killed in North Waziristan on Jan. 28. 

While the strikes have disrupted al Qaeda's senior leadership, they have done little to disrupt the growth of al Qaeda and the Taliban in northwestern Pakistan.

The Taliban, al Qaeda, and allied terrorist groups have established 157 training camps and more than 400 support locations in the tribal areas and the Northwest Frontier Province, US intelligence officials have told The Long War Journal. 

The Taliban has organized some of its fighters into military formations. Al Qaeda has reformed the notorious 055 Brigade, the Arab legion of al Qaeda fighters that was destroyed during the initial US assault in Afghanistan in late 2001. Additional al Qaeda brigades have been formed, intelligence officials informed The Long War Journal.

Foreign al Qaeda fighters have flocked to the Pakistani border regions. On July 23, Pakistani Prime Minister Gilani and his cabinet were told that more than 8,000 foreign fighters were operating in the tribal areas.


US attacks inside Pakistan in 2008:

• US airstrike killed five al Qaeda operatives in North Waziristan, 
Sept. 5, 2008
• Report: US airstrike kills four in North Waziristan, 
Sept. 4, 2008
• Pakistanis claim US helicopter-borne forces assaulted village in South Waziristan, 
Sept. 3, 2008
• US hits al Qaeda safe house in North Waziristan, 
Aug. 31, 2008 
• Five killed in al Qaeda safe house strike in South Waziristan, 
Aug. 31, 2008
• Al Qaeda safe house targeted in South Waziristan strike, 
Aug. 20, 2008
• Cross-border strike targets one of the Taliban's 157 training camps in Pakistan's northwest, 
Aug. 13, 2008
• Six killed in strike in South Waziristan, 
July 28, 2008
• Senior Algerian al Qaeda operative killed in May 14 strike inside Pakistan, 
May 24, 2008
• Missile strike kills 20 in South Waziristan, 
March 16, 2008 
• Unprecedented Coalition strike nails the Haqqani Network in North Waziristan, 
March 13, 2008
• Missile strike on al Qaeda meeting in South Waziristan kills 13, 
Feb. 28, 2008
• Senior al Qaeda leader Abu Laith al Libi killed in North Waziristan, 
Jan. 31, 2008

For more information on the Haqqani family, see:

• The Haqqani Network: Reign of terror, Aug. 2, 2008 
• Targeting Taliban commander Siraj Haqqani, Oct. 20, 2007


----------



## tomahawk6

Basically its the Khyber Pass supply route thats cut off at the moment.

 http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008%5C09%5C06%5Cstory_6-9-2008_pg1_1

Pakistan stops NATO supplies

* Khyber Agency PA says Torkham Highway closed due to Taliban threats to trucks 
* Says decision not a reaction to US attacks 

By Iqbal Khattak

PESHAWAR: Pakistan stopped supplies to the United States and NATO forces in Afghanistan through its western Torkham border on Friday, citing security concerns. 

A senior official said the measure followed increasing Taliban threats to trucks carrying the supplies.

“All Afghanistan-bound supplies for the International Security Assistance Force have been stopped as the [Torkham] highway is vulnerable,” Khyber Agency Political Agent Tariq Hayat told Daily Times, dismissing the impression that the decision is a reaction to continued United States attacks in Waziristan.

“This decision has nothing to do with the situation in Waziristan or the US attacks. This is purely a security issue and we want no untoward incident to take place as far as supplies for ISAF are concerned.” The international Torkham Highway was closed for “vulnerable vehicles”, he said referring to trucks carrying ISAF supplies, and the supplies would resume after the highway was cleared. 

The political agent did not say how long the highway would take to be cleared, but added that other traffic would be allowed on the road. 

A senior border official at Torkham, 58 kilometres west of Peshawar, said the closure of the highway would also affect the US forces, which get fuel, food and other military supplies through Torkham crossing points. 

The coalition forces also get supplies through the Chaman border in Balochistan, but the bulk of the supplies goes through Torkham – a shorter route for Kabul where the US and NATO forces are based.


----------



## The Bread Guy

Bit more info....

Fuel supply to Nato forces ‘suspended’


> The government is reported to have decided to stop fuel supplies to Nato forces in Afghanistan via the Torkham highway with effect from Saturday.  “An order to this effect has come from Islamabad and the Frontier Corps has been asked to stop oil supplies to Nato forces forthwith,” a senior government official said.  Sources said the federal government did not cite any reason for the move, but the decision was apparently taken in the wake of the US ground and missile attacks in North and South Waziristan tribal regions....



Pakistan cuts supply lines to Nato forces


> In a major development, the federal government on Friday announced disconnection of supply lines to the allied forces stationed in Afghanistan through Pakistan in an apparent reaction to a ground attack on a border village in South Waziristan agency by the Nato forces.  Political authorities of the Khyber Agency claimed to have received verbal directives to immediately halt transportation of all kinds of goods meant for the US-led Nato forces in Afghanistan for an indefinite period.  Authorities claimed the decision was taken in the wake of the growing unrest in the Khyber Agency that provides for the only ground link of the country to the war-torn Afghanistan. "Until now, drivers of the vehicles carrying goods meant for the foreign forces in Afghanistan were directed to reach the tribal agency between 7am to 10am, which were then escorted to the border town of Torkhum by the Khassadar force," the authorities told The News.  The authorities claimed that due to repeated attacks on the personnel of the Khassadar forces during the last one week and abduction of a few personnel, it had become difficult for the security forces to provide foolproof security to the supply lines.  Independent sources, however, claimed that the government feared retaliation by the tribesmen against a recent ground attack conducted by the Nato forces in Angoor Adda of the South Waziristan Agency that triggered condemnation from various quarters, including the government of Pakistan itself ....


----------



## The Bread Guy

Apparently, the closure was only temporary - shared with the usual disclaimer.

*Pakistan reopens vital border crossing to NATO*
Bill Roggio, Long War Journal, 7 Sept 08
Article link


> Pakistan has reopened the vital Torkham border crossing point to NATO supply trucks destined for Afghanistan. The crossing point was closed late on Sept. 5, the same day the Pakistani military threatened to retaliate against the US for conducting attacks against the Taliban and al Qaeda inside Paksitan.
> 
> Pakistan's defense minister said the border closure was meant to show the US that it would not tolerate airstrikes and raids inside its borders, Daily Times reported.
> 
> "We have told them that we will take action and we have already taken action today," Defense Minister Chaudhry Ahmed Mukhtar said. "We have stopped the supply of oil and this will tell how serious we are."
> 
> The US has recently stepped up attacks against Taliban and al Qaeda safe houses and training camps inside Pakistan's tribal areas of North and South Waziristan over the last week. The US has conducts five strikes in the Waziristans in the past week, including a controversial helicopter assault in a village along the border.....




Still not ENTIRELY safe, though.....


> The driver of an oil tanker was killed when a rocket hit his vehicle here on Sunday. According to police, armed men fired the rocket on the tanker carrying fuel for Nato forces deployed in Afghanistan.
> 
> The driver was killed while his companion was injured. A police officer confirmed that the assailants had targeted the tanker.
> 
> The Taliban have attacked and destroyed in the border town of Chaman several tankers carrying fuel for coalition forces in recent past. However, the Taliban have not claimed responsibility for the attack....


----------



## tomahawk6

Seems every day the Pred's are in action. 

http://www.adnkronos.com/AKI/English/Security/?id=1.0.2468786422

Miranshah, 8 Sept. (AKI) - More than 20 people were killed and several others were injured in a suspected missile attack by US drones in Pakistan near the Afghan border on Monday.

A religious school founded by Jalaluddin Haqqani, a Taliban leader, was the apparent target of the aerial attack in Miranshah, capital of the North Waziristan tribal region.

The attack was the fourth cross-border raid against Taliban targets carried out by coalition forces in Afghanistan in recent days and is certain to provoke fierce debate in Pakistan.

According to Pakistan's Geo News network, sources said that US drones fired ten guided missiles at the home and madrassa run by the Taliban commander in Dandi Darpakheil area near Miranshah.

The son of Haqqani said that his father was not in the area at the time of the attack but other family members were among the victims.

Women and children were reportedly killed in the attack, while up to 20 others who were injured in the attack were ferried to Miranshah's main hospital.

Haqqani is a veteran commander of the US-backed Afghan war against the Soviet invasion and is reported to have links to Al-Qaeda leader Osama Bin Laden.

On Wednesday US commandos carried out a ground assault in nearby South Waziristan in what was the first known incursion into Pakistan by US troops since the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Local officials said 20 people, including women and children, were killed in that attack.


----------



## GAP

If they keep this up, pretty soon all the AQ and TB leaders will have to start sleeping in the woodshed or equivalent.....


----------



## karl28

One could only hope that we could get all there leadership ( AQ and TB ) .   Send a clear message  that there kind of behaviour will not be tolerated or go unpunished .


----------



## tomahawk6

http://www.nysun.com/foreign/american-raids-penetrating-pakistan/85460/

WASHINGTON — American military forces are stepping up cross-border ground attacks into Pakistan from Afghanistan on the eve of the seventh anniversary of the attacks of September 11, 2001.

In the last two weeks, the military has begun launching ground assaults in the Pakistani border provinces known as the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, American intelligence and military officials said. The region is believed by American and Pakistani intelligence to be hosting the leadership of Al Qaeda, including Osama bin Laden.

While American special forces and military contractors have conducted raids in Pakistan, such actions were rare and required Cabinet-level approval. In July, the leadership of Central Command, which oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, was given the sole authority to approve ground assaults in Pakistan. Late last month, the American military began launching ground attacks in the country on a near daily basis, depending on local conditions and intelligence, according to a military official who requested anonymity.

The escalation in Pakistan is due in part to the incoming leader of Central Command, General David Petraeus, who has been credited with changing the course of the Iraq war and is said to have the full trust of President Bush. Before formally taking the reins at Central Command, General Petraeus began meeting in June with Pakistani political leaders to develop an effective strategy for combating Al Qaeda in the border provinces.

Most important for the Bush administration, however, has been the political implosion in Islamabad since the resignation of America's longtime ally, President Musharraf.

"With Musharraf gone, the policy of self-deterrence is now gone," a former senior counterterrorism official for both the Clinton and Bush national security councils, Roger Cressey, said. "We would deter ourselves from doing anything for fear that any action would destabilize Musharraf."

"The other point here is the brazenness and frequency of Taliban-led raids really required U.S. forces to be aggressive," he said. "I think this is less about getting bin Laden than it is about responding to the Taliban."

A spokeswoman for Central Command declined to comment for this article.

The ground presence of American forces also has led to more air attacks in the Pakistani border provinces. Yesterday a Predator drone aircraft fired missiles into a small town in the province of North Waziristan, killing at least nine people, according to the Associated Press. The target was a senior Taliban leader, Jalaluddin Haqqani, who was believed to be living in the religious school struck by the missile. Mr. Haqqani escaped the attack, but three other Arab Al Qaeda deputies at the scene were killed, Agence France-Presse reported.

The use of Predator drone attacks in Pakistan has been a part of American policy since the beginning of the war on terrorism. The attacks, often launched from Afghanistan, have not been acknowledged publicly by American officials, and the Pakistani government has said the attacks are part of its own counterinsurgency efforts. But America's intelligence on Al Qaeda in the Pakistani border provinces has been hindered by the lack of the kind of tribal allies that proved to be such a boon to the war effort in Iraq, reducing the effectiveness of the air war against the group. Many potential tribal allies in the Pashtun provinces on the border have been slain by Al Qaeda's leadership to send a message to other tribal leaders who might consider cooperation with America and NATO.

The targeting intelligence so far has been, according to one American intelligence official, "shots in the dark." The official, however, said ground operations in Pakistan at least offer the prospect of refining targets, so that missiles fired from the air would hit Al Qaeda and Taliban leaders.

Another factor in the escalation against Al Qaeda may be Mr. Bush's desire to secure a legacy and capture Mr. bin Laden or his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahri.

"There are all kinds of initiatives at work here, such as the end of the Bush administration," the director of a consortium of university think tanks in Washington, the Inter-University Center for Terrorism Studies, Yonah Alexander, said. "What better way to score a victory, in terms of getting bin Laden or Zawahri?"

Both Senator Obama and Senator McCain have highlighted the front in Afghanistan on the campaign trail. As early as 2007, Mr. Obama called for bringing troops home from Iraq and sending more of them to Afghanistan. In July, Mr. McCain called for an Afghanistan "surge" of troops, similar to the successful troop surge he advocated for in Iraq. Both senators will be participating in a joint event in New York City to commemorate the seven-year anniversary of the September 11 attacks.


----------



## dapaterson

The New York Times Magazine had an excellent piece this past weekend on the Fronteir Areas of Pakistan.  The reality on the ground does not necessarily correspond to the claims of various political leaders.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/magazine/07pakistan-t.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&pagewanted=all


----------



## tomahawk6

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7627135.stm

The hotel is on fire

A bomb attack has hit the Marriott Hotel in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad, killing at least 40 people. 

The BBC's Barbara Plett who is at the scene says the blast created a 20ft (6m) deep crater, and destroyed the entire front section of the hotel. 

She says the building is engulfed in flames, and rescue workers are carrying out bloodied victims and bodies. 

Police say the blast occurred as a car approached the hotel, and that it was a suspected suicide attack. 

Police estimate that the blast was caused by more than a tonne of explosives. 

Heavy security 

Our correspondent says that the centre of the blast was at the front of the building close to the area where security checks are carried out

She says that about two-thirds of the 290-room hotel is on fire, and the wounded and dead are still being brought out, on stretchers or wrapped in sheets. 

There are unconfirmed reports of people being trapped inside the building. 

Ambulances and police have rushed to the scene. 

A hotel employee, Mohammad Sultan, said he was in the reception when something exploded, forcing him to the ground. 

"I don't understand what it was, but it was like the world is finished," he told the Associated Press news agency. 

There are reports that the explosion brought down the ceiling of the banquet hall, where some 300 people were sharing a meal to break the fast during the holy month of Ramadan. 

The Marriott is located near government buildings and diplomatic missions. Security there is tight, with guests and vehicles subject to checks. 

The hotel is popular with foreigners visiting Pakistan or members of the expat community, and has previously been the target of militants. 

Last year a suicide bomber killed himself and one other in an attack at the hotel. 

Insurgency 

The bomb attack comes just hours after Pakistan's newly installed President, Asif Ali Zardari, said he would not allow Pakistan's territory to be violated by terrorists or foreign powers fighting them. 

In his first speech to MPs since he replaced Pervez Musharraf in August, he vowed instead to "root out terrorism and extremism wherever and whenever they may rear their ugly heads". 

He was speaking in Islamabad, just several hundred metres to the east of the Marriott. 

Pakistan has been a key ally of the US in its "war on terror", but relations have become strained over tactics. 

In recent months, Pakistan has voiced growing disquiet over US raids targeting militants in its territory, launched from neighbouring Afghanistan. 

Al-Qaeda and Taleban militants based in Pakistan's north-west tribal region have repeatedly carried out attacks across the border in Afghanistan. 

Militants have also carried out waves of attacks in Pakistan in recent years.


----------



## armyvern

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> ...
> The bomb attack comes just hours after Pakistan's newly installed President, Asif Ali Zardari, said he would not allow Pakistan's territory to be violated by terrorists or foreign powers fighting them.
> 
> In his first speech to MPs since he replaced Pervez Musharraf in August, he vowed instead to "root out terrorism and extremism wherever and whenever they may rear their ugly heads".



Well, if this terrorist attack isn't the swift boot in the ass that Pakistan required to really start "doing" instead of "saying" --- nothing will be.


----------



## HItorMiss

My bet is nothing is enough.

You have to understand that all Pakistan really can do as a government is pay lip service and allow under the table actions in the lawless frontier. They risk public revolt should they do anything else. Honestly I am surprised they haven't been more strong in their condemnation of "overt" western strikes into the border region as it is.


----------



## tomahawk6

The casualty figures are over 60 dead including a US service member.


----------



## GAP

BulletMagnet said:
			
		

> My bet is nothing is enough.
> 
> You have to understand that all Pakistan really can do as a government is pay lip service and allow under the table actions in the lawless frontier. They rick public revolt should they do anything else. Honestly I am surprised they haven't been more strong in their condemnation of "overt" western strikes into there border region as it is.



Musharraf danced around most of these issues just enough to get away with it. Even then there were numerous assassination attempts on him. The new guy is either gonna have a short career, or learn to be a quick learner....

BM is dead on....in Pakistan you are a target no matter which way you go...


----------



## tomahawk6

The civilian leadership of Pakistan just isnt prepared to deal with their extremist citizenry,not to mention the lack of control of the border areas. The military and security forces are divided. We better dust off Plan B - you know just in case.


----------



## 54/102 CEF

3450 est kg blast http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/world/asia/21islamabad.html

Crater analysis ref http://www.amcaonline.org.ar/ojs/index.php/mc/article/viewFile/713/675

I extrapolated the table 5 figures with EXCEL to get the possible charge based on 40 foot crater and you can see how deep it is in the NYT Ref

    Diameter 
  Kg TNT Diameter Feet 
Reference 50 2 6 
Reference 100 2 7 
Reference 150 2 8 
Reference 200 2 8 
Reference 250 2 8 
Reference 300 3 9 
Reference 350 3 10 
Reference 400 3 10 
Reference 500 3 10 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 522 3 11 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 576 4 12 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 629 4 12 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 682 4 13 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 736 4 13 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 789 4 14 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 842 4 14 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 896 5 15 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 949 5 15 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1002 5 16 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1056 5 16 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1109 5 17 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1162 5 17 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1216 5 18 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1269 6 19 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1322 6 19 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1376 6 20 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1429 6 20 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1482 6 21 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1536 6 21 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1589 7 22 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1642 7 22 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1696 7 23 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1749 7 23 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1802 7 24 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1856 7 24 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1909 8 25 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 1962 8 25 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2016 8 26 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2069 8 27 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2122 8 27 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2176 8 28 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2229 9 28 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2282 9 29 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2336 9 29 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2389 9 30 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2442 9 30 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2496 9 31 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2549 10 31 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2602 10 32 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2656 10 32 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2709 10 33 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2762 10 33 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2816 10 34 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2869 11 34 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2922 11 35 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 2976 11 36 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3029 11 36 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3082 11 37 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3136 11 37 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3189 11 38 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3242 12 38 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3296 12 39 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3349 12 39 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3402 12 40 
Extrapolated via EXCEL 3456 12 40


----------



## tomahawk6

Big bomb for sure. The location of the hotel is close to many government buildings so the taliban/aq were sending a strong message to the government. I wonder if more "messages" are forthcoming ?


----------



## 54/102 CEF

I checked the numbers

The table in the Engineering ref suggests that its 3450 kg if just off the ground = like on a truck but 2236 kg if say the truck flipped over before it went off = the charge on the surface of the ground


----------



## Kat Stevens

Three and a half tons of TNT in a car?  I need to get my suspension work done at THAT shop!


----------



## 54/102 CEF

A truck

For comparison - its suggested the Khobar Towers Bomb was approx 5000 pounds = 2300kg..... a pattern here?? http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/khobar.htm

and from Wikipedia  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khobar_Towers_bombing

images from Khobar Towers http://images.google.ca/images?hl=en&q=Khobar+towers+bomb+size&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2

Crater in front of Bldg = Al Quaida :threat:


----------



## 54/102 CEF

The New Table with the grd / abov grd figures is attached 

Can any city without a truck by pass be considered safe? The trouble is its as scalable threat - eg in 1996 a bomb was set in Manchester UK - 1500 kg - could have caused CITY SIZE casualties which we have not yet experienced 

See http://www.manchester.com/features/bombboom/

These refs pretty much lean in the direction of the charge sizes I have written above.

Damn scary - and what do the politicians talk about?? Mine`s bigger than yours?


----------



## tomahawk6




----------



## 54/102 CEF

I`d say we`ll see a few more of these and then the B52s will go into a certain valley next door to a certain NATO deployed country


----------



## 54/102 CEF

Fox News link - note what it says about size of the charge http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,425676,00.html

Keep your eyes peeled and post similar links - sort of morbid and interesting at the same time

Interesting in that its open source and leans to such things as key government buildings need standoff distances - no public infrastructure is safe really - if you were a politician do you spend a few billion on a new HQ for this or that dept or do you pay off dead men's widows?


----------



## tomahawk6

http://www.dawn.com/2008/09/21/top1.htm


Suicide bomber blows up 1000kg explosives: At least 40 killed, over 250 injured: Fireball consumes Marriott: Zardari vows to eradicate terrorism


ISLAMABAD, Sept 20: An explosive-laden truck rammed into the front gate of a premier hotel in a high-security zone of Islamabad on Saturday, setting off what police called the most devastating suicide attack in the capital that killed at least 40 people and wounded more than 250.

The attack outside the five-star Marriott Hotel — not far from key government buildings such as the parliament house, the presidency, the prime minister’s house and Pakistan Television headquarters — happened early in the evening shortly after Iftar and hours after President Asif Ali Zardari addressed a joint session of the two houses of parliament where he said Pakistan would not allow the use of its territory for terrorist activities.

In an address to the nation after Saturday midnight, President Asif Ali Zardari vowed to “continue to fight terrorism and extremism”.

“The government will continue to fight terrorism and extremism in all its forms and manifestations and such dastardly acts cannot dent the government’s commitment to fight this menace,” Mr Zardari said.

Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani joined the president in condemning the massive attack.

The president and the prime minister have ordered authorities to conduct an inquiry into the blast and to submit a report within 12 hours.

Information Minister Sherry Rehman told reporters that “such cowardly acts cannot deter the government’s commitment to fight terrorism and extremism”.

There was no immediate report of any foreigner killed in the blast that set off fires, apparently due to gas leakages, in most of the five-floor hotel in Islamabad’s F-5 sector. But police and doctors said some foreigners were among the wounded taken to hospitals.

An Iftar dinner, also attended by President Zardari, was being held at the prime minister’s house at the time of the blast, which shook the whole of Islamabad, causing panic in markets and residential districts.
While rescue workers were busy tracing blast victims inside the burning hotel, some streets near the building looked like graveyards of destroyed cars.

Places as far away as 30kms from the hotel reverberated with the thunder of the explosion. Almost all the 290 rooms of the hotel, which was occupied by both local and foreign guests, were gutted.

Four foreigners — one American, two Saudis and one Filipino — were killed and seven — two Saudis, three Germans and two British nationals — were wounded.

According to earlier unofficial reports, over 40 people were killed mostly from those attending an Iftar party at the hotel’s Marquee Hall located on front side of the building.

The blast caused a huge crater, 20 feet deep and 40 feet wide, at the main entrance of the hotel where, according to some witnesses, a white mini-truck rammed into the steel barrier at 8.05pm.

Interior Secretary Syed Kamal Shah told reporters outside the hotel that it was a “unique blast”.

Rehman Malik, the adviser to the prime minister on interior, said preliminary investigations revealed that some 1000kgs of explosive material had been used in the blast. He put the death toll at 28 and the number of the injured at 50.

Mr Malik revealed the interior ministry had received intelligence that terrorists could strike the Parliament Building on the occasion of presidential address to the joint session of parliament.

“As a result of the report, security was already tightened in the federal capital and additional police and rangers were called into the city to foil designs of the terrorists.”

Outside the hotel, the blast destroyed over 150 cars parked within a radius of 500 feet, uprooted a number of trees and electricity poles, and damaged nearby buildings, including the Frontier House, the Evacuee Trust Building, and those housing the Federal Public Service Commission, Pakistan Television, and government residential buildings.

The timing of the blast was significant as it coincided with an Iftar dinner at the Prime Minister’s House only half a kilometre away.

Some witnesses said the driver of the mini-truck first fired three shots at security guards manning the checkpost of the hotel and then hit the steel barrier. The truck soon turned into a heap of twisted metal, splinters flying in all directions and landing at a good distance from the scene.

A mangled door was found deep inside the crater.

The authorities concerned have been ordered to conduct an inquiry into the bombing and submit a report within 12 hours.

A team comprising police and intelligence officials has been set up to carry out the inquiry.

Sadruddin Hashwani, the owner of the Marriott, told reporters outside the burning building that some 300 people were in the Marquee Hall attending an Iftar function, and about 1,000 guests were staying at the hotel.

Six hundred members of the staff were present in the building when tragedy struck.

Mr Hashwani said almost all the guests had been evacuated. But the Marquee Hall bore the brunt of the strike

Saudi Ambassador Alfawad Al Aseeri rushed to the scene after hearing reports that five employees of the Saudi Arabian Airlines were missing.

Four other employees were admitted to hospital after receiving injuries.

“I hope that the missing crew members are safe or they would have been shifted to some private hospitals for treatment,” he said.

According to some sources, a number of US marines who had put up at the Marriott sustained injuries. They were due to leave for Kabul on Sunday.

A law enforcement official said in all likelihood “personnel of a US security agency” were the attackers’ target.

Some police sources said two explosive-laden vehicles were used in the attack.

They said at first the attackers, riding in a car, opened fire on the security staff at the hotel gate to clear the way and later they blew up their vehicle. Seconds later, the explosive-laden truck hit the security cordon.

A senior police official said 1000kgs of explosive material had been used by the terrorists.

He said the two vehicles carrying explosive travelled through Khyaban-i-Margalla road and then hit the Marriot Hotel avoiding a red zone.

Well-equipped security officers from the US embassy were seen on the spot soon after the explosions. However, they left the scene shortly afterwards.

Those killed included two Frontier Constabulary (FC) officials, six private security guards standing at the hotel gate and a passer-by civilian woman. The injured included two British nationals, three Germans and two Saudis.

A Pims hospital spokesman said 25 dead bodies including two of the FC personnel, six security guards, and two other persons were brought in the hospital. Seven dead bodies were shifted to the Poly Clinic Hospital, two to the CDA hospital.

The hotel building was engulfed in flames, leaving its rooms, café and restaurant in ruined, while several people remained trapped inside their room for several hours due to fire that blocked the emergency exits.

Police said the blast occurred when a vehicle — believed to be a dumper approached the hotel gate and the suicide bomber exploded it when was stopped by the security personnel.

The blast left a 20feet deep and 35 feet in radius crater and destroyed the entire front of the hotel and also shattered down the window pans of nearby buildings. Street light poles and trees were uprooted and dozens of vehicles parked outside the hotel were damaged.The sound of the blast that was heard miles away sent a wave of panic and fear among the resident of the federal capital territory and Rawalpindi. More than 1500 guests, including foreigners were dining in the hotel when the terrorist attack occurred.Ambulances, fire engines and rescue teams rushed to the scene of the blast. The entire area was cordoned off by the security personnel. Later, the troops were called to help the local administration in pulling out the people trapped inside the hotels that was engulfed.

The Marriot Hotel has been popular among the foreigners visiting Islamabad and had been previously targeted by terrorists.

The attack came a few hours after the newly elected president Asif Ali Zardari made his first address to the joint session of the parliaments amid tight security.

The president said in his address that he would not allow Pakistan’s territory to use for terrorist activities.

The Marriot Hotel is located near government buildings, including President House, Parliament building, Prime Minister House, and right opposite to the Sindh House and judicial colony.

Strict security checks are carried out at the hotel gate. The scene of the blast was closed to the security check point.

Abdul Hameed, a police constable who was on duty close to the hotel had recorded his last few worded wireless massage saying as: “I tried to stop a dumper but it exploded at the gate.”

Some women and children staying in the 290 room-hotel went on rooftop of the hotel as the fire erupted. They were shouting for help.

Ikhlaq Ahmed, one of the hotel employees said he was in side the hotel when a small blast occurred, seconds later another explosive laden dumper appeared at the gate and exploded.

No militant group has claimed responsibility of the today’s terrorist attack on the hotel so far.

At least seven of the injured victims, including a female were shifted to Benazir Bhutto hospital Rawalpindi. Shortly after the explosion, emergency was declared in all the government run hospitals in Rawalpindi.

A red-alert was declared in Rawalpindi and night police patrol was also started.


----------



## tomahawk6

Czech Ambassador Ivo Žďárek is one of the victims .


----------



## tomahawk6

Video of the attack. The explosives didnt ignite until the fire reached the explosives.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJnsXzgh5uI&eurl=http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/


----------



## tomahawk6

A USAF Major was one of those killed in the blast.

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/09/airforce_americans_killed_pakistan_092208mil/

Airman among dead in Pakistan hotel blast

By Bryan Mitchell - Staff writer
Posted : Monday Sep 22, 2008 18:48:34 EDT
   
At least two U.S. troops died in Sunday’s suicide bombing at a luxury Pakistani hotel popular with foreigners. One of the dead is an Air Force officer; the other has yet to be identified.

The deaths caused confusion as scores of news agencies reported Monday that the two dead were Marines. Some publications reported the bombing was targeting Marines.

Air Force Maj. Rodolfo I. Rodriquez, 34, of El Paso, Texas, died Sept. 20 in Islamabad from injuries sustained in an improvised explosive device attack, according to the Defense Department. Rodriguez served with the 86th Construction and Training Squadron based out of Ramstein Air Base, Germany.

“He was in the area assisting with the training of Pakistani forces,” said Ramstein spokesman Aaron Schoenfeld.

Schoenfeld said at least one other service member died in the attack, but he was unsure what branch of service that person served in. The Corps, however, says no Marines died in the blast.

“We read the same thing first thing today and checked on it. It’s incorrect,” Marine Corps spokesman Capt. Carl Redding said. “There were no Marines killed or injured in connection with the attack in Islamabad this weekend.”

A suicide bomber rammed an explosive-laden vehicle into an upscale Marriott hotel in the capital of Islamabad on Saturday, killing at least 53 and injuring more than 200. The hotel is one of the primary meeting points for foreigners in Pakistan.

In a country accustomed to a rash of suicide bombings in the past several years, the toll of the blast had commentators referring to it as Pakistan’s 9/11.

The blast killed the Czech Ambassador to Pakistan. A handful of news outlets are reporting that up to 30 Marines who allegedly recently stayed in the hotel were the target. The Corps declined to comment on whether Marines stayed on the hotel.

Marine Corps Times counted at least a dozen news agencies from the Middle East, Asia and Europe that had reported on two dead Marines on Monday.

Redding said internal checks by the Corps indicate no Marine Corps security detachment personnel were injured or killed in the bombing. The Corps would not discuss if Marines were recently at the hotel.

“We are not in a position to state whether Marines were staying in or near that site, and we do not discuss living arrangement for Marines assigned to post overseas,” Redding said in an e-mail. “I realize there has been some shoddy reporting, but there is no truth to “two Marines dead” storyline. It is not true.”

Redding said Marine Corps Times was the first outlet to call the Marine Corps to confirm if Marines died in the attack, despite some reports that the Pentagon had confirmed the two dead Marines.

The bombing of the posh American hotel occurred just days after the U.S. military’s top officer, Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, visited Pakistan following confirmation from U.S. officials that military units in Afghanistan had targeted militants in Pakistan.

The bombing occurred as State Department officials recover from the brazen attack on the embassy in the capital of Yemen last week. At least 18 people, including an American, were killed when terrorists attacked the embassy on Sept. 17.


----------



## ballz

perhaps this could be the turning point for NATO in the war in Afghanistan? perhaps we'll get some better cooperation from Pakistan now?

or is this just wishful dreaming?


----------



## 54/102 CEF

2 refs suggest it may have been at least 1000 kg - amazing - maybe Al Quaida BS - but the hole is in the ground and the table linksback to the size of the holes 

This reference (and it is from the press says 1000 kg) http://www.thenational.ae/article/20080920/FOREIGN/446624715/1133 as does this one http://www.kuwaittimes.net/read_news.php?newsid=OTU1Nzc0MjU1


----------



## The Bread Guy

Advisor to PAK PM refers to RDX & TNT, as well as aluminum as fire catalyst (not to mention Waziristan link) via Dawn (PAK daily):  "Prime Minister’s Adviser on Interior Affairs Rehman Malik has said that Saturday’s blast in Islamabad that claimed 53 lives had links with Waziristan ....  "It is premature to blame any particular group or individual for the blast but all roads lead to Waziristan,” the adviser said.  *The video clip showed a six-wheeler dumper truck hitting a steel barrier at the hotel’s main entrance. The attacker, who could not be seen in the film, opened fire on security guards, forcing them to retreat, and then blew himself up causing a small blast which set the truck on fire.  A number of courageous security guards reappear, one of them with a fire extinguisher who tries to extinguish the blaze but fails. He tries repeatedly to douse flames as traffic is seen on the road. There is no sign of movement in the truck and the footage does not show the massive blast which wreaked the havoc.*  Questions have been raised as to how such a huge quantity of highly explosive material (RDX and TNT) could be brought into the capital and then taken to the high security area. And there were only five or six private guards at the hotel gate and no arrangement to put out fire.  *“It was the first incident in the capital in which terrorists used RDX and TNT explosives. In all previous blasts the terrorists had used potassium. Aluminium powder used in the explosion caused the fire inside the hotel*,” Mr Malik said....."

Claim of responsibility....

"Shadowy group claims Islamabad bombing: Al-Arabiya TV" (Agence France-Presse):  "A shadowy group calling itself "Fedayeen of Islam" has claimed responsibility for the deadly bombing of Islamabad's Marriott Hotel in a telephone call to Dubai-based Al-Arabiya television, the channel said on Monday.  Its correspondent in the Pakistani capital said he received a text message on his mobile phone showing a telephone number, which he called and then heard a recording in which the group admitted launching Saturday's attack...."

"Little-Known Islamic Group Claims Pakistan Attack" (Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty):  "A little known Islamic group has claimed responsibility for Saturday's suicide attack on the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad which killed 53, Al Arabiya television reported.  The group calling itself Fedayeen Islam (Partisans of Islam) demanded the closure of U.S. and NATO military bases in the region and the U.S. Embassy in Pakistan, and an end to U.S. attacks against tribal areas in Pakistan and Afghanistan.  "If these demands are not met, we are ready to die," said a spokesman for the group on an audio tape aired by Arabiya. The Dubai-based television station said the English-language recording had been played over the phone to its correspondent in the Pakistani capital.  The speaker said the group had targeted 250 U.S. Marines and NATO officials which he said had been at the hotel, and warned of new attacks, urging Muslims to keep away from places frequented by Westerners.  Arabiya said the authenticity of the tape could not be verified, and the group is not known to have claimed other attacks...."

More on links

<slight highjack>

The bombing, combined with this, spooks me more than usual....

"Top Afghan diplomat abducted in Pakistan" (Reuters)

</slight highjack>


----------



## The Bread Guy

Or are the claims of responsibility a ruse?  Shared with the usual disclaimer....

*Fidayeen-e-Islam is a cover up?*
Amir Mir, Daily Jang Group (PAK), 24 Sept 08
Article link - More
LAHORE: 





> The Pakistani authorities probing the deadly Marriott bombing say the responsibility claim made by an unknown Jihadi group Fidayeen-e-Islam has given credence to their suspicion that the attack was carried out by Harkatul Jehadul Islami led by al-Qaeda-linked Qari Saifullah Akhtar.  On Monday night, a shadowy group, calling itself Fidayeen-e-Islam, had claimed responsibility for the Marriott Hotel attack in a telephone call to Al-Arabiya television. The Dubai-based television's correspondent in Islamabad said he received a text message on his mobile phone showing a telephone number, which he called and then heard a recording in which the group admitted launching the September 20, 2008, attack.  The caller, who spoke in English with South Asian accent, identified himself as Ahmad Shah Abdali and put some conditions to stop attacks against the US interests in Pakistan, including an end to the Pak-US cooperation.  Ahmad Shah Abdali said the attack was carried out by a suicide bomber while 250 US Marines and NATO officials were inside the Marriott Hotel. However, officials probing the September 20 terrorist attack insist that the telephonic claim was meant to confuse the investigators and to divert their attention from the actual culprits who belong to the HUJI ....


----------



## tomahawk6

The two dead US military personnel are USAF Major Rodriquez,34 and Cryptologic Technician 3rd Class Matthew J. O’Bryant, 22.

Reports about Pakistani security are not encouraging. There were 6 checkpoints leading to the Marriot police were asleep at four of them. The terrpr group is no doubt taliban/aq affiliated.


----------



## tdr_aust

It seems that there are 2 more explosive trucks somewhere..

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/print.asp?page=2008\09\24\story_24-9-2008_pg1_10

link http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008\09\24\story_24-9-2008_pg1_10



> Daily Times - Site Edition Wednesday, September 24, 2008
> 
> 
> Hunt on for two explosives-laden trucks in capital
> 
> ISLAMABAD/KARACHI: Police are searching for two explosives-laden trucks in the federal capital, Daily Times learnt on Tuesday.
> 
> Sources said intelligence agencies had informed the police that three trucks loaded with explosives had entered the federal capital. One of them targeted the Marriott Hotel on Saturday, while whereabouts of the other two are not known.
> 
> The sources said the ‘missing’ trucks were still present in the city, adding that a risk of strikes by them had forced the police to put the security on high alert, increase personnel deployment near important buildings, erect pickets on key roads and begin intensive patrolling across Islamabad.
> 
> Vehicles, especially trucks, were being searched by the police at the pickets, the sources said, adding the police were keeping a close watch on hotels and guesthouses.
> 
> Meanwhile, the Federal Interior Ministry has warned that banned militant groups could strike in Karachi as well as other cities of the country, Daily Times learnt on Tuesday.
> 
> Following this, Additional Home Secretary for Law Enforcement Dr Shafqat Abbasi has written a letter to Sindh Police Inspector General (IG) Sultan Salahuddin Babar Khattak and ordered him to ensure foolproof security measures for foreigners, especially Chinese nationals and their installations, sources said on condition of anonymity.
> 
> “We have ordered the Sindh IG to provide foolproof security to all foreign nationals and sensitive government and foreign installations,” Abbasi said. fazal sher/faraz khan


----------



## The Bread Guy

Jihadi forum suggests "thermal bomb" used?, with a .zip file of TV story (source unknown) showing computerized re-enactment of the attack and what looks like what they think was the mechanism used in the bomb itself (9+MB download)

_- edited to add link to video download -_


----------



## tomahawk6

http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2008/10/suicide_bomber_targe_1.php

Suicide bomber targets chief of Pakistani Pashtun political party
By Bill RoggioOctober 2, 2008 8:26 AM 

A suicide bomber killed five Pakistanis during an assassination attempt on the leader a secular Pashtun political party. The bomber targeted Asfandyar Wali Khan, the chief of the Awami National Party, in his home in the settled district of Charsadda in the turbulent Northwest Frontier Province. 

The attack occurred as Khan was hosting celebrations in a guesthouse next to his home for Eid-ul-Fitr, the holiday at the end of Ramadan. The suicide bomber was shot by security guards as he attempted to reach Khan. 

"The suicide bomber tried to pass from the security scanner avoiding a physical search. Two security guards grabbed him but he tried to get away," Provincial police chief Malik Naveed told Geo TV. "Then he was shot and as soon as he fell on the ground he blew himself up.”

The Awami National Party is an ethnic Pashtun political party that controls the government Northwest Frontier Province after the February 2008 election. The party is opposed to military action against the Taliban and advocates a peaceful end to the fighting in Pakistan's northwest. The party has backed peace agreements with the Taliban in the past.

The Awami National Party has been the target of multiple Taliban attacks over the past year. The Taliban conducted two major strikes against ANP offices in North Waziristan and Kurram the week before the election, killing and wounding scores of its members. 

The Taliban have conducted attacks during religious events and in mosques up and down the Northwest Frontier Province over the past year. The most high-profile attack occurred on Dec. 28, 2007, in Charsadda, when a suicide bomber detonated in a mosque in an attempt to kill former Interior Minister Aftab Sherpao as he conducted Eid prayers. More than 50 were killed and scores were wounded. 

Recently, the Taliban bombed a mosque in Dir, killing 25 and wounding more than 50. The Taliban targeted a tribe that was organizing local security to eject the extremists from the region.


----------



## tomahawk6

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/251/story/53926.html

New intelligence report says Pakistan is 'on the edge'
By Jonathan S. Landay and John Walcott | McClatchy Newspapers 

WASHINGTON — A growing al Qaida-backed insurgency, combined with the Pakistani army's reluctance to launch an all-out crackdown, political infighting and energy and food shortages are plunging America's key ally in the war on terror deeper into turmoil and violence, says a soon-to-be completed U.S. intelligence assessment. 

A U.S. official who participated in drafting the top secret National Intelligence Estimate said it portrays the situation in Pakistan as "very bad." Another official called the draft "very bleak," and said it describes Pakistan as being "on the edge."

The first official summarized the estimate's conclusions about the state of Pakistan as: "no money, no energy, no government." 

Six U.S. officials who helped draft or are aware of the document's findings confirmed them to McClatchy on the condition of anonymity because NIEs are top secret and are restricted to the president, senior officials and members of Congress. An NIE's conclusions reflect the consensus of all 16 U.S. intelligence agencies.

The NIE on Pakistan, along with others being prepared on Afghanistan and Iraq, will underpin a "strategic assessment" of the situation that Army Gen. David Petraeus, who's about to take command of all U.S. forces in the region, has requested. The aim of the assessment — seven years after the U.S. sent troops into Afghanistan — is to determine whether a U.S. presence in the region can be effective and if so what U.S. strategy should be.

The findings also are intended to support the Bush administration's effort to recommend the resources the next president will need for Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan at a time the economic crisis is straining the Treasury and inflating the federal budget deficit.

The Afghanistan estimate warns that additional American troops are urgently needed there and that Islamic extremists who enjoy safe haven in Pakistan pose a growing threat to the U.S.-backed government of Afghan Prime Minister Hamid Karzai.

The Iraq NIE is more cautious about the prospects for stability there than the Bush administration and either John McCain or Barack Obama have been, and it raises serious questions about whether the U.S. will be able to redeploy a significant number of troops from Iraq to Afghanistan anytime soon.

Together, the three NIEs suggest that without significant and swift progress on all three fronts — which they suggest is uncertain at best — the U.S. could find itself facing a growing threat from al Qaida and other Islamic extremist groups, said one of the officials.

About the only good news in the Pakistan NIE is that it's "relatively sanguine" about the prospects of a Pakistani nuclear weapon, materials or knowledge falling into the hands of terrorists, said one official.

However, the draft NIE paints a grim picture of the situation in the impoverished, nuclear-armed country of 160 million, according to the U.S. officials who spoke to McClatchy.

The estimate says that the Islamist insurgency based in the Federally Administered Tribal Area bordering Afghanistan, the suspected safe haven of Osama bin Laden and his top lieutenants, is intensifying.

However, according to the officials, the draft also finds that the Pakistani military is reluctant to launch an all-out campaign against the Islamists in part because of popular opposition to continuing the cooperation with the U.S. that began under Pervez Musharraf, the U.S.-backed former president, after the 9/11 attacks.

Anti-U.S. and anti-government sentiments have grown recently, stoked by stepped-up cross-border U.S. missile strikes and at least one commando raid on suspected terrorist targets in the FATA that reportedly have resulted in civilian deaths.

The Pakistani military, which has lost hundreds of troops to battles and suicide bombings, is waging offensives against Islamist guerrillas in the Bajaur tribal agency and Swat, a picturesque region of the North West Frontier Province bordering Afghanistan. U.S. officials said insurgent attacks on Pakistani security forces provoked the Pakistani army operations.

The Pakistan general staff also remains concerned about what it considers an ongoing threat to its eastern border from its traditional foe, India, the draft NIE finds, according to the U.S. officials.

For these reasons, they said, the army chief of staff, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani, wants the new civilian coalition government of Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani to provide the military with political cover by blessing a major anti-insurgency crackdown.

However, the ruling coalition, in which President Asif Ali Zardari, the widower of the late prime minister Benazir Bhutto, holds the real authority, has been preoccupied by other matters, according to the draft NIE.

These include efforts to consolidate its power after winning a struggle that prompted its main rival, the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, to leave the ruling coalition.

Moreover, widespread anti-U.S. anger has left the coalition deeply divided over whether to unleash a major military assault on the Islamists, the U.S. officials said.

The government is also facing an accelerating economic crisis that includes food and energy shortages, escalating fuel costs, a sinking currency and a massive flight of foreign capital accelerated by the escalating insurgency, the NIE warns.

The Pakistani public is clamoring for relief as the crisis pushes millions more into poverty, giving insurgent groups more opportunities to recruit young Pakistanis.

(Warren P. Strobel and Nancy A. Youssef contributed to this article.)


----------



## twistedcables

A little more in depth analysis.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1842131,00.html



Pakistan's military and the U.S. forces operating across the country's mountainous border with Afghanistan have become locked into a confusing and potentially dangerous game of brinkmanship over how to fight the al-Qaeda and Taliban militants sheltering on Pakistani soil. U.S. military strikes on Pakistani soil are provoking increasingly strident warnings from Pakistan's military and political leadership, and they are continuing despite Washington's reassurances about respecting Pakistani sovereignty. Still, many believe the Pakistanis are engaged in ritual denunciation of U.S. actions primarily for domestic political consumption.

 Exasperated by Pakistan's failure to wipe out the militant sanctuaries on its soil, Washington decided earlier this month to take matters into its own hands. The first known ground assault of the campaign, staged by U.S. Special Operations troops in Angoor Adda, a village in South Waziristan, was followed by stepped up air strikes on suspected militants by pilotless drones. Pentagon officials had suggested in recent weeks that the U.S. would be "testing" the new Pakistani government by stepping up its attacks in western Pakistan to gauge Islamabad's reaction. Previously, U.S. actions had been been limited to launching missile strikes or hot pursuits into Pakistani territory without the consent of the Pakistani government. The Sept. 3 attack was the first significant cross-border U.S. ground strike without prior Pakistani approval — a change approved by President Bush in July. That raid, which Pakistan's military says killed up to 20 people including civilians, triggered angry criticism across Pakistan. As the protector of his country's sovereignty and nervous about rising anti-American sentiment, Pakistan's army chief issued an unprecedented warning in response to the raid. "No external force is allowed to conduct operations inside Pakistan," Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani said. The statement was cheered by an anxious public and, in a sign of the military's influence, it was echoed by leading members of the government who had, until then, been reluctant to speak on the issue.

The ramping up of U.S. operations, Pakistani government and military officials believe, reflect a desperate bid to "get Bin Laden" before the Bush Administration leaves the White House. "It is all about the U.S. elections and Bush's legacy," says an aide to newly elected President Asif Ali Zardari. "But what purpose has it served? They have not got any high-value targets, and the public outrage only threatens to destabilize our new democratic government."

Zardari's government claims to be escalating its own campaign against the militants after attempts at negotiations proved fruitless, and believes that its own efforts are undermined by U.S. operations. "The [Pakistani counterinsurgency] operation in Bajaur is the most intense for many years. It is not popular with the public, but we are doing it," says the Zardari aide, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "And in Waziristan, after a lot of effort we got the Waziri tribes to unite against [Taliban commander] Baitullah Mehsud. But after all these drone strikes, they got dejected."

The U.S. has launched six air strikes into the tribal areas in the course of this month alone, the latest coming on Sept. 17 at a suspected militant training camp in South Waziristan. For all their insistence on sovereignty, the Pakistani army has not reacted militarily, nor has the government taken steps to break off diplomatic ties. Their only complaint, military analysts said, is over the use of ground troops. For the past six years, the CIA has routinely flown pilotless drones over Pakistan's tribal areas to collect intelligence and fire at select targets. Only when attacks have claimed large-scale civilian casualties, as in the abortive 2006 attempt to kill al-Qaeda No.2 Ayman al-Zawahiri, have the Pakistani authorities bothered to go through the more advanced motions of protest.

While this month's air strikes have passed with only comment from the Pakistan army, fears of a U.S.-Pakistan confrontation were sparked on Sept. 16 by media reports that Pakistani paramilitary troops may have fired warning shots to prevent U.S. military helicopters from returning to Angoor Adda. The Pakistan army swiftly denied the incident. "The helicopters did not enter Pakistani territory and the Pakistan army did not do the firing," says Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the military's chief spokesman. "The firing was done by local Waziri tribesmen."

Still, the Associated Press followed up by reporting that the Pakistan army had issued fresh orders "to open fire on U.S. troops if they launch another raid across the Afghan border." Again, General Abbas, who was quoted in the story, disputes the claim: "The comments were taken out of context," he says. "There was no new order issued. As the army chief has said, we reserve the right to defend our territory and reply to aggression."

The picture was made even more confusing by Wednesday's strike, at a suspected militant training camp in the village of Bagh in South Waziristan. That air-strike came just hours after the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Mike Mullen had visited Islamabad to calm fears about U.S. encroachment on Pakistan's turf. According to a statement issued by the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, "Admiral Mullen reiterated the U.S. commitment to respect Pakistan's sovereignty and to develop further U.S.-Pakistani cooperation and coordination."

Speaking to Reuters, unnamed local intelligence officials said that the Wednesday strike was the product of improved "U.S.-Pakistani intelligence sharing". But Ahmad Mukhtar, the Pakistani defense minister, says he was taken aback by the attack. "The Mike Mullen visit was very nice and he was very understanding," Mukhtar says. "And now these air strikes have come as a surprise. There is no understanding that the air strikes should happen from the U.S. Whatever is on our side of the border, we will deal with. There is anxiety in the country, and the situation here was meant to be resolved now."

Zardari, who returned to Pakistan from a visit to London as news of the incident broke, had also suggested he believed that air strikes would end. Speaking to reporters after a lengthy meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Brown, he said: "I don't think there will be any more [air strikes]." In his meeting with Brown, Zardari had urged the British prime minister to persuade the Americans to refrain from further attacks on Pakistani soil. "The U.K. agrees with us that such moves are counterproductive," says the Zardari aide, who had been present at the meeting.

Still, despite the apparent discord over continuing air raids, it would be a mistake to exaggerate the differences between Washington and Islamabad on the issue. The U.S. has given the Pakistani military about $6 billion in aid since 9/11, and recently announced a plan to supply Pakistan with 18 new F-16 fighter planes to be armed with satellite guided bombs to take out militant encampments. "That's the element that is missing in the fight now on their western border," Air Force Major General Burton Field told a House panel earlier this month. Lacking precision-guided bombs, the Pakistani military has been forced to rely on ground operations against Taliban and al-Qaeda militants, which eliminates the element of surprise. And, says analyst Ayesha Siddiqa. "As far as the army's reaction is concerned, I haven't seen the Pakistan army say it no longer needs F-16s and military aid."

Siddiqa suggested that Gen. Kayani's protests over the raids may have been designed for domestic consumption."And where the public is concerned, there have been only a few demonstrations in Peshawar, which is natural," she added. "But again, that hasn't stopped the queues outside McDonald's and the visa section of the U.S. embassy. I think there is a lot of unhappiness and discomfort in Pakistan. But the reality, as Prime Minister Gilani recently said, is that we can't do anything. I think what the Americans have calculated is that this will not get out of control, and they will continue to pursue their policies."

—With reporting by Mark Thompson/Washington


----------



## Yrys

Gordon Brown says it is time for "action, not words"

Three-quarters of the most serious terror plots being investigated by UK authorities have links to 
Pakistan, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said.

He was unveiling a £6m ($8.9m) deal with Pakistan he called "the most comprehensive anti-terrorist 
programme" between the UK and another country. He is in Pakistan meeting President Asif Ali Zardari, 
following talks with India's premier Manmohan Singh.

UK police want to quiz a Pakistani suspect in the Mumbai attacks. They want to interview Mohammed 
Ajmal Amir Qasab - the sole gunman taken alive - about terror groups operating from Pakistan.

Mr Brown's series of meetings in the region came as Pakistan accused India of violating its airspace. India 
has denied this but has announced a security overhaul. It blames Pakistan-based militants for the Mumbai 
attacks, which killed at least 170 people, including one Briton. Mr Brown said he had wanted to express 
his condolence for the Mumbai attacks at first hand. 


*'Work together'*

He said the "terrible terror outrages" had shocked the whole world and the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba 
(LeT) militant group, thought to be responsible, had "a great deal to answer for". He added: "No country 
should have to go through what India has had to go through as a result of the Mumbai outrages.

"I've said to Prime Minister Singh we will give every help that we can. We will work together in tackling 
terrorism. And we will work together on issue of security. We also know that there have been arrests in 
Pakistan. "We also know that the group responsible is LeT and that they have a great deal to answer for."

India has urged Pakistan to take action over the recent attacks. Pakistan denies any involvement, but has 
promised to co-operate with the Indian investigation. Mr Zardari has pledged to take "strong action" against 
terrorists, but has also called on India to share more information about the attacks. 

*Partnership plan*

During a news conference in Islamabad with Mr Zardari, Mr Brown proposed the start of a new partnership 
with Pakistan to fight terrorism. The "pact against terror" funding will go towards anti-car bomb equipment 
and material to educate people out of becoming extremists, he said.

"The time has come for action and not words, and I want to help Pakistan and other countries root out 
terrorism. "In return for this action we will continue to expand our counter-terrorist assistance programme 
with Pakistan, and it will be more than ever, the most comprehensive anti-terrorist programme Britain has 
signed with any country."

Speaking during a surprise visit to Afghanistan on Saturday, Mr Brown said wherever there was terrorism, 
it had to be fought. He described Pakistan's border region with the country, where he met troops fighting 
the Taleban, as one end of a "chain of terror" that could stretch to Britain if more was not done to tackle 
the threat of al-Qaeda.

The prime minister's visit to Afghanistan came a day after four Royal Marines were killed in two separate 
bomb attacks. Mr Brown spoke of his "disgust and horror" at the willingness of the Taleban to use a 
13-year-old child to deliver a bomb in a wheelbarrow to a Marine patrol, killing three men and the boy.

The PM is expected to update MPs on the security situation in Afghanistan in a statement to the House 
of Commons on Monday. 

India has denied this but has announced a security overhaul. It blames Pakistan-based militants for the 
Mumbai attacks, which killed at least 170 people, including one Briton.


----------



## Yrys

Taliban on agenda as Zardari visits Afghanistan, CNN

KABUL, Afghanistan (CNN) -- Pakistan's president will use his first visit to Afghanistan 
to discuss how the country's can unite to defeat terrorists.

 Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari travels to the Afghan capital, Kabul, Friday to meet 
Hamid Karzai and other high-ranking government officials. The visit comes amid 
ongoing warfare and tension along the Afghan-Pakistan border.

Some of the Taliban militants conducting attacks in Afghanistan have been based in 
Pakistan's North West Frontier Province and nearby tribal regions. The group's 
resurgence has prompted U.S. commanders and the incoming Barack Obama 
administration to put more of a focus on confronting militants along the volatile border.

In the past, Afghan and Pakistani leaders have blamed the other for the security 
problems in the region. Zardari will be accompanied by the governor of North-West 
Frontier Province, as well as his foreign minister and adviser on internal affairs.

The two presidents also will discuss expansion of bilateral relations and trade, and 
they plan to hold a joint press conference. The two leaders have met before, and 
Karzai visited Pakistan in September to attend Zardari's swearing-in ceremony.


----------



## phoenixbear

Yrys said:
			
		

> Gordon Brown says it is time for "action, not words"
> 
> Three-quarters of the most serious terror plots being investigated by UK authorities have links to
> Pakistan, UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has said.
> 
> He was unveiling a £6m ($8.9m) deal with Pakistan he called "the most comprehensive anti-terrorist
> programme" between the UK and another country. He is in Pakistan meeting President Asif Ali Zardari,
> following talks with India's premier Manmohan Singh.
> 
> UK police want to quiz a Pakistani suspect in the Mumbai attacks. They want to interview Mohammed
> Ajmal Amir Qasab - the sole gunman taken alive - about terror groups operating from Pakistan.
> 
> Mr Brown's series of meetings in the region came as Pakistan accused India of violating its airspace. India
> has denied this but has announced a security overhaul. It blames Pakistan-based militants for the Mumbai
> attacks, which killed at least 170 people, including one Briton. Mr Brown said he had wanted to express
> his condolence for the Mumbai attacks at first hand.
> 
> 
> *'Work together'*
> 
> He said the "terrible terror outrages" had shocked the whole world and the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba
> (LeT) militant group, thought to be responsible, had "a great deal to answer for". He added: "No country
> should have to go through what India has had to go through as a result of the Mumbai outrages.
> 
> "I've said to Prime Minister Singh we will give every help that we can. We will work together in tackling
> terrorism. And we will work together on issue of security. We also know that there have been arrests in
> Pakistan. "We also know that the group responsible is LeT and that they have a great deal to answer for."
> 
> India has urged Pakistan to take action over the recent attacks. Pakistan denies any involvement, but has
> promised to co-operate with the Indian investigation. Mr Zardari has pledged to take "strong action" against
> terrorists, but has also called on India to share more information about the attacks.
> 
> *Partnership plan*
> 
> During a news conference in Islamabad with Mr Zardari, Mr Brown proposed the start of a new partnership
> with Pakistan to fight terrorism. The "pact against terror" funding will go towards anti-car bomb equipment
> and material to educate people out of becoming extremists, he said.
> 
> "The time has come for action and not words, and I want to help Pakistan and other countries root out
> terrorism. "In return for this action we will continue to expand our counter-terrorist assistance programme
> with Pakistan, and it will be more than ever, the most comprehensive anti-terrorist programme Britain has
> signed with any country."
> 
> Speaking during a surprise visit to Afghanistan on Saturday, Mr Brown said wherever there was terrorism,
> it had to be fought. He described Pakistan's border region with the country, where he met troops fighting
> the Taleban, as one end of a "chain of terror" that could stretch to Britain if more was not done to tackle
> the threat of al-Qaeda.
> 
> The prime minister's visit to Afghanistan came a day after four Royal Marines were killed in two separate
> bomb attacks. Mr Brown spoke of his "disgust and horror" at the willingness of the Taleban to use a
> 13-year-old child to deliver a bomb in a wheelbarrow to a Marine patrol, killing three men and the boy.
> 
> The PM is expected to update MPs on the security situation in Afghanistan in a statement to the House
> of Commons on Monday.
> 
> 
> pity Blair/Broon etc and his pretend govt hadn't taken the same stance with the IRA as he has with al queda etc rather than giving into them and allowing them into government and giving them everything they wanted.....  double standards, two faced twisted scumballs.....
> 
> India has denied this but has announced a security overhaul. It blames Pakistan-based militants for the
> Mumbai attacks, which killed at least 170 people, including one Briton.


----------



## Yrys

Threatened Pakistan schools close







Private schools in Pakistan's troubled north-western Swat district have 
closed to comply with a Taleban edict banning girls' education, officials 
say.

The edict was issued on schools in Swat by a Taleban cleric in a radio 
broadcast last month. A 15 January deadline was set. Owners say the 
schools will not reopen until the conflict in Swat is resolved, or the 
Taleban revoke the ban.

The government says it will do all it can to protect education.

*Security pledge*

School owners in Mingora, the administrative centre of Swat district, 
say even if they keep the schools open, parents are unlikely to send 
their children in view of the Taleban threat.

"The local administration called a meeting of Mingora's school owners 
two days ago and promised to provide security to us if we remained 
open, but no-one is ready to run the risk,", Ahmad Shah, a Mingora 
school owner, told the BBC.

There are more than 350 privately owned schools in Swat, each with 
separate sections for boys and girls, according to data available from 
a local association of schools. Over the past year, most of them were 
ordered closed by the Taleban, except 96 schools that operated in 
Mingora town. They have now closed, bringing all privately 
administered girls' education in Swat to an end.

The Taleban have destroyed nearly 150 schools in the last year.

Minister for Information and Broadcasting Sherry Rehman said on 
Friday that the government would work with the provincial administration 
to protect education, particularly for girls, in North West Frontier Province.
She expected a resolution in the National Assembly against the attacks on schools.


----------



## Yrys

Musharraf: Pakistan 'treated unequally' in war on terror

(CNN) -- Pakistan's former president said his country is being treated "unequally" 
to other countries, despite being a staunch ally of the United States in its war on 
terror. "Pakistan is being treated so unequally while we are the ones who are in 
the lead role fighting the global war on terror," said Pervez Musharraf, interviewed 
by CNN's Wolf Blitzer for "The Situation Room."

"This is what hurts Pakistan. It hurts the leadership. Indeed, it hurts the government. 
It hurts the people of Pakistan," said Musharraf, speaking from Dallas, Texas, during 
a book tour in the United States.

The interview took place amid reports Friday of U.S. drones striking militant targets 
in Pakistan just days after the start of the Obama administration -- which has made 
combating al Qaeda and Taliban militants in the Pakistan tribal region near Afghanistan 
its most immediate national security priority.

Musharraf was asked whether he is comfortable with the continuation of the attacks, 
even with a new U.S. president in place. "Nobody in Pakistan is comfortable with the 
strikes across the border. There is no doubt in that. Public opinion is very much against it," 
he said. "But as far as this issue of the new president -- President Obama having taken 
over and this continuing -- but I have always been saying that policies don't change with 
personalities; policies have national interest, and policies depend on an environment.

"So the environment and national interest of the United States being the same, I thought 
policies will remain constant," he said.  Musharraf also addressed a statement he made 
about the $10 billion in assistance from the United States that Pakistan has received, 
calling it a "pittance for a country which is in the lead role to fight terrorism."

He emphasized his gratitude to the United States for the funding, but said the amount is 
low compared to billions spent in Afghanistan and "maybe over a trillion dollars" in Iraq.
"Please don't think that this $10 billion was such a great amount that we ought to be 
eternally grateful while we know that we deserve much more and we should have got 
much more and we must get much more if we are to fight the global war on terror," he said.

Musharraf stressed that Pakistan was "in the lead role fighting a war for you for 10 years, 
between '79 and '89," a reference to Pakistan's alliance with the United States and the Afghan 
mujahedeen rebels during the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Musharraf emphasized that for 
42 years, up until 1989, Pakistan had been a "strategic partner" of the United States.

But many Pakistanis felt abandoned by the United States after the Russians pulled out of 
Afghanistan. Musharraf said the 1989 "peace dividend" went to Europe -- East Europe. 
Pakistan was "left alone" from 1989 to 2001, and during that period, the militant Taliban 
movement took control of Afghanistan.

"What did Pakistan get out of fighting for 10 years with you? Nothing, sir," he said, explaining 
why public opinion in Pakistan has been "so much against the United States."

Musharraf said public opinion in his country is strongly against strikes by U.S. drones against 
militants in the Pakistani tribal region. While al Qaeda and the Taliban must be confronted, 
he said, "public opinion is certainly against the methodology being adopted." 

Musharraf, once Pakistan's army chief, resigned under intense political pressure in August as 
the ruling coalition began taking steps to impeach him. He swept to power in 1999 in a 
bloodless coup. Asked why al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, who is thought to be somewhere 
in the border region, hasn't been found, he replied:

"I would like to ask the United States why he hasn't been found. They have their intelligence. There 
are -- you have more intelligence capability. I would like to ask the United States, why Mullah Omar 
has not been found, who is the leader of all of the Taliban in Afghanistan?"


----------



## Fishbone Jones

He should just ask Pakistan's Inter-Services-Intelligence where Omar is, and likely bin Laden also. They're the ones supporting him.


----------



## tomahawk6

What hurts Pakistan is their support of fundamentalism which now has infected their country at all levels of society. Pakistan is the classic state within a state. The center has ceded control of the tribal areas to the taliban and it looks to me like Karachi has been infiltrated by the taliban and have close ties with organized crime. The west also bear some responsibility for the mess by pulling the rug out from under Musharraf and backing Bhutto. Now we have Bhutto's corrupt husband Mr 10% in charge.
Pakistan's weakness is also our achilles heel in Afghanistan. 

I hate to say it but one way to improve security in Afghanistan is to see an Indian invasion of Pakistan. I would think that such an invasion would draw jihadists like moths to a flame.


----------



## a_majoor

More bad news for Pakistan (and the region):

http://www.captainsjournal.com/2009/01/25/has-swat-fallen-to-the-taliban/



> *Has Swat Fallen to the Taliban?*
> BY Herschel Smith
> 12 hours, 6 minutes ago
> The Captain’s Journal has kept close watch over the Talibanization of the FATA.  Amir Mir gives us reason to believe that Taliban control over the FATA and NWFP is almost complete.
> 
> Fifteen months after the launching of a military operation in the lush-green picturesque valley of Swat by the Pakistan army to dismantle the militant network of Maulana Fazalullah, a major part of the mountainous region seems to have fallen to the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan and Swat apparently lives under the Sharia of Fazalullah.
> 
> Not too long ago, the idyll Swat valley, with its rolling hills, gushing streams and scenic vistas, was described as Pakistan’s Switzerland. However, ever since the beginning of the military operation in 2007 the law and order situation in Swat has gone from bad to worse, converting this paradise on earth into a valley of death and destruction. Around 10,000 militants of the Tehrik-e-Taliban have been pitted against 15,000 Pakistan army troops since October 22, 2007 when the operation was officially launched. Leading the charge against the Pakistan army is Maulana Fazalullah, who is also known as Mullah Radio for the illegal FM radio channel he operates. Through his FM broadcast that is still operational despite being banned by the NWFP government, Fazalullah keeps inspiring his followers to implement Islamic Shariat, fight the Pakistan army, and establish his authority in the area …
> 
> While following in the footsteps of the former Taliban regime of Afghanistan, the militants of Fazalullah are also pursuing a rigid agenda of religious beliefs which is based on a violent jehadi doctrine. Barbers in Swat and its adjoining districts under have been ordered not to shave beards and shops selling CDs and music cassettes ordered to close down. In some places, just a handful of the militants control a village since they rule by fear - beheading government sympathizers, blowing up bridges and asking women to wear all-encompassing burqas. Similarly, the army is manning several police stations in Swat because the police force there had been decimated by desertions and militant killings. The gravity of the law and order situation can be gauged from the fact that one of the busiest squares in Mingora has been renamed by the shopkeepers as ’Khooni Chowk’ because every morning, as they come to their shops, they would find four or five dead bodies hung over the poles or the trees.
> 
> Mir also points to the larger organization to which Fazlullah belongs - the Tehrik-i-Taliban, which he decided to join in 2007.
> 
> Soon after the Lal Masjid operation, Fazalullah decided to join hands with the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan led by Commander Baitullah Mehsud, in a bid to provide an umbrella to all insurgent movements operating in several tribal agencies and settled areas of the NWFP. Since then, Fazalullah and his followers are toeing Baitullah’s line, whether they are issuing a decree, signing a peace deal with the government or scrapping the same. Therefore, it appears by all accounts that the small coterie of Fazalullah-led militants is working in the same mould as the fanatic clerics of the Lal Masjid did, to make the Swat district hostage to its rigid vision of militant Islam. And remember, the valley is hardly 160 kilometers from Islamabad.
> 
> Mir inexplicably calls Fazlulah’s followers a “small coterie” of militants.  If this was true, the Pakistan Army would have been successful in its operations in the FATA and NWFP.  In fact, there is reason to believe that the Tehrik-i-Taliban has as many as a division of fighters in Swat.
> 
> The governor of Pakistan’s North West Frontier Province has been quoted as saying that there are 15,000 militants in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA).
> 
> The fighters, who would very nearly constitute a small army division, “have no dearth of rations, ammunition, equipment, even anti-tank mines,”  Owais Ahmad Ghani told a team from the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan led by Asma Jahangir, according to newspaper reports. A militant or a foot soldier earned between  6,000 ($75) to 8000 rupees a month while commanders took home 20,000 rupees to 30,000 rupees, the governor said.
> 
> The TTP is apparently so confident in its power and de facto authority in Swat that they have summoned Swat valley political leaders and dignitaries before Sharia courts.
> 
> A radical Pakistani Taliban cleric is demanding that a group of more than 50 Swat Valley dignitaries appear in his Islamic “court,” local media says.
> 
> Maulana Fazullah (sic), commander of the local Taliban militia in the northwestern Pakistan region, wants its provincial and federal lawmakers, dignitaries, elders and their families to present themselves in his sharia court within a week or be hunted down, the Press Trust of India, quoting local media, reported Sunday.
> 
> There are too many media reports to mention that indicate that the organization of al Qaeda is staggering under the heavy load of targeted UAV strikes against its leadership in the tribal areas of Pakistan.  True or not, it should be remembered about the TTP that while they were spawned by the Taliban of Afghanistan and aid them in the struggle against U.S. forces there, they have evolved into a much more radical organization than the original Taliban bent on global engagement, what Nicholas Schmidle calls the Next-Gen Taliban.
> 
> The TTP shout to passersby in Khyber “We are Taliban! We are mujahedin! “We are al-Qaida!”  There is no distinction.  A Pakistan interior ministry official has even said that the TTP and al Qaeda are one and the same.  As for their global vision, Baitullah Mehsud has said “We want to eradicate Britain and America, and to shatter the arrogance and tyranny of the infidels. We pray that Allah will enable us to destroy the White House, New York, and London.”
> 
> The celebration of the demise of al Qaeda should be a short one, with full knowledge that something just as bad, bigger and more powerful is replacing it in the FATA and NWFP region of Pakistan.  Our attention should return to the global counterinsurgency in which we are engaged, with full commitment to the defeat of militant jihad wherever it becomes manifest.


----------



## Yrys

'US missile strikes' hit Pakistan

At least 18 people are reported dead in a suspected US drone attack 
near the Afghan border in north-west Pakistan. Two missiles fired by 
the drone struck the home of a local tribesman in the Kurram tribal 
region, officials say. The building was being used as a Taleban 
recruitment office, officials told the BBC.

The US has launched many similar attacks in recent months, mostly 
targeting Taleban and al-Qaeda militants in Pakistan's tribal regions.
Local administration officials told the BBC the home was being used 
by the organisation of Taleban leader Baitullah Mehsud.

The Pakistani government has not yet commented on the incident.
The attack took place in the Sarpul area of Kurram, about 15km (nine 
miles) from the border with Afghanistan's Khost province.

*Serious differences*

"Smoke can be seen over the area where the missiles struck," a security 
official told Reuters news agency. The official said the "Afghan Taleban 
were holding an important meeting there when the missiles were fired". 
The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan in Islamabad says the strike is the first to 
target the Taleban in the Kurram tribal region.

The area has been the scene of an ongoing sectarian war between Sunni 
Taleban militants and local Shia militias. The strike is also the second to 
target Baitullah Mehsud's organisation in as many days.

On Saturday, two missiles destroyed a house near the Afghan border 
reportedly being used as a meeting place by his men. At least 28 militants, 
including foreign fighters, were killed in that attack.

Kurram, which is less than 100km from the Afghan capital, Kabul, served 
as the most important launching pad for the Afghan mujahideen during the 
Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s.

Last month, suspected US missile strikes killed at least 25 militants close 
to the Afghan border.

More than 20 attacks have been carried out from drones on targets in 
north-western Pakistan in recent months.

The US and Pakistan have had serious disagreements over the Afghan 
border zone, with Washington unhappy at Pakistani efforts to tackle 
militants and Islamabad condemning the US drone attacks.

Pakistani leaders had expressed hope that the new US administration 
would halt the controversial air strikes, saying they fuelled public anger 
and complicated Pakistan's own counter-insurgency efforts.

But the drone attacks have continued since Barack Obama was 
inaugurated as US president last month.


----------



## Yrys

Deja-vu in Pakistan crackdown, Wednesday, 11 March 2009





Police arrest opposition supporters in Multan

The latest wave of arrests in Pakistan's most populous province, Punjab, has brought 
an unwelcome feeling that this has all been seen before.

Governments in the past have done this and more to prevent opposition groups from 
destabilising the system, often with unsavoury results.

But unlike in the past, when the army had carte blanche to step in, either as the arbiter 
of political power or as a direct aspirant, the situation this time is far murkier and more 
dangerous. The army has lost much of its credibility as an efficient fighting force or as 
an able administrator.

In the past eight years it has been widely seen as having failed to curb the militant menace 
in spite of having been adequately paid to do so by the international community. When the 
military ruler, Gen Pervez Musharraf, finally quit, he left the country politically fragmented,
economically destitute and exposed to the militant threat.

That is why his political allies were soundly beaten in the 2008 elections.

They delivered a split mandate in favour of the Pakistan People's Party (PPP) and the Pakistan 
Muslim League - Nawaz (PML-N), two bitter rivals from the 1990s who showed signs they had 
grown wiser. That may not be the case any more.

*Mandate*

After a perfect start a year ago, the PPP's Asif Ali Zardari and the PML-N's Nawaz Sharif have 
drifted apart on the issue of the restoration of judges who were sacked by then President 
Musharraf in November 2007. heir differences became more stark last month when a court 
declared that Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shahbaz were ineligible to hold elected office.
The differences over the restoration of judges are political in nature.

Without saying it in so many words, the PPP made it known to the PML-N and others concerned 
that the transfer of power back to civilian rule in March 2008 required an agreement that Mr 
Musharraf would not face further action against him. Restoring the judges would challenge that.

But Nawaz Sharif considered this contrary to his election mandate. Many in Pakistan believe that 
Mr Sharif considers the restoration of the judges the first step towards laying a legal trap for 
Mr Musharraf, who had toppled Mr Sharif's government in a military coup in 1999. Mr Sharif 
continued to press for the judges' restoration and quit the federal government in May 2008, 
accusing Mr Zardari - who had then been elected president - of being "insincere".

The government did try to wean the Sharifs from protesting lawyers with political offers, but 
with little success. Then came the court verdict on the Sharifs. Shahbaz Sharif was deposed 
as chief minister of the PML-N stronghold in Punjab province. The Sharifs strengthened their 
ties further with the protesting lawyers.

*Army role*

Nawaz Sharif trained his guns on the president, saying that Gen Musharraf's spirit had "infused 
into Zardari". The government has responded by making it known that it would like to form its 
own administration in Punjab.

It may not allow the PML-N to come back to power in the country's largest and politically most 
influential province, which accounts for two-thirds of its military and bureaucracy.

The general view is that both sides have gone too far to retrace their steps and assume a 
conciliatory posture, at least for the time being. In the past, governments have been able 
to contain violent protests through administrative means, but have generally failed to 
overcome the fallout.

What role will the army play?

One thing is for sure - all of the political elements, even if they are feuding, see the number 
one enemy as a politically active military.


----------



## Yrys

A crisis about more than judges, BBC News, Sunday, 15 March 2009





Many see great dangers in 
the bitter power struggle

Nawaz Sharif has won the latest round in an ongoing battle with the government, 
driving in triumph through a police cordon surrounding his house in Lahore. After 
a jubilant reception from thousands of supporters, Pakistan's main opposition leader 
headed to Islamabad. He is determined to lead lawyers and political activists in the 
final leg of what is called a Long March to push their demand for the restoration of 
the deposed chief justice.

It is not clear how far he will get: the government has sealed the capital to prevent 
protestors from fulfilling their plan to hold an indefinite sit-in in front of parliament.
What is clear is that the challenge has Pakistan's military establishment and 
international allies very worried.

*Power struggle*

Top diplomats including US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have called Mr Sharif 
and the President, Asif Zardari, in recent days. The army chief of staff has been 
holding meetings with the prime minister. All are urging a political resolution 
to the crisis. It is obvious by now that this is about more than judges.

Of course it is true that the restoration of the chief justice, sacked two years ago 
by the then military leader Pervez Musharraf, has been a bone of contention between 
Mr Sharif and Mr Zardari for months.

Mr Sharif accuses the president of failing to honour three written agreements to reinstate 
the top judge. Mr Zardari argues it is a constitutionally complex issue, but his critics say 
he is afraid the restored judiciary would challenge aspects of his rule.

However, the controversy over the Long March mushroomed into a political crisis several 
weeks ago, when the Supreme Court disqualified Nawaz Sharif and his brother Shahbaz 
from holding elected office. The Sharifs saw this as a deliberate attempt, backed by the 
president, to remove them from power, despite Mr Zardari's denials.

That suspicion was reinforced when Asif Zardari imposed federal rule on the Punjab 
province - the power base of Nawaz Sharif's Muslim League Party (PMLN). In effect 
the Sharifs' government was dismissed while the president's representatives began 
negotiations with other parties to permanently replace the PMLN.

Why is this power struggle so dangerous?

*Alarming rhetoric*

First of all, because it puts the main opposition party into a violent confrontation with 
the government. That harkens back to the instability of the 1990s, when Mr Sharif's 
Muslim League and Mr Zardari's Pakistan Peoples' Party traded terms in power, each 
undermining the other. Secondly, it pits the centre against the Punjab. Again history 
demonstrates that when the two are in conflict, the government struggles to function.

Some observers believe Mr Zardari may have tried to remove the Sharifs' provincial 
government for that reason. The president can mobilise the resources of the state, 
but Mr Sharif can mobilise popular and material resources, such as his efforts to send 
thousands of people to lay siege to the capital.

Third, it pits the country's two biggest parties against each other.

The Pakistan Peoples' Party has representation across the country, particularly in the 
province of Sindh, Mr Zardari's base. Nawaz Sharif's Muslim League is the party of the 
Punjab, the largest and wealthiest province. Both can rally the street if they want to, 
violence cannot be ruled out.

Some observers have also expressed concern at rhetoric which appears to endanger 
the fragile threads of Pakistan's federation, implying that a Punjabi leader is trying to 
destabilise a Sindhi president.

The West is alarmed because it wants the Pakistani political forces to focus on battling 
the Taleban and al-Qaeda on the Afghan border, not each other.

The military is alarmed because it sees threats to the integrity of the state. Few believe 
it wants to intervene. Few doubt it will if the situation descends into chaos.

After Mrs Clinton's intervention, President Zardari has offered to appeal against the 
Supreme Court decision, but that has not ended Nawaz Sharif's support for the Long 
March. A reversal of the court ruling may lead to the reinstatement of his government 
in the Punjab, but the opposition leader has made it clear that any political resolution 
of the crisis must include the restoration of the chief justice.


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan ex-PM ignores 'arrest', BBC News, Sunday, 15 March 2009

Protestors set fire to a bus and fought pitched battles with police (54 sec)






Pakistan opposition leader Nawaz Sharif has defied an apparent bid to put him 
under house arrest in Lahore ahead of a "march" on the capital Islamabad.

Thousands of supporters joined him after he broke through a police barricade 
of his home to reach a rally. Police fired tear gas as protesters hurled stones.

Sharif activists later managed to overcome barriers blocking access to the main 
highway to Islamabad and Mr Sharif left Lahore in a convoy. The Pakistan Muslim 
League (PML-N) supporters plan a "long march" to the capital to demand judges
sacked by the former government be reinstated.

"It's now a matter of the future of Pakistani nation and coming generations," 
Mr Sharif said earlier by telephone from his bullet-proof car. "How can we 
abandon our mission halfway?"

Mr Sharif is expected to arrive in Rawalpindi - near Islamabad -in the early hours 
of Monday. He is due to be joined there by his brother, Shahbaz Sharif, former 
chief minister of the Punjab, and leaders of the lawyers' movement.

Police are said to be surrounding the property in Rawalpindi where his brother 
is believed to be staying.

*'Fascist tactics'*

Sharif activists used mobile hydraulic lifts, apparently brought along for the purpose, 
to remove massive containers placed as obstacles on the highway. The BBC's Barbara 
Plett says it is not clear if Mr Sharif will be able to reach Islamabad, given the 
authorities have blocked routes leading to the capital.

Ahead of the protest, the government has also arrested hundreds of opposition activists 
and banned rallies, saying they could trigger violence.

Our Islamabad correspondent says the campaign over the judges has become a power 
struggle between Mr Sharif and current President Asif Ali Zardari.She says the unrest 
has alarmed the West, which wants Pakistan to focus on the battle against the Taleban 
on the Afghan border.

President Zardari - the widower of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto - promised to 
bring back the judges when he took office last year following his wife's assassination.

Early on Sunday, riot police blocked access roads to Mr Sharif's home and reportedly 
baton-charging his supporters. Leaving his home later in the morning, Mr Sharif told a 
crowd: "The house arrest is illegal and immoral. All these decisions are unconstitutional," 
reported AFP news agency. Party spokesman Ahsan Iqbal told the BBC: "A government 
which claims to be a democratic government is coming with such heavy-handed fascist 
tactics."

But interior ministry chief Rehman Malik told the BBC the police were outside Mr Sharif's 
home for his own protection because of the threat from terrorists.

*Long-running tensions*

Mr Sharif was ousted as prime minister in 1999 during a coup by General Pervez Musharraf, 
who ruled until August 2008. Tensions between Mr Zardari and Mr Sharif date back to the 
1990s, but the two formed a brief partnership in government after parliamentary elections 
in February 2008. Mr Sharif's party later left the alliance, complaining of reluctance by 
Mr Zardari's Pakistan People's Party to reinstate the judges sacked by the last government.

Relations have been further strained in recent weeks by a Supreme Court decision to ban 
Mr Sharif and his brother Shahbaz from elected office, and President Zardari's decision to 
put their stronghold in Punjab province under direct rule from Islamabad.

But on Saturday, in a move seen as a conciliatory gesture, the government agreed to seek 
a review of the Supreme Court ruling.

The political instability comes as Pakistan faces an economic crisis and a growing militant 
insurgency based in the north-west.


----------



## Yrys

In pictures: Pakistan protests, Sunday, 15 March 2009, 9 pictures





1.Pakistan opposition leader Nawaz Sharif has defied an apparent 
house arrest order, to join a protest in Lahore. Riot police had 
surrounded the former prime minister's home in the city in the early hours.





4.Our Pakistan correspondent says the unrest has become a power 
struggle between Mr Sharif and current President Asif Ali Zardari - 
the widower of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto.





6. Police scattered the crowds and beat a number of stragglers 
with batons, only for the demonstrators to regroup and counter-
attack with fresh supplies of sticks and stones.


----------



## Yrys

Sharif 'joins' Pakistan protest, 21:54 GMT, Sunday, 15 March 2009





Nawaz Sharif has been a long-term 
opponent of the President Zardari

Pakistani opposition leader Nawaz Sharif has joined supporters on a march to the capital 
Islamabad to stage an anti-government protest.

There have been reports that President Asif Ali Zardari has agreed to reinstate sacked 
Supreme Court chief justice Iftikhar Chaudhry. The reinstatement of Mr Chaudhry and 
other judges has been a key opposition demand amid a growing political crisis.

Mr Sharif earlier defied an apparent bid to place him under house arrest. Hundreds of 
police surrounded his home in Lahore but the government denied that he was being 
detained.

Mr Sharif's party, the Pakistan Muslim League (PML-N), has been planning a "long march" 
to arrive in Islamabad on Monday to stage a sit-in to demand the reinstatement of judges 
sacked by former President Pervez Musharraf.

Mr Sharif is expected to arrive in Rawalpindi - near Islamabad - in the early hours of 
Monday. He is due to be joined there by his brother, Shahbaz Sharif, former chief minister 
of the Punjab, and leaders of the lawyers' movement demanding the judges' reinstatement.

Correspondents say the campaign over the judges has become a power struggle between 
Mr Sharif and current President Asif Ali Zardari.


----------



## Mike Baker

Pakitan?


----------



## Yrys

Yes, it's a new country, which secede from its neighbourg,
Afganitan   ...


----------



## Yrys

Mass Demonstration Defies Pakistani Government, NY Times, March 15, 2009





Police officers clashed with protesters in Lahore on Sunday as government efforts 
to suppress a demonstration collapsed.


Pakistan judge 'to be reinstated', at 00:16 GMT, Monday, 16 March 2009





_Iftikhar Chaudhry and other judges 
were sacked by Gen Musharraf_

There are moves in Pakistan to restore the sacked former Supreme Court chief justice, Pakistani
officials have said. Pakistan's High Commissioner to the UK, Wajid Shamsul Hasan, told the BBC 
an announcement was expected soon on Iftikhar Chaudhry's reinstatement.

The move comes as anti-government protesters are planning to march on the capital to demand 
his reinstatement. Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif earlier left a police blockade around his home 
in Lahore to join the protesters.

Riot police had surrounded Mr Sharif's home in an apparent bid to place him under house arrest 
but the government denied that he was being detained.

The reinstatement of Mr Chaudhry and other judges sacked by former President Pervez Musharraf 
has been a key opposition demand amid a growing political crisis. There were clashes as police 
fired tear gas and baton charged Sharif supporters who threw stones at the police.

Sharif activists later managed to overcome barriers blocking access to the main highway to 
Islamabad and Mr Sharif left Lahore in a convoy. 

Rest of the article on link


----------



## CougarKing

A Pakistani Police Academy was just attacked with pictures from the attack below:






_A TV grab shows Pakistani policemen trying to take cover as a body is seen in the foreground in Lahore after gunmen attacked a police training school. At least 20 people were killed Monday after gunmen stormed the school, police officials told AFP.
(AFP/NDTV)_






_Pakistani police officers take cover outside a police training school on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Monday, March 30, 2009. Pakistani soldiers and other security forces laid siege Monday to the police academy that heavily armed gunmen attacked earlier, killing 11 officers and taking others hostage in a brazen assault that underscored the growing threat militancy poses to the U.S.-allied, nuclear-armed country.
(AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)_






_A Pakistani police officer takes cover behind a fallen horse outside a police training school on the outskirts of Lahore, Pakistan, Monday, March 30, 2009. Pakistani soldiers and other security forces laid siege Monday to the police academy that heavily armed gunmen attacked earlier, killing 11 officers and taking others hostage in a brazen assault that underscored the growing threat militancy poses to the U.S.-allied, nuclear-armed country.
(AP Photo/K.M. Chaudary)_
















_Policemen lie dead and injured after a shooting at a police training centre in Lahore March 30, 2009. Militants holed up in the police training centre in the Pakistani city of Lahore on Monday after storming the building, with estimates of the dead ranging up to 20. Interior Ministry chief Rehman Malik said 52 police were wounded in the attack but gave no word on the number killed, while Geo News television channel said the toll was 20.
REUTERS/Mohsin Raza (PAKISTAN CONFLICT SOCIETY IMAGE OF THE DAY TOP PICTURE)_


----------



## CougarKing

Perhaps it's time for a "Pakistan Instability" superthread?

Other threads the mods should consider for merging with this include:

 "The Bhutto Assasination" thread

"Pakistan March 2009 unrests" thread

"Monster Bhutto created" thread

Attacking into Pakistan (Western intervention) thread


Done, thanks.
Bruce



> http://www.smh.com.au/world/warning-that-pakistan-is-in-danger-of-collapse-within-months-20090412-a40u.html
> 
> *Warning that Pakistan is in danger of collapse within months*
> Paul McGeough
> April 13, 2009
> 
> PAKISTAN could collapse within months, one of the more influential counter-insurgency voices in Washington says.
> 
> The warning comes as the US scrambles to redeploy its military forces and diplomats in an attempt to stem rising violence and anarchy in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
> 
> "We have to face the fact that if Pakistan collapses it will dwarf anything we have seen so far in whatever we're calling the war on terror now," said David Kilcullen, a former Australian Army officer who was a specialist adviser for the Bush administration and is now a consultant to the Obama White House.
> 
> "You just can't say that you're not going to worry about al-Qaeda taking control of Pakistan and its nukes," he said.
> 
> As the US implements a new strategy in Central Asia so comprehensive that some analysts now dub the cross-border conflict "Obama's war", Dr Kilcullen said time was running out for international efforts to pull both countries back from the brink.
> 
> When he unveiled his new "Afpak" policy in Washington last month, the US President, Barack Obama, warned that while al-Qaeda would fill the vacuum if Afghanistan collapsed, the terrorist group was already rooted in Pakistan, plotting more attacks on the US.
> 
> "The safety of people round the world is at stake," he said.
> 
> Laying out the scale of the challenges facing the US in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, Dr Kilcullen put the two countries invaded by US-led forces after the September 11 attacks on the US on a par - each had a population of more than 30 million.
> 
> "But Pakistan has 173 million people and 100 nuclear weapons, an army which is bigger than the American army, and the headquarters of al-Qaeda sitting in two-thirds of the country which the Government does not control," he told the Herald .
> 
> Added to that, the Pakistani security establishment ignored direction from the elected Government in Islamabad as waves of extremist violence spread across the whole country - not only in the tribal wilds of the Afghan border region.
> 
> Cautioning against an excessive focus by Western governments on Afghanistan at the expense of Pakistan, Dr Kilcullen said that "the Kabul tail was wagging the dog". Comparing the challenges in the two, he said Afghanistan was a campaign to defend a reconstruction program. "It's not really about al-Qaeda. Afghanistan doesn't worry me. Pakistan does."
> 
> But he was hesitant about the level of resources for, and the likely impact of, Washington's new drive to emulate an Iraq-style "surge" by sending an extra 21,000 troops to Afghanistan.
> 
> "In Iraq, five brigades went into the centre of Baghdad in five months. In Afghanistan, it will be two combat brigades [across the country] in 12 months. That will have much less of a punch effect than we had in Iraq.
> 
> "We can muddle through in Afghanistan. It is problematic and difficult but we know what to do. What we don't know is if we have the time or if we can afford the cost of what needs to be done."
> 
> Dr Kilcullen said a fault line had developed in the West's grasp of circumstances on each side of the Durand Line, the disputed border between Afghanistan and Pakistan.
> 
> "In Afghanistan, it's easy to understand, difficult to execute. But in Pakistan, it is very difficult to understand and it's extremely difficult for us to generate any leverage, because Pakistan does not want our help.
> 
> "In a sense there is no Pakistan - no single set of opinion. Pakistan has a military and intelligence establishment that refuses to follow the directions of its civilian leadership. They have a tradition of using regional extremist groups as unconventional counterweights against India's regional influence."
> 
> In the absence of a regional diplomatic initiative to build economic and trade confidences before tackling the security issue, the implication, Dr Kilcullen said, was that India alone could not give Pakistan the security guarantees Islamabad required.
> 
> The special US envoy Richard Holbrooke has been charged with brokering a regional compact by reaching out to Iran, Russia and China, and Dr Kilcullen said: "This is exactly what he's good at and it could work.
> 
> "But will it? It requires regional architecture to give the Pakistani security establishment a sense of security which might make them stop supporting the Taliban," he said.
> 
> "The best case scenario is that the US can deal with Afghanistan, with President Obama giving leadership while the extra American troops succeed on the ground - at the same time as Mr Holbrooke seeks a regional security deal," he said. The worst case was that Washington would fail to stabilise Afghanistan, Pakistan would collapse and al-Qaeda would end up running what he called 'Talibanistan.'
> 
> "This is not acceptable. You can't have al-Qaeda in control of Pakistan's missiles," he said.
> 
> "It's too early to tell which way it will go. We'll start to know about July. That's the peak fighting season … and a month from the Afghan presidential election."


----------



## 54/102 CEF

Very effective propaganda pic

War on the Cheap

Watch for the Black Clad bastards on the Tarmac at Islamabad

Big Canadian Community about to get bigger 

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/24/world/asia/24pstan.html


----------



## tomahawk6

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistani authorities on Thursday deployed paramilitary troops to a district, only 96 kilometers (60 miles) from the capital, where Taliban militants appeared to be consolidating control after this week's land-grab.

Militants locked up courthouses and seized court documents in the district of Buner, said police Superintendent Arsala Khan.

However, a highly placed Buner official said the judges left voluntarily after meeting with Taliban leaders.

A van carrying Frontier Corps paramilitary troops through the district came under fire Thursday. One police official was killed and another wounded, authorities said.

The troops were sent to protect civilians and properties, said Maj. Gen Athar Abbas, spokesman for Pakistan's military.

He said the government was monitoring the situation closely, and talks were under way among community elders, the civilian administration and the Taliban.

"Taliban is only in control of 25 percent of Buner district," Abbas said. "The Taliban will either move out or they'll be thrown out, one way or another."

The militant group's leaders met with community elders and the civilian administration Thursday and agreed that its members will not move about openly with guns nor will they disturb police, courts, schools, hospitals or non-governmental organizations. 

The takeover of Buner brings the Taliban closer to the capital, Islamabad, than it has been since the insurgency started.

The Taliban commander in Buner, Mowlana Mohammed Khalil, gave a statement before Pakistani television cameras Wednesday, appearing with his face hidden behind a cloth mask.


"We came here only to preach Islam," Khalil said. He added that his fighters were carrying weapons only because they were an important symbol for Muslims.

The militants said they took control of the Buner district to ensure that Islamic law, or sharia, was properly imposed. The Pakistani government called the advance into the district a breach of a recently signed peace agreement.

Residents of Buner said the militants had set up checkpoints and were patrolling streets throughout the district.

Speaking by telephone from Buner on Wednesday night, Sardar Hussain Babik, education minister for the North West Frontier Province regional government, accused the militants of looting the offices of non-government organizations and stealing cars.

"We are collecting from different parts of the province," he said.
A few hours' drive away, in the Pakistani capital, salesmen hawking Urdu newspapers in morning traffic on Thursday called out headlines over the din of car engines.Taliban has entered Islamabad," a newsboy yelled.

On Wednesday, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned that Pakistan was in danger of falling into terrorist hands because of failed government policies, and called on Pakistani citizens and expatriates to voice more concern.

"I think that we cannot underscore the seriousness of the existential threat posed to the state of Pakistan by continuing advances, now within hours of Islamabad, that are being made by a loosely confederated group of terrorists and others who are seeking the overthrow of the Pakistani state, a nuclear-armed state," Clinton told the House Foreign Affairs Committee in her first appearance before Congress since being confirmed.

"I don't hear that kind of outrage and concern coming from enough people that would reverberate back within the highest echelons of the civilian and military leadership of Pakistan."

Mike Mullen, U.S. chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, was in Islamabad on Wednesday to meet with Pakistani officials.

Taliban militants implemented Islamic law in Pakistan's violence-plagued Swat Valley last week, before taking control of the neighboring Buner district. But Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, Husain Haqqani, told CNN on Wednesday that the situation was not as dire as Clinton described.

"Yes, we have a challenge," Haqqani said. "But, no, we do not have a situation in which the government or the country of Pakistan is about to fall to the Taliban."

Taliban fighters moved into the Swat Valley as part of a peace deal with the government that has come under fire from U.S. observers. But Haqqani compared it to the deals U.S. commanders in Iraq made to peel insurgents away from Islamic jihadists blamed for the worst attacks on civilians there.

Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani said at a news briefing Thursday: "I want to explain to the West and Hillary Clinton about the agreement. ... The agreement is actually a very good thing. ... It brings two parties to an agreement based on mutual understanding."

"We have to establish control of government in Malakand division," which includes Swat, he said. "If peace is not restored in that area [Malakand], certainly we have to review our policy."

"If there is an effort of Taliban-ization, we have the right to review our policy." 

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/as...wat/index.html


----------



## 54/102 CEF

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/04/22/zakaria.pakistan/index.html

see the last para -


----------



## Corey Darling

Aired on the 14th

"Pakistan: Children of the Taliban"  PBS Frontline Documentary  36 mins

http://www.pbs.org/frontlineworld/stories/pakistan802/video/video_index.html


----------



## Michael OLeary

*Does Pakistan's Taliban Surge Raise a Nuclear Threat?*
By Mark Thompson / Washington Friday, Apr. 24, 2009



> When asked last year about the security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal, Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Admiral Mike Mullen didn't hesitate: "I'm very comfortable that the nuclear weapons in Pakistan are secure," he said flatly. Asked the same question earlier this month, his answer had changed. "I'm reasonably comfortable," he said, "that the nuclear weapons are secure."
> 
> As America's top military officer, Mullen has traveled regularly to Pakistan — twice in just the past two weeks — for talks with his Pakistani counterpart, General Ashfaq Kayani, and others. And like all those who have risen to four-star rank, Mullen chooses his words with extreme care. Replacing "very comfortable" with "reasonably comfortable" is a decidedly discomforting signal of Washington's concern that no matter how well-guarded the nukes may be today, the chaos now enveloping Pakistan doesn't bode well for their status tomorrow or the day after. (See pictures of the recent militant attack on a Pakistani police academy)
> 
> The prospect of turmoil in Pakistan sends shivers up the spines of those U.S. officials charged with keeping tabs on foreign nuclear weapons. Pakistan is thought to possess about 100 — the U.S. isn't sure of the total, and may not know where all of them are. Still, if Pakistan collapses, the U.S. military is primed to enter the country and secure as many of those weapons as it can, according to U.S. officials.
> 
> The U.S. has been keeping a watchful eye on Pakistan's nukes since it first detonated a series of devices a decade ago. "Pakistan has taken important steps to safeguard its nuclear weapons, although vulnerabilities still exist," Army General Michael Maples, chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told the Senate Armed Services Committee last month. Then, he immediately turned to the threat posed by al-Qaeda, which, along with the Taliban, is sowing unrest in Pakistan. "Al-Qaeda continues efforts to acquire chemical, biological, radiological or nuclear materials," he said, "and would not hesitate to use such weapons if the group develops sufficient capabilities."
> 
> The concern in Washington is less that al-Qaeda or the Taliban would manage to actually seize Pakistan's nuclear weapons, but instead that increasingly-radicalized younger Pakistanis are finding their way into military and research circles where they may begin to play a growing role in the nation's nuclear-weapons program. Pakistani officials insist their personnel safeguards are stringent, but a sleeper cell could cause big trouble, U.S. officials say.
> 
> Nowhere in the world is the gap between would-be terror-martyrs and the nuclear weapons they crave as small as it is in Pakistan. Nor is their much comfort in the fact that Abdul Qadeer Khan, the father of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal who was recently ordered freed from house arrest by the country's supreme court, was the Johnny Appleseed of nuclear proliferation, dispatching the atomic genie to Iran, Libya and North Korea. But U.S. and Pakistani officials insist it is important to separate Pakistan's poor proliferation record with what is, by all accounts, a modern and multilayered system designed to protect its nuclear weapons from falling into the wrong hands.
> 
> For starters, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials, there is no way a complete nuclear weapon can be plucked from Islamabad's stockpile, which is protected by about 10,000 of the Pakistani military's most elite troops. The guts of the nuclear warhead are kept separate from the rest of the device, and a nuclear detonation is impossible without both pieces. Additionally, the delivery vehicle — plane or missile — is also segregated from the warhead components.



More at link.[/utl]


----------



## CougarKing

Reportedly, the Taliban have withdrawn to the Swat valley...for now.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hkiMxbHNH0BqgpWA2ZG6VD6wVTmAD97OQNM00



> *Pakistani Taliban pull back to Swat stronghold*
> By RIAZ KHAN – 3 hours ago
> 
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — Taliban militants began pulling out of a recently seized district of northwestern Pakistan on Friday and returning to a stronghold where they have signed a peace deal with the government, a local official and the insurgents said.
> 
> The apparent withdrawal from Buner is unlikely to do much to ally Western fears that Islamabad is failing to deal forcefully with militants seen as slowly expanding into the heart of the country from strongholds close to the Afghan order.
> 
> Witness said scores of militants had effectively taken control of Buner since the government formally agreed to a peace deal in the adjoining Swat Valley region early this month. Buner is just 60 miles (100 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad, and the advance raised alarm bells in Pakistan and the West.
> 
> TV images showed dozens of militants emerging on Friday from a high-walled villa that served as their headquarters in Buner, a rural area in the foothills of the Karakoram mountains. The men, most of them masked with black scarves and carrying automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades, clambered into several pickup trucks and minibuses before driving away.
> 
> Syed Mohammed Javed, the top government administrator in the region, said a hard-line cleric who helped mediate the disputed peace deal persuaded the Taliban to return to Swat in a meeting on Friday.
> 
> "We told them that we have a deal, we have a peace agreement. We told them not to become a tool in the hands of someone aiming at sabotaging the peace in the region," Javed told The Associated Press by telephone from Buner.
> 
> Javed said he and the aging cleric, Sufi Muhammad, were leading the Taliban convoy back to Mingora, Swat's main town, but it was not clear when they would cross the mountains passes leading out of Buner.
> 
> The government agreed in February to impose Islamic law in Swat and surrounding areas of the northwest in return for a cease-fire that halted nearly two years of bloody fighting between militants and Pakistani security forces.
> 
> But hard-liners have seized on the concession to demand Islamic law across the country, and the Swat Taliban used it to justify their push into Buner, putting them within striking distance of the capital and key roads leading to the main northwestern city of Peshawar.
> 
> The U.S. is considering rooting out militant sanctuaries in Pakistan critical to success in the Afghan war. It also worries about the security of Pakistan's nuclear weapons.
> 
> U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Wednesday that Pakistan's leaders were "abdicating to the Taliban" in Swat, and on Thursday told U.S. lawmakers the Obama administration was trying to convince Islamabad to shift its traditional security focus from archrival India to Islamic extremists.
> 
> With the pressure mounting, the army, whose ability and commitment to combating Islamist extremists is under intense international scrutiny, issued an unusually tough statement Friday.
> 
> Apparently referring to the Swat deal, army chief Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani said it was "meant to give the reconciliatory forces a chance (but) must not be taken for a concession to the militants."
> 
> Kayani said the army was "determined to root out the menace of terrorism" and would "not allow the militants to dictate terms to the government or impose their way of life."
> 
> Government leaders had also warned they would use force if the Swat Taliban — who have beheaded opponents, torched girls schools and denounced democracy as un-Islamic — continue to challenge the state.
> 
> "Those who took up arms must lay them down," Iftikhar Hussain, spokesman for the provincial government in the northwest, said earlier Friday, while issuing what he said was a "last" appeal to the Taliban to quit Buner.
> 
> But they have also sought to counter a rising tide of extremist violence with dialogue and peace deals that critics worry only grant brutal extremists impunity, legitimacy and the time and space to muster more forces.
> 
> The disputed peace accord covers Swat, Buner and other districts in the Malakand Division, an area of about 10,000 square miles (25,900 square kilometers) near the Afghan border and the tribal areas where al-Qaida and the Taliban have strongholds.
> 
> Supporters have said the deal takes away the militants' main rallying call for Islamic law and will let the government gradually reassert control. But the militants have rejected calls for them to give up their arms.
> 
> Taliban commanders insisted their fighters had been preaching peacefully for Islamic law, or Sharia, in Buner and Muslim Khan, their spokesman, said they were leaving "of their own accord, not under any pressure."
> 
> Asked on Express News television if they were breaking the peace accord by carrying weapons, Khan said Sharia allowed every Muslim to carry a gun — "especially those busy in jihad."
> 
> Associated Press writer Asif Shahzad in Islambad contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

Hopefully it won't come to this: with the US/the West intervening by actually putting ground troops in Pakistan, though things seem to be headed that way.



> AMERICA made clear last week that it would attack Taliban forces in their Swat valley stronghold unless the Pakistan government stopped the militants’ advance towards Islamabad.
> A senior Pakistani official said the Obama administration intervened after Taliban forces expanded from Swat into the adjacent district of Buner, 60 miles from the capital.
> 
> The Pakistani Taliban’s inroads raised international concern, particularly in Washington, where officials feared that the nuclear-armed country, which is pivotal to the US war against the Taliban in Afghanistan and against Al-Qaeda, was rapidly succumbing to Islamist extremists.
> 
> “The implicit threat - if you don’t do it, we may have to - was always there,” said the Pakistani official. He said that under American pressure, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency told the Taliban to withdraw from Buner on Friday.
> 
> (....)



http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/asia/article6168940.ece


----------



## gordjenkins

Flux in Pakistani valley after Taliban retreat
Sat, 25 Apr 2009 04:54 pm PDT
Reuters - Taliban fighters remained in a Pakistani valley near the capital on Saturday, but many had pulled out after quitting their main base, officials said  
BUNER, Pakistan (Reuters) – Taliban fighters remained in a Pakistani valley near the capital on Saturday, but many had pulled out after quitting their main base, officials said.

"They have gone, but left their germs here," Abdul Rasheed Khan, the district's top police officer, told Reuters. "Now we have about 200 local Taliban who can be seen on roadsides."

The Taliban's entry into the northwest district of Buner, some 100 km (60 miles) northwest of Islamabad, alarmed Washington during the past week, as fears mounted over the nuclear-armed Muslim state's stability.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, speaking in an interview with Fox News in Baghdad, said Washington believes Pakistan's nuclear arsenal is now secure "but that's given the current configuration of power."

"One of our concerns, which we've raised with the Pakistani government and military, is that if the worst, the unthinkable were to happen, and this advancing Taliban ... were to essentially topple the government for failure to beat them back, then they would have the keys to the nuclear arsenal of Pakistan," Clinton said.

"We can't even contemplate that. We cannot ... let this go on any further. Which is why we're pushing so hard for the Pakistanis to come together around a strategy to take their country back."

Pakistan is a country the West dares not neglect. Its support is critical to defeating al Qaeda and the West's mission to stabilize Afghanistan.

On Friday, guerrilla commander Fazlullah ordered his men to pull back to the neighboring Swat valley, and his spokesman said around 100 fighters were being withdrawn.

Residents saw Taliban fighters abandoning their main base at Sultan Was village in the Buner valley.

A senior security official said the Taliban should lay down arms, allow the police to carry out their duties and allow new courts, known as qazi courts, to deliver justice according to sharia law.

"If they do not do any of this, the state will decide to go for an operation, and this time the operation will be on a larger scale," he said.

While militants from Swat had returned home, armed fighters who hailed from Buner were seen moving around as usual, despite hundreds of police militia being sent to the district.

"They won't lay down their arms so quickly," said Syed Javed Shah, a senior government official in Buner. "They know they have made enemies of people living here whose relatives were killed."

Fazlullah, the Taliban leader in Swat, had forced the government to submit to demands for the imposition of Islamic sharia law across the Malakand Division of North West Frontier Province, which includes Swat and Buner.

While the order for the introduction of sharia in Swat was promulgated by parliament and a reluctant President Asif Ali Zardari earlier this month, it has still to be implemented.

Pakistani officials say the militants' move into Buner and Shangla, another district adjoining Swat, violated terms of a deal meant to keep the peace.

U.S. UNEASE

Western governments, worried Pakistan is sliding into chaos, want to see coherence and action, and Zardari may want to show some steel before talks in Washington with President Barack Obama and his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai on May 6-7. 

The International Monetary Fund had to save Pakistan from an economic meltdown last November. Peace talks with India were suspended after Pakistani militants attacked Mumbai that month. 

Senior U.S. officials have strongly criticized Pakistan's appeasement of militants in Swat, with Clinton having said the state had abdicated authority. 

Grave problems surround the one-year-old civilian government that took over after nearly a decade of military rule. 

U.S. commanders have voiced suspicions that some Pakistani intelligence agents secretly help Islamist militants. 

Army chief General Ashfaq Kayani issued a strongly worded statement on Friday to dispel doubts about the military's capacity and will to fight the militants. 

Overall insecurity has worsened with high profile attacks in Islamabad and Lahore, the capital of Punjab province, and the Taliban has extended its reach across the northwest. 

But the army has contained militant activity in the Waziristan tribal region and defeated them last month in Bajaur, the other tribal region regarded as a militant hotspot. 

(Reporting by Junaid Khan in Swat, Abdul Rehman in Buner, Faris Ali in Peshawar and Kamran Haider and Sheree Sardar in Islamabad; Additional reporting by Arshad Mohammed; Writing by Simon Cameron-Moore; Editing by John O'Callaghan)


----------



## CougarKing

An update about the current Pakistani Army offensive against the Taliban in Pakistan.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/asiapcf/05/03/pakistan.fighting/index.html?iref=mpstoryview



> Pakistan kills 80 in assault on Taliban
> Story Highlights
> Pakistani security forces kill at least 80 militants in country's tribal region
> 
> Pakistani army has been waging a week-long crackdown on Taliban
> 
> Three soldiers killed, eight wounded in crackdown in northwest of country
> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Pakistani armed forces have killed 80 militants since launching an assault on a region recently held by the Taliban, the military announced Sunday.
> 
> Three soldiers have been killed and eight wounded in the crackdown in the Buner district in the northwest of the country, the military statement said.
> 
> The Pakistani offensive started in the province last Sunday, after Taliban militants moved into Buner, a move that alarmed U.S. and Pakistani officials.
> 
> Pakistani security forces also killed at least 16 militants late Friday and early Saturday in the Mohmand district, in the country's volatile tribal region, the country's military said on Saturday.
> 
> The incident appears to be separate from the hostilities in Buner.
> 
> However, it reflects the tensions in the region and could signal a spread of fighting resulting from the crackdown.
> 
> In the incident, about 100 militants attacked a Frontier Corps post in the Mohmand Agency, or district, an area where militants hold great sway. Troops returned fire and killed the 16 militants, the military said.
> 
> Mohmand is in the country's Federally Administered Tribal Areas that border a volatile region in war-torn Afghanistan and Pakistan's North West Frontier Province.
> 
> Earlier this year, Pakistan had entered into an agreement with militants, allowing them to enforce Islamic law, or sharia, in parts of Swat Valley in exchange for ceasing violence. The Swat Valley is a broader area that includes several provincial districts, including Chitral, Swat, Shangla, Malakand, Upper Dir, and Lower Dir.
> 
> But Pakistani officials say the armed militants' advance into Buner district violated the agreement and briefly halted peace talks between the two sides in North West Frontier Province.
> 
> Representatives from Pakistan's government and the Taliban restarted their negotiations on Friday and were planning to have another session soon, a provincial spokesman said.
> 
> The Pakistani government has been criticized for not cracking down on militants along its border with Afghanistan. As a result, the U.S. military has carried out airstrikes against militant targets in Pakistan, which have rankled relations between the two countries.


----------



## CougarKing

He is calling for a coup? Is he crazy? That's not gonna help stabilize this country.  

http://rawstory.com/08/blog/2009/05/01/john-bolton-we-may-have-to-acquiesce-in-a-pakistani-military-takeover/



> John Bolton: We may have to acquiesce in a ‘Pakistani military takeover’
> By Muriel Kane
> 
> Published: May 1, 2009
> Updated 2 days ago
> 
> Perennial Neoconservative gadfly John Bolton, who has often been accused of making exaggerated claims about Middle Eastern threats, is now suggesting that a military coup in Pakistan may be the only viable response to the growing power of the Taliban.
> 
> In an op-ed for Saturday’s Wall Street Journal, Bolton writes, “To prevent catastrophe will require considerable American effort and unquestionably provoke resistance from many Pakistanis, often for widely differing reasons. We must strengthen pro-American elements in Pakistan’s military so they can purge dangerous Islamicists from their ranks; roll back Taliban advances; and, together with our increased efforts in Afghanistan, decisively defeat the militants on either side of the border. This may mean stifling some of our democratic squeamishness and acquiescing in a Pakistani military takeover, if the civilian government melts before radical pressures. So be it.”
> 
> Bolton’s stance on Pakistan appear to go hand-in-hand with his recent attempts to describe the Obama administration’s international outreach efforts as amounting to a “tangible projection of weakness” and “revealing a Jimmy Carter-style unwillingness to do what’s necessary in a hard world to protect America’s interest.”
> 
> Both Bolton’s temper and his attempts to force intelligence analysis to match his own preconceptions are legendary. When he was nominated by former President Bush to be United Nations ambassador in 2005, the former head of the State Department’s intelligence bureau, Carl Ford, testified that Bolton was “a serial abuser” who had tried to have an analyst fired because he disagreed with Bolton’s belief that Cuba has a biological weapons program.
> 
> In his current op-ed, Bolton somewhat surprisingly blames the Bush administration for creating the current crisis by “pushing former President Pervez Musharraf into unwise elections and effectively removing him from power,” a policy which Bolton compares to the 1963 CIA-sponsored overthrow and assassination of South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem.
> 
> Bolton also paradoxically argues that the current danger of Pakistan’s atomic weapons falling into the hands of the Taliban is actually the result of earlier US efforts to discourage Pakistan’s nuclear proliferation.
> 
> “We are reaping the consequences of failed nonproliferation policies that in the past penalized Pakistan for its nuclear program by cutting off military assistance and scaling back the International Military Education and Training (IMET) program that brought hundreds of Pakistani officers to the U.S.” Bolton insists. “Perhaps inevitably, the Pakistani officers who haven’t participated in IMET are increasingly subject to radical influences.”


----------



## gordjenkins

*The Taliban Tightens Hold In Pakistan's Swat Region*
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/04/AR2009050400189.html
By Pamela ConstableWashington Post Foreign Service 
Tuesday, May 5, 2009 
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan, May 4 -- Taliban forces tightened their grip on Pakistan's Swat region Monday and continued resisting the military's efforts to dislodge them from neighboring Buner, bringing a fragile peace accord closer to collapse and the volatile northwest region nearer to full-fledged conflict. 
Yet even as the Taliban continued its rampage and rejected the government's latest concession to its demands -- the appointment of Islamic-law judges in Swat -- Pakistan's military leaders clung to hopes for a nonviolent solution, saying that security forces were "still exercising restraint to honor the peace agreement." 
Behind this strained hope for a peaceful solution lie an array of factors -- competing military priorities, reluctance to fight fellow Muslims, lack of strong executive leadership and some internal sympathy for the insurgents -- that analysts say have long prevented the Pakistani army from making a full-fledged assault on violent Islamist groups. 
Over the past two days, extremists in the northwest have attacked a military convoy, beheaded two soldiers, imposed a curfew and blown up a boys' high school and a police station. Troop reinforcements were sent into Buner on Monday after heavy fighting, and there were reports that the army would imminently launch an attack on Swat, an action that could coincide with a crucial aid-seeking visit to Washington this week by President Asif Ali Zardari, whose government has been criticized by U.S. officials for capitulating to the insurgents.


----------



## gordjenkins

*Face-Off Between Taliban, Pakistani Army Appears Imminent*
Thousands Flee Swat Ahead of Expected Fighting
Face-Off Between Taliban, Pakistani Army Appears Immine

By Pamela Constable and Haq Nawaz Khan
Washington Post Foreign Service 
Wednesday, May 6, 2009 


Residents of Mingaora, the capital of Swat, pack onto buses leaving the region. Army officials ordered residents of Mingaora to leave the area and lifted a nighttime curfew to enable their departure. (Associated Press) 

PESHAWAR, Pakistan, May 5 -- Thousands of panicked civilians began fleeing the conflict-ridden Swat Valley region Tuesday, fearing a full-fledged confrontation between government forces and Taliban fighters after the insurgents declared an end to their peace accord with the government. 

Officials in the North-West Frontier Province said half a million people would join the exodus from Swat, *where Taliban fighters are occupying hundreds of houses and other buildings as they prepare to resist an anticipated assault by Pakistani troops. * 
The rapidly growing crisis came as Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari began two days of intensive talks in Washington with senior U.S. officials and leaders of neighboring Afghanistan about how to combat the threat of Islamist militancy and terrorism in both countries. 

Mian Iftikhar Hussain, the provincial information minister, told journalists in this northwestern capital that six camps would be set up to accommodate refugees from Swat as they flee what was once a tourist destination. Pakistani journalists reported seeing hundreds of frightened families clambering onto buses and trucks Tuesday in Mingaora, capital of the scenic Swat. 

Army officials ordered residents of Mingaora to leave the area and lifted a nighttime curfew to enable their departure. Heavy gunfire was heard throughout the day, and security forces were barricaded inside their bases, while heavily armed Taliban forces patrolled the streets and laid mines. 

A spokesman for the Taliban, Muslim Khan, said the extremist forces controlled 90 percent of the Swat region. He told Pakistani journalists that the Swat peace deal, in which officials agreed to implement strict Islamic law in the region if the insurgents agreed to disarm, was now dead. 


For the past week, Pakistani military forces have been trying to push back Taliban fighters from the Buner district just south of Swat, but they have encountered strong resistance. Khan said the military offensive had betrayed the peace accord. 

Refugees and officials from Buner, however, said the insurgents had occupied their district for almost one month despite widespread popular opposition and several efforts by local armed groups to force them to leave. 

"Nobody supports them. They just came in and occupied our houses and took everything, even the matchboxes," said Afsar Khan, the mayor of a town in Buner who fled to Peshawar several weeks ago. "Everyone has heard about the barbaric atrocities that took place in Swat, with Muslims slaughtering Muslims in the name of God." 

Pakistani military officials did not confirm reports that they plan to stage a massive operation


----------



## gordjenkins

Looks like our war has moved south

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durand_Line

*Pakistan moves against Swat militants, civilians flee*
Reuters

By Junaid Khan Junaid Khan – Fri May 8, 11:22 am ET
MINGORA, Pakistan (Reuters) – Pakistani forces attacked Taliban militants in the Swat valley on Friday as concern grew about the fate of nearly a million people displaced by an upsurge in violence.

The military said 143 militants had been killed in the Islamist bastion of Swat over the past 24 hours. There was no independent confirmation. Seven soldiers had been killed, an army spokesman said.

The struggle in the scenic northwestern valley 130 km (80 miles) from Islamabad and a former center for tourism has become a test of Pakistan's resolve to fight a growing Taliban insurgency that has alarmed the United States.

Civilians have poured out of the valley since fighting intensified on Wednesday and aid groups have warned of an intensifying humanitarian crisis. The U.N. refugee agency said a "massive displacement" was underway. Citing provincial government estimates, it said up to 200,000 people had left their homes over recent days with another 300,000 on the move or about to move.

They are joining another 555,000 people displaced in other areas because of fighting since August, it said.

The government has ordered the army to strike at "militants and terrorists" it said were trying to hold the country hostage at gunpoint.

"On the directive of the government, the army is now engaged in a full-scale operation to eliminate the militants," military spokesman Major-General Athar Abbas told a news briefing at army headquarters in Rawalpindi.

"They are on the run and trying to block exodus of civilians from the area," Abbas said, while warning that the operation was difficult and declining to give a time for clearing the valley.


----------



## Retired AF Guy

Back in January CSIS held a two-day conference in Ottawa to look at the situation in Pakistan. At the end of the conference they produced a report, _*Pakistan's Security: Today and Tomorrow*_ which can be found here:

http://www.csis-scrs.gc.ca/pblctns/cdmctrch/Pakistans%20security_web.pdf

From the reports Backgrounder: 

"_In light of the volatile security situation which has developed in Pakistan in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the United States on 11 September 2001 and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS), joined by Canada's departments of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, National Defence and Public Safety, hosted a two-day conference in Ottawa on the topic of Pakistan's Security Today and Tomorrow. Held at the CSIS headquarters in Ottawa, the conference featured presentations by leading Canadian, Pakistani, American and European experts drawn from academia, the media, think-tanks, as well as government. The objective of the conference, attended by upwards of ninety people, was to expose participants to a variety of expert views on Pakistan's security, enabling them to identify key drivers influencing the country's security, and to discuss alternative futures for Pakistan. It also supported the development of an informal community of interest on Pakistan's security within the government of Canada_."


The report summarizes the various problems (political, military and economic) facing Pakistan, including the possibility of nuclear weapons falling into the wrong hands. It also includes three _*"what-if" *_scenarios on possible future outcomes for Pakistan. 

A good primary for those not familiar with the situation in Pakistan and are looking for an "one-stop-shopping" backgrounder.

Enjoy.


----------



## gordjenkins

With respect
a lot can happen quickly in this type of engagement
between January and now

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/LAC.20090505.EPAKISTAN05ART1956//TPStory/Editorials

and
Canadian Defence Associations
http://www.cdaforumcad.ca/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1241719739

*PAKISTAN

Focus on a new enemy
May 5, 2009
Globe and Mail*

Pakistan's military and intelligence establishments need to wake up to the fact that their own interests are not compatible with those of the Taliban. There is some evidence that this is at last happening, fighting between the armed forces and the Islamist militants having intensified in the past two days, in the Buner valley of the North-West Frontier Province.

Asif Ali Zardari, the President of Pakistan, weakly and unwisely agreed to the application of Islamic law, as interpreted and administered by the Taliban, to the Swat valley of NWFP. That encouraged the Taliban to expand into other districts of NWFP, only 100 kilometres away from the country's capital, Islamabad.

Mr. Zardari is meeting tomorrow in Washington with President Barack Obama and Hamid Karzai, the President of Afghanistan, but this event is unlikely to be a turning point; Mr. Zardari's hold on power is not strong enough.

Pakistan will not wholeheartedly embrace any regime in Afghanistan that is not under its own influence, but the Taliban, which it helped create, are now demonstrating that they are to the Pakistani establishment as the monster of Mary Shelley's novel was to Dr. Frankenstein, rather than a manipulable puppet.

 The armed forces of Pakistan and the Inter-Services Intelligence are nationalistic, not a set of radical Islamists, and they cannot welcome the anarchy that now threatens their country, let alone the possibility of the seizure of their nuclear weapons. But their long-term orientation has been to oppose the power of India; they remember all too well how India's conventional military strength was decisive in the breaking off of East Pakistan, now Bangladesh, in 1971. They have little skill in counterinsurgency, but they need to acquire some quickly.

Islamabad was created as the new capital, instead of Pakistan's original metropolis, Karachi, which is close to the Indian Ocean and was felt to be too exposed to external threats. Islamabad seemed more secure, close to the army's headquarters in Rawalpindi and to the mountains. Proximity to the NWFP has turned into a liability. Though the Taliban are not so well-organized an army as to be able to seize power in Islamabad, they are eminently capable of spreading chaos.

Maulana Fazlullah, the Taliban's leader in Swat, has invited Osama bin Laden to come to live there, as if to bait the United States. 

The U.S. should not be tempted into heavy-handed action, however, and should not invest much hope in Wednesday's Washington meeting. It has some influence on Pakistan, but cannot change the country's direction by money or by pressure.
*It will be much more persuasive for the U.S. and other Western powers to point out that Pakistan's real interests lie in reasserting its national unity.
*


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan urging residents to flee, Sunday, 10 May 2009 01:50 UK

Pakistan's government is lifting a curfew in the Swat valley to allow residents to escape 
an intense battle between the army and Taleban militants. The curfew has trapped tens 
of thousands of people attempting to flee the violence.

The army is trying to reverse militant advances in the area, in what the prime minister 
has called a "fight for the survival of the country". The army said dozens of militants 
had been killed in fighting on Saturday.

The government said the curfew would be lifted for seven hours on Sunday, beginning 
at 0600 local time. It asked civilians to take the chance to flee the area. BBC regional 
analyst Anbarasan Ethirajan says the lifting of the curfew is a sign that the army offensive 
is likely to intensify over the coming days.

Pakistan's government signed a peace agreement with the Swat Taleban in February, 
allowing Sharia law there, which was sharply criticised by Washington. The militants 
then moved towards the capital, Islamabad, causing further alarm.

Up to 15,000 troops have been deployed in the Swat valley and neighbouring areas to take 
on 4,000-5,000 militants. The military has said it intends to "eliminate" the Taleban fighters.
The fighting has already displaced some 200,000 people, while a further 300,000 are 
estimated to be on the move or about to flee, the UN says.

The government also said on Saturday that refugee camps would be set up in Peshawar, 
the capital of North West Frontier Province, and to the north-east in Naushara. Footage on 
local television showed people at one camp desperately looting UN supplies including blankets 
and cooking oil.

*'Road jammed'*

Earlier, fighting was reported to have reached the biggest town in the region, Mingora, which 
the army has been trying to recapture. The army said it had killed 55 more militants on 
Saturday, having said that more than 140 militants had died in earlier clashes.

Due to the intensity of the fighting and the cutting of phone networks, it is difficult to get 
independent information on the fighting or verify the army's claims, correspondents say.

Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani told reporters on Saturday called the conflict "a guerrilla war". 
"This is our own war. This is war for the survival of the country," Reuters news agency quoted 
him as saying. Our correspondent says Sunday's curfew is especially aimed at the residents of 
the towns of Kambar and Raheemabad. They have been blaming both sides for the violence, 
he says, as the military continues to bombard the area while the Taleban reportedly prevents 
people from fleeing.

One Mingora resident was quoted by Reuters saying he had not been able to escape during an 
earlier curfew. "We are feeling so helpless, we want to go but can't," said Sallahudin Khan. "We 
tried to leave yesterday after authorities relaxed the curfew for a few hours, but we couldn't as 
the main road leading out of Mingora was literally jammed with the flood of fleeing people."


----------



## CougarKing

From the Long War Journal...



> Excerpt 1
> *The US launched a covert airstrike against a Taliban safe house in Pakistan's Taliban-controlled tribal agency of South Waziristan.
> 
> The US targeted a Taliban compound with an airstrike in the lawless tribal agency of South Waziristan, killing between five to ten terrorists.
> 
> A swarm of unmanned Predator attack aircraft fired four missiles at a compound run by Taliban forces loyal to Baituallah Mehsud in the town of Sararogha, a US intelligence official told The Long War Journal. The official would not disclose the name of the Taliban or al Qaeda operatives targeted in the operation.*
> 
> The number killed is unclear, according to initial reports from Pakistan. "Officials claimed 10 Taliban had been killed, a deputy Taliban commander said five were killed, the political administration claimed nine Taliban were killed, while tribesmen claimed they had counted 25 bodies," Daily Times reported.





> Excerpt 2
> 
> *Baitullah Mehsud leads alliance against the Pakistani government and the West
> 
> Today's strike is the eighth recorded attack against camps and compounds in Baitullah's tribal areas. Baitullah is the leader of the Tehrik-e-Taliban, or the Movement of the Taliban in Pakistan, a group established in December of 2007 to unite disparate Taliban groups in Pakistan's northwest. The Tehrik-e-Taliban has led the insurgency and conducted many of the terror attacks against the Pakistani government.*
> 
> In February, Baitullah put aside tribal rivalries and joined forces with senior Taliban leaders Hafiz Gul Bahadar and Mullah Nazir in February of this year to form the Council of United Mujahideen. The three leaders said they "united according to the wishes of Mujahideen leaders like Mullah Muhammad Omar and Sheikh Osama bin Laden."


----------



## Xiang

The current conflict in Pakistan is certainly an interesting lesson learned by the people and the government (at least I hope)

The population initially thought they were fighting a government that bowed to American pressure when they supported the Taliban.

The Government thought the Taliban could be trusted with this "peace deal".

The government learned their lesson and are now engaged in yet another bloody conflict, and the people are now caught in the middle, after learning how brutal the Taliban are and how distorted their views on Islam are, and have now taken up arms along side the soldiers.

The Taliban really shot themselves in the foot here.  Their hard liner policies they implemented in Swat have backfired.  A population that was once too scared to attempt to fight back now have the backing and support of the advancing military and government.

The Taliban will never have the strong influence they once did again in that region.


----------



## GAP

> The Taliban will never have the strong influence they once did again in that region



Remember that the Taliban are a creature of the ISI....we do not hear anything being done about them do we?....


----------



## Colin Parkinson

The problem is that the ISI has always played both ends against the middle, thinking they can deal with this by backroom deals, if the army has to fight to clear Swat, then the ISI is weakened, the ISI likley see's the army as the bigger threat to their survival. The ISI has a long history of trying to influeance Taliban behaviour since the inception of the Taliban, ISI did not so much start the Taliban, as it did to nurture, protect and feed it. The Taliban are like an attack dog that has rabies and sleeping in your living room.


----------



## Xiang

> Remember that the Taliban are a creature of the ISI....we do not hear anything being done about them do we?....



The Pakistani Taleban are a different entity from the Afghan one (which received ISI support)

They both often fought for control of tribal Pashtun areas and only in 2006 did they decide to finally join forces.

Also, the Taliban inside Pakistan are funded by foreign nations (India being one of them) while the Taliban in Afghanistan were for the most part funded by Pakistan.


----------



## tomahawk6

They also have one thing in common - they are fundamentalists and have a common goal. The Pakistani's have not been very serious about rooting out the taliban and have made a show of fighting them for the benefit of the US. They want the flow of money to continue without trying to stop the taliban from entering Afghanistan. They cant even secure the MSR into Afghanistan. The Pakistani government I think has ceded control of the tribal areas to the taliban. Its a foolish game they are playing and one that could see them swinging from lamp posts after the taliban take over. Here is a very instructive article.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/magazine/07pakistan-t.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&ref=world


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Xiang said:
			
		

> The Pakistani Taleban are a different entity from the Afghan one (which received ISI support)
> 
> They both often fought for control of tribal Pashtun areas and only in 2006 did they decide to finally join forces.
> 
> Also, the Taliban inside Pakistan are funded by foreign nations (India being one of them) while the Taliban in Afghanistan were for the most part funded by Pakistan.



While the Taliban are made up of various groups and the foot soldiers are often local recruitment, the leadership core still seems to be Omar and his close followers. What happens in Afghanistan and Pakistan is linked. Perhaps the ISI wanted one group to control the FATA/NWF but things got out of hand, the Taliban seem to have a history of not following their backers plans and the ISI was not always able to influence the leadership of the Taliban (example: ISI tried to get the Taliban to mediate with various groups during their takeover of Afghanistan, but failed to get agreements with the Iranians, Hazara, etc)  
Do you have any source documents or links to back up the claim that the Indians are supporting the Taliban? Since India is supporting the Afghan government and has had it’s people killed by the Taliban in Afghanistan, I will take your claims with a bag of salt. One of the problems is that politics there are so convoluted it’s really hard to divine the truth from all of the OPSEC, lies, misdirection’s and betrayals done by all sides.


----------



## Xiang

Unfortunately, I do not have anything that would constitute iron clad proof that India has been involved in some of the funding the Taliban within Pakistan receive. 

It was just common knowledge among the people there unfortunately.

Both countries deny they do it, but both countries have funded terrorist groups inside each others countries.  Pakistan has been known to fund and arm the rebels inside Kashmir, against India.


----------



## Xiang

> They cant even secure the MSR into Afghanistan. The Pakistani government I think has ceded control of the tribal areas to the taliban. Its a foolish game they are playing and one that could see them swinging from lamp posts after the taliban take over.



I had spoken to a Captain in the Pakistani army during my time in Dubai not too long ago.  After striking up a conversation about how Pakistan plans on dealing with the current threat the Taliban posed, and what seemed like a lack of will and backbone Zardari seemed to have when dealing with them, he mentioned a plan he heard discussed with some of the top brass within the Pakistani military.  

Apparently in the event of an attempted full scale take over by the Taliban, the military would have a Musharraf style coup d'état and assume control of government, and go after the Taliban full force.

I found it funny he was telling me this, but after a few beers and shooters at the Juna Lounge, he would have probably given me his credit card number too.  Nothing worse than an officer who can't hold his liqueur. 

But back to the point, if what this guy said was true, I don't think the Taliban have any real chance of actually taking anything that would be considered "power" in Pakistan.


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Xiang said:
			
		

> Unfortunately, I do not have anything that would constitute iron clad proof that India has been involved in some of the funding the Taliban within Pakistan receive.
> 
> It was just common knowledge among the people there unfortunately.
> 
> Both countries deny they do it, but both countries have funded terrorist groups inside each others countries.  Pakistan has been known to fund and arm the rebels inside Kashmir, against India.



I don’t doubt that India has worked at causing internal issues within Pakistan, but helping the Taliban would be quite counter productive to their mission in Kashmir. They might have helped a group that is currently aligned with the Taliban, but I would see that it would be more productive for them to foster unrest in Punjab and in Balochistan, using the non Pastun populations in order to distract Pakistan from the Kashmir issue.

As for the army taking over the government, that would be easily done but would not solve the major issues facing Pakistan, the Taliban have been exploiting the social issues, namely the fact that few of the people working the land own any of it. Even though the army will eventually win, the cost will be high, the Taliban have been fighting some of the best armies in the world and have been learning from it. They have and will exploit tactical errors by the Pakistan army, who likely have not been incorprating some of the hard won lessons of the west. As I mentioned there are questions about the loyality of the rank and file of the army in regards to fighting what may be felt (rightly or wrongly) as a civil war upon their brethern on behalf of the west. Thankfully the Taliban are their own worst enemy and can’t seem to help oppressing the people who intially support them. The Pakistan government really needs to exploit this weakness of the Taliban and expose them as the greater evil.


----------



## Xiang

> Even though the army will eventually win, the cost will be high, the Taliban have been fighting some of the best armies in the world and have been learning from it. They have and will exploit tactical errors by the Pakistan army, who likely have not been incorprating some of the hard won lessons of the west



True.  As far as I know, there is no doctrine employed by the pakistani Army regarding counter insurgency operations.  Their doctrine still revolves around pitch battles with India.



> Thankfully the Taliban are their own worst enemy and can’t seem to help oppressing the people who intially support them.



Exactly, which is why loyalty will not be an issue within the Pakistani military.  They are now quite content with the way things are as opposed to living under the warped version of Shira law the Taliban were imposing, as is the population.


> As I mentioned there are questions about the loyality of the rank and file of the army in regards to fighting what may be felt (rightly or wrongly) as a civil war upon their brethern on behalf of the west.



There has been a major shift in opinion regarding the Taliban and fighting against them recently.

You were correct in questioning the loyalty of the military when engaging the Taliban (this being more serious within the Frontier Guard corps, given the majority of them are of the same ethnicity as the Taliban), however since the Swat take over, and the true colours of the Taliban displayed for all to see, the people are no longer seeing support for the Taliban as their way of protesting their governments campaign to appease the West and are actively turning to the government and military for support.

Before the current operation being conducted, during the Taliban advance out of Swat, people in surrounding provinces had been preparing to take up arms in the event of a situation where the military did not respond.

Fortunately they did, and were able to push back, and continue to push back, the Taliban.


----------



## CougarKing

And the Pakistani Army campaign against the Taliban continues.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090520/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> By ZARAR KHAN, Associated Press Writer Zarar Khan, Associated Press Writer – 21 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – Pakistani troops killed 80 militants and drove the Taliban from a major urban stronghold on Wednesday, the army said, as U.S. military planes brought aid for refugees fleeing fierce fighting across the northwest.
> One soldier was killed and nine seriously wounded as troops battled insurgents still holding several other towns in the neighboring Swat Valley, a military spokesman said.
> 
> Pakistani troops launched an offensive last month after Taliban militants based in Swat pushed into Buner, bringing them within 60 miles (100 kilometers) of the capital of Islamabad and prompting intense U.S. pressure for a stiff response.
> 
> Government forces cleared Sultanwas, the main Taliban-held town in Buner, overnight following intense clashes, army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said.
> 
> He said troops destroyed several vehicles used by black-clad militants and defused a string of homemade bombs.
> 
> "Sultanwas was the main stronghold of terrorist-miscreants in Buner, where they have made concrete underground bunkers and ammunition dumps," Abbas said.
> 
> The army claims it has killed more than 1,000 militants and re-claimed swaths of territory recently seized by the militants.
> 
> However, the clashes have prompted some 1.5 million people to flee their homes, a humanitarian emergency that could sap Pakistani enthusiasm for similar action against other Taliban and al-Qaida sanctuaries near the Afghan border.
> 
> Relatives have taken in many of those fleeing. However, more than 100,000 refugees are housed in sweltering camps south of the war zone.
> 
> U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton announced Tuesday that Washington would provide $110 million in immediate humanitarian assistance to Pakistan.
> 
> As part of that effort, two American military planes touched down on Wednesday at an air base near Islamabad laden with supplies including air-conditioned tents and 120,000 pre-packed meals, the U.S. Embassy said.


----------



## MarkOttawa

A post at _The Torch_:

Canada/Pakistan: _Globeites_ cooking up controversy 
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2009/05/canadapakistan-globeites-cooking-up.html

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## Xiang

Interesting developments.  I wonder how this will bide for our soldiers on the ground in Afghanistan.



> Pakistani troops encircle Taliban base in Swat
> 
> Updated Fri. May. 22 2009 1:03 PM ET
> 
> The Associated Press
> 
> KHWAZAKHELA, Pakistan -- Troops are encircling Taliban militants in their mountain base as well as the main town in the Swat Valley, a Pakistani general said Friday, as the UN appealed for $543 million to ease the suffering of nearly 2 million refugees from the fighting.
> 
> Elsewhere in the northwest, a car bomb exploded close to a movie theater in the city of Peshawar, killing at least four people and wounding 20 others, witnesses and police office Noor Khan said. It was unclear who was behind the attack, but militants have targeted movie theaters before in the region, believing them to be un-Islamic.
> 
> With skepticism growing about the progress of the month-old army offensive in the northwestern region, the army flew a handful of reporters from foreign news organizations into Swat on Friday.
> 
> An Associated Press reporter aboard the helicopter saw no cars and few people in the town of Mingora or on roads farther up the valley, a former tourist haven just 60 miles (100 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> From the air, there was little evidence of the fierce fighting and airstrikes that the military claims have already killed more than 1,000 militants as well as some 60 soldiers.
> 
> But a senior commander insisted the army was trapping militants in Mingora and Piochar, a side-valley farther north that is the stronghold of Swat Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah.
> 
> "The noose is tightening around them. Their routes of escape have been cut off," Maj. Gen. Sajad Ghani said. "It's just a question of time before (Taliban leaders) are eliminated."
> 
> Pakistan launched an offensive last month to halt a Taliban advance from Swat toward the capital, Islamabad, that prompted U.S. warnings about the stability of the nuclear-armed country.
> 
> While the U.S. has praised the military operation, it is also contributing to a gathering effort to shield the government from the political fallout from the humanitarian crisis.
> 
> Officials say 1.9 million people have fled the fighting. More than 160,000 are staying in sweltering camps just south of the battle zone. The rest have been taken in by relatives.
> 
> The United Nations said its appeal would help provide food, schooling and health care to the multitude displaced from the Swat area and by fighting in other border regions last year.
> 
> "The scale of this displacement is extraordinary in terms of size and speed and has caused incredible suffering," said Martin Mogwanja, the acting U.N. humanitarian coordinator in Pakistan. "We are calling for generous support from the international community."
> 
> The U.N. said the figure included some $88 million from the United States, which this week pledged total assistance of $110 million in emergency aid.
> 
> The government said Thursday that international donors had pledged a total of $224 million. Pakistan, which is heavily dependent on foreign aid, has pledged $100 million of its own.
> 
> The Obama administration has declared eliminating militant havens in Pakistan vital to its goals of defeating al-Qaida and winning the war in Afghanistan.
> 
> But an army failure or a botched relief effort in Swat would further undermine Pakistani enthusiasm for tough military action inside its own borders.
> 
> The army claims to have won back swaths of territory in Swat, which was popular with tourists before the Taliban took over, enforcing a hardline brand of Islamic law and beheading opponents.
> 
> However, it faces stiff resistance from thousands more fighters and has ventured no prediction of when the Taliban will be defeated.
> 
> Ghani, the commander of military operations in the upper portion of the Swat valley, sought Friday to counter allegations that many civilians had died in army shelling. Reporters are unable to work in the war zone, making it difficult to verify accounts of the fighting.
> 
> Only ground troops were operating in residential areas and the number of innocents killed in the area under his responsibility had "not reached double figures," he said.
> 
> Violence is also rising in the tribal regions along the Afghan border from where Taliban and al-Qaida militants launch attacks on both sides of the frontier.
> 
> On Thursday, a suicide car bomber attacked a paramilitary fort in the town of Jandola, killing four soldiers and four civilians, intelligence officials said.


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan army vows Swat victory, Saturday, 23 May 2009 17:25 UK







A large Pakistani flag flaps in the wind atop a tree-covered mountain.

Just metres away, soldiers are crouching behind sandbags to command a view of the 
stunning Swat valley - a river winding past green orchards and golden wheat fields, 
surrounded by snow-capped peaks.

The army has brought journalists to this 7,000-foot ridge known as Baini Baba Ziarat to 
showcase what it says is a major victory in its battle against Taliban militants who had 
overrun Pakistan's north-west Swat region. In the past two years the army has twice 
failed to defeat the Taliban of Swat. But this time will be different, it says.

We are told these heights were a strategic location for guerrilla fighters.

"It was important to deny them the vantage point from where they had uninterrupted 
communications," says Brig Ajab Khan, brigade commander for a part of northern, or 
upper, Swat. "The ridge also dominated the area as an observation point. In addition 
it was a safe haven, so it had to be taken and destroyed."

We are shown a sophisticated network of bunkers and tunnels, supplied with electricity 
and water. One soldier points out two flat green patches of grass as the places where 
the Taliban trained. Earlier the army had presented a frightened, 15-year-old school 
boy. He told journalists he had been forcibly recruited as a Taliban fighter and ordered 
to become a suicide bomber. He said he had escaped during the military operation.

*Mingora offensive*

We skirt around craters punched into the earth by heavy artillery, fired from nearby 
mountains as troops scaled the heights to capture the ridge in "less than a day". The 
commanding officer in charge of the Upper Swat operations, Maj Gen Sajjad Ghani, is 
upbeat about the army's achievements. He says troops have secured the town of Matte, 
the Taliban's administrative centre, and are closing in on a key militant stronghold in 
the remote Peochar Valley.

Further south, we were told, soldiers had encircled the main city of Mingora, the 
Taliban's urban base, and are poised to start the offensive. It began less than 24 hours 
after our visit. The army acknowledges there can be no purely military victory against 
the Taliban. In the past, the militants exploited a weak civil administration and judiciary 
to ride to power on popular calls for Islamic law.

Peace deals with the government had interrupted two previous army operations, providing 
"the other side with time to rearm, reassert, reorganise, and return to the valley", says 
Maj Gen Athar Abbas, an army spokesman. "That created problems for the military in the 
subsequent phases of the operation." He notes that lack of public support, due to "death, 
damage, destruction and displacement", had created a political consensus in favour of 
peace talks.

But now, the Taliban have been "politically disarmed and isolated", Gen Abbas says. People 
"saw their real face, and realised their aims" when they continued to challenge the state, 
even after the introduction of Islamic law in Swat, he adds.

*'Small steps'*

Clearly, the army has been bolstered by political support.

"There is a national will," Maj Gen Ghani said. "The operations have been endorsed by 
parliament, the entire nation is behind this operation."

And this time the army will stay to provide a security umbrella so that the police and 
civil administration have time to recover.

But public support is fragile. In previous military actions in Pakistan's northwest it was 
lost by army measures that left many dead and whole villages destroyed. This time too, 
fleeing residents describe seeing unburied bodies in fields and ditches.

The generals dismiss these reports. They insist they are taking great care to avoid 
civilian casualties. As much as 90% of Mingora's population fled ahead of the fighting, 
they say.

Still, surveying the Swat valley from the ridge, Brig Khan is cautious about issuing 
any claims of victory. "In an insurgency environment it's always small, small steps 
which ultimately lead to the resolution of the problem," he says. "I can say the Taliban 
have suffered a serious setback, but the threat is dynamic and it keeps evolving." 





_Pakistan's army says it has denied 
the Taliban this vantage point_


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan army 'in Taliban city', Saturday, 23 May 2009 20:32 UK





_The army says it has cut off 
the militants' supply routes_

Fierce fighting is taking place between Pakistani troops and Taliban militants in Mingora, 
the main city in the militant-controlled Swat valley. At least 17 militants have been killed 
in the clashes, the army says. The Taliban deny the deaths.

The push into Mingora is seen as a key phase of an offensive aimed at crushing the 
militants, whose influence extends across a wide area of the north-west. The fighting began 
after a peace deal broke down earlier this month. "Street fights have begun," Maj Gen Athar 
Abbas told reporters. He said soldiers had cleared parts of the city, but added that the pace 
of the offensive was "painfully slow". "This is an extremely difficult, extremely dangerous 
operation, because clearance has to be done street by street, house by house."

The military says the city is surrounded, most of the militants' ammunition dumps are 
destroyed and their supply routes cut off. The BBC's Shoaib Hassan, in Islamabad, says it is 
the most important battle yet in the army's offensive against the Taliban in Swat. A swift 
victory would bolster public support for a greater fight against the militants, our 
correspondent adds.

*Exodus*

A Taliban spokesman confirmed that the military had entered Mingora, but denied that any 
militants had been killed. The spokesman also said the Taliban would fight the security 
forces to their last breath. Residents say the militants are still in control of the city.

Nearly 1.5 million people have been displaced by this month's fighting in the north-western 
region, and about two million since last August, the United Nations refugee agency says.
One resident who fled the Mingora area told the BBC that he was among many who had lost 
everything. "Our homes were destroyed - we left behind our cattle and our properties," 
he said. "We walked all the way and had to walk for two days on the mountains."

On Friday, the UN appealed for $543m in humanitarian aid to help those displaced by the 
conflict.

Pakistan's army began an offensive against the Taliban on 2 May after the peace deal broke down 
and the militants began expanding their area of influence.

A recent investigation by the BBC suggested that less than half of Pakistan's North West Frontier 
Province (NWFP), which contains Swat Valley, and the neighbouring Federally Administered Tribal 
Areas is under full government control. In Swat, the army says that about 15,000 members of the 
security forces are fighting between 4,000 and 5,000 militants.

It says more than 1,000 militants and more than 50 soldiers have been killed since the offensive 
began.


----------



## Yrys

On the same subject, by NY Times :

Pakistan and Taliban Battling for Key City, Published: May 23, 2009

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan— The Pakistani military said Saturday that its troops had entered Mingora, 
the largest city in the contested Swat Valley, in an effort to wrest the city from Taliban hands.
Calling it the most important part of the recent offensive against the Taliban in the region, military 
officials said they were bracing for an intense, bloody fight. Seventeen militants were killed in 
clashes as troops entered the city over the last 24 hours, according to a spokesman for the 
Pakistani Army, though the claim could not be independently verified.

“It’s a very intense battle,” said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the spokesman. “Everyone is sniping one 
another.”

The fight in Mingora is being seen as a test of the ability of the Pakistani military to defeat the 
Taliban in Swat. Until now, the battle between the military and the Taliban was confined to the 
mountainous countryside and villages of Swat.

But Mingora, about 100 miles from the capital, could prove to be the toughest challenge. Militants 
have ensconced themselves in urban neighborhoods, where they command the rooftops of houses 
and other buildings. As infantry troops move in, the use of aerial strikes and artillery against the 
militants is constrained because of the presence of civilians in the city. Exactly how many civilians 
are trapped there is unclear. Throughout the region, hundreds of thousands of residents have fled 
the fighting, and there were estimates by government officials that only 10,000 residents remained 
in what was recently a city of 200,000.

Still, there have been fears of large-scale civilian casualties, and the authorities have mostly barred 
journalists from entering the area, making it difficult to verify what is happening. Even the military 
seemed unsure of how many civilians remained. “It is difficult to estimate how many civilians or 
militants are present in the city,” General Abbas said. He said that troops had captured the
 Continental Hotel, a famous tourist destination, and were trying to clear neighborhoods. Intense fire 
was being exchanged at one of the main intersections of the city.

One suicide bomber was killed before he could manage to blow himself up, while a vehicle laden with 
explosives was destroyed, the military said. Troops had also captured Qambar Ridge, which overlooks 
the city. Six militants were killed in the fighting and their bodies were lying in the open, the military said. 
During search-and-destroy operations, three caves containing large quantities of ammunition and rations 
were discovered, according to the Pakistani Army. Troops also managed to recapture a transmission 
station along with a base unit.

The military has previously said that it had cleared militant strongholds in Khawazakhela, one of the 
largest cities in Swat; Matta; and Bini Baba Ziarart, and that it was closing in on another stronghold in 
Piachar, in the upper Swat Valley. Pakistani military officials said that the offensive against the Taliban 
in Swat had entered a decisive phase. General Abbas said troops were consolidating their positions around 
Matta, a town that the military said it had captured from the Taliban. Troops have also secured Wanai 
Bridge, which links Matta with Piachar, a remote valley that is a stronghold of the militants.

General Abbas expressed confidence that the military would capture Mingora as well, but noted that it 
was a difficult fight. “It is a battle,” he said.


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan army fights for key city. Sunday, 24 May 2009 11:11 UK






Pakistan's army says it has recaptured several areas of Mingora, the main city in the Swat valley, 
as its offensive against the Taliban continues. A security official said soldiers were now clearing 
landmines in those sections back under government control.

But clashes are still continuing with soldiers and militants engaged in hand-to-hand fighting at 
some of the city's main intersections, the army says. The fighting began after a peace deal 
broke down earlier this month.

Hundreds have died and over a million have fled Swat since the operation against the Taliban 
was launched. The success of Pakistan's military operation in the region hinges on a swift 
victory in Mingora, according to the BBC's Shoaib Hasan in Islamabad.

This fresh assault on the Taliban has the full backing of the US, which has identified Pakistan 
and Afghanistan as central to the international battle against Islamist extremism.

*Surrounded*

Although the military has always had bases inside Mingora, the city has effectively been under 
Taliban control in recent weeks. The military now says Mingora is surrounded, and most of the 
militants' ammunition dumps have been destroyed.

Journalists are not being allowed near the city, so it is not possible to verify the claims.

The army has also said it has gained control of several important intersections, including Green 
Square where the Taliban is thought to have carried out several beheadings. A local citizen in 
Mingora confirmed this, but told the BBC that fighting was continuing around four nearby 
villages : Takhtaband, Garozai, Nawakalay and Shahdara.

The military claim to have killed 17 Taliban militants - a figure the Taliban denies. The army 
also said it had made progress in other parts of the Swat valley, with the city of Matta reportedly 
cleared of militants. But army spokesman Major General Athar Abbas warned that the operation 
in Mingora could be "painfully slow", as up to 20,000 civilians were still trapped there. "This is an 
extremely difficult, extremely dangerous operation because clearance has to be done street by 
street, house by house," he told reporters on Saturday.

A curfew remains in place in the city, and there are already reports of many civilian casualties, 
but these cannot be independently confirmed.

*Humanitarian crisis*

Our correspondent says the Swat battle is the most important yet in the army's offensive against 
the Taliban in north-west Pakistan. A swift victory would bolster public support for a greater fight 
against the militants, our correspondent adds.

But anything other than complete victory could quickly diminish public support for the campaign, 
he adds - which would be disastrous for Pakistan's fragile political coalition and the long-term war 
against militancy in the region.

Nearly 1.5 million people have been displaced by this month's fighting in the north-western region, 
and about two million since last August, the United Nations refugee agency says. Helped by a 
massive influx of foreign aid, Pakistan has been able to deal with the situation so far, but if the 
situation gets worse aid workers will find it increasingly difficult to deal with the tide of displaced 
people.

In separate developments over the weekend :

    * Pakistani aircraft have bombed Taliban militants near Orakzai tribal area, killing at least seven 
       people. The militants are thought to have been preparing to travel to South Waziristan on the 
       Afghan border.
    * Police say a French tourist has been kidnapped by gunmen in the southern Baluchistan province. 
       Four other French nationals travelling with the tourist reported the kidnapping. 

Pakistan's army began an offensive against the Taliban on 2 May after the peace deal broke down 
and the militants began expanding their area of influence. In Swat, the army says that about 15,000 
members of the security forces are fighting between 4,000 and 5,000 militants. It says more than 
1,000 militants and more than 50 soldiers have been killed since the offensive began.


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan in humanitarian aid plea, Thursday, 21 May 2009 11:56 UK





_Pakistan says there is an "urgent need 
for a comprehensive response"_

Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani has appealed for urgent cash aid to help up 
to two million people who have fled fighting with the Taliban. Addressing international 
donors in Islamabad, Mr Gilani warned the mass exodus had "grave repercussions".

The UN says that about 1.5 million people have been displaced since the army's latest 
offensive began on 2 May, and two million since last August. The donors have so far 
responded with pledges of $224m, officials said. The fighting continues, with at least 
seven people killed in Lower Dir.

*'Concrete and visible'*

"Given the magnitude of the task that lies ahead, the government of Pakistan would 
like to seek the support from the donor community, both for the ongoing relief efforts 
and for the rebuilding process," the prime minister said. "There is an urgent need for 
a joint and comprehensive response to this issue by all those who are committed to 
fighting terrorism. We need to do something concrete and visible."

Mr Gilani said that a special prime minister's fund had been established for the inter-
nally displaced and called for domestic and international donations.

The US has praised Pakistan's latest efforts to fight what some in Washington have 
described as an "existential threat" to the country caused by the Taliban and al-Qaeda.

International donors have pledged $224m for the relief and rehabilitation of those 
displaced in North West Frontier Province, $110m from the US.

Pakistan has immediately allocated $25m to the NWFP government for relief efforts, 
but critics warn that is not enough to provide adequate reconstruction and law enfor-
cement. Ministers say the UN will launch an urgent appeal on Friday in a bid to raise 
further money.

Correspondents say that as the conflict ploughs on, concerns are mounting about how 
to cope with the huge number of displaced people, uprooted in what human rights 
groups have described as Pakistan's largest movement of people since partition from 
India in 1947.

A senior US military official based in Islamabad said the crisis could last until December 
because the authorities expected large numbers of displaced people to remain in 
temporary camps until the end of the year.

*Explosive device*

In the latest fighting, at least seven people have been killed in two separate incidents 
in the district of Lower Dir, officials say. Four militants and three security personnel, 
including an army officer, died.

The first incident took place in a mountainous part of the Shahi Koto area, when a security 
force convoy was hit by an improvised explosive device on the main road. "Three people 
were killed in the attack," a local official in Dir told the BBC. "Two more were injured and 
one of them is in critical condition." The second incident involved clashes between militants 
and security forces in the Qambar area.

The incidents took place two days after security forces claimed to have taken complete 
control of Dir district. In Swat, the army says that about 15,000 members of the security 
forces are fighting between 4,000 and 5,000 militants. It says more than 1,000 militants 
and more than 50 soldiers have been killed.

There has been no independent confirmation of the casualties - communications with the 
few remaining local people still in Swat have been seriously disrupted.

The army say that after clearing Taliban strongholds and supply depots in Swat's mountains, 
soldiers are battling militants in towns where many thousands of civilians are believed to be 
hiding. The army is also conducting a big offensive against Taliban militants in Buner.

Meanwhile US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said she was "encouraged" by the army's 
offensive. Appearing before a Congressional committee on Wednesday she said that the 
Pakistani government was taking more positive action than previously and its action was 
backed by opposition parties.

"If you look at the political support today, the statements that are being made by the prime 
minister and others in support of the military's action against the Taliban - we've never seen 
anything quite like this before. "That does not guarantee the outcome, but it certainly is, to 
some extent, reassuring that the government and opposition are now united in their 
recognition of the threat posed by extremism."


----------



## Yrys

UN in $543m Pakistan aid appeal, Friday, 22 May 2009 07:53 UK





_Tens of thousands are housed 
in camps south of the war zone_

The UN has appealed for a total of $543m in humanitarian aid to help more than 1.6 million 
people displaced by fighting in north-west Pakistan. The UN said the "extraordinary" exodus 
had caused "incredible suffering". Tens of thousands of people are being housed in camps 
south of the main fighting zone in the Swat valley.

Pakistan's army began an offensive on 2 May against the Taliban after a peace deal broke 
down and militants began spreading their area of influence.

Separately, the top US military commander, Adm Michael Mullen, has warned that the US 
troop build-up in Afghanistan could push Taliban fighters deeper into Pakistan, further 
destabilising it.

*'Comprehensive response'*

The UN said the $543m (£342m) was needed to help fund about 165 projects it had drawn 
up to help between 1.6 million and 1.7 million displaced people. Martin Mogwanja, acting 
UN humanitarian coordinator, said: "The scale of this displacement is extraordinary in 
terms of size and speed and has caused incredible suffering.

"We are calling for generous support from the international community."

The UN said it was working with authorities to "ensure we get relief to people as quickly as 
possible".

On Thursday, Pakistani Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani chaired a donor conference in 
Islamabad and officials said the international community had so far responded with 
pledges of $224m. It is not clear if that is included in the latest UN target figure.

Mr Gilani said: "There is an urgent need for a joint and comprehensive response to this 
issue by all those who are committed to fighting terrorism. We need to do something 
concrete and visible."

In Swat, the army says that about 15,000 members of the security forces are fighting 
between 4,000 and 5,000 militants. It says more than 1,000 militants and more than 
50 soldiers have been killed. It remains difficult to confirm reports from the war zone 
but the Dawn newspaper says that troops are advancing on a key bridge near Mingora, 
the main city of Swat.

In another area of North West Frontier Province on Thursday night, at least four people 
were killed and 46 injured, including 25 security personnel, when an explosives laden 
truck blew up in Jandola, near Tank in the south of the province.

Meanwhile Adm Mullen admitted to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in Washington 
that successes against the Taliban in Afghanistan could push militants further into Pakistan.
"Can I... [be] 100% certain that won't destabilise Pakistan? I don't know the answer to that," 
he said. However, Adm Mullen said US and Pakistani forces were planning measures to 
prevent this, without giving further details.

Adm Mullen's comments come as US President Barack Obama's administration prepares to 
send thousands of extra troops to Afghanistan.


----------



## Yrys

'Bloody intersection' secured by Pakistani troops, May. 24 2009

The Associated Press

ISLAMABAD -- The Taliban left so many mutilated bodies at the crossing -- some hanging from trees with 
threatening notes -- that Pakistanis in the Swat Valley's main town took to calling it "bloody intersection."

On Sunday, the army said that spot and seven other major crossings in Mingora were secured, part of 
street-by-street urban fighting whose success is considered critical to flushing out the militants from 
the valley as a whole. The advances in Swat came as helicopter gunships pounded alleged militant 
hide-outs in a nearby tribal region, killing at least 18 people, while police announced the arrest of a 
militant commander and six other Taliban fighters elsewhere in the northwest.

The events underscored how widespread and entrenched militant activity is along Pakistan's rugged 
region bordering Afghanistan, and how pushing the Taliban out of Swat is unlikely to defuse the 
overall insurgency beleaguering the nuclear-armed Muslim nation.

The U.S. has pushed Pakistan to use force to root out the al Qaeda and Taliban insurgents, who are 
often involved in attacks on U.S. and NATO troops across the border. The operation in Swat has 
strong support from Washington, and retaking Mingora, the valley's main commercial hub, could be 
the stiffest test for the security forces.

A military statement Sunday said forces had encountered at least 12 roadside bombs while securing 
the eight intersections. Five suspected militants were killed in various parts of Mingora while 14 
others were arrested, the army said.

The retaking of Green Chowk could have serious symbolic value. Residents nicknamed it "khooni chowk" 
or "bloody intersection" because the militants would leave their victims' bodies there -- some decapitated, 
some killed in other brutal fashions. The dead often were left hanging from trees. Some had notes 
attached that accused the victims of spying and told local residents not to move the bodies until specified 
times. It was just one fear tactic used by Taliban fighters to exert control over the population of Mingora, 
which when not under army siege normally has at least 375,000 residents.

Some 10,000 to 20,000 residents are still stranded in the town, according to the army.

One trapped civilian told The Associated Press via phone Saturday night that gunshots were ringing through 
the air, first continuously then at intervals. He said he had tried to flee the city twice but failed due to the 
fighting and lack of transportation. "I will try to leave again whenever I get another chance," said Fazal 
Wadood, a local leader of the opposition Pakistan Muslim League-N party. "It is like inviting death to stay 
here anymore."

Overall in the valley, 10 militants were killed in the past 24 hours while three security troops died, the 
army statement said. It added that troops had entered Piochar village, a hub in a remote part of Swat 
that is the rear base for Swat Taliban leader Maulana Fazlullah. A huge cache of arms and a bomb-making 
factory were unearthed, the statement said. Officials have downplayed reports that the army would soon 
expand the offensive to the lawless, semiautonomous tribal regions bordering Afghanistan. However, 
violence has continued to flare in those areas.

On Sunday morning in the Orakzai tribal region, helicopter gunships pounded suspected militant targets 
in multiple locations, including a religious school, local government official Mohammad Yasin said. At  
least six civilians were among the 18 dead, he said, adding the targeted spots were strongholds of 
Hakeemullah Mehsud, a deputy to Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud. Hundreds fled the area 
amid the fighting, he said.

Also Sunday, police in nearby Charsadda district said they caught seven Taliban militants during a raid 
on a religious school. They included Qari Ihsanullah, a Taliban commander suspected in attacks in Pakistan 
and Afghanistan, Charsadda police Chief Riaz Khan said. "We recovered three suicide jackets, explosives 
and assault rifles," he said of the Saturday night raid.

The military says about 1,100 suspected insurgents have died so far in the monthlong offensive in Swat 
and neighboring districts. It has not given any tally of civilian deaths, and it's unclear how it is separating 
noncombatants killed from militants. Residents fleeing the region have reported dozens of ordinary 
Pakistanis killed in the fight. Some 1,500 to 2,000 hard-core insurgent fighters remain in Swat, the army 
says. Information provided by the military and civilians is nearly impossible to verify independently 
because of limited access to the area.

The offensive has also triggered an exodus of nearly 1.9 million refugees, more than 160,000 to relief 
camps. Some fear the generally broad public support for the military campaign could drain away if the 
refugees' plight worsens or if the army gets bogged down too long. 


Pakistan Says It Makes More Gains on Taliban





_A boy, displaced by fighting, stood in a relief camp in the town of Swabi in Pakistan 
on Sunday._


----------



## CougarKing

So is the end of this campaign within sight?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090530/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Military retakes largest town in Swat Valley*
> 
> By ROHAN SULLIVAN, Associated Press Writer Rohan Sullivan, Associated Press Writer – 1 min ago
> ISLAMABAD – Pakistani troops have retaken the largest town in the Swat Valley from the Taliban as the army presses its offensive against militants in the country's northwest, the army spokesman said Saturday.
> 
> Government forces had full control of Mingora, though they were still meeting pockets of resistance from fighters on the outskirts of the town, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said.
> 
> Abbas said many militants had fled the town instead of confronting troops in a final battle, despite the military saying earlier that escape routes had been closed.
> 
> "They had prepared Mingora city ... with bunkers, but when they realized that they were being encircled and the noose was tightening they decided not to give a pitched battle," Abbas said.
> 
> The military launched a major offensive one month ago in the Swat Valley and neighboring areas to oust Taliban militants who were extending their control over the northwestern region, near the border with Afghanistan.
> 
> The campaign is strongly backed by Washington and the government's other Western allies, who see it as a test of the government's resolve to fight extremism in the Pakistan.
> 
> Government troops had been advancing steadily into the Swat region, bombarding towns from the air and fighting house-to-house with Taliban gunmen.
> 
> The fighting has caused more than 2 million people to flee the region, raising fears of a humanitarian crisis. More than 160,000 people are taking refuge in sweltering refugee camps south of the battle zone, while the rest are staying with relatives or relying on goodwill from local residents.
> 
> Widespread domestic support for the campaign could sour if the government is perceived to have failed the refugees or if a high number of civilian casualties is revealed.
> 
> The Taliban has warned it will launch terrorist strikes in Pakistani cities in retaliation for the campaign, and claimed responsibility for a gun and suicide bomb attack on Wednesday in the eastern city of Lahore that killed at least 30 people. A day later, three suicide bombings killed at least 14 people in two cities in the northwest.
> 
> Abbas said on Saturday that 1,217 militants have been killed in the Swat offensive and 79 arrested; 81 soldiers have died. The military has not released civilian casualties and has said all care has been taken to minimize them.
> 
> The figures could be independently verified. The tally and the extent of destruction caused by the fighting is largely unknown because media have been restricted from traveling in the region.
> 
> Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Saturday defended the decision to launch the offensive, saying it was necessary because the Taliban had challenged the authority of the government by advancing from its stronghold of Swat to the neighboring district of Buner, just 60 (100 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> "The very existence of Pakistan was at stake, we had to start the operation," Gilani told a group of workers at state-owned Pakistan Television.
> 
> He promised cash payments to people forced from their homes and a massive reconstruction effort.
> 
> ____
> 
> Associated Press Writers Asif Shahzad and Munir Ahmad in Islamabad contributed to this report.


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan student convoy 'missing', Monday, 1 June 2009 18:31 UK






Police in north-western Pakistan say several hundred students are missing in a tribal area near the 
Afghan border. Unconfirmed reports from the Taliban stronghold of North Waziristan say the students,
teachers and relatives may have been kidnapped by militants.

Further north, troops are tightening their hold on Mingora, the main town in the Swat valley, after 
retaking it from the Taliban at the weekend. In the town of Kohat, a blast at a bus terminal killed àat least two people.

*Attack fears*

Reports say a convoy of about 30 minibuses carrying the students left Razmak Cadet College in North 
Waziristan bound for the town of Bannu. Only two minibuses turned up, police say.

"Two vehicles carrying some 25 students reached Bannu, we are investigating about other students," 
local police chief Iqbal Marwat told the AFP news agency. According to witnesses who escaped the 
convoy was stopped by a group of heavily armed men. Police officials quote these witnesses as saying 
a large number of people have been kidnapped, although there are conflicting reports about how many.

There has been a rise in violent incidents in recent days in the tribal areas next to the Afghan border.

The BBC's Chris Morris in Islamabad says officials believe militants are trying to divert attention away 
from a major military offensive in the Swat valley.

Fears of attacks by militants have increased after a military offensive against the Taliban in parts of the 
north-west. The militants said they had carried out a massive bombing in the city of Lahore last week 
and have threatened more attacks. Pakistani troops are still fighting against Taliban militants in the 
Swat valley, pushing northwards from Mingora, which is now under full government control.

The authorities say more than 1,200 militants and about 90 soldiers have been killed since their 
offensive began in a neighbouring district nearly six weeks ago. There has been no official word 
about civilian casualties, and no independent confirmation of the military's claims.

An estimated 2.5 million people have fled from the fighting, but tens of thousands who were trapped 
in their homes are in even greater need of assistance.

*'Retaliation'*

The blast which killed two in Kohat, an important garrison town in North-West Frontier Province (NWFP),
injured at least eight others, officials say. Police say a bomb went off in a crowded bus terminal on 
Monday afternoon. Kohat police chief Mohammad Idrees said the attack could be retaliation for police 
operations against the militants, the Associated Press reported. 

Taliban militants were driven out of Mingora, Swat's main town, on Saturday by Pakistani government 
troops. Officials said operations in the whole Swat valley region should end in the next few days, 
although military chiefs are more cautious


----------



## MarkOttawa

Good Pak infowar:

Pakistan Fighting Militants on 2 Fronts 
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/02/world/asia/02pstan.html?hp



> It was several weeks into a military campaign to flush out militants from a valley north of Pakistan’s capital, and the words of a Taliban commander, Maulana Fazlullah, crackled over a handheld radio.
> 
> “How are you? Is everything alright?” said Mr. Fazlullah, the main commander in the Swat Valley, according to a transcript of a radio intercept recorded by the Pakistani military.
> 
> There was no response.
> 
> “Don’t lose morale,” he said. “Go into the trees and take the sniper rifles with you. Take aim and fire. You should be able to kill at least one or two.”
> 
> The exchange was part of a series of conversations among Taliban militants in Swat that the Pakistani military recorded since the beginning of its offensive there last month. The discussions were transcribed, translated into Urdu, Pakistan’s official language, and compiled in a log book by intelligence officials here, and senior Pakistani military officials allowed The New York Times to read it.
> 
> The snippets, audible when the military happened to find the constantly changing frequency on which the militants were speaking, offer brief glimpses into the lives of the militants during the past weeks of war that vanish as fast as they appear.
> 
> The military argues the conversations are proof that the militants have suffered a serious setback in Swat, a scenic valley just north of here that had become a Taliban stronghold. But the military campaign is not over, and the top leadership, including Mr. Fazlullah, is still at large.
> 
> The Taliban is striking back in other areas. The Taliban kidnapped students, teachers and a principal riding in four cars from Razmak Cadet College on Monday in Waziristan, a Taliban stronghold in western Pakistan. The government has said Waziristan would be the next front in its campaign against the Taliban.
> 
> The Swat campaign, which began on May 8, is seen as a test case for Pakistan’s resolve to tackle its spreading insurgency, which came within 70 miles from its capital, Islamabad, earlier this year. Two earlier offensives failed, criticized as half-hearted efforts that inflicted too many civilian casualties.
> 
> But this time is different, military officials argue, as the army has committed more than double the number of troops, and has broad public support, opening a potential opportunity for the government to re-establish its authority in the area.
> 
> Whatever the outcome, the militant chatter in recent weeks sounded gloomy. There were some inspirational words, some jihad battle rallying cries, but also many lost, hungry and isolated voices. One resident of the village of Khazara said Taliban leaders gathered locals in the Minara Mosque shortly before he and his family fled, demanding contributions of a gun, a son, or 50,000 rupees in cash, but few obliged.
> 
> On May 27, a militant who called himself Abu Daud, asked urgently: “Where are the five boys we trained? Where are they? Bring them here because we need them.”
> 
> The response was not encouraging: “One has been killed and two are alive. I don’t know about the others.”..
> 
> The area of fighting has been off limits to journalists and it is not clear how much of a fight militants put up. Guerrillas often melt away when faced with superior firepower, only to resurface later. About eight brigades — approximately 16,000 troops — were committed to the offensive, more than double past campaigns.
> 
> A Swat resident who fled, Adnan Rashid, said in the later stages of the fighting, militants would shoot very short bursts from their guns, in order not to waste bullets.
> 
> The military says over 1,000 militants have been killed, but that is only an estimate. Most were pulled off the battlefield and buried by comrades before being counted, and some were probably civilians. There has been no casualty count of civilians.
> 
> The civilians seemed to irritate the militants.
> 
> A man who called himself Jawad fumed on May 27 that villagers were raising white flags on their houses. “Why are these gutless people holding white flags?” he said.
> 
> Another man responded: “Everyone has their own will. How can we stop them?”..



Pakistan Makes Gains in Key Swat Valley Town [video]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Br0wtzXPL0



> Residents of the Swat Valley's main town of Mingora on Sunday assessed the damage, a day after the Pakistani military claimed to have retaken the city from...



Pakistan to attack the fountainhead of extremism: Rugged Waziristan
http://www.miamiherald.com/news/world/AP/story/1075752.html



> Waziristan, the remote area that's the epicenter of Taliban and al-Qaida militants in Pakistan, is set to become the next war zone in the nation's fight against Islamic extremists, where clashes between insurgents and the army erupted over the weekend.
> 
> So far, there are just skirmishes in Waziristan but the key U.S. ally plans a full-scale military offensive there this summer, according to Pakistani and Western officials, a fight that is certain to be deadlier than the current operation in Swat valley and with profound international repercussions.
> 
> Western leaders have repeatedly said that international terrorist plots are being hatched in Waziristan, while the area provides a sanctuary for Afghan insurgents and al-Qaida leaders, possibly including Osama bin Laden and his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri.
> 
> South Waziristan, a part of the wild tribal territory that lies along the Afghan border, houses Pakistan's public enemy No. 1, warlord Baitullah Mehsud, who has thousands of armed followers around him. The insurgency across the country is fueled by fighters and suicide bombers sent by Mehsud. North Waziristan is also under the control of a Taliban warlord.
> 
> Pakistani forces are making rapid progress through Swat valley, in the North West Frontier Province, and they've previously claimed to have cleared two other areas that were under Taliban domination, Bajaur and Mohmand, which are part of the tribal territory.
> 
> But the specter of Waziristan, the fountainhead of extremism, now looms...



Al-Qaeda Seen as Shaken in Pakistan
U.S. Officials Cite Drones, Offensive
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/31/AR2009053102172.html



> Drone-launched U.S. missile attacks and Pakistan's ongoing military offensive in and around the Swat Valley have unsettled al-Qaeda and undermined its relative invulnerability in Pakistani mountain sanctuaries, U.S. military and intelligence officials say.
> 
> The dual disruption offers potential new opportunities to ferret out and target the extremists, and it has sparked a new sense of possibility amid a generally pessimistic outlook for the conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Although al-Qaeda remains "a serious, potent threat," a U.S. counterterrorism official said, "they've suffered some serious losses and seem to be feeling a heightened sense of anxiety -- and that's not a bad thing at all."
> 
> The offensive in Swat against its Taliban allies also poses a dilemma for al-Qaeda, a senior military official said. "They're asking themselves, 'Are we going to contest' " Taliban losses, he said, predicting that al-Qaeda will "have to make a move" and undertake more open communication on cellphones and computers, even if only to gather information on the situation in the region. "Then they become more visible," he said.
> 
> It remains unclear whether U.S. intelligence and Pakistani ground forces can capitalize on such opportunities before they vanish. Chances to intercept substantive al-Qaeda communications or to take advantage of the movement of individuals are always fleeting, according to several officials of both governments, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss counterinsurgency operations and the bilateral relationship.
> 
> Since last fall, the Predator drone attacks have eliminated about half of 20 U.S.-designated "high-value" al-Qaeda and other extremist targets along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, U.S. and Pakistani officials said. But the attacks have also killed civilians, stoking anti-American attitudes in Pakistan that inhibit cooperation between Islamabad and Washington...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## Yrys

Abducted Pakistani students freed






_The authorities say all the students 
have been accounted for_

Dozens of students abducted by militants in the north-west of Pakistan have been released, 
the military and college staff say. Several buses carrying students and staff were reported 
missing in an area near the Afghan border on Monday. The vice principal of Razmak Cadet 
College told the BBC everybody seized in North Waziristan had been released.

About 80 hostages were freed after a clash between militants and the army, a military 
spokesman said. Pakistani officials believe that Taliban militants are trying to divert 
attention away from the military offensive against them further north.

*'Armed militants'*

Vice principal of the cadet college, Junaid Alam, said that all of the abducted students were 
accounted for, except for 20 students who had escaped from the militants earlier and could 
still be making their way to the town of Bannu. He stressed that none of the students 
remained in the custody of the militants. The students were kidnapped when travelling in 
a convoy of buses from their college to Bannu.

While figures cannot be confirmed, reports suggest that as many as 500 people, including 
students, their family members and staff were travelling in the convoy. The buses were 
stopped in the semi-tribal area of Bakakhel by heavily armed militants.

The BBC's Syed Shoaib Hasan says that initially up to 300 people may have been held, but 
many of these were released. The others managed to escape on foot or in the remaining 
vehicles. The Taliban then took away 80 students and staff and kept them hostage for 
several hours. Negotiations about the hostages between the militants, a tribal council 
and the local political agent took place throughout the kidnappings.

Major Gen Athar Abbas, a spokesman for the Pakistan military, described how the army 
ultimately managed to rescue the captive students. He said soldiers had opened fire on 
the militants as they were taking the students to South Waziristan. "Under cover of the 
firing the militants escaped and we have recovered them all," he said.

Pakistani troops are battling militants in the Swat valley and pushing northwards from its 
main city of Mingora, which is now under full government control. The authorities say 
more than 1,200 militants and about 90 soldiers have been killed since their offensive 
began in a neighbouring district nearly six weeks ago.

The last few days have seen a rise in violence in the tribal areas next to the Afghan border.


----------



## CougarKing

Some good news from this blighted part of the world: *the local people in the areas the Taliban used to control/currently control are now turning against the Taliban, according to this report.*



> June 5, 2009
> 
> Taliban Stir Rising Anger of Pakistanis
> 
> By SABRINA TAVERNISE
> 
> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — A year ago, the Pakistani public was deeply divided over what to do about its spreading insurgency. Some saw the Taliban militants as fellow Muslims and native sons who simply wanted Islamic law, and many opposed direct military action against them.
> 
> But history moves quickly in Pakistan, and after months of televised Taliban cruelties, broken promises and suicide attacks, there is a spreading sense — apparent in the news media, among politicians and the public — that many Pakistanis are finally turning against the Taliban.



http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/05/world/as...ref=global-home


----------



## CougarKing

And the offensive continues in earnest not too long after a deadly suicide attack in a Pakistani mosque that was believed to have been planned by the Taliban.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090607/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Pakistanis avenge mosque blast, attack Taliban*
> Associated Press Writer Asif Shahzad, Associated Press Writer – 49 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – *Hundreds of Pakistanis banded together and attacked Taliban strongholds in a troubled northwestern region, killing 11 militants, to avenge a deadly suicide bombing at a local mosque, officials said Sunday.
> 
> The incident Saturday underscored a swing in the national mood toward a more anti-Taliban stance — a shift that comes as suicide attacks have surged and the military wages an offensive in the Swat Valley.
> 
> Some 400 villagers from the neighboring Upper Dir district, where a suicide bomber killed 33 worshippers at a mosque in the Haya Gai area on Friday, formed a militia and attacked five villages in the nearby Dhok Darra area, said Atif-ur-Rehman, the district coordination officer.
> 
> The citizens' militia has occupied three of the villages since Saturday and is trying to push the Taliban out of the other two. Some 20 houses suspected of harboring Taliban were destroyed, he said.
> 
> At least 11 militants were killed, said the district police chief, Ejaz Ahmad.
> 
> The government has encouraged local citizens to set up militias, known as lashkars, to oust Taliban fighters.*
> 
> "It is something very positive that tribesmen are standing against the militants. It will discourage the miscreants," Rehman said.
> 
> *Ahmad said around 200 militants were putting up stiff resistance in their strongholds surrounded by the villagers. "We will send security forces, maybe artillery too, if the villagers ask for a reinforcement," he added.
> 
> The surge in suicide attacks reached Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, on Saturday when a man wearing an explosive-laden jacket attacked a police compound but was shot down before he could enter the main building. Two officers died and six were wounded, police said.
> 
> No one has claimed responsibility for the attack at the police emergency response center, but it fit with a Taliban threat of strikes in major cities across Pakistan in retaliation for the military's month-old offensive in Swat.
> 
> On Sunday, police in the southern city of Karachi said they averted a suicide attack by arresting a would-be bomber allegedly linked to Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud. Several explosives and bomb-laden jackets were found during the raid, which was spurred by a tip, senior police official Javed Bukhari said.*
> 
> "He was planning to carry out large attacks in Karachi with other accomplices, but we have averted the attempt," he said.
> 
> The Swat battle is seen as a test of Pakistan's resolve to take on militants challenging the government in the northwestern regions near Afghanistan. More than 1,300 militants and 105 soldiers have died so far, the military says.
> 
> The U.S. supports the Swat offensive, hoping it will eliminate a potential sanctuary for al-Qaida and Taliban militants implicated in attacks on Western forces in Afghanistan.
> 
> The campaign began after the collapse of the most recent peace deal, which imposed Islamic law in Swat and surrounding districts. The agreement was brokered by hard-line cleric Sufi Muhammad, three of whose aides were arrested by security forces last week. Two of the aides were killed Saturday after the Taliban attacked their convoy, the army said.
> 
> The motive for the ambush was unclear. It could have been an attempt to rescue the men or kill them before they gave intelligence to the military.
> 
> But Swat Taliban spokesman Muslim Khan said Sunday that Pakistani authorities killed the men because U.S. envoy Richard Holbrooke was visiting.
> 
> "It is a gift the government has presented to Holbrooke," Khan told The Associated Press via phone from an undisclosed location. "We believe that they are martyred. We want to tell the government that their martyrdom is not going to be futile."
> 
> There have been tensions between Sufi Muhammad's movement and the Taliban, which itself is composed of different factions.
> 
> In Bajur tribal region, a clash between the two groups left four dead Saturday, a local official said. The fight occurred over the alleged abduction of a Taliban commander, said Faramoosh Khan, an administrator in Bajur's Mamund town.
> 
> Bajur was the focus of a previous military offensive, and the military said it vanquished the Taliban there in February, but reports of militant activity in the region persist.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Ashraf Khan in Islamabad and Habib Khan in Khar contributed to this report.


----------



## MarkOttawa

More on tide maybe turning:

Pakistan military campaign has broad support, but for how long?
People across Pakistan, even in the northwest, support the offensive against the local Taliban militants. But among refugees, and areas bearing the brunt of the influx, patience is wearing thin.
http://www.latimes.com/news/la-fg-pakistan-support8-2009jun08,0,1543103.story?track=ntothtml



> Reporting from Mardan, Pakistan — Cradled in his father's arms, 8-month-old Maaz Ayaz appeared listless and underweight.
> 
> A smudge of dirt marked the boy's face. His father, Mohammed Ayaz, anxiously talked of how he and his wife could feed Maaz only tea and biscuits -- the only food they could get their hands on at the refugee camp.
> 
> "We've asked for milk, but there's none available," Ayaz said. "We're worried about our boy."
> 
> Such moments of anguish abound at the Sheikh Yaseen camp in this chaotic, sun-baked city that has become the hub for Pakistanis fleeing the fighting in the Swat Valley, about 30 miles to the north.
> 
> Support for the military offensive against the Pakistani Taliban in the northwest has been widespread, cutting across economic and ethnic lines. But that support hinges precariously on how Pakistan manages the massive humanitarian crisis created by the war's displacement of an estimated 3 million Pakistanis.
> 
> About 200,000 of the displaced people, nearly all ethnic Pashtuns, are crammed into sprawling tent camps in Mardan and elsewhere in the country. The rest have sought refuge with relatives or friends. At Sheikh Yaseen, more than 7,600 people live in 1,485 tents.
> 
> The Pakistani military launched the offensive in April after Taliban militants based in Swat began to assert control over adjoining districts, one of them just 60 miles from the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> The broad support for the military campaign could be undermined if the flow of displaced Pashtuns to other regions and cities triggers ethnic tensions. Thousands of Pashtuns have sought shelter in camps and homes in the southern port city of Karachi, where political leaders of the majority ethnic Sindhi population have vehemently opposed their influx.
> 
> More than half of Karachi's shops and markets closed May 25 after *Sindhi nationalists called for a citywide strike to protest the arrival of Pashtuns from Swat* [emphasis added--not much love lost between Pakistan's ethnic groups]. In the past, many Sindhis have opposed the settlement of Pashtuns in Karachi, saying their presence marginalizes locals and takes away jobs.
> 
> Pakistanis have been encouraged by reports of the gains being made by the troops against militants, and, experts say, they are realizing how severe a threat the Taliban poses if allowed to spread unchecked...



A broad view (long article):

Why the Taliban won't take over Pakistan
For reasons of geography, ethnicity, military inferiority, and ancient rivalries, they represent neither the immediate threat that is often portrayed nor the inevitable victors that the West fears. 
http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0607/p06s07-wosc.html?page=1



> It has become the statistic heard round the world. The Taliban are within 60 miles of Islamabad. Just 60 miles. Every dispatch about the insurgents' recent advance into the Pakistani district of Buner carried the ominous number.
> 
> Washington quivered, too. A top counterinsurgency expert, David Kilcullen, reiterated that Pakistan could collapse within six months. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said flatly if the country were to fall, the Taliban would have the "keys to the nuclear arsenal." On a visit to Islamabad, Sen. John Kerry – the proctor of $7.5 billion in Pakistani aid as head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee – warned bluntly: "The government has to ratchet up the urgency."
> 
> The Pakistani military did launch a major counteroffensive that has sent 2 million people fleeing their homes. For now, both the US and many Pakistanis appear to be relieved that the military has drawn a line at least somewhere, in this case in the fruit orchards of the Swat Valley and the city of Mingora, north of Islamabad.
> 
> Yet Pakistani analysts and officials here caution that the casus belli of all the commotion – the infamous 60 miles and the threat of an imminent Taliban takeover – is overblown. The Visigoths are not about to overrun the gates of Rome. Bearded guys with fistfuls of AK-47s are not poised to breeze into Islamabad on the back of white Toyota pickups...
> 
> The M1 Motorway heading out of the capital starts like an American Interstate highway – three divided lanes in each direction, manicured on and off ramps. Take an exit toward Buner and soon the pavement grows intermittent, as does the sight of any women in public view.
> 
> Eventually, a bridge spans the rock-strewn Indus River. Historically, this has marked a significant divide – and serves as a reminder of how geography and history intrude on the Taliban. "West of the Indus [versus] East of the Indus – the cultures, attitudes, and linkages with Afghanistan are very different," says General Masood.
> 
> West was frontier and Pakistan still calls it that: the North West Frontier Province. In this direction, the land rises toward Afghanistan, and the lives get harder as mountains tear apart arable land and communities divide into insulated tribes.
> 
> The worldview of the Taliban comes from West of the Indus. For them, the plains represent exposure. "The Taliban have been able to operate in certain [mountainous areas] because of the terrain and the sympathy factor," says Rifaat Hussain, a military expert at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad. "But the moment they begin to move out of the hideouts, they are exposed. If you have 100 truckloads of Taliban on the Peshawar Highway, all you need is two helicopter gunships" to wipe them out.
> 
> Coming down from the hills also would expose the Taliban to a more secular, urban world that views their way of life as something on the cover of National Geographic. Or, as a colleague of Professor Hussain puts it: "*They are a bunch of mountain barbarians* [emphasis added--many Paks do see them that way, and the Baluchs as even worse]."..



On the other hand, the unity of the country is pretty fragile; its fissiparousness is what is to be feared, rather than a takeover by the Talib miscreants.
http://www.app.com.pk/en_/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=76158&Itemid=2
And the army sees itself as the guarantor of that unity, which the politicians have been rather poor at promoting--see:

AfPak: Compare and contrast 
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2009/06/afpak-compare-and-contrast.html

Existential Pakistan/Threatened Afstan 
http://toyoufromfailinghands.blogspot.com/2009/05/existential-pakistanthreatened-afstan.html

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## Colin Parkinson

In Swat, the Taliban exploited the social order, where most of the land is held by a few large landowners who have not always been nice to the people working the land. The Taliban drove the landowners out of the valley. Saying they will be killed if caught and that all rent is to go to them and they intended to change land distribution. Needless to say this gained them a lot of sympathy from the people on the bottom. Thankfully the Taliban are their own worst enemy and quickly set about alienating the same people who recently saw them as saviours. From my reading, the Taliban has always suffered a shortage of administrators and civil planners in their ranks and with their distrust of existing officials, they are ill prepared to run the territories they gain.


----------



## CougarKing

Serves "Terry" Taliban right for all the trouble he caused in Pakistan; they're getting cornered by the locals they tried to control. 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090609/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Taliban cornered in NW Pakistan by angry locals*
> Associated Press Writer Munir Ahmad, Associated Press Writer – 23 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – *A group of Taliban fighters under siege by hundreds of angry tribesmen tried to sneak to another village in northwest Pakistan, only to find themselves cornered there too, an official said Tuesday.
> 
> A citizens' militia that sprang up over the weekend to avenge a deadly suicide bombing at a mosque in Upper Dir district appeared unwilling to stop pursuing the Islamist fighters, underscoring the rising anti-Taliban sentiment in Pakistan.
> 
> The growing pressure on militants who have held sway in parts of Pakistan's northwest comes as the army bears down on their one-time stronghold in the Swat Valley region. Talk has also turned to the possibility of another operation against al-Qaida and Taliban fighters in the nearby tribal belt along the country's border with Afghanistan, something U.S. officials privately say they would like to see.
> 
> Some 1,500 tribesmen laid siege to several villages known as Taliban strongholds in Upper Dir over the weekend, eventually cornering militants in Shatkas and Ghazi Gay villages. By Tuesday, some of the Taliban tried to get away to Malik Bai village, which the tribesmen also encircled, police official Fazal Rabi said.*
> 
> "About 200 Taliban have been surrounded by the militia" in the villages, Rabi said.
> 
> *Officials have said the Taliban carried out Friday's mosque bombing that killed 33 in the town of Haya Gai because they were angry that local tribesmen had resisted their moving into the area, where minor clashes between the two sides occurred for months. Rabi said the tribesmen had sworn on the Quran that they would not let the militants go unpunished.
> 
> At least 13 insurgents have died in the fighting since Saturday.
> 
> The citizens' militia, or lashkar, was using its own weapons and had no police backup, Rabi said.
> 
> The army's chief spokesman, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, on Monday urged civilians to consider the kind of rule the Taliban was trying to impose — they stand accused of whippings and beheadings in the name of Islamic law in Swat — and join the fight against them.*
> "Citizens should ponder upon the way of life they are introducing, if that is acceptable to us," Abbas told the News1 television network. "If not, they have to raise a voice against them, they have to rise against them."
> 
> *Washington strongly backs the Swat offensive, and officials have said privately they would like Pakistan to follow up by launching an operation in nearby South Waziristan tribal region, the main base for Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud.*The government has announced no plans to attack the area, where al-Qaida fighters also are believed to be operating.


----------



## CANADIAN F0RCES

now this is what we need more of. people who know "their" country to help if they really want this threat gone. no?


----------



## dale622

Sounds like our friends from the south in green beret's are getting involved. Glad te see foreward progress being made.


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## X-mo-1979

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090609/Pakistan_Taliban_090609/20090609?hub=World

The Associated Press

ISLAMABAD -- Pakistan's military has dispatched helicopter gunships to the volatile northwest in support of thousands of angry tribesmen who have laid siege to a group of Taliban fighters, police said Tuesday.

The citizens' militia sprang up over the weekend to avenge a deadly suicide bombing at a mosque in Upper Dir district and appeared unwilling to stop pursuing the Islamist fighters, underscoring the rising anti-Taliban sentiment in much of Pakistan.

The tribesmen's numbers have steadily risen to more than 2,000, with residents of two villages and a town joining them Tuesday, area police official Atlas Khan said.

"People back in the villages, especially children, are fetching them food and other supplies. They are doing it because they think the fighters are fighting for their sake, they think it is their common war," Khan said.

He confirmed media reports that helicopter gunships struck two villages, Shatkas and Ghazi Gay, where the militants have strongholds, late Monday and Tuesday morning. Some of the Taliban were blocked Tuesday when they tried to get away to nearby Malik Bai village, which the tribesmen also encircled, police said.

The growing pressure on militants who have held sway in parts of Pakistan's northwest comes as the army bears down on their one-time sanctuary in the Swat Valley. Talk has also turned to the possibility of another operation against al Qaeda and Taliban fighters in the nearby tribal belt along the country's border with Afghanistan, something U.S. officials privately say they would like to see.

Upper Dir district police chief Ejaz Ahmad said some 200 militants, including foreigners, were putting up tough resistance, with sporadic fighting continuing.

"Reports we are getting say that the foreigners among them are around 20 to 25. Most of them are Afghans, but some of them are Central Asians and Arabs too," Ahmad said.

Ahmad said the militia was foiling the fighters' efforts to flee.

"Villagers have encircled them completely, and they cannot run away," he said.

Asked how long the fight might go on, the police chief said, "The militants are well-entrenched in their strongholds. The area is large and consists of tough terrain, which also has thick forests. I cannot say when, but it will take time to expel or kill all the militants completely."

Officials have said the Taliban carried out Friday's mosque bombing that killed 33 in the Upper Dir town of Haya Gai because they were angry that local tribesmen had resisted their moving into the area, where minor clashes between the two sides occurred for months.

At least 14 insurgents have died in the fighting since Saturday.

The military said in a statement Tuesday that 27 militants were killed and 22 were taken into custody across the region, including Swat, in the past 24 hours, with one soldier killed in an attack on a checkpoint and nine wounded.

The army's chief spokesman, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, on Monday urged civilians to consider the kind of rule the Taliban was trying to impose -- they stand accused of whippings and beheadings in the name of Islamic law in Swat -- and join the fight against them.

"Citizens should ponder upon the way of life they are introducing, if that is acceptable to us," Abbas told the News1 television network. "If not, they have to raise a voice against them, they have to rise against them."

Washington strongly backs the Swat offensive, and officials have said privately they would like Pakistan to follow up by launching an operation in nearby South Waziristan tribal region, the main base for Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud.

The government has announced no plans to attack the area, where al Qaeda fighters also are believed to be operating.

Wouldn't it be just grand if this started happening in Z/P?


----------



## CougarKing

And the Taliban in Pakistan retaliate with another bombing in a Pakistani city. Apparently they don't realize this will only hasten their demise since this will only further inflame Pakistanis against them.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090609/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> Bomb at luxury hotel in Pakistan kills at least 11
> Riaz Khan, Associated Press Writer – 27 mins ago
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan – Suicide attackers shot their way past guards and set off a massive blast Tuesday outside a luxury hotel where foreigners and well-to-do Pakistanis mixed, killing at least 11 people and wounding 70, officials said. The bombers struck the Pearl Continental Hotel at about 10 p.m., when nightlife was still in swing. The attack reduced a section of the hotel to concrete rubble and twisted steel and left a huge crater in a parking lot.
> 
> The blast came a week after Taliban leaders warned they would carry out major attacks in large cities in retaliation for an army offensive to reclaim the nearby Swat Valley region from the militants. No claim surfaced immediately for the bombing in Peshawar, the northwest's largest city with about 2.2 million people.
> 
> Earlier in the day, officials said Pakistan's military engaged militants on two fronts elsewhere in the northwest. The army dispatched helicopter gunships in support of citizens fighting the Taliban in one district and used artillery fire against militants in another after sympathetic tribal elders refused to hand them over.
> 
> Neither operation was anywhere near the size of the military's offensive in the Swat Valley, where 15,000 troops have battled up to 7,000 Taliban fighters.
> 
> But the battles Monday and Tuesday in the Upper Dir and Bannu districts suggest that pockets of pro-Taliban sentiment remain strong in some areas, while the militants' form of hardline Islam is unpalatable in others — particularly because of the violence the militants have used to enforce it.
> 
> Peshawar lies in between the two districts. The Pearl Continental, affectionately called the "PC" by Pakistanis, overlooks a golf course and a historic fort. The ritziest hotel in the city, it is relatively well-guarded and set far back from the main road.
> 
> Police official Liaqat Ali said witnesses gave vivid accounts of how the bombers carried out their attack.
> 
> Three men in a pickup truck approached the hotel's main gate, opened fire at security guards, drove inside and detonated the bomb close to the building, Ali said. A senior police officer, Shafqatullah Malik, estimated it contained more than half a ton of explosives.
> 
> The chaotic scene echoed a bombing last year at Islamabad's Marriott Hotel that killed more than 50 people. Both hotels were favored places for foreigners and elite Pakistanis to stay and socialize, making them high-profile targets for militants despite tight security.
> 
> The method of attack also matched a May 27 assault on buildings belonging to police and a regional headquarters of Pakistan's top intelligence agency in the eastern city of Lahore, for which the Taliban claimed responsibility. A small group opened fire on security guards to get through a guard post, then detonated an explosive-laden van.
> 
> In Washington, two senior U.S. officials said the State Department had been in negotiations with the hotel's owners to either purchase or sign a long-term lease to the facility to house a new American consulate in Peshawar. The officials said they were not aware of any sign that U.S. interest in the compound had played a role in its being targeted.
> 
> The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because the negotiations were not public and had not been completed. They said no immediate decision had been made on whether to go ahead with plans to base the consulate on the hotel grounds.
> 
> Lou Fintor, spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad, said there were no immediate reports of American casualties.
> 
> North West Frontier Province Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain told The Associated Press early Wednesday that officials were reporting 11 deaths in the blast. Other police and government officials could confirm only five dead.
> 
> An AP reporter saw six wounded foreigners being helped out of the Pearl. One said the group worked for UNHCR.
> 
> The U.N. agency identified a staff member as among the dead: Aleksandar Vorkapic, 44, an information technology specialist from Belgrade, Serbia.
> 
> Peshawar district coordination officer Sahibzada Anis said the blast wounded three others working for the U.N. agency — a Briton, a Somali and a German.
> 
> Amjad Jamal, spokesman for the World Food Program in Pakistan, said more than 25 U.N. workers were staying at the hotel. He said all seven WFP workers were safe.
> 
> Dr. Khizar Hayat at Lady Reading Hospital said the hospital received some 70 wounded people, with at least nine in critical condition.
> 
> Farahnaz Ispahani, spokeswoman for President Asif Ali Zardari and the ruling party, condemned the attackers.
> 
> "We will not be cowed by these people," she said. "We will root them out, we will fight them and we will win. This is Pakistan's unity and integrity that is at stake."
> 
> The military offensive in Swat and surrounding districts began in late April, and officials have blamed a handful of suicide attacks on Taliban attempts to seek revenge.
> 
> U.S. officials would like Pakistan to launch an operation in the nearby South Waziristan tribal region, the main base for Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud. The government has announced no plans to attack the area, where al-Qaida fighters also are believed to be operating.
> 
> A new operation started Tuesday in Jani Khel, a semiautonomous region in Bannu bordering North Waziristan, another Taliban stronghold, after the government imposed an indefinite curfew, said Kamran Zeb Khan, coordination officer for the Bannu district.
> 
> He told the AP that the operation, backed by artillery, was launched after tribal elders failed to meet a Monday deadline to expel or hand over militants believed responsible for a mass kidnapping last week of students who were later released.
> 
> Pakistan's military would not confirm that any operation had begun.
> 
> The other fighting took place next to the Swat Valley in the Upper Dir district, where helicopter gunships arrived to support a citizens' militia battling some 200 Taliban fighters.
> 
> The militia, called a lashkar, sprang up over the weekend to avenge a suicide bombing that killed 33 people at a mosque. Officials say the Taliban carried out the bombing because local tribesmen resisted their moving into the area.
> 
> "In Upper Dir, as you are seeing, a lashkar has risen, people have stood up. God willing, the situation will soon improve there," legislator Najmuddin Malik said while visiting a refugee camp in Peshawar.
> 
> The militia's numbers have steadily risen to more than 2,000, with residents of two villages and a town joining them Tuesday as they surrounded the Taliban in tough terrain, area police official Atlas Khan said. His report could not be independently confirmed because media access to the conflict zone has been restricted to military-escorted junkets.
> 
> A tribal elder said villagers won't go home until the militants are gone — one way or another.
> 
> "We are out on a mission to kill or flush out all the Taliban," Malik Motabar Khan told AP by phone from the village of Ghazi Gay. "We will stay here until we kill all of them."
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad, Asif Shahzad and Nahal Toosi in Islamabad and Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report.


----------



## jollyjacktar

I have been wondering why they have not risen up against the Talibs earlier.  Bombing Mosques and killing people at prayers is a sin against Islam.  Hopefully these folks won't let any of these assholes escape alive from the trap and this positive change of standing up to the Talibs moves to other areas.  About time too.  Good hunting.


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Because the Taliban are adept at using terror and aren't above hurting your family if you oppose them. Generally it takes a spontaneous surge of anger to create the conditions that allow the citizens to respond forcefully enough to nullify the Talibans use of force and terror.


----------



## CougarKing

At least the Pakistani government continues to show its resolve to eliminate the Taliban from its teritory.



> Agence France-Presse - 6/13/2009 11:51 AM GMT
> Pakistan vows to fight Taliban 'until the end'
> President Asif Ali Zardari said on Saturday that Pakistan was battling for its "sovereignty" a day after scores of people were killed amid an escalating offensive against the Taliban.
> 
> Zardari said Pakistan would fight "until the end," as US defence officials in Washington confirmed that Islamabad was stepping up its operations against militants in the country's troubled northwest.
> 
> "We are fighting a war for our sovereignty," Zardari said in a television address. "We will continue this war until the end, and we will win it at any cost.
> 
> "The Taliban are the enemies of innocent people. They want to terrorise the people and to take control of the country's institutions."
> 
> Zardari's pledge came after suicide bombings targeting Friday prayers at two mosques killed at least six people, including a prominent Muslim cleric, and wounded more than 100.
> 
> The explosions confirmed fears that Taliban militants would avenge an offensive against them in the northwest, where the military said Friday 39 insurgents and 10 soldiers had been killed in fresh fighting.
> 
> Religious scholar Sarfraz Naeemi, who had spoken out against Taliban suicide bombings, was among two people killed in one of the mosque attacks, in the eastern city of Lahore, police said.
> 
> Lahore police chief Pervez Rathore said a suicide bomber had entered the room where Naeemi was sitting with others after Friday prayers, and blew himself up.
> 
> Naeemi had issued a fatwa (edict) against suicide bombings carried out by Taliban militants.
> 
> Shops, offices, banks and schools in Karachi and Lahore, Pakistan's two largest cities, were closed Saturday in protest at Naeemi's killing, officials said.
> 
> Protests to condemn the killing were also held by religious groups in several Pakistani cities.
> 
> In the other mosque attack, four people died and at least 105 were wounded when an explosives-filled car ploughed into a mosque in the northwestern garrison town of Nowshera, police said.
> 
> Meanwhile, security officials said that jets pounded militant hideouts in the Mohmand tribal district bordering Afghanistan, killing at least seven rebels. Jets also attacked the northwestern tribal districts of South and North Waziristan, they said.
> 
> The tolls could not be verified independently as the areas are out of bounds to journalists due to the ongoing military operations.
> 
> Separately, a roadside bomb targeting a police vehicle in the northwestern garrison town of Kohat killed a policemen and a civilian and six others on Saturday, senior police official Dilawar Khan Bangash told AFP.
> 
> A spokesman for militant leader Baitullah Mehsud's Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) claimed responsibility for Friday's two mosque attacks, as well as Tuesday's bombing of Peshawar's Pearl Continental hotel that killed nine people.
> 
> "Anyone who will oppose us to please the Americans will face the same fate," Maulvi Omar told AFP by telephone from an undisclosed location.
> 
> In Washington, senior defence officials, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said Islamabad planned to step up its offensive against Taliban forces in South Waziristan.
> 
> The region is a stronghold for the TTP, Pakistan's umbrella Taliban organisation, as well as for Al-Qaeda and other extremist groups.
> 
> These groups are clearly interconnected, the official said, so "an offensive certainly can play an important role," noting that the strategy is to "have pressure on both sides of the border."
> 
> A 90,000-strong US and international coalition is fighting the Afghan Taliban and other insurgents on the Afghanistan side.
> 
> A second US defence official told reporters the Pakistani army has been redeploying forces to areas surrounding South Waziristan: "We think the initial phase of the operation has already begun," the official said.


----------



## MarkOttawa

A cautionary note:

Pakistan's Next Fight? Don't Go There.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/12/AR2009061202392.html



> ...
> hopes are high in many quarters that the Pakistani military will ride this momentum into the more crucial battle -- in South Waziristan, the home base of Baitullah Mehsud, Pakistan's terrorist honcho, and untold numbers of al-Qaeda fighters. Last week, the United States delivered four MI-17 cargo helicopters to Pakistan to support the army's fight against the Taliban. Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari has called the Swat operation "just the start" and has declared, with cheering from the Western sidelines, "We're going to go into Waziristan."
> 
> But this enthusiasm should be tempered. The Obama administration has shown a refreshing realism in its policy toward Afghanistan and Pakistan, and if it wants to succeed there, it should encourage the Pakistani army to stay out of Waziristan -- at least for now.
> 
> South Waziristan is an area slightly smaller than Connecticut. Yet after a couple of thousand years of fighting -- and defeating -- anyone who has dared tread too close, Waziristanis have acquired an outsize reputation as recalcitrant tough guys. "No patchwork scheme," Lord Curzon, the turn-of-the-20th-century British viceroy of India, declared, "will settle the Waziristan problem. Not until the military steamroller has passed over the country from end to end, will there be peace. But I do not want to be the person to start that machine." His recent bluster notwithstanding, Zardari doesn't want to start it either.
> 
> Unlike Swat, South Waziristan has been under Taliban rule for most of the past decade. In March 2004, Pakistani troops entered this southernmost tribal agency in their first bid to crush the militants. A month later, the Taliban were clobbering the army, and former president Pervez Musharraf was scrambling to find an exit strategy. Since then, the Taliban have repelled several other operations and, in 2007, kidnapped more than 200 soldiers.
> 
> Does that make it impossible for the Pakistani army to defeat them today? Not necessarily. But it is unrealistic to believe that the Pakistani army could continue fighting Taliban remnants in Swat, remain heavily deployed along the border with India (where they'll remain until, well, forever) and dedicate enough troops in South Waziristan to resemble a steamroller.
> 
> Another stumbling block is the Pakistani military's roster of assets in South Waziristan: They have an almost equal number of jihadist friends and enemies. In the Waziri areas (the region is populated by two tribes, Wazirs and Mehsuds), some Pakistanis see a Taliban leader named Maulvi Nazir as a strategic asset, the kind of "good" Talib who is only interested in fighting the Americans in Afghanistan. Nazir endeared himself to the officer corps when he expelled hundreds of Uzbek militants from the Waziri areas in March 2007.
> 
> If the Pakistani government considers Nazir a good Talib, then Baitullah Mehsud is definitely a bad one. How bad? The U.S. government is offering $5 million for his head, compared with the $600,000 bounty Islamabad put up for Fazlullah. Whether Mehsud is eight times more dangerous than Fazlullah remains to be seen, but he is undoubtedly more capable of committing catastrophic acts of terrorism. Pakistani and U.S. intelligence agencies believe he masterminded the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and has a pool of trained suicide bombers waiting for orders.
> 
> Nazir is no saint, though. There have been several drone attacks, including one that killed al-Qaeda's leading WMD expert, in his territory. But the Pakistani army won't come for him, and he knows it. He has sounded unfazed by rumors of an impending invasion. He has even reportedly told Mehsud that though he can't join him in fighting Pakistani forces, he'll guarantee him safe passage through Waziri areas to Afghanistan to fight NATO forces there.
> 
> And finally, there's al-Qaeda. In his Cairo speech, Obama declared that the United States doesn't want to stay in Afghanistan forever. But neither he nor any future president will be able to ponder withdrawal without having either killed or captured Osama bin Laden and his deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri. Both men are suspected of having bunked down in South Waziristan at various points. If uber-stealthy drones and commandos haven't found them so far, a noisy, invading battalion of Pakistani troops probably won't, either.
> 
> In some ways, Swat and South Waziristan today are like Afghanistan and Iraq in 2003: Rushing into the latter would almost certainly jeopardize success in the former. Pakistan's battle against the Taliban won't be won or lost in the hills, but in the hearts of ordinary Pakistanis, and especially the Pashtuns who live on either side of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border. They are watching more closely than anyone to see whether the army is serious about finishing off Fazlullah's Taliban. They are also watching more closely than anyone to see the fate of millions of Pashtuns who have fled their homes in and around Swat as a result of the army offensive...



Another one, though I suspect Mr Khan has some political self-interest in mind:

Imran Khan warns of Pakistan’s ‘suicide’ 
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6493667.ece



> Pakistan's military offensive against the Taliban will backfire and fuel more extremism and bomb attacks, the cricketer-turned-politician Imran Khan warned last week.
> 
> “I have never been so depressed in my life,” he said. “Pakistan is on a suicidal course.”
> 
> Khan was speaking in London, where he was visiting his two sons by his ex-wife Jemima before heading to America to raise funds for refugees displaced by the fighting.
> 
> The 56-year-old leader of Pakistan’s Movement for Justice party has been branded pro-Taliban for speaking out against the military operation, which has driven 2.5m people from their homes.
> 
> “I’m not pro-Taliban,” he said. “But my point is: shouldn’t we have looked at other options? How do you justify using heavy artillery, helicopter gunships and F-16 fighter-jets in civilian areas? Who in the world does this? Meanwhile all the top Taliban leadership have escaped. It’s so inhuman, what they have done; it will backfire.”
> 
> Khan pointed out that the launch of the operation coincided with President Asif Ali Zardari’s visit to Washington in late April, after which the US agreed a five-year deal worth $1.5 billion (£910m) a year. “Was this operation to save the people of Swat or to get dollars from the Americans?” he asked.
> 
> “Only 10 days earlier, Parliament had passed a resolution endorsing a peace deal in Swat with the Taliban. Why was there no discussion? A military operation should have been the last resort.”
> 
> Khan insisted that *Pakistan would never contain extremism as long as American troops remained across the border in Afghanistan* [emhpasis added]. “Hatred of America is much more than of the Taliban,” he said...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## CougarKing

And the Pakistani Army has been ordered to now target the Taliban commander of all their forces in Pakistan, Mehsud himself.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090614/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> By NAHAL TOOSI and ASIF SHAHZAD, Associated Press Writers Nahal Toosi And Asif Shahzad, Associated Press Writers – 34 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD –* Pakistan ordered its army to go after the country's top Taliban commander, a feared al-Qaida-allied militant whose remote stronghold could prove a difficult test for troops but whose demise would remove a major threat to the country's stability.*
> 
> The announcement Sunday of the operation in South Waziristan, rumored for weeks, came hours after a suspected U.S. missile strike killed five alleged militants there. The move will likely please Washington, which wants Pakistan to eliminate safe havens for militants leaving Afghanistan and which considers South Waziristan a particularly troublesome hideout for al-Qaida.
> 
> *Owais Ghani, the governor of North West Frontier Province, told reporters in Islamabad late Sunday that the government felt it had no choice but to resort to force against Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud and his network. Past army action in the region had usually faltered or ended in truces, strengthening the militants.
> 
> "Baitullah Mehsud is the root cause of all evils," Ghani said, noting a slew of suicide bombings that have shaken Pakistan in recent days. "The government has decided that to secure the innocent citizens from terrorists, a meaningful, durable and complete action is to be taken."
> 
> Ghani suggested the operation has already begun, though the military has insisted its recent attacks on militants in South Waziristan were retaliatory, not the launch of a new offensive. Two intelligence officials said the army and Taliban were fighting in the Spinkai Raghzai area of South Waziristan as the governor made the announcement.*
> 
> Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas told The Associated Press late Sunday: "The government has made the announcement. We will give a comment after evaluating the orders."
> 
> *South Waziristan, part of Pakistan's semiautonomous tribal belt, is a rumored hide-out of al-Qaida chief Osama bin Laden. As the military has pursued a separate offensive against Taliban fighters in the northwest's Swat Valley, observers have noted that the Taliban will not be defeated in Pakistan unless they lose their tribal sanctuaries.
> 
> The U.S. has frequently targeted South Waziristan with missile strikes. The suspected strike Sunday hit three vehicles and killed five suspected militants. Two Pakistani intelligence officials confirmed the attack on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
> 
> Neighboring North Waziristan, another militant stronghold and target for U.S. missiles, may also fall under the new Pakistani offensive at some point.
> 
> Mehsud is believed to pose a serious internal threat to the Pakistani government, and has been blamed for the killing of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, though he has denied that accusation. The Taliban chief also has been linked to attacks on both sides of the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, though he is believed to have operated primarily in Pakistan.
> 
> In many ways, a full-scale battle in South Waziristan will be a harder fight than in Swat, where the army claims to have killed hundreds of militants over the past six weeks.
> 
> One reason is that the tribal region's porous border with Afghanistan could make it easier for militants to escape to the other side. Because of the tribal belt's semiautonomous nature, the government has long had limited influence, allowing militants to become deeply entrenched.
> 
> A new offensive could also mean more displaced civilians in Pakistan, already struggling to deal with more than 2 million who fled their homes in Swat and surrounding districts.
> 
> Pakistan's decision comes as public opinion has shifted against the Taliban, who have been blamed or have claimed responsibility for a series of bloody attacks in recent weeks, including one that killed a prominent anti-Taliban cleric and another that devastated a luxury hotel in Peshawar.
> 
> On Sunday, a bomb rocked a market in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan, while officials said clashes between the Taliban and security forces killed at least 20 militants in a tribal area supposedly cleared of insurgents months ago.
> 
> Government official Inayat Ullah said 11 to 13 pounds (5 to 6 kilograms) of explosives were planted in a fruit vendor's hand-pulled cart in the market. Police official Mohammad Iqbal put the death toll at nine, with 20 wounded.*
> 
> At a hospital where some of the wounded were taken, cries punctured the air.
> 
> "It was crowded there when something big exploded," said 30-year-old Ilyas Ahmad, whose legs were wounded. "It was a big noise. Everybody was crying. Bodies were lying there. People were lying around blood."
> 
> A Taliban commander, Qari Hussain Ahmad, blamed the blast on Pakistani intelligence agencies, saying the government was carrying out such acts to legitimize an operation in Waziristan.
> 
> "They want to malign us. They want to use killings of innocent citizens against us," Hussain told The Associated Press by phone from an undisclosed location.
> 
> Fighting on multiple fronts could tax the army's ability to hold regions once it says it has cleared them. The latest clashes in the Bajur tribal region underscored that.
> 
> Bajur was the main theater of operations against the militants before Swat. After some six months of fighting, the army said in February that the Taliban there had been defeated. But there have been occasional reports since then of ongoing militant activity.
> 
> Pakistani forces used jets, helicopters and artillery to pound suspected Taliban hide-outs in Bajur over the weekend.
> 
> Zakir Hussain Afridi, the top government official for Bajur, said the fighting was in the Charmang valley, a stretch he described as largely under Taliban control. Jamil Khan, his deputy, put the militant death toll at 20 since Friday.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Habib Khan in Khar and Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan contributed to this report.


----------



## Yrys

Lahore buries anti-Taliban cleric





_Thousands attended the funeral 
in Lahore _

The funeral has taken place in the Pakistani city of Lahore of a prominent Muslim cleric killed 
in a suicide attack on Friday. The cleric, Sarfraz Naeemi, was one of Pakistan's leading Sunni 
scholars and was known for his outspoken views opposing suicide bombings. He had denounced 
the activities of Taliban militants as un-Islamic.

Protests against the killing have taken place in a number of Pakistani cities, including Lahore.
Sarfraz Naeemi was killed when an explosion struck the Jaamia Naeemia madrassa around 
the time of Friday prayers. He was one of the few scholars who had openly supported the 
ongoing military operation in Swat and had labelled the activities of the Taliban "un-Islamic".

Six people were killed in the attack on Sarfraz Naeemi and a simultaneous suicide bombing 
at a mosque in the north-west garrison town of Nowshera.

*Presidential support*

The Pakistani President, Asif Ali Zardari, used a late-night broadcast to the nation on Friday, 
to condemn the killing of the cleric. He said the Taliban were brutal people who were working 
against the sovereignty of Pakistan. Mr Zardari also announced pay rises for the armed forces, 
who are engaged in a major offensive against the Taliban.


----------



## MarkOttawa

On to South Waziristan:

Pakistan To Pursue Taliban Leader
Militant Suspected In Bhutto Killing
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/14/AR2009061402428.html



> Pakistani officials announced Sunday night that security forces will launch a military operation against Baitullah Mehsud, a feared Taliban leader who has asserted responsibility for numerous suicide bombings across the country and who is believed to have ordered the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in late 2007.
> 
> The announcement by officials in North-West Frontier Province came after a week of deadly attacks attributed to the Pakistani Taliban ["Mehsud's trail of blood", note assassination of Benazir Bhutto Dec. 27, 2007],
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/mehsuds-trail-of-blood/article1181727/
> including the bombing Tuesday of a five-star hotel that killed 11 people in the northwestern city of Peshawar and the assassination Friday of a moderate Sunni Muslim cleric in another suicide bombing here in the capital of Punjab province.
> 
> It also followed another day of violence in the northwestern region where the Taliban forces are based. A bomb hidden in a market cart in the town of Dera Ismail Khan killed at least eight people and wounded 25, and a suspected U.S. drone aircraft fired a missile in the tribal region of South Waziristan, reportedly killing three Islamist fighters, officials said.
> 
> Provincial Gov. Owais Ghani said at a news conference in Peshawar on Sunday that the government will soon begin a military operation against Mehsud in South Waziristan, the rugged semiautonomous region near the Afghan border that has been his stronghold for several years. Ghani did not say when it would begin, but an army spokesman confirmed that the decision had been made.
> 
> Last month, the army launched a major offensive against Taliban forces in the region around the northwest Swat Valley, sending more than 2 million refugees fleeing to other districts for safety. Until now, however, it has been reluctant to penetrate more dangerous tribal districts in pursuit of Mehsud and other Taliban leaders, who seek to forcibly impose a draconian version of Islam on the nation.
> 
> "Baitullah is the root cause of all the problems. He is the axis of evil [not Obama-speak, what?]," Ghani told reporters. He said the young militant leader was responsible for "gory acts of terror," including the slaying of Bhutto at a rally in Rawalpindi and the recent string of deadly suicide bombings, among them a second attack Friday that killed four worshipers at a military-run mosque in Nowshera...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Start of good (long) article by Jonathan Kay in the _National Post_:

Pakistan: land of unintended consequences
http://www.nationalpost.com/todays-paper/story.html?id=1702948



> I've spent the last two days at a conference sponsored by the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, listening to dozens of specialists discuss the best way to pacify the Taliban-infested border areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan. It's been a humbling experience, as well as an educational one: I seemed to have been the only person on the speaking roster who hadn't spent a good chunk of his or her life in south Asia. (Emphasis on "or her": It surprised me how many women have adopted this remote, misogynistic corner of the globe as their focus of study.)
> 
> Alongside the various ambassadors -- current and former -- there was a former police chief from Pakistan's North-West Frontier Province, a former CIA operative and a variety of brand-name global terrorism experts. Other speakers had done in-depth reporting from the region for Western publications, or run grass-roots NGOs. Most of the attendees agreed that the Taliban was strong, and getting stronger -- and not one offered a simple solution.
> 
> A basic problem, it emerged, is the sheer complexity of the military dynamic in eastern Afghanistan and northwestern Pakistan.
> 
> While journalists often talk about the Taliban as if it were a single, unified force, there are in fact many Talibans. On the highest level are the hardcore, mass-murdering jihadis -- men whose cause is inseparable from that of al-Qaeda; who are intermarried into the group and have even adopted Arabic as their primary language. Everyone in the room agreed that ordinary politics means little to these men: Holy War is in their blood.
> 
> In the middle tier are the tribal militias, village-defence forces, drug gangs and other Taliban-of-convenience. These groups shift their allegiance around opportunistically, depending on who seems to be winning at any given moment.
> 
> Finally comes the hapless foot soldiers -- illiterate peasants paid by the month to tote a gun and go where they're told.
> 
> Each group calls out for a different strategy. In the case of the dedicated jihadis, the only thing to be done is to kill them -- which means boots on the ground, special forces and drones. The militias, by contrast, respond quickly to shifts in popular opinion, propaganda and outreach. And the low-level foot soldiers can be lured away by jobs -- which means economic projects and nation-building...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## CougarKing

Another update:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090623/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> * Taliban commander shot dead in northwest Pakistan*
> Associated Press Writer Paul Alexander, Associated Press Writer – 35 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – *A Taliban faction leader who was seen as the chief rival to the militant group's Pakistani head was fatally shot Tuesday, reportedly by one of his own guards. The attack on Qari Zainuddin appeared to be a sign that divisions within the Taliban have broken into the open as they come under military assault.
> 
> The army is clearing out militants from the Swat Valley and has been pounding strongholds of Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in the South Waziristan tribal region bordering Afghanistan in apparent preparation for a major offensive.
> 
> The tribal zone was also hammered by suspected U.S. missile strikes, which targeted a purported Taliban training center and then hours later hit a funeral procession for some of those killed in the earlier strike.
> 
> Two intelligence officials said up to 40 people were killed — including Sangeen Khan, a top aide to Mehsud — and 60 more wounded. The military said it had no information on the attack, and it was impossible to independently verify the information because the area is dangerous and restricted to outsiders.
> 
> In the first strike, three suspected U.S. missiles hit the training center in the village of Najmarai in the Makeen area of South Waziristan, said the two intelligence officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk the media.
> 
> Hours later, four more missiles blasted into the evening funeral procession.
> 
> "I saw three drones, they dropped bombs," said Sohail Mehsud, a resident of Makeen, which is the home district of Baitullah Mehsud.
> 
> Dozens of such strikes have been carried out in the tribal regions over the last year. U.S. officials concede they have been using drone-fired missiles to target suspected militants in Pakistan, but they do not comment on individual strikes.*
> 
> Zainuddin was gunned down in the nearby town of Dera Ismail Khan. He had emerged as Mehsud's chief rival and had criticized the militant leader over attacks that killed civilians.
> 
> Dr. Mahmood Khan Bitani told The Associated Press that he pronounced Zainuddin dead on arrival at a local hospital with gunshot wounds to the head and chest.
> 
> Baz Mohammad, an aide to the militant leader who also was wounded, said a guard barged into a room at Zainuddin's compound after morning prayers and opened fire. He accused Mehsud of being behind the attack.
> 
> "It was definitely Baitullah's man who infiltrated our ranks, and he has done his job," Mohammad told AP, vowing to avenge the death.
> 
> He later filed a criminal complaint with police, alleging the shooting was carried out at Mehsud's behest.
> 
> A spokesman for Mehsud could not immediately be reached to respond to the accusation.
> 
> Bahawal Khan, the area police official, confirmed the slaying, as did Sher Mohammad, an uncle of Zainuddin. Aides said the guard had gotten closer to Zainuddin about four months ago. He fled after the attack in a waiting car, they said.
> 
> Mahmood Shah, a former top security official, said the slaying sends a strong message to the government that they need to launch a strong, comprehensive operation to eliminate Mehsud, described as the center of gravity for much of the terrorist activity in Pakistan. Instead, Shah said, they have relied on "local efforts" by Mehsud's opponents like Zainuddin.
> 
> "Baitullah Mehsud has overcome all tribal dynamics. He has resources, funding and a fighting force to strike anywhere in Pakistan," Shah said, calling him a front man for al-Qaida. "You simply can't eliminate him through local efforts; instead, you need a major force."
> 
> Zainuddin was estimated to have about 3,000 armed followers in Dera Ismail Khan and nearby Tank. Earlier this month, he denounced Mehsud for recent attacks that have killed civilians — apparently launched in retaliation for the army offensive in the northwestern Swat Valley.
> 
> "Whatever Baitullah Mehsud and his associates are doing in the name of Islam is not a jihad, and in fact it is rioting and terrorism," Zainuddin told the AP after a mosque suicide bombing attack, blamed on Mehsud, killed 33 people. "Islam stands for peace, not for terrorism."
> 
> Zainuddin's motive for criticizing Mehsud was not clear, but there was speculation that he was trying to portray himself as a more moderate alternative to the Taliban leader, although there appeared to be little or no differences between the two over fighting U.S. and NATO forces in Afghanistan.
> 
> Daily bombing runs and artillery barrages have been softening up militant targets in South Waziristan for about a week and ground troops have moved into position, the military says, though it says the main offensive has not yet started.
> 
> Meanwhile, five suspected aides of Mehsud were arrested Tuesday in the southern city of Karachi after an encounter with police, while six others escaped, police official Raja Omar Khatab said. The men are accused of involvement in robberies, kidnappings for ransom and other criminal activity to generate funds for Mehsud, Khatab said.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan and Zarar Khan in Islamabad contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

Al Qaeda infiltrators and sympathizers within the Pakistani military's ranks? 

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/655572



> Extremists' goal to infiltrate military adds to uncertainty over army offensive in tribal regions
> 
> Jun 24, 2009 04:30 AM
> Rick Westhead
> SOUTH ASIA BUREAU
> 
> NEW DELHI – As Pakistan's military continues its offensive against the Taliban in the northern part of the country, a senior Al Qaeda leader is threatening to ferret out and use Pakistan's nuclear weapons against the United States.
> 
> Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, Al Qaeda's commander of operations in Afghanistan, said both Al Qaeda and the Taliban are working to infiltrate Pakistan's military in an effort to get access to the country's nuclear weapons.
> 
> If they're successful, "the mujahideen would take them and use them against the Americans."
> 
> "The strategy of the (Al Qaeda) organization in the coming period is the same as in the previous period: to hit the head of the snake, the head of tyranny, the United States," al-Yazid said in an interview on the al Jazeera TV network.
> 
> "That can be achieved through continued work on the open fronts and also by opening new fronts in a manner that achieves the interests of Islam and Muslims and by increasing military operations that drain the enemy financially."
> 
> This threat lends to the air of chaos that has descended on Pakistan: President Asif Ali Zardari is rarely seen in public, afraid he will be assassinated like his populist wife, former prime minister Benazir Bhutto; Islamabad is no longer a quiet civil service town filled with restaurants, but rather one of guns, police and concrete barriers; in northern Pakistan more than two million people have fled their homes, chased away by the threat of the Taliban and Al Qaeda, who are now working in concert.
> 
> The Pakistani secret service, the ISI, has long had a close relationship with the Taliban and has turned a blind eye to the extremist ideology taught in the madrassas. It is also well known that nuclear technology developed in Pakistan by scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan has been sold to countries such as North Korea, Iran and Libya and could find its way into the "wrong hands."
> 
> There have been fears in Washington the Taliban could get its hands on nuclear missiles: already, the insurgents are using American technology to battle U.S. troops. The Pakistani arsenal is spread around the country, in places known only to the Pakistani military.
> 
> The U.S. General Accounting Office conducted a recent investigation that revealed enemy insurgents, particularly suicide bombers, have been wearing infrared patches on their clothing to get close to American soldiers at night. The patches are available for sale to the public in the U.S. and China and are designed to be seen by soldiers using night-vision goggles.
> 
> Military analysts are split over whether Al Qaeda's threats of acquiring Pakistan's nuclear technology should be taken seriously. Over the past month, the Taliban and its Al Qaeda allies have been forced by the advancing Pakistani army to abandon positions in villages and towns in the lush Swat Valley after earlier taking control of communities close to Islamabad, the capital.
> 
> It's doubtful that extremists could seize a nuclear weapon by force. What is plausible is they could find allies in the Pakistan military sympathetic to its cause.
> 
> Pervez Hoodbhoy, a nuclear physics professor at Islamabad's Quaid-e-Azam University, told the Star in an interview that nuclear weapons remain "as safe as the people who are their custodians."
> 
> Remembering a former "very right wing" student who is now working in a high-level military position, Hoodbhoy said the threat to Pakistan's well-guarded nuclear weapons comes not from "mountain barbarians" but from Al Qaeda's "Islamist allies within the Pakistani state and society. These are urban people: engineers, technicians, people in fairly high office."
> 
> Because Pakistan keeps its nuclear warheads in a disassembled state, it would probably take weeks to put warheads together, further reducing the risk of a weapon's capture. The professor said it would be much more probable that a terrorist could obtain the nuclear material needed to make a radioactive dirty bomb. The core of a nuclear warhead, for instance, is the size of a grapefruit and conceivably could be moved without detection.
> 
> The militants latest threat comes as Pakistan's military conducts operations in South Waziristan, an area that's been used as a base of operations by Baitullah Mehsud, a Taliban leader accused of orchestrating a string of bomb attacks.


----------



## CougarKing

Yet another Predator strike?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090708/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> By CHRIS BRUMMITT, Associated Press Writer Chris Brummitt, Associated Press Writer – 4 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – Suspected U.S. unmanned aircraft launched two attacks against militants loyal to the head of the Pakistani Taliban on Wednesday, killing at least 45 in the latest in a barrage of strikes against a group also being targeted by the Pakistani military, intelligence officials said.
> 
> The convergence of U.S. and Pakistani interests in the South Waziristan tribal region suggests the two uneasy allies were cooperating in the strikes, making it harder for Islamabad to protest them publicly as it has in the past.
> 
> The army denied signing off on the attacks and insisted they were hurting its campaign against Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud by alienating local tribes it is trying to enlist in the fight.
> 
> Meanwhile, an army spokesman said a Pakistani jet attack wounded the local Taliban commander in the scenic Swat Valley elsewhere in the northwest. Troops have been battling militants in Swat for more than two months, an offensive that has so far failed to net any top insurgent leaders.
> 
> The mountainous border region is home to al-Qaida and Taliban leaders who plot attacks in Pakistan and neighboring Afghanistan, which is witnessing an unprecedented level of violence against U.S. and NATO troops.
> 
> South Waziristan is the stronghold of Mehsud and his followers, whom the government blames for more than 90 percent of the suicide bombings in Pakistan in recent years. The U.S. State Department says Mehsud is a key al-Qaida facilitator in the region.
> 
> Suspected American drones have carried out more than 45 attacks in the region since last August. Although most have targeted foreign al-Qaida militants and those accused of violence in Afghanistan, increasingly they are aimed at the Mehsud network.
> 
> The first strike Wednesday took place before dawn. Six missiles were fired at a mountaintop training camp in the Karwan Manza area of South Waziristan, killing 10 militants, Pakistani intelligence officials said on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media.
> 
> Hours later, 12 miles to the east, missiles hit four vehicles carrying Taliban militants, killing at least 35, including a key Taliban commander, one intelligence official said. Another said 50 were killed.
> 
> Independent verification of the targets and casualties was not possible because the region is remote, dangerous and largely inaccessible to journalists. U.S. and Pakistani officials do not publicly comment on such strikes.
> 
> On Tuesday, a suspected U.S. missile attack killed 12 militants in South Waziristan, including five foreigners, according to intelligence officials. Another recent strike killed up to 80 insurgents attending a funeral.
> 
> The timing is significant because Pakistan's military is also carrying out bombing runs and firing mortar rounds at militant targets in the region as part of efforts to kill or capture Mehsud and his followers. It says it plans to launch a large offensive there soon.
> 
> The government routinely protests suspected U.S. missile strikes as violations of Pakistani sovereignty and has publicly asked the U.S. to give it technology to launch its own attacks. But many analysts suspect the government — which has received billions of dollars a year from the U.S. since 2001 — supports the strikes, especially those against Mehsud and his Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan.
> 
> "They are decrying them on one hand and aiding and abetting them on the other,"  said Shuja Nawaz, director of the U.S.-based Atlantic Council. "It is helpful for the Pakistanis when the TTP is being targeted. There is obviously much better coordination now."
> 
> Speaking after Tuesday's attack, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas insisted the U.S. help was unwelcome and alienated local tribes it wanted to enlist in the fight against Mehsud.
> 
> The United States has been trying to get Pakistan's military to crack down on militants in the border area since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, but the country's past nurturing of militants to use as proxies in Afghanistan and Pakistan has complicated those efforts.
> 
> The Swat offensive began after militants there violated a peace deal with the government and moved into regions close to the capital, Islamabad. The army claims to have nearly cleared the valley of insurgents, killing more than 1,500.
> 
> Abbas told a news conference Wednesday that according to "credible information," the leader of the Swat Taliban, Maulana Fazlullah, was wounded in a recent airstrike. Fazlullah's capture or killing would be a major symbolic victory for the army and could ease the fears of some 2 million residents who fled the valley and surrounding districts and have yet to return.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad, Ishtiaq Mahsud and Hussain Afzal contributed to this report from Islamabad, Dera Ismail Khan and Parachinar.


----------



## CougarKing

Will the helos discussed below be actually used in the Northwest Frontier against the Taliban or diverted for patrolling the Kashmir border is another question that weighs on some people's minds.

http://www.defensenews.com/story.php?i=4177914&c=ASI&s=TOP



> *France Preps Arms Package for Pakistan*
> By USMAN ANSARI
> Published: 8 Jul 2009 17:49
> ISLAMABAD - France is preparing a comprehensive defense package to offer to Pakistan for its counterterrorism operations in the North West Frontier Province bordering Afghanistan, according to a spokesman at the French defense section at Paris' Embassy here.
> 
> Local media had reported a possible Franco-Pakistani defense deal in early July.
> 
> 
> The spokesman said that the deal would include weapons and training, but gave no further details..
> 
> "Nothing has been agreed, but a lot of things have been discussed. The main issue is to help Pakistan in the area of counterterrorism," he said.
> 
> As for media reports that an agreement had been reached to sell the Franco-German Tiger attack helicopter to Islamabad, the spokesman dismissed them as "a media buzz."
> 
> The spokesman said the larger deal might be concluded when French President Nicholas Sarkozy visits sometime after Sept. 21.
> 
> *France is already working to remedy a shortage of helicopters that has hindered the Pakistan Army during its counterterrorism operations in the North West Frontier Province. The French have returned Pakistan's Puma transport and utility helicopters to full operational status. They are also providing the armed variant of the AS550 Fennec light helicopter, which will join the unarmed Ecureuil variant that is in service with Pakistan Army Aviation.
> 
> However, the Tiger gunship, if it is included in the package, may not be suitable for Pakistan's needs, said defense analyst Haris Khan of the Pakistan Military Consortium.
> 
> Khan said the Pakistan Army needs extra gunships "immediately," but he noted that the most obvious source, Washington, is unable to meet the need. Pakistan had hoped to acquire the AH-64 Apache, but no funds are available for the purchase.
> 
> Additional AH-1F Cobras are also unlikely to materialize soon because, he said, "it takes close to 24 to 36 months to refurbish a stored AH-1 S/F and make it fully combat-operational."
> 
> However, a spokesman for the defense section in the U.S. Embassy in Islamabad said Pakistan had previously declined an offer of further refurbished Cobras.
> 
> "Through Foreign Military Financing [FMF], the U.S. provided 12 refurbished AH-1Fs to Pakistan in 2007. Pakistan used U.S. grants to pay for the refurbishments. Also through FMF, the U.S. offered to refurbish an additional eight Pakistan Army AH-1F Cobras; however, Pakistan decided not to pursue this course of action," he said.
> 
> Khan said the only other U.S. option also comes with a considerable time delay.
> 
> "The U.S. has indicated that they are willing and able to release close to 14 AH-1W Super Cobras immediately, but first Pakistan Army pilots and technicians would need to be trained. Therefore, the Pakistan Army would be looking at another 10 to 12 months before it wears Pakistani colors," he said.
> 
> Khan said Pakistan's needs would best be met by the South African AH-2 Rooivalk.
> 
> "It is hard-hitting, rugged, needs little support, the Pakistan Army is familiar with the Puma platform [upon which it is based] and has expertise with it, and it suits Pakistan's industrial base to a large degree."*
> 
> But he said the Rooivalk program is now all but at a premature end, and Islamabad lacks the finances to revive and purchase it from the South Africans. ■
> 
> E-mail: uansari@defensenews.com.


----------



## CougarKing

And the clashes re-ignite as the Pakistani Army and friendly militias called Lashkars encounter more Taliban fighters.



> Agence France-Presse - 7/14/2009 5:01 PM GMT
> *Deadly Pakistan clashes, NATO tanker ambushed
> Fresh fighting against the Taliban in Pakistan killed more than 30 militants and destroyed an oil tanker supplying NATO forces based across the border in Afghanistan, officials said Tuesday.
> 
> The unrest came as officials said the number of displaced returning home to the Swat valley and adjoining northwest districts surged despite the reported killing of nine militants there over the last 24 hours.
> 
> The deadliest clashes involved a village militia in the border tribal areas, officials said, reflecting the state's increasing reliance on local tribesmen to battle Islamist radicals allegedly plotting attacks against targets in this region and in the West.
> 
> The worst violence occurred Monday and overnight in the village of Anbar in Mohmand district, 15 kilometres (nine miles) southwest of Khar, the main town of the neighbouring Bajaur district -- another Islamist stronghold. *
> 
> "According to reports received here, a lashkar (traditional tribal militia) killed 23 militants and several others were wounded," local administration official Asad Ali Khan told AFP.
> 
> Administration official Mohammad Rasul Khan said three villagers were missing after the clashes between a 150-strong village force and militants.
> 
> Intelligence and security officials confirmed the death toll.
> 
> *Hundreds of Islamist fighters are believed to have fled Afghanistan into Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal areas to carve out safe havens after the US-led invasion toppled the hardline Taliban regime in Kabul in late 2001.
> 
> Pakistan is encouraging locals to organise lashkars against militants in several northwestern regions, as they widen the fight against extremists blamed for bomb attacks that have killed about 2,000 people in two years.
> 
> In the infamous Khyber region, militants ambushed a tanker carrying fuel for NATO forces in Afghanistan and an ensuing gunfight killed two civilians, said local administration official Rehan Gul Khattak. *
> 
> *The attack took place near the town of Landi Kotal on the main highway which links Pakistan to landlocked Afghanistan.
> 
> "Militants first fired a mortar on the oil tanker and then set it on fire. Meanwhile a gunfight broke out with paramilitary troops which left two civilians dead and three others wounded," Khattak said.
> 
> The ambush was staged by around 30 militants who fled after the exchange of fire, he said. The highway was temporarily closed, but NATO supply convoys were halted even after the road re-opened, Khattak said.
> 
> "We will target all those who continue," Umar Farooq, a spokesman for Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in Khyber, told AFP by telephone from an undisclosed location.
> 
> Violence has flared in the tribal areas despite a two-month campaign welcomed by the United States against the Taliban in and around the northwest district of Swat, once dubbed the "Switzerland of Pakistan" for its mountain resorts.
> 
> The military reported killings in Swat on Tuesday for the first time in days, saying that nine militants were shot dead in the last 24 hours.*
> 
> The government this week bussed home the first of nearly two million people displaced by the conflict ahead of the monsoon season, although so far only a fraction have taken up the offer -- with most still fearful about security.
> 
> Lieutenant Colonel Waseem Shahid said the pace of returns was quickening to Swat and the neighbouring district of Buner, where Taliban fighters thrust towards Islamabad in April, defying a peace deal and sparking the offensive.
> 
> "Some 1,200 families returned by buses provided by the government and another 1,066 families returned by private vehicles," said Shahid, giving an update Tuesday afternoon.
> 
> But many displaced families vowed not to return until they receive bank cards charged with 25,000 rupees (300 dollars) to rebuild their lives.
> 
> Crops were left to rot during the two-month offensive and the local economy has been shattered by a two-year Taliban uprising to enforce sharia law.
> 
> "I fear the Taliban will come back because their leadership is alive," said Saleh Shah, 40, living with his wife and five children in Sheikh Shehzad.


----------



## CougarKing

Meanwhile, in Pakistan's own front against the Taliban in its own country:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090726/world/pakistan_unrest_northwest



> *Pakistani jets kill 13 militants: officials *
> 2 hours, 47 minutes ago
> 
> 
> 
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AFP) -* Pakistani fighter jets pounded militant positions, killing at least 13 rebels and destroying their hideouts in the restive northwest, security officials said Sunday.
> 
> 
> The bombardment took place on late Saturday in Lower Dir town, where troops have been carrying out search and clearance operation to hunt down militants.
> 
> 
> "At least 13 militants were killed and 15 of their hideouts destroyed in the bombing carried out by fighter jets in Lower Dir," a security official in the area told AFP.
> 
> 
> A local government official confirmed the incident and the militant casualties, saying the death toll might rise as intelligence intercepts revealed that there were some 140 militants holed up in the area.*
> 
> The Pakistani army launched the offensive to dislodge Taliban guerrillas from the three districts of Lower Dir, Buner and Swat in late April and early May after rebels flouted a peace deal and thrust towards the capital Islamabad.
> 
> 
> The offensive has the backing of the United States and enjoys broad popular support among Pakistanis exasperated by worsening Taliban-linked attacks, which have killed nearly 2,000 people in the nuclear-armed country since July 2007.
> 
> 
> Meanwhile the military continued its search and clearance operation in Swat, Dir and Buner to track down militants.
> 
> 
> "A local Taliban commander was killed and nine other terrorists were arrested in Swat during the last 24 hours," it said in a statement.
> 
> 
> Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said earlier this month the military had "eliminated" extremists and government statistics show that 385,000 of 1.9 million civilians who were displaced by the fighting have returned.
> 
> 
> But skirmishes have continued, raising fears that the Taliban escaped into the mountains and will return, a tactic militants adopted after similar military offensives in the past.
> 
> 
> Pakistan says more than 1,800 militants and 166 security personnel have been killed since April but the death tolls are impossible to verify independently.



http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090725/world/pakistan_unrest_northwest_289



> *Troops kill 14 militants in NW Pakistan: military *
> Sat Jul 25, 11:24 AM
> 
> 
> 
> ISLAMABAD (AFP) - *Pakistani troops killed at least 18 militants and arrested another 29 during an ongoing offensive against Taliban insurgents in northwest Pakistan, the military and police said on Saturday.
> 
> 
> The military continued search and clearance operations across Malakand district and the former tourist resort of Swat.*
> 
> "During last 24 hours, search and clearance operations were conducted in Swat and Malakand division," it said in a daily update on the operation.
> 
> 
> *Ten militants were killed in Buner district and 29 were arrested elsewhere in the region, it said.
> 
> 
> Troops killed four militants in Swat and destroyed a training camp and a militants' cave, recovering a huge cache of arms and ammunition, the statement said.
> 
> 
> In the nearby district of Upper Dir jets pounded a suspected Taliban base, killing at least four militants, local police chief Ejaz Ahmed said.*
> 
> 
> "It was a key militant stronghold in the area which has been totally destroyed," Ahmed told AFP by telephone.
> 
> 
> Local administration chief Javed Marwat said: "It was heavy bombing and the toll may go up."
> 
> 
> *Pakistan launched the offensive in late April, under pressure from the United States to clamp down on militants who had advanced from Swat into the neighbouring district of Buner, further south towards Islamabad.
> 
> 
> Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani said earlier this month the military had "eliminated" extremists and government statistics show that 385,000 of 1.9 million civilians who were displaced by the fighting have returned.
> 
> 
> But skirmishes have continued, raising fears that the Taliban escaped into the mountains and will return, a tactic militants adopted after similar military offensives in the past.
> 
> 
> Pakistan says more than 1,800 militants and 166 security personnel have been killed since April but the death tolls are impossible to verify independently.*
> 
> 
> Separately, a remote controlled bomb killed two Pakistani soldiers in the tribal Bajaur district, local administration official Ghulam Haider said.
> 
> 
> "A remote controlled bomb exploded when soldiers were scanning a road for possible landmines in Charmang region's Matak town of Bajaur, killing two soldiers," he said.
> 
> 
> Troops retaliated, killing three suspected Taliban militants, he added.
> 
> 
> A military official confirmed the incident but gave no casualty figures.
> 
> 
> Bajaur borders eastern Afghan province of Kunar.



http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090726/world/pakistan_afghanistan_unrest_military_3



> *Pakistan stretched thin for Mehsud battle *
> Sun Jul 26, 1:25 AM
> 
> 
> 
> ISLAMABAD (AFP) - *Consolidating military gains in Swat and worries about Taliban spillover from south Afghanistan are clouding Pakistan's offensive against the country's most wanted warlord, analysts say.
> 
> 
> In mid-June, the military said it had received orders and was preparing to launch an offensive against Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud and his network in the South Waziristan tribal district bordering Afghanistan.
> 
> 
> Troops have sealed off much of the eastern border between South Waziristan and areas under government control, and carried out air raids in what the military calls softening up for a full-scale ground operation.
> 
> 
> Pakistan says it has eliminated the Taliban in a military offensive launched last April in northwestern districts Buner, Dir and Swat, which rendered nearly two million people displaced.
> 
> 
> But deadly skirmishes continue, raising fears that the Taliban escaped into the mountains and might return, as after previous offensives.*
> 
> 
> Signs of battle were visible on the road winding up to Swat at the weekend. South of the valley at Batkhela, two bodies were dumped by the road. Residents said they were Taliban killed by the army.
> 
> 
> Another body lay in the Swat town of Marghazar. Residents identified him as a local Taliban commander who was captured and killed as a warning.
> 
> 
> "The army has to consolidate Swat and help maintain security so that IDPs (internally displaced persons) return without any fear that the Taliban would come back," former interior minister Hamid Nawaz told AFP.
> 
> 
> "My assessment is that the army will remain in Swat until the civilian set-up is also consolidated and an intelligence network is in place," added Nawaz, who is also a retired lieutenant general.
> 
> 
> *Last week US regional envoy Richard Holbrooke heard concerns in Pakistan that 4,000 US Marines operating further south in Afghanistan will push Taliban across the border and inflame in insurgency in Baluchistan.
> 
> 
> When the US airborne assault began, Pakistan said it redeployed troops along the Afghan border to stop Taliban fighters fleeing into its southwest, ripped apart by Islamist, sectarian and regional violence.*
> "There can be a spillover of the Helmand operation into Pakistan and the military has to guard the border as well," said Nawaz.
> 
> 
> "But in South Waziristan, firefights continue and strikes are being carried out against militants with a view to cause maximum damage."
> 
> 
> *Mehsud has two prices on his head -- five million dollars from the United States, which considers him a key Al-Qaeda facilitator, and 615,000 dollars from the Pakistani government.
> 
> 
> Suspected US missiles and Pakistani air strikes target his strongholds but so far he has escaped harm.*
> 
> 
> "Baitullah Mehsud is one of the most dangerous and odious people in the entire region," said Holbrooke, but added he thought a Waziristan offensive had been delayed because of operations in Swat.
> 
> 
> "The highest priority right now has to be to secure the areas in Swat and Buner as the refugees return... So maybe they're delaying their offensive.
> 
> 
> The Taliban denies claims that Maulana Fazlullah, architect of the Swat uprising, was wounded and threatened renewed holy war.
> 
> "Northern Swat is still insecure and the leadership, Fazlullah, is not captured, so there's a long way to go there," recognised Holbrooke.
> 
> *He said Pakistan was busy coordinating its military activities with NATO troops in Afghanistan, where the United States was determined not to repeat mistakes of the past when Taliban escaped.*
> 
> Defence analyst Talat Masood said "this could be the consideration," but argued the army would continue targeted air strikes against Mehsud's network, concentrated on perfect guerrilla terrain.
> 
> "They have always been hesitant to launch a full-scale operation in South Waziristan, because the conditions there are very different than Swat," Masood said. "They would continue with limited targeted action."
> 
> *Military spokesman Major General Athar Abbas ruled out any question that Waziristan was on the back burner.
> 
> "Military operations are of different forms... The areas around South Waziristan are sealed and aerial targeting is being done," Abbas said.
> 
> "We will decide upon the ground offensive at an appropriate time. We do not start operations because someone or media reports say so," he said.*


----------



## CougarKing

Reserved- contents edited out.


----------



## tomahawk6

Mehsud evidently has been killed by a Predator strike that also killed one of his wives. The taliban will have to decide who moves up to take Mehsud's job. Short term disruption then business as usual for the taliban. I think that Mehsud's death is more psychological. Proof yet again that the good guys have eyes and ears everywhere and if the ISI wants a HVT dead the word goes out to the americans.


----------



## CougarKing

We'll see which one of these reports are true as the story develops.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090808/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> By ELENA BECATOROS and ZARAR KHAN, Associated Press Writers Elena Becatoros And Zarar Khan, Associated Press Writers – 5 mins ago
> ISLAMABAD – Senior Taliban commanders denied that their leader, Baitullah Mehsud, had been killed in a CIA missile strike, while conflicting reports emerged late Saturday of a clash between rival Taliban factions during a meeting to chose a successor.
> 
> Interior Minister Rahman Malik said authorities had received information about a fight breaking out during a meeting, or shura, between groups led by Hakimullah, one of the Taliban's most powerful commanders, and Waliur Rehman. Both are believed to be top contenders to replace Mehsud should reports of his death in Wednesday's strike prove true.
> 
> "We had the information that one of them is dead. So the information is being verified. We need to see the dead bodies, we need to do some DNA, we need to have something solid," Malik told local television.
> 
> He said the incident occurred Friday. However, Hakimullah spoke to an AP reporter on Saturday morning, when he called to claim that Mehsud was alive.
> 
> A senior government official, who could not be named due to the sensitivity of the situation, cast doubt on the claim.
> 
> He said there were reports of a clash among Taliban guards at a meeting Saturday evening and indications some people had been wounded, but that there was no credible information to suggest any of the Taliban leaders were among them.
> 
> Another Taliban commander, Noor Sayed, denied to The Associated Press that there had been any quarrel between rival Taliban factions. He said he had spoken to Waliur Rehman himself and that he was not injured.
> 
> Nevertheless, local TV stations were running stories saying that either Hakimullah or Waliur Rehman, or both, had been killed.
> 
> The meeting was reportedly being held somewhere in the lawless, rugged tribal region of Waziristan, an area off limits to journalists, and the claims were impossible to verify independently.
> 
> The conflicting reports came as Taliban commanders, including Hakimullah, insisted Mehsud, suspected in the assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and numerous suicide attacks across Pakistan, was alive despite assertions he was killed during a missile strike on his father-in-law's house in South Waziristan.
> 
> On Friday, four intelligence officials said they had information that the Taliban leader had been killed in Wednesday's missile strike, but acknowledged that authorities did not have his body as proof. Intelligence officials said Taliban commanders were holding a meeting to decide a successor. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter with the media.
> 
> Mehsud's aide Kafayat Ullah told the AP on Friday that Mehsud was killed with one of his two wives in his stronghold in South Waziristan, while on Saturday, Malik told Pakistani television there were "confirmed reports" that Mehsud was dead. He did not elaborate.
> 
> Yet three Taliban fighters — Hakimullah, Qari Hussain, who is known for training suicide bombers, and Taliban spokesman Maulvi Umar — called AP reporters and insisted their leader was alive.
> "The reports about his death are false," Hussain said, adding that "I will take revenge against the Pakistan government for celebrating the false news of Baitullah Mehsud's death."
> 
> He said he met with Mehsud on Saturday and that he was well.
> 
> But the Taliban commanders offered no proof, and the claim could be aimed at keeping militants unified until a successor could be found.
> 
> Mehsud's Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan is more a loose alliance of groups operating in Pakistan's lawless and mountainous tribal region near the border with Afghanistan, rather than one cohesive organization. Taking out the man who coordinated the factions could lead to fierce rivalry over who will succeed him, and it could be in the interests of the top commanders to deny their leader was dead until they could agree on who will replace him.
> 
> Mahmood Shah, a former security chief for the tribal regions, was skeptical about the Taliban's assertions, saying the claims could be part of a leadership struggle.
> 
> "I think that this denial from them ... doesn't appear to be holding much water," Shah said, noting that the Taliban had waited for two days after news began to leak out that Mehsud was probably dead to deny it.
> 
> "It should have come earlier and .... much stronger. For example, if he was alive he could have spoken himself," Shah said.
> 
> "There is, I think, a struggle going on for the leadership, and Hakimullah Mehsud is one of the contenders," he added.
> 
> Without irrefutable evidence either way — a body or an appearance by Mehsud himself — it was impossible to determine whether the man Pakistan considered its No. 1 threat was dead.
> 
> Last year, a senior Pakistani intelligence official said Mehsud had died of kidney failure due to diabetes complications. But a Taliban spokesman and a doctor denied the report the same day and Mehsud re-emerged.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan, Riaz Khan in Peshawar, and Ashraf Khan and Nahal Toosi in Islamabad contributed to this report.


----------



## The Bread Guy

"In a little-noticed article published last month in a West Point counterterrorism journal, a British academic pointed out that while the world waits for the kind of global public announcement of doomsday that would come from a Bond villain, Islamist militants in Pakistan have quietly launched at least three attacks in the past two years on military bases that may contain nuclear weapons."


"Pakistan’s nuclear facilities have come under attack from the Taliban and other groups, and there is a “genuine” risk that militants could seize weapons or bomb-making material, an article published in a West Point research group’s newsletter said."


"The Terrorist Threat to Pakistan’s Nuclear Weapons" (.pdf)


Canada's latest this week (from PAK media):  "Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani on Tuesday expressed his gratitude to the people and government of Canada for its announcement of enhanced assistance of 25 million Canadian dollars for the rehabilitation of the internally displaced persons (IDPs) and reconstruction phase in Malakand Division.  In a meeting with Beverly Oda, Canadian Minister for International Cooperation, here at the PM House, the prime minister also conveyed his appreciation for the debt swap of 449 million Canadian dollars by the Canadian government in the field of education, teachers training and vocational institutions in Pakistan .... The prime minister also briefed the Canadian minister on successful military operation against the militants in Malakand Division. He said Pakistan would continue its campaign against the menace of extremism and terrorism for its own peace and security.  *Beverly Oda acknowledged that Pakistan had commendably confronted the militants at a great human and material cost.* She termed the government’s relief efforts for millions of IDPs laudable and promised that her country would continue assisting Pakistan."


----------



## CougarKing

Another update:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090813/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Dozens die in militant battle in NW Pakistan*
> By ISHTIAQ MAHSUD and ELENA BECATOROS, Associated Press Writers Ishtiaq Mahsud And Elena Becatoros, Associated Press Writers
> 34 mins ago
> 
> DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan –* Fierce clashes between Taliban fighters and those loyal to a pro-government warlord killed at least 70 people Wednesday, intelligence officials said, a week after a CIA drone reportedly killed the top Taliban leader in Pakistan.
> 
> The battles pitched Taliban militants against followers of tribal warlord Turkistan Bitani on the fringes of the South Waziristan border region, where U.S. and Pakistani officials believe Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud died in a missile strike on Aug. 5.
> 
> Pakistan's army sent in helicopter gunships as reinforcements to pound about 300 Taliban fighters attacking Bitani's mountain stronghold, two intelligence officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media.
> 
> The fighting raged for five hours, with militants using rockets, mortars and anti-aircraft guns against Bitani's village of Sura Ghar, the officials said. They said wireless intercepts from the area showed at least 70 people — including one woman in the village — were killed. Ten of the dead were from Bitani's stronghold, the officials said, while the rest were militants.
> 
> It was impossible to independently confirm the death toll, as the fighting was taking place in a remote mountainous area that is off-limits to journalists.*
> 
> Bitani put the casualty figure higher, telling The Associated Press that about 90 fighters were killed and 40 houses destroyed.
> 
> The fighting followed days of confusion and competing claims over Mehsud's fate. While U.S. and Pakistani officials say they are almost certain he is dead, Taliban commanders insist he is alive.
> 
> Neither side has produced any evidence, and since the claims of Mehsud's death, both the Taliban and the Pakistani government have been waging competing propaganda campaigns over the state of the Taliban's leadership.
> 
> Days after the missile strike, Interior Minister Rehman Malik claimed a Taliban meeting to choose Mehsud's successor degenerated into a gunbattle between the leading contenders — Waliur Rehman and Hakimullah Mehsud — and that one of the two was dead.
> 
> Bitani made similar claims, saying there had been a gunfight at the meeting, known as a shura — although he had said both Rehman and Hakimullah Mehsud were dead.
> 
> The two militant commanders both later phoned international media organizations to prove they survived.
> 
> Baitullah Mehsud and his followers have been the target of both U.S. and Pakistani operations aimed at ridding the country's volatile northwest of militants.
> 
> *Washington has increased its focus on Pakistan's rugged tribal regions because they provide safe haven for insurgents fighting international forces across the border in Afghanistan. The U.S. is also concerned the militants could undermine the stability of the government in Islamabad, especially after Taliban insurgents briefly captured areas some 60 miles (100 kilometers) from the capital. That bold takeover stoked fears Pakistan's nuclear weapons could fall into the wrong hands.*
> 
> A recent report written by a U.K.-based security expert said militants had attacked nuclear facilities three times in two years, but a military spokesman denied that on Wednesday.
> 
> Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said there is "absolutely no chance" the country's atomic weapons could fall into terrorist hands.
> 
> Shaun Gregory, a professor at Bradford University's Pakistan Security Research Unit, wrote that several militant attacks have already hit military bases where nuclear components are secretly stored. The article appeared in the July newsletter of the Combating Terrorism Center of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.
> 
> Abbas said Wednesday that none of the military bases named was used to store atomic weapons.
> 
> Separately, a bomb and gunfire attack against a paramilitary checkpoint in the southwestern city of Quetta killed at least two passers-by and wounded four other people, including a police officer, authorities said.
> 
> Senior police officer Mohammad Suleman said a booby-trapped motorcycle exploded near a Frontier Corps checkpoint, and then gunmen on another motorcycle opened fire.
> 
> Quetta is the capital of Baluchistan, where ethnic Baluch militants have waged a low-level insurgency for decades. Suleman said Baluch separatists were suspected in the attack.
> 
> ____
> 
> Becatoros contributed from Islamabad. Associated Press writer Zarar Khan in Islamabad also contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

And the offensive continues:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090813/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Pakistan pounds Taliban commander's bases, 12 die*
> By HUSSAIN AFZAL, Associated Press Writer Hussain Afzal, Associated Press Writer
> 24 mins ago
> 
> PARACHINAR, Pakistan – *Helicopter gunships pummeled a key Taliban commander's bases in Pakistan's northwest, killing at least 12 insurgents Thursday as government forces ratcheted up pressure on the militants following their top leader's reported death, officials said.
> 
> Military helicopters destroyed several bases and hide-outs Thursday morning near the Kurram and Aurakzai tribal regions run by militant commander Hakimullah Mehsud, three intelligence officials said.*
> 
> Hakimullah Mehsud is a clansman and potential successor to Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud, who was reported killed in a CIA missile strike on Aug. 5.
> 
> Thursday's attacks were on bases in tribal areas near the Afghan border, about 60 miles (100 kilometers) north of the Mehsud clan's main base in south Waziristan.
> 
> The intelligence officials said troops saw the bodies from the air but did not retrieve them. Several militants were also wounded, and the casualties could rise because some people were believed to be still buried under the rubble of their hide-outs, said the officials, who sought anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
> 
> Pakistan's military redoubled its fight against the Pakistani Taliban — a loose federation of Islamist groups with various tribal and regional factions — in April after militants broke a peace deal and took over a district about 60 miles (100 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> (...)


----------



## MarkOttawa

Petraeus offering and persuading:

U.S. general in Pakistan for talks on equipment
http://www.reuters.com/article/asiaCrisis/idUSISL487557



> U.S. General David Petraeus and Pakistan military leaders would discuss on Wednesday expediting delivery of U.S. equipment to Pakistan so it can expand its offensive against Taliban militants, U.S. officials said.
> 
> With U.S. troop strength growing in Afghanistan, the United States wants Pakistan to eradicate Islamist militant enclaves on its side of the border and prevent Taliban fighters from crossing into Afghanistan.
> 
> The Pakistani army has been battling militants in parts of the northwest for months but a commander said on Tuesday the army was *short of equipment, including Cobra attack helicopters* [emphasis added], needed for a large-scale ground operation.
> 
> "It is part of a substantial effort to strengthen U.S.-Pakistani military cooperation," U.S. envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, Richard Holbrooke, told Reuters, referring to the Patraeus visit.
> 
> Holbrooke said on Tuesday that Washington was trying to expedite delivery of equipment requested by the Pakistani army, including helicopters and parts.
> 
> Pakistan's request for equipment would "come up for sure" in talks between Petraeus and senior Pakistani military officials, Holbrooke said.
> 
> He said Pakistani army chiefs would also provide Petraeus with their assessment of the battle in the Swat valley, northwest of Islamabad, after a three-month offensive in which Pakistani forces have pushed back militants.
> 
> Pakistan forces have also stepped up attacks on Pakistani Taliban fighters led by Baitullah Mehsud in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border.
> 
> Mehsud is widely believed to have been killed this month in a missile strike by a U.S. pilotless drone aircraft.
> 
> OTHER FACTIONS
> 
> The United States also wants Pakistan to move against other militant factions, based in various areas including North Waziristan, which focus on battling Western forces in Afghanistan.
> 
> But a senior Pakistani commander, Lieutenant-General Nadeem Ahmed, said on Tuesday *Pakistan would need months to prepare for a ground offensive against the Taliban in South Waziristan* [emphasis added].
> 
> Some U.S. officials have expressed concern Pakistan will lose momentum if it puts off the offensive for too long...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## CougarKing

Hopefully a Predator UAV will find him quite soon.



> *Ruthless new Pakistan Taliban leader named*
> (philstar.com) Updated August 23, 2009 06:56 PM
> 
> ISLAMABAD (AP) – The commander named by members of the Pakistani Taliban as its new leader is as ruthless as his predecessor, taking credit for several attacks, and could order more in the coming weeks to prove the terror network is still in business.
> 
> Despite the naming of *Hakimullah Mehsud * to replace ex-chief Baitullah Mehsud, who is believed to have been killed in a CIA missile strike Aug. 5, questions remained Sunday as to whether the al-Qaida-allied group was united behind their new leader.
> 
> A new Taliban leader could direct more fighters across the border in Afghanistan like other jihadi commanders in the northwest, joining insurgents there in the fight against US and NATO forces as they try to stabilize the country eight years after the US-led invasion.
> 
> Baitullah was mostly known for suicide strikes against Pakistani civilian, government and security targets.
> 
> Two close aides to another commander, Maulvi Faqir Mohammad, told The Associated Press on Saturday a 42-member Taliban council, or shura, had appointed Hakimullah their new leader in an unanimous decision. Like other members of the network, they insisted Baitullah was alive but sick, hence the need for a new chief. US and Pakistani officials are almost certain he is dead.
> 
> "Now all these talks of differences should end," said one of the aides, Bakht Zada. "There have not been any differences ever."
> 
> Mohammd Amir Rana, an expert on Pakistani militant groups, said he believed the Taliban had not agreed on a replacement, regardless of Mohammad's aides' remarks.
> 
> "Maulvi Faqir Mohammad is trying to manipulate the race by announcing to the press that Hakimullah is the head," he said. "Until now there is no consensus," he said, adding that supporters of Hakimullah's major rival, Waliur Rehman, did not accept him.
> 
> Interior Minister Rehman Malik said the government had received intelligence reports about Hakimullah's appointment "as the chief terrorist" but there was no official confirmation. The Dawn newspaper quoted one unidentified intelligence officer as saying the announcement "was a ruse" as part of the ongoing power struggle.
> 
> Verifying information from the tribal regions is very difficult, especially since both the government and the Taliban have made claims in the past that turned out not to be true.
> 
> Hakimullah comes from the same tribe as Baitullah and had been seen as a likely replacement.
> 
> Earlier this month, Pakistani intelligence agencies claimed Hakimullah had been killed in a shootout between rival factions over who should take over a movement that controls large swaths of territory close to the Afghan border, up to 25,000 men and much arms and cash.
> 
> Hakimullah called The Associated Press and other news agencies after that battle to say he was still alive.
> 
> His apparent selection as head could shore up the Taliban, said Kamran Bokhari, director of Middle East analysis for Stratfor, a global intelligence company.
> 
> "It's an attempt to stabilize the group after the initial reports of infighting," Bokhari said, noting the loss of Baitullah was "a massive blow to the organization."
> 
> As military chief of Baitullah's Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or Pakistani Taliban Movement, Hakimullah commanded three tribal regions and had a reputation as Baitullah's most ruthless deputy. He first appeared in public to journalists in November 2008, when he offered to take reporters on a ride in a US Humvee taken from a supply truck heading to Afghanistan.
> 
> Authorities say he was behind threats to foreign embassies in Islamabad, and there was a 10 million rupee ($120,000) bounty on his head. Hakimullah claimed responsibility for the June 9 bombing of the Pearl Continental hotel in the northwestern city of Peshawar, and the attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore earlier this year.
> 
> Since Aug. 5, Pakistani officials have been eager to portray the Taliban as in disarray, saying commanders and the rank-and-file were fighting among themselves. At one point, Mohammad — who comes from a different part of the tribal region — claimed to have taken over the leadership.
> 
> While it is unclear whether he will be able to maintain unity, Hakimullah was likely chosen for his operational capabilities, said Bokhari, adding that new suicide bombings could be expected.
> 
> More attacks would demonstrate the Pakistani Taliban is still intact, he said.
> 
> "I think that the decision of the shura to appoint this particular individual is based on that consideration," he said.
> 
> Another close Mohammad aide, Sher Zamin, also confirmed that Hakimullah had been elected as the new Taliban chief.


----------



## CougarKing

Yikes. Give the Pakistani Taliban any breathing room again and they will bounce back again, like after that ceasefire which allowed them to regroup and reinforce in Swat.



> Pakistan's Noncampaign Against the Taliban
> 
> Despite strenuous entreaties by top U.S. officials, Pakistan has abandoned plans to mount a military offensive against the terrorist group responsible for a two-year campaign of suicide bombings across the country.  Although the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) has been in disarray since an Aug. 5 missile strike from a CIA-operated drone killed its leader, Baitullah Mehsud, the Pakistani military has concluded that a ground attack on its strongholds in South Waziristan would be too difficult.
> 
> The Pakistani military has choked off main roads leading out of South Waziristan, and the country's fighter jets have been pounding targets from the air (an operation Islamabad insists it will continue). But that falls short of the military campaign the U.S. desires. Instead, Pakistani authorities are hoping to exploit divisions within the TTP to prize away some factions, while counting on the CIA's drones to take out Baitullah's successors.  (See pictures of refugees fleeing the fighting in Pakistan's Swat Valley.)
> 
> U.S. counterterrorism officials worry that a failure to capitalize on the post-Baitullah confusion within the TTP will allow its new leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, to consolidate his position and reorganize the group.  Officials in Washington say special envoy Richard Holbrooke and NATO commander General Stanley McChrystal have pressed the Pakistanis to strike while the iron is hot. But after initial promises to launch a ground offensive in South Waziristan, the Pakistanis have backed off.
> 
> A top Pakistani general, Nadeem Ahmed, recently said preparation for such an operation could take up to two months. Now there will be no ground assault at all, according to a senior Pakistani politician known to have strong military ties. Instead, the politician tells TIME, the military will try to buy off some TTP factions through peace deals.
> 
> This alarms U.S. officials, who point out that terrorist leaders have previously used peace deals to expand their influence.  Such deals have been "abject failures that at the end of the day have made the security situation in parts of Pakistan worse," says a U.S. counterterrorism official. "Why the Pakistani government keeps returning to this strategy is a mystery." (See pictures of Pakistan beneath the surface.)
> 
> A senior Pakistani military official tells TIME a ground operation in the mountainous wilds of South Waziristan would be too difficult and would risk triggering a "tribal uprising" in a region over which Islamabad has little control.
> 
> That assessment is shared by some Pakistan experts in Washington, who say the country's military, despite some success against militants in the Swat Valley, simply doesn't have the ability to confront the TTP head-on. A ground operation would leave the Pakistani army "with its nose bloodied," says Daniel Markey of the Council on Foreign Relations. Having "come out of Swat looking reasonably good," Pakistan's generals don't want to risk "taking a morale hit." (Read "Are Pakistan's Taliban Leaders Fighting Among Themselves?")
> 
> But the experts — like some U.S. officials — suspect the Pakistani military lacks the desire to eliminate the TTP entirely. Bruce Riedel of the Brookings Institution, who conducted the Obama Administration's review of Afghanistan and Pakistan policy, says the military may simply want "to get the TTP back to where it was two years ago — a malleable force that doesn't attack the Pakistani state, and particularly not the army." A somewhat tame TTP is a useful bogeyman "to keep civilians appreciative of the need for the army to be getting resources and priority attention," Riedel adds.
> 
> For the Obama Administration, the Pakistani military's reluctance to take on the TTP doesn't bode well for the pursuit of U.S. interests. Washington would like Islamabad to confront the groups that pose a direct threat to NATO forces across the border in Afghanistan — the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani network. But "it's not clear that the Pakistanis are prepared to pay more than lip service to that," says Riedel.
> 
> — With reporting by Omar Waraich / Islamabad
> 
> http://www.time.com/time/world/artic...919327,00.html


----------



## tomahawk6

From Strateypage.



> Standing Back And Hoping For The Best
> August 31, 2009: As police expand their search of Pakistan's Swat valley, looking for any remaining Taliban, they are finding that local tribal militias, who have openly declared war on pro-Taliban tribesmen, have been there first. Over two hundred bodies, of pro-Taliban men, have been found so far. Many local men in Swat sided with the Taliban, and participated in the brutal Taliban rule. These guys have not been able to get transport out of the area, because of all the army roadblocks, and the difficulty of going cross country for long distances. So the tribal militias are hunting down and killing known Taliban thugs.
> 
> The Taliban movement in Pakistan is also a business. While the Afghan Taliban have lucrative financial arrangements with the heroin gangs, the Pakistan Taliban get lesser amounts of cash by helping the heroin smuggling and distribution inside Pakistan, and into India and elsewhere in the region. Karachi, the largest port in Pakistan, is also a key smuggling conduit for heroin headed to the Persian Gulf. The heroin business in Pakistan is farmed out to whichever criminal gangs offer the best deals. It's all very competitive and businesslike. It's also very ruthless. Homicide is a common problem solving method. Many Pushtun tribesmen join the criminal gangs outright, rather than being Taliban mercenaries. The poor, illiterate and tough Pushtun tribesmen have long been prominent in the gangs. One reason the government was so eager to get millions of Afghan refugees to go home (which most now have) was to eliminate the many criminal gangs that formed among the unemployed Afghan Pushtuns. But the Pakistani Pushtun gangsters remain a problem. At one point, in the 1980s, it was thought that the establishment of hundreds of religious  schools in the tribal areas would reduce the number of gangsters. But instead, these schools gave rise to the Taliban and al Qaeda. All this is nothing new for the lowland people of Pakistan and northern India. The Pushtun tribes have been a problem for centuries.
> 
> The army has changed its mind about invading South Waziristan, the home of the pro-Taliban Mehsud tribe, and the core of Taliban power in Pakistan. The generals believe that the new Taliban leader, Hakimullah Mehsud, is such a hot headed terrorist thug, that more tribal factions (both Taliban and anti-Taliban) will rise up against him. Pakistani gunships and warplanes, along with American UAVs, will support the anti-Taliban tribesmen as they finish off the Islamic radicals in their midst. Or at least that's the plan.
> 
> Attacks on trucks carrying NATO supplies from Pakistan to Afghanistan have resumed. The cause is not a Taliban attempt to halt these supply movements, but local criminal gangs trying to force customs police to stop searching trucks crossing the border. The customs police have become more diligent lately, as part of a crackdown on smuggling via the two main highways between the two nations.
> 
> India has arrested the son of an ISI (Pakistani intelligence service) in northern India, and interrogation revealed that son and father were heavily involved in a Pakistani operation that produced counterfeit Indian currency in Lahore and Karachi, flew it to Nepal, and then smuggled it across the border into India, where it was sold at half the face value.
> 
> India has been conducting an offensive all Summer against Maoists in several eastern states. While successful, casualties among security personnel has been higher than expected. The Maoists have been aggressive in resisting police and army patrols.
> 
> August 30, 2009: Pakistani police arrested two more suspects in the terror attack in Mumbai India last November. This makes seven suspects that have been arrested, and that Pakistan says it will prosecute. India remains doubtful. In the Swat Valley, a suicide bomber got into a police training camp, and killed fifteen police trainees.
> 
> August 29, 2009: In Bihar, India, police captured a Maoist leader, who had recently ordered an attack that left five policemen dead.
> 
> August 28, 2009: Pakistani gunships attacked a small island in the Swat river, which was found to be a training camp for suicide bombers, and the source of three recent attacks. The gunships killed 18, including six suicide bombers in training. Troops came in after the attack to collect documents and other evidence.
> 
> August 27, 2009: In Torkham, Pakistan,  one of the major border crossings with Afghanistan, a terrorist bomb killed 22 border guards  gathered for the meal to break the Ramadan fast. A few hours earlier, U.S. Hellfire missiles from a UAV had killed at least eight Taliban.
> 
> In the eastern India state of Jharkhand, Maoists attacked the house where a suspected police informer lived, killing four civilians, including a child. For the last week, several Maoist bands have been on a rampage in the states of Orissa, Jharkhand and Bihar, attacking several civilian targets. All this was to force the police to admit they had arrested two Maoist leaders, and to show that the Maoists would not be intimidated by the loss of the two leaders.
> 
> August 26, 2009: In southwest Pakistan, rebel Baluchi tribesmen blew up a natural gas pipeline. While this was quickly repaired, more attacks were promised. The Baluchis want a larger cut of the natural gas revenue. Most Baluchis don't want to set up a separate Baluchistan, because they fear being taken over by neighboring Iran (which already has a lot of Baluchi in its southeast). While most Pakistanis still fear an Indian invasion, in the southwest, Iran is the big bad. Al Qaeda and the Taliban have kept their violence out of Baluchistan, because the province has become a good base area. Many Baluchi tribesmen are willing to shelter Taliban and al Qaeda leaders, especially if it means much less terrorist violence in their territory.


----------



## CougarKing

Another update:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090919/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> Pakistan police raid US-contracted security firm
> By MUNIR AHMAD and NAHAL TOOSI, Associated Press Writers Munir Ahmad And Nahal Toosi, Associated Press Writers
> 55 mins ago
> 
> ISLAMABAD – Pakistani police raided a local security firm that helps protect the U.S. Embassy on Saturday, seizing dozens of allegedly unlicensed weapons at a time when unusually intense media scrutiny of America's use of private contractors has deepened anti-U.S. sentiment.
> 
> Two employees of the Inter-Risk company were arrested during the raids in Islamabad, police official Rana Akram said. Reporters were shown the seized weapons — 61 assault rifles and nine pistols. Akram said police were seeking the firm's owner.
> 
> U.S. Embassy spokesman Rick Snelsire said the U.S. contract with Inter-Risk to provide security at the embassy and consulates took effect this year. It is believed to be the first U.S. contract for the firm, said Snelsire, who did not have a figure for its amount.
> "Our understanding is they obtained licenses with whatever they brought into the country to meet the contractual needs," he said. "We told the government that we had a contract with Inter-Risk."
> 
> *Akram said he had no idea about any U.S. links to Inter-Risk. A man who answered the phone number listed for the company and identified himself as Riaz Hussain confirmed the raid but gave contradictory answers when asked about any U.S. ties.
> 
> The company popped up Friday in one of a slew of local media reports that have focused on private security firms American diplomats are believed to use in Pakistan.
> 
> In particular, Pakistani reporters, anti-U.S. bloggers and others have suggested the U.S. is using the American firm formerly known as Blackwater — a claim that chills many Pakistanis because of the company's alleged involvement in killings of Iraqi civilians.
> 
> The U.S. Embassy denies it uses Blackwater — now known as Xe Services — in Pakistan.
> 
> Scandals involving U.S. private contractors have occurred elsewhere in the region.
> 
> In Washington on Friday, the Commission on Wartime Contracting heard testimony about another contractor — ArmorGroup North America — involving alleged illegal and immoral conduct by its guards at the U.S. Embassy in Afghanistan.
> 
> Earlier this year, the Iraqi government refused to grant Xe Services an operating license amid continued outrage over a 2007 lethal firefight involving some of its employees in Baghdad, although the State Department has temporarily extended a contract with a Xe subsidiary to protect U.S. diplomats in Iraq.
> 
> Many of the reports in Pakistan have been prompted by U.S. plans to expand its embassy space and staff. Among the other rumors the U.S. denies: that 1,000 U.S. Marines will land in the capital, and that Americans will set up a Guantanamo-style prison.
> 
> The U.S. says it needs to add hundreds more staff to allow it to disburse billions of dollars in additional humanitarian and economic aid to Pakistan. The goal is to improve education and other areas, lessening the allure of extremism.
> 
> Some analysts say Islamist and other opposition groups may be planting the stories in the Pakistani press and blogs to portray Pakistan's government as an American lackey.
> 
> Pakistani political analyst Talat Masood said Inter-Risk's association with America "will increase the apprehensions that existed that the Americans are engaged in clandestine activities," and that the raid shows "the Pakistan government is asserting itself."
> 
> The U.S. considers stability in Pakistan critical to helping the faltering war effort in neighboring Afghanistan, and has pressed Pakistan to crack down on extremism on its soil. Al-Qaida and Taliban fighters are believed to use Pakistan's northwestern regions bordering Afghanistan as hide-outs from which to plan attacks on Western troops in Afghanistan.*
> Pakistan has launched offensives against militants, but has also relied on some local militias to help fend off the Pakistani Taliban. Some of these militias share the same aims as the Taliban in Afghanistan, but disagree with targeting the Pakistani government.
> 
> On Saturday, one pro-government militia leader said the army had asked him to stop fighting the Pakistani Taliban. Turkistan Bhitani told The Associated Press that he and 24 aides surrendered their weapons to the army in the northwestern city of Dera Ismail Khan and that he had asked 350 of his men to do so as well.
> 
> Pakistani army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, however, said he knew nothing of such an arrangement.
> 
> Also Saturday, a bomb at a security checkpoint in the northwestern region of Dara Adam Khel killed at least two people, local government official Aslam Khan said. He said police are still investigating if it was a suicide attack and determining the identity of the victims.
> 
> Taliban fighters in Pakistan's northwestern regions bordering Afghanistan frequently target security checkpoints. The Sunni extremist militants also have fueled violence pitting Muslim sects against each another.
> 
> Police said Saturday that the death toll from a suicide car bombing at a hotel in a Shiite Muslim-dominated village in Pakistan's northwest rose to 40. The Friday blast in Usterzai village was followed by a bomb in nearby Cho village that killed a Sunni official.
> 
> The army said in a statement that 51 militants had surrendered in the last 24 hours in the northwest Swat Valley, and that another seven were arrested during ongoing operations there. It also said militants fatally shot five civilians in a minibus there.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Lori Hinnant in Kabul and Ishtiaq Mahsud in Dera Ismail Khan contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

A couple of more notable updates, including the Pakistani military's concern over the latest US aid bill:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091007/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's powerful military, preparing for a new offensive against Taliban and al-Qaida militants, expressed "serious concern" Wednesday about a proposed multibillion-dollar U.S. aid package some consider an avenue to American meddling.
> 
> The military's unusual public statement opens a rift with the weak U.S.-backed civilian administration in Islamabad and bolsters opposition leaders. It also appears intended to show the Pakistani people that their army is not taking orders from Washington.
> 
> The aid bill, which awaits President Barack Obama's signature, would provide Pakistan with $1.5 billion a year over the next five years to spend on democratic, economic and social development programs. It also allows "such sums as may be necessary" for military aid, subject to special conditions related to its fight against militants.
> 
> U.S. officials say the bill's broad goal is to alleviate widespread poverty among the 175 million Pakistanis, lessening the allure of Taliban and other Islamist extremists who have wreaked havoc in the country and across the border in Afghanistan.
> 
> But to many here, the conditions attached to the aid are a sign of growing, and unwanted, U.S. influence in Pakistan. The worries are burnished by a media-fueled backlash over U.S. plans to add hundreds more embassy staff in Islamabad. American officials say the added staff are needed to disburse and monitor the cash flow.
> 
> "The question in Pakistani minds is: 'Is so much intrusion worth what we will be getting?'" said Ayaz Amir, a journalist and member of parliament with the Pakistan Muslim League-N, the largest opposition party. "Once we accept the terms of this bill and we start receiving aid under it, already great American influence will grow."
> 
> A Parliament discussion of the issue began on a fiery note Wednesday night, with PML-N lawmaker Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan claiming "each and every page of the bill is reflective of the insulting attitude towards Pakistan."
> 
> The military's statement was vague. It said senior commanders, including the army chief, "expressed serious concern regarding clauses (of the bill) impacting on national security." But it also referred to the parliament's deliberation on the subject, which it said would allow "the government to develop a national response."
> 
> The statement came after local media reports signaling military displeasure with the bill.
> 
> One part of the bill says the U.S. must assess the extent of control Pakistan's government has over the military, including its budgets, the chain of command and top promotions. In a country that has spent about half its 62-year existence under military rule, such language may not go down well with the army.
> Cyril Almeida, a columnist for Dawn newspaper, said it was unusual to see the military view publicized so blatantly, and that could lead to greater tension with the Pakistani president, causing political instability at a time the U.S. needs Islamabad to stay focused on battling militants.
> 
> The debate comes as the army stepped up preparations for a new offensive in South Waziristan — seen as al-Qaida and the Taliban's major stronghold on the Afghan border — in what could be one of the most important operations against militants here since 2001.
> 
> "God willing, peace will again be restored in the area through a successful operation," Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the army's chief spokesman, told the ARY news channel.
> 
> He did not give a start date for an offensive, which would face steep challenges, ranging from harsh terrain to well dug-in militants. Analysts say 10,000 well-armed militants, including foreign fighters, are in the region.
> 
> Pakistan's government and the U.S. embassy on Wednesday defended the aid bill, while Pakistan Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira said the government will look into the army's reservations.
> 
> Opposition leaders object to a number of items in the bill, including references to the southwest city of Quetta and eastern town of Muridke as militant hubs — a claim they say there is no evidence to back up.
> 
> The U.S. believes the Afghan Taliban's top leadership is in Quetta, while Muridke is a base for militants linked to attacks on India.
> 
> The Quetta reference in particular could be seen as potentially giving latitude for the U.S. to launch missile strikes into Pakistan's southwest, something that would infuriate Pakistanis already unhappy with such attacks in the northwest region.
> 
> Language in the bill that says the U.S. will expect Pakistan to cooperate in efforts to dismantle nuclear weapons supplier networks alarms some because it suggests Pakistan provide "direct access to Pakistani nationals associated with such networks."
> 
> Aside from specifics, critics say the bill paints Pakistan as a misbehaved child needing a monitor, and does not give it enough praise for the sacrifices and progress it has made against militants on its soil.
> 
> "The tone and tenor of the bill in terms of conditionalities is not just intrusive, it's also overbearing and bordering on the humiliation of Pakistan," said Mushahid Hussain, a leader of the Pakistan Muslim League-Q. "We are not being treated kindly."
> 
> Gerald Feierstein, the deputy chief of the U.S. mission in Islamabad, dismissed the notion that the U.S. was trying to interfere in Pakistani affairs.
> 
> "Our viewpoint is that this should not be a discussion about the conditions, it should be a discussion about what this legislation can accomplish for Pakistan," he told The Associated Press in a phone interview. "It has the U.S. and Pakistan working together on trying to address the relevant challenges confronting Pakistan — health, education, transportation, energy."
> 
> Farahnaz Ispahani, a top aide to Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, insisted the standards presented by the bill were reasonable and that the language had actually been softened through the various versions.
> 
> "If the government feels at any point that this is intrusive to the sovereignty of Pakistan, it can say 'No, thank you,' and walk away from the aid," she said, declining to comment on the reported displeasure within the army.
> 
> Almeida said that no matter what, in the end, Pakistan was unlikely to reject billions of dollars in U.S. assistance. The economic needs of the country are simply too great.
> 
> "There'll be a lot of noise, but at the end of the day the bill is about giving Pakistan money, and we need money and we're probably going to take the money, but we're going to do in a way which suggests that we're taking it under protest," Almeida said.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Zarar Khan and Munir Ahmad contributed to this report.



Plus another update from yesterday:



> *Taliban claim responsibility for UN blast*
> AP
> 
> 6 mins ago
> 
> ISLAMABAD – The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility Tuesday for the deadly suicide bombing at the U.N. food agency's heavily fortified compound in Islamabad and said they planned more such attacks in the future.
> 
> The attack, which *killed five workers for the World Food Program* on Monday, pushed the U.N. to temporarily close its offices in Pakistan and exposed the vulnerability of many international relief agencies working to provide aid to millions of civilians affected by the fight between the government and Islamic militant groups.
> 
> Interior Minister Rehman Malik accused the Taliban of carrying out the attack to avenge the Aug. 5 slaying of their leader Baitullah Mehsud in a U.S. drone attack.
> 
> Taliban spokesman *Azam Tariq confirmed his group was behind the strike in a phone conversation with The Associated Press.*
> 
> "We proudly claim the responsibility for the suicide attack at the U.N. office in Islamabad. We will send more bombers for such attacks," he said.
> 
> Tariq did not reveal why the group attacked a U.N. relief agency. He said its *future targets would include Pakistani security officials, government offices and American installations.*
> 
> http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091006/ap_on_...WxpYmFuY2xhaW0-


----------



## CougarKing

Let's see how long this new offensive will last, if it ever starts or if this will result in just more talk; one has to be more skeptical especially after they abandoned the offensive a few months ago, IIRC.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091010/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> PESHAWAR, Pakistan – Pakistan vowed to launch a new offensive against militant strongholds along the Afghan border after a suicide bomber blew up a car near a crowded outdoor market on Friday, killing 49 people in the bloodiest attack to hit the country in six months.
> 
> The United States has been pushing Pakistan to take strong action against insurgents who are using its soil as a base for attacks in neighboring Afghanistan. A push into the rugged mountains of South Waziristan could be risky for the army, which was beaten back on three previous offensives into the Taliban heartland there and forced to sign peace deals.
> 
> But the army may have been emboldened by a reasonably successful military campaign in the Swat Valley and adjoining Buner district and by the killing in a U.S. missile strike of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud. The military also appears committed to destroying Mehsud's group, as opposed to its often ambivalent position toward other insurgents in the past.
> 
> Islamic militants have been carrying out nearly weekly attacks in Pakistan, but the sheer scale of Friday's bombing — which killed nine children — pushed the government to declare it would take the fight to South Waziristan, part of the lawless tribal belt where al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden may be hiding.
> 
> Interior Minister Rehman Malik said the militants had left the government "no other option" but to hit back. "We will have to proceed," he told a local television station. "All roads are leading to South Waziristan."
> The massive blast tore through a busy road in the heart of Peshawar, a city of more than 3 million people about 150 miles northeast of South Waziristan along the Afghan border. The force of the bomb flipped a bus on its side, ripped apart a motorbike and flung charred debris down the street.
> 
> Passers-by pulled out the wounded and the dead, covering the bodies of victims whose clothes were burned. One man staggered down the road, his face covered with blood.
> 
> Another man dashed from the scene carrying an 8-year-old girl dressed in a bright orange outfit in his arms. The child, Amna Bibi, was heading to a wedding when she was caught by the blast. Her family, sobbing at the main Peshawar hospital in their wedding finery, said later that she had died. Amna's mother, Zareen, kissed her daughter's bandaged face and wept.
> 
> "I understood for the first time in my life what doomsday would look like," said Noor Alam, who suffered wounds to his legs and face.
> 
> The hospital was overwhelmed by the wounded, with many forced to share beds. Some of the dead were laid out on nearby gurneys, covered with sheets.
> 
> "I pray to Allah, please destroy all these people who are killing the innocents," said Sher Akbar from his hospital bed.
> 
> Zafar Iqbal, a doctor at the hospital, said 49 people were killed and more than 100 were wounded.
> 
> Peshawar Police Chief Liaqat Ali Khan said the attacker drove a car packed with a massive amount of explosives and artillery rounds. The blast was heard for miles around.
> 
> There was no claim of responsibility for the bombing and its target was not immediately apparent. Militants typically attack government, military or Western targets, but previous blasts have hit public places as well.
> 
> The bombing, along with an attack Monday at a U.N. aid agency in Islamabad that killed five, highlighted the insurgents' ability to hit major cities despite previous army offensives and Mehsud's death in August.
> 
> In April, the military launched a three-month offensive in the Swat Valley and largely cleared the region of the thousands of Taliban reportedly based there. That operation followed an August 2008 offensive in the semiautonomous Bajur tribal area along the Afghan border that ended six months later with the army declaring success. The militants have fought back with scores of suicide attacks.
> 
> For months, officials have been hinting at a new operation in South Waziristan, blockading roads there and carrying out targeted airstrikes as thousands of civilians fled the area.
> 
> But until Malik's comments Friday, no Pakistani official had publicly declared the military was preparing a full offensive.
> 
> Malik did not give a timeline for an offensive that is likely to be far fiercer than the Swat and Bajur battles.
> 
> The army has launched three operations in South Waziristan since 2001 but each time has been forced to abandon the push and sign peace deals with the militants.
> 
> The region is considered the epicenter of militant resistance in the country, and new Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud, who pledged to repel any attack, is reported to have 10,000 guerrilla fighters on his side. An Associated Press reporter visiting the area this week saw Taliban taking up key vantage points, and residents said fighters were digging trenches along routes the military was expected to traverse.
> 
> The area is filled with independent, heavily armed Pashtun tribes hostile to outsiders — including the Pakistani army — and any offensive that led to high civilian casualties could spark a quick public backlash and bolster the Taliban.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad and Asif Shahzad contributed to this report from Islamabad.


----------



## tomahawk6

I think the Pakistani Army would like to see other tribal areas throw the taliban out with Army support as they did in Swat.


----------



## old medic

Gunmen attack Pakistani army HQ, killing 6 troops
By: CTV.ca News Staff
Date: Sat. Oct. 10 2009 8:52 AM ET
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20091010/pakistan_attack_091010/20091010?hub=TopStoriesV2



> Heavily armed gunmen disguised in military uniforms stormed Pakistan's army headquarters Saturday, triggering fierce gun battles that left six military personnel and four gunmen dead, officials said.
> 
> The attack began shortly after the noon hour local time when the gunmen, wearing army fatigues, pulled up to the compound's main gate in a white van and opened fire on security personnel, according to army spokesperson Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas.
> 
> The gunmen then left the van and carried on to a second checkpoint before spreading out, Abbas said. They set off at least one grenade and fired a number of rounds at security personnel, who were likely caught off guard by the militants' disguises.
> 
> A 45-minute gunfight left four militants dead.
> 
> Of the six military personnel killed, one was a brigadier and another, a lieutenant colonel, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
> 
> Five other troops were wounded, one critically, Abbas said.
> 
> Officials first denied that the gunmen were able to infiltrate the compound, which is located in Rawalpindi, just outside the capital of Islamabad. However, Abbas later confirmed that two of the militants were still at large.
> 
> CNN reporter Reza Sayah said the brazen nature of the attack, and the fact the gunmen were wearing disguises, shows "more determination and more sophistication on the part of the militants."
> 
> "This is a heavily secured area, (with) check posts at three separate gates," Sayah told CTV News Channel Saturday in an interview from Pakistan. "But the dilemma when facing these types of insurgents, militants who are willing to die, militants who welcome death, it's very difficult to stop them without them inflicting some sort of damage. And that's what you saw today."
> 
> Khan Bahadur, a shuttle van driver who was standing outside the compound when the attack began, said the gunfight sparked mass chaos at the first checkpoint.
> 
> "There was fierce firing, and then there was a blast. Soldiers were running here and there," Bahadur said. "The firing continued for about a half-hour. There was smoke everywhere. Then there was a break, and then firing again."
> 
> The attack was the third major assault by militants in Pakistan in the past week.
> 
> On Monday, a bombing at the headquarters of a UN aid agency in Islamabad killed five people. In that attack, the bomber was also wearing a security forces' uniform and was allowed entry into the building when he asked to use the bathroom.
> 
> On Friday, a suicide bomber blew up a car near a crowded outdoor market in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 49 people.
> 
> That attack led to promises by the Pakistani government to launch a new series of offensives against militant strongholds along the Afghan border.
> 
> The United States has been pushing Pakistan to take strong action against insurgents who are using its soil as a base for attacks in neighbouring Afghanistan. A push into the rugged mountains of South Waziristan could be risky for the army, which was beaten back on three previous offensives into the Taliban heartland there and forced to sign peace deals.
> 
> But the army may have been emboldened by a reasonably successful military campaign in the Swat Valley and adjoining Buner district and by the killing in a U.S. missile strike of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud. The military also appears committed to destroying Mehsud's group, as opposed to its often ambivalent position toward other insurgents in the past.
> 
> With files from The Associated Press


----------



## old medic

Gunmen take hostages at Pakistan army HQ
By: CTV.ca News Staff
Date: Sat. Oct. 10 2009 10:27 AM ET



> Heavily armed gunmen disguised in military uniforms who stormed Pakistan's army headquarters Saturday are holding several hostages inside the compound, officials said, hours after fierce gun battles left 10 people dead.
> 
> While four of the militants were killed in the attack, at least two others managed to infiltrate the compound in the heavily fortified city of Rawalpindi, just outside the capital of Islamabad, officials said.
> 
> Authorities had originally denied reports that two gunmen had made it inside the building. But later Saturday, a military spokesperson confirmed that two of the militants are still at large.
> 
> Officials said security forces have surrounded the militants, who are barricaded in a single room at a security office building. The hostages are believed to be security personnel.
> 
> "We are trying to finish it at the earliest, clear the area of terrorists and restore complete control," army spokesperson Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas told Dunya TV.
> 
> Abbas would not confirm if army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, was inside the complex. He had been scheduled to attend meetings there and at the president's office, according to military statements.
> 
> The attack began shortly after the noon hour local time when the gunmen, wearing army fatigues, pulled up to the compound's main gate in a white van and opened fire on security personnel, according to Abbas.
> 
> The gunmen then left the van and carried on to a second checkpoint before spreading out, Abbas said. They set off at least one grenade and fired a number of rounds at security personnel, who were likely caught off guard by the militants' disguises.
> 
> A 45-minute gunfight left four militants dead.
> 
> Six military personnel were killed, including a brigadier and a lieutenant colonel, according to an official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
> 
> Five other troops were wounded, one critically, Abbas said.
> 
> CNN reporter Reza Sayah said the brazen nature of the attack, and the fact the gunmen were wearing disguises, shows "more determination and more sophistication on the part of the militants."
> 
> "This is a heavily secured area, (with) check posts at three separate gates," Sayah told CTV News Channel Saturday in an interview from Pakistan. "But the dilemma when facing these types of insurgents, militants who are willing to die, militants who welcome death, it's very difficult to stop them without them inflicting some sort of damage. And that's what you saw today."
> 
> Khan Bahadur, a shuttle van driver who was standing outside the compound when the attack began, said the gunfight sparked mass chaos at the first checkpoint.
> 
> "There was fierce firing, and then there was a blast. Soldiers were running here and there," Bahadur said. "The firing continued for about a half-hour. There was smoke everywhere. Then there was a break, and then firing again."
> 
> Pakistani media reported that the Taliban had claimed responsibility for the attack. Meanwhile, two news channels known for being critical of the Pakistani government, Geo and SAMA, went off the air late Saturday.
> 
> The attack was the third major assault by militants in Pakistan in the past week.
> 
> On Monday, a bombing at the headquarters of a UN aid agency in Islamabad killed five people. In that attack, the bomber was also wearing a security forces' uniform and was allowed entry into the building when he asked to use the bathroom.
> 
> On Friday, a suicide bomber blew up a car near a crowded outdoor market in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 49 people.
> 
> That attack led to promises by the Pakistani government to launch a new series of offensives against militant strongholds along the Afghan border.
> 
> The United States has been pushing Pakistan to take strong action against insurgents who are using its soil as a base for attacks in neighbouring Afghanistan. A push into the rugged mountains of South Waziristan could be risky for the army, which was beaten back on three previous offensives into the Taliban heartland there and forced to sign peace deals.
> 
> But the army may have been emboldened by a reasonably successful military campaign in the Swat Valley and adjoining Buner district and by the killing in a U.S. missile strike of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud. The military also appears committed to destroying Mehsud's group, as opposed to its often ambivalent position toward other insurgents in the past.
> 
> With files from The Associated Press


----------



## tomahawk6

A video report.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vtwROAYUqRY&feature=player_embedded#


----------



## old medic

Militants holding hostages in Pakistani army headquarters 
Asif Shahzad
RAWALPINDI, Pakistan — The Associated Press Published on Saturday, Oct. 10, 2009 9:07AM EDT Last updated on Saturday, Oct. 10, 2009 12:40PM EDT



> Heavily armed militants were holding between 10 and 15 soldiers hostage inside army headquarters Saturday after they attacked the complex in an audacious assault on Pakistan’s most powerful institution.
> 
> The attack, which left at least 10 people dead, was the third major militant strike in Pakistan in a week and came as the government was planning an imminent offensive against Islamist militants in their strongholds in the rugged mountains along the border with Afghanistan.
> 
> It showed that the militants retain the ability to strike at the very heart of Pakistan’s security apparatus despite recent military operations against their forces and the killing of Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud in a CIA drone attack in August.
> 
> Army spokesman Major General Athar Abbas said “four or five” assailants were holding between 10 and 15 troops hostage in a building close to the main gates of the complex. He said the building had no connection to any of the country’s intelligence agencies.
> 
> He said no senior military or intelligence officials were among those being held.
> 
> The attack began shortly before noon when the gunmen, dressed in camouflage military uniforms and wielding assault rifles and grenades, drove in a white van up to the army compound and opened fire, Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas and a witness said.
> 
> “There was fierce firing, and then there was a blast,” said Khan Bahadur, a shuttle van driver who was standing outside the gate of the compound. “Soldiers were running here and there,” he said. “The firing continued for about a half-hour. There was smoke everywhere. Then there was a break, and then firing again.”
> 
> After a 45-minute gunfight, four of the attackers were killed, said Maj. Gen. Abbas, who told the private Geo news television channel the assault over and the situation “under full control.”
> 
> But more than an hour later, gunshots rang out from the compound, and Maj. Gen. Abbas confirmed that gunmen had eluded security forces and slipped into the headquarters compound in Rawalpindi. The city is filled with security checkpoints and police roadblocks.
> 
> “We are trying to finish it (the siege) at the earliest, clear the area of terrorists and restore complete control,” Maj. Gen. Abbas told Dunya TV.
> 
> He said six troops were killed and five wounded, one critically. Those killed included a brigadier and a lieutenant colonel, according to a military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
> 
> Pakistani media said the Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack, and Interior Minister Rehman Malik said the ongoing assaults strengthened the government’s resolve to launch the offensive.
> 
> “We have been left no other option except to go ahead to face them,” he told Dawn television.
> 
> Militants regularly attack army bases across the country and bombed a checkpoint the outside army compound in Rawalpindi two years ago.
> 
> The gunbattle following a car bombing that killed 49 on Friday in the northwestern city of Peshawar and the bombing of a UN aid agency Monday that killed five in Islamabad. The man who attacked the U.N. was also wearing a security forces’ uniform and was granted entry to the compound after asking to use the bathroom.
> 
> As the attack wore on Saturday, Pakistan briefly took two news channels, Geo and SAMA, off the air, but several others continued broadcasting.
> 
> The attack appeared to be a message to the army that the militants intend to ramp up their strikes across the country in response to the government’s planned offensive against Taliban strongholds in the border region of South Waziristan.
> 
> Pakistan vowed Friday to launch the new offensive in the wake of the massive Peshawar bombing.
> 
> The United States has been pushing Pakistan to take strong action against insurgents using its soil as a base for attacks in Afghanistan. The assault could be risky for the army, which was beaten back on three previous offensives into the Taliban heartland.
> 
> But the army may have been emboldened by its successes against the militants in the Swat Valley and by the killing of Baitullah Mehsud.
> 
> Islamist militants have been carrying out nearly weekly attacks in Pakistan, but the sheer scale of Friday’s bombing — which killed nine children — pushed the government to declare it would take the fight to the lawless tribal belt along the border where al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden may be hiding.


----------



## tomahawk6

Most of the hostages were recovered by commandos - three were killed in the operation along with 4 militants. A pretty bold operation by the tango's to attack Army Hq.

RAWALPINDI, Pakistan – The Pakistani military says commandos have freed 22 hostages held by militants inside army headquarters. It said three captives and four militants died in the dawn raid.

Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas says "mopping operations" inside the building were continuing early Sunday.

Abbas said those freed included soldiers and civilians.

The army had previously said between 10 and 15 soldiers were being held hostage.

About five heavily armed militants took the hostages after they and other assailants attacked the main gate of the headquarters on Saturday, killing six soldiers. The hostages were held for about 18 hours.


----------



## PMedMoe

*Bloody siege at Pakistani army HQ ends with 20 dead*

Pakistan's military says its commandos have freed 42 hostages that were held by militants inside the army's headquarters in a 22-hour siege that left 20 people dead.

Officials said three of the hostages and eight militants died in the standoff, which began when gunmen disguised as soldiers stormed the heavily fortified army compound in Rawalpindi, just outside the capital of Islamabad.

One gunman, who officials believe led the operation, was captured.

The attack embarrassed the Pakistani military establishment as it prepares to ramp up its efforts to root out the Taliban and other militants from lawless tribal regions such as South Waziristan.

"It certainly is an embarrassment for the Pakistan army," Janis Mackey Frayer, CTV's South Asia Bureau Chief, told CTV News Channel in a telephone interview on Sunday.

"It would be seen as an embarrassment that the vulnerability was exposed to the extent that these militants would be able to stage such a bold attack on a compound that is so heavily fortified. No doubt the Pakistan army wanted to have a very swift response to end this siege on its own terms, and we're likely to see in the coming days almost a guarantee of a fuller and wider operation by the Pakistan security forces against militants, particularly in the area of South Waziristan." 

More on link


----------



## CougarKing

A renewed Pakistani Army offensive against Taliban-held areas is reportedly brewing.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/091012/world/international_us_pakistan



> *Pakistan bombs militants, ground offensive imminent*
> 56 minutes ago
> By Robert Birsel
> 
> ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - *Pakistani aircraft attacked Taliban militants in their South Waziristan stronghold near the Afghan border as the government said a ground offensive against the al Qaeda-linked fighters was imminent.
> 
> 
> The aircraft struck the militants late on Sunday, hours after commandos stormed an office building and rescued 39 people taken hostage after an attack on the army headquarters.
> 
> 
> "The jets hit and destroyed two of their hideouts in Makeen and Ladha and we have a total of about 16 militants killed," a Pakistani intelligence official in the region said.
> 
> 
> Pakistani Taliban militants linked to al Qaeda have launched numerous attacks on government and foreign targets over the past couple of years killing hundreds of people.
> 
> 
> The military has been conducting air and artillery strikes in south Waziristan for months, while moving troops, blockading the region and trying to split off militant factions.
> 
> 
> But a ground offensive, in what could be the army's toughest test since militants turned on the state, has yet to begin.*
> 
> Interior Minister Rehman Malik told Reuters in an interview in Singapore the offensive was "imminent."
> 
> 
> "There is no mercy for them because our determination and resolve is to flush them out," Malik said. "They have no room in Pakistan, I promise you."
> 
> 
> Malik said members of the Pakistani Taliban and al Qaeda were suspected to have been behind Saturday's attack on army headquarters in Rawalpindi, near Islamabad, which ended a week when suicide bombers struck in the capital Islamabad and Peshawar, killing more than 50 people.
> 
> 
> Security officials said there appeared to be links between the attackers, who were disguised in army uniforms, and militant groups based in Punjab province.
> 
> 
> But Malik said it was too early to say whether those groups were involved.
> 
> 
> STOCKS NOT DENTED
> 
> 
> Malik said the offensive against the militants in South Waziristan was no longer a matter of choice.
> 
> 
> "It is not an issue of commitment, it is becoming a compulsion because there was an appeal from the local tribes that we should do the operation," he said.
> 
> 
> About 28,000 troops have been put in place to take on an estimated 10,000 hard-core Taliban, army officials said earlier.
> 
> 
> Investors in Pakistan's main stock market were unperturbed by the weekend of violence outside the army's General Headquarters (GHQ) in which nine gunmen, eight soldiers and three hostages were killed.
> 
> 
> "The market discounted the GHQ thing completely today," said Ashraf Zakaria, a dealer at brokers Ali Hussain Rajabali and Co.
> 
> The main index was 0.02 percent lower at 9,766.31 at 0533 GMT.
> 
> "The matter was resolved very quickly and the efficient way that things were handled made sure that investor confidence was not dented," Zakaria said.
> 
> Security around the headquarters, and in the nearby capital, is very tight but analysts say it is very difficult to guard against gunmen disguised as security force members who are prepared to kill anyone who challenges them, and to be killed.
> 
> The gunmen were stopped at a main gate and did not get into the headquarters.
> 
> An offensive in South Waziristan would not have a long-term effect on the market as investors felt concrete action was necessary, dealers said.
> 
> Early on Monday, aircraft also attacked militants in the Bajaur region, about 250 km (150 miles) northeast of Waziristan, government officials in the region on the Afghan border said.
> 
> "Two jets have been bombing militant hideouts in areas very close to the Afghan border. They've made several sorties," said one official who declined to be identified.
> 
> There was no information on casualties in the latest attacks.
> 
> (Additional reporting by Faisal Aziz, Sahibzada Bahauddin and Hafiz Wazir; Editing by Nick Macfie)


----------



## George Wallace

Reproduced under the Fair Dealings provisions of the Copyright Act.

Suicide car bombing in Pakistan kills 41
LINK in Title

12/10/2009 8:54:56 AM

CTV.ca News Staff 
A suspected suicide bomber killed 41 people in an attack on the Pakistani military on Monday -- the fourth militant attack in just over a week, as the Taliban pledged there would be more strikes. 


The target of this latest attack was a military convoy near the Swat valley, police said. The bomber reportedly hit one of three military vehicles that were passing through the busiest market in the district. 

Reports say 41 people were killed, including 35 civilians and six soldiers; another 45 people were wounded. 

The Pakistani Taliban also claimed responsibility for an intense attack on the nation's heavily fortified army headquarters in the city of Rawalpindi that began Saturday and lasted 22 hours. That attack killed nine militants and 14 others. 

The group said a cell from Punjab, Pakistan's most populous province, carried out the raid. That may be a sign the terror group has forged links with militants outside their main strongholds in Pashtun areas close to the Afghan border. 

Militant attacks have intensified over the past week as the Pakistani army prepares to launch what will likely be a long and bloody ground offensive on the al Qaeda-linked fighters' South Waziristan stronghold. 

Military officials insisted Saturday's attack was launched from South Waziristan. 

Provincial Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain said Monday's attack would not derail the planned offensive. 

"Such attacks cannot deter us from the offensive against the militants," Hussain said. "We will continue our fight till the death of the last terrorist." 

Military spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas too said the string of attacks was aimed at making the government reconsider its decision to go after the Taliban in their heartland on the Afghan border. However, the government had already decided to launch the offensive, and the army would now decide how and when to carry it out, he said. 

The recent string of attacks began last week when a suicide bomber blew himself up inside a heavily guarded United Nations aid agency in the heart of Islamabad, killing five staffers. 

On Friday, a suspected militant detonated an explosives-laden car in the middle of a busy market in the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing 53. 

Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq told The Associated Press the assault on army headquarters was only the first in a planned wave of strikes intended to avenge the killing of Pakistani Taliban chief Baitullah Mehsud in a CIA missile strike in August. 

"This was our first small effort and a present to the Pakistani and American governments," he said.

With reports from The Associated Press


----------



## Colin Parkinson

One hopes that the elements within the army and intelligence branches that support the Taliban will lose popularity and power through these attacks. Hard to say though, Pakistani mindthink seems very tunnelvision on the subject.


----------



## CougarKing

A reminder of this threat:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/as_pakistan_nuclear_safety



> ISLAMABAD –* An audacious weekend assault by Islamic militants on Pakistan's army headquarters is again raising fears of an insurgent attack on the country's nuclear weapons installation. Pakistan has sought to protect its nuclear weapons from attack by the Taliban or other militants by storing the warheads, detonators and missiles separately in facilities patrolled by elite troops.*
> 
> Analysts are divided on how secure these weapons are. Some say the weapons are less secure than they were five years ago, and Saturday's attack would show a "worrisome" overconfidence by the Pakistanis.
> 
> While complex security is in place, much depends on the Pakistani army and how vulnerable it is to infiltration by extremists, said a Western government official with access to intelligence on Pakistan and its nuclear arsenal, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.
> 
> Analysts say a more realistic scenario would involve militant sympathizers getting work as scientists at the facilities and passing information to extremists.
> 
> "It's not thought likely that the Taliban are suddenly going to storm in and gain control of the nuclear facilities," said Gareth Price, head of the Asia program at London think tank Chatham House. "There are enough command-and-control mechanisms in place to prevent that."
> 
> A U.S. counterproliferation official in Washington said strong safeguards are in place and there is no reason to believe the nuclear arsenal is in imminent jeopardy of seizure by militants.
> 
> The official, who commented on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the matter publicly, said there is a major difference between attacking a nuclear site and actually seizing and using the nuclear material stored inside.
> 
> Security at Pakistan's isolated nuclear installations is believed to be significantly higher than at the army headquarters, which was relatively relaxed by the standards of other nations. Thousands of people and vehicles enter the headquarters compound in Rawalpindi daily, and the 10 attackers, while able to take dozens of hostages Saturday and kill 14 people before a commando raid ended the siege, never penetrated to the heart of the complex.
> 
> Pakistan is estimated to have between 70 and 90 warheads, according to Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project of the Federation of American Scientists.
> 
> Shaun Gregory, an expert on Pakistani security at the University of Bradford in Britain, said militants have struck near an air base in Sargodha, where nuclear missiles are believed to be stored, and the Wah cantonment, where missiles that could carry nuclear weapons are believed to be assembled. He added that the attacks did not appear to have targeted nuclear weapons.
> 
> Pakistan uses armed forces personnel to guard nuclear weapons facilities, and it physically separates warhead cores from their detonation components, Gregory wrote in the July issue of The Sentinel, the monthly journal of the Combating Terrorism Center.
> 
> The components are stored in protected underground sites. The warheads themselves are electronically locked to ensure that they cannot be detonated even if they fall in terrorists' hands, Gregory said.
> 
> The Pakistan military carefully screens and monitors the officers vested with protecting the warheads, drawing them almost exclusively from Punjabi officers who are considered to have fewer links to religious extremists or with the Pashtun area of Pakistan, where the Taliban garners much of its support.
> 
> No action or decision involving a nuclear weapon can be undertaken by fewer than two persons. But Gregory acknowledged the possibility of collusion between cleared officers and extremists.
> 
> The personnel assigned to sensitive nuclear posts go through regular background checks conducted by Pakistan's intelligence services, according to a 2007 article in the journal Arms Control, co-written by Naeem Salik, a former top official at Pakistan's National Command Authority, which oversees the nuclear arsenal.
> 
> "It is being acknowledged by the world powers that the system has no loopholes," Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, a military spokesman, said Monday. "The system is foolproof, as good and bad as their own systems."
> 
> The U.S. and the British governments agree there is little risk of a weapon falling into militants' hands.
> 
> In London, British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said there is no evidence "that has been shown publicly or privately of any threat to the Pakistani nuclear facilities, said.
> 
> Gregory said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that he did not share Miliband's assertion, adding that "there is plenty of evidence of threat."
> 
> Individuals in the Pakistan military have colluded with al-Qaida in providing safe houses for Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and individuals in Pakistan's civil nuclear sector have met with al-Qaida figures, including Osama bin Laden himself, Gregory said.
> 
> U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton dismissed any suggestion militants could overthrow the government and gain control of the nuclear arsenal. "We have confidence in the Pakistani government and military's control over nuclear weapons," she said.
> 
> Kristensen said that while U.S. officials have said they have helped Pakistan increase security at its nuclear facilities, "they have not been allowed to go to those sites, so it's something they've had to do remotely."
> 
> Saturday's attack "somehow seems to show that the Pakistani military is perhaps a little overly confident" about some of its most important military facilities, he said.
> 
> "If a relatively small group of people is able to penetrate into their 'Pentagon,' then it might show something about the overconfidence of the Pakistanis, and that is worrisome — it's surprising that they were able to go in there relatively simply," Kristensen said.
> 
> He noted that the military headquarters is different from a nuclear facility. "One cannot compare insurgents going into an office building to them going into a nuclear facility for the nation's crown jewels," he added.
> 
> While stringent security checks on personnel are meant to prevent militant sympathizers from working at the facilities, Pakistan's nuclear establishment has seen serious leaks of nuclear knowledge and materials by insiders.
> 
> Top government scientist A.Q. Khan operated a global black market nuclear network for more than a decade until he was uncloaked by U.S. intelligence. And the CIA has confirmed a meeting between Khan associates and bin Laden before 9/11.
> 
> Israel has not taken a formal position on the danger of Pakistan's nuclear weapons falling into the hands of terrorists. However, in a parliamentary briefing last year, Defense Minister Ehud Barak mentioned such a scenario as a nightmare for the world, according to security officials speaking on condition of anonymity because the session was closed.
> 
> "Pakistan's weapons are less secure today than they were five years ago, and it seems they're even less secure than under the Musharraf government," said Gerald Steinberg, professor of political studies and conflict management at Bar Ilan University in Israel, referring to the previous administration of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf.
> 
> Steinberg said Israelis are becoming less confident of the U.S. ability to control events and put plans into action that would protect Pakistan's nuclear stockpile.
> 
> ___
> 
> Hess reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Jill Lawless in London, Ravi Nessman in Islamabad and George Jahn in Vienna contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

Another attack...this time on Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency building:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091015/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> LAHORE, Pakistan – Gunmen entered a federal law enforcement building in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore on Thursday, firing shots and terrifying employees in the latest in a string of attacks to rock this U.S.-allied nuclear-armed country as it prepares to launch a major offensive in a Taliban and al-Qaida stronghold.
> 
> In the Taliban-riddled northwest, meanwhile, a suicide car bomber detonated his vehicle next to a police station, killing at least eight people, while a suspected U.S. missile strike killed four alleged militants, officials said.
> 
> The attack in Lahore occurred at a building housing the Federal Investigation Agency, a premier law enforcement organization that deals with matters ranging from immigration to terrorism. Local media channels reported that hostages were being held.
> "We are under attack," said Mohammad Riaz, an FIA employee reached inside the building via phone by The Associated Press. "I can see two people hit, but I do not know who they are."
> 
> *The attack appeared similar to a siege mounted on the army's headquarters over the past weekend that left 23 people dead and was claimed by the Taliban as their work. The militants have also claimed credit for other attacks in recent days, warning Pakistan to stop pursuing them in military operations.
> 
> The Pakistani army has given no time frame for the expected offensive in South Waziristan, but has reportedly already sent two divisions totaling 28,000 men and blockaded the region.*
> 
> Fearing the looming offensive, about 200,000 people have fled South Waziristan since August, moving in with relatives or renting homes in the Tank and Dera Ismail Khan areas, a local government official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.


----------



## CougarKing

Multiple targets were attacked in this one day, it seems.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091015/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> LAHORE, Pakistan – *A Pakistani police official says gunmen have attacked a second police training center near the eastern city of Lahore.
> 
> Senior police official Chaudhry Shafiq says the attack on the elite police commando training center on the outskirts of the city is the third militant assault to hit the city Thursday morning.
> 
> Gunmen had earlier attacked a federal building in Lahore and a police training center near the city in attacks that killed at least seven people.*
> The attacks took place less than two hours apart and plunged the city into chaos.
> 
> *THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
> 
> LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) — A Pakistani official says seven people have been killed when a team of gunmen attacked the federal law enforcement building in the eastern city of Lahore.
> 
> Senior official Sajjad Bhutta said Thursday the attack lasted about 1 1/2 hours and was over by 11 a.m.*
> He said the dead included two attackers, four government employees and a bystander.
> 
> The attack came as gunmen also attacked a police academy on the outskirts of Lahore.


----------



## CougarKing

Good. Hopefully they can wipe out these Taliban scum soon.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091016/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> ISLAMABAD – *The Pakistani military is setting its sights on the Taliban's remote sanctuary after nearly two weeks of big bombings across the country, as hundreds flee the Afghan border region each day before what promises to be the army's riskiest offensive yet.
> 
> With the first snows of winter less than two months away, the army has limited time to mount a major ground attack. The U.S. is racing to send in night vision goggles and other equipment. The Pakistani military insists it's sealing off supply and escape routes, forcing the militants to rely on goat paths.*
> 
> The army has tried three times since 2001 to dislodge Taliban fighters from their stronghold in *South Waziristan*, part of the lawless tribal area along the border. All three previous attempts ended in negotiated truces that left the Taliban in control.
> 
> More at link- (...)


----------



## tomahawk6

Pakistans support of fundamentalists is the seed that could undo their government and country. I would hope that the government has decided to do what needs to be done. Maybe they can head off civil war and maybe they cant. But its a fight that is for the very soul of Pakistan. A taliban victory will surely spark a war with India as they wont tolerate a nuclear armed taliban. They certainly cannot rely on support from Washington. Another scenario is that Pakistani nuclear weapons are seized by taliban/aq attackers. All they need is an inside guy or two. The attack on Army Headquarters is very distrubing. Just as disturbing is this report from Debka. I know take it with a grain of salt. But all you have to do is look at a map and see where the terror attacks have occured and I think that gives the Debka article substance.



> Taliban gunmen attacked three law enforcement facilities in Pakistan's eastern city of Lahore early Thursday, Oct. 15, their fifth large-scale strike in 10 days. At least 38 people were killed. Interior minister Rehman Malik announced a nationwide red alert. He said: "The enemy has started a guerilla war."
> 
> DEBKAfile's military sources report: Five days ago, Taliban gunmen and bombers hit Pakistan's army headquarters in Islamabad and at the same time advanced on the northwestern Kohat road to Peshawar and a cluster of air bases holding its nuclear arsenal around Kamra in the North West Frontier Province.
> 
> Thursday, Taliban struck further northeast toward the Kamra nuclear center, aiming to cut it off from Islamabad, 150 kilometers east of Kohat. They have begun encircling the Sargodha air base, the location of nuclear warheads stores. En route, suicide attackers flattened a police station in the Saddar suburb of Kohat town, killing 10 people and wounding 20.
> 
> Taliban has stepped up the tempo of its large-scale assaults in an effort to throw central government and the military command off-balance as they prepare a major offensive against terrorist bastions in South Waziristan.
> 
> Lahore descended into chaos Thursday as one team of gunmen attacked the Federal Investigation Agency and took hostages before the attack was over, and two other groups struck police and commando training centers.
> 
> At the same time, an unidentified missile hit a Taliban compound in North Waziristan. At least four people were killed.
> 
> After the Oct. 10 siege of army HQ, which left 23 dead, Taliban warned that harsher acts were coming unless Pakistan called off its military operations against its strongholds and stopped working with the US.


----------



## CougarKing

Finally.



> *Ground offensive begins in Pakistan al-Qaida haven*
> MUNIR AHMAD, AP
> 10/17/2009 | 04:29 PM
> 
> ISLAMABAD — *More than 30,000 Pakistani soldiers launched a much-awaited ground offensive in an al-Qaida and Taliban stronghold along the Afghan border early Saturday, officials told The Associated Press — the nuclear-armed U.S. ally's toughest test yet against militants aiming to topple the state.*
> The offensive in South Waziristan follows months of airstrikes intended to soften up militant defenses that have also forced tens of thousands of civilians to flee. The full-scale operation also comes after two weeks of militant attacks that have killed more than 175 people and ramped up the pressure on the army to take on the insurgents.
> 
> Aside from being the nerve-center for Pakistani insurgents opposed to the U.S.-backed central government, South Waziristan is a key base for foreign and national jihadi groups planning attacks on American and NATO targets in Afghanistan and beyond. The U.S. is racing to send in night-vision goggles and other equipment to aid the latest operation.
> 
> The region is remote and mountainous. It has a leaky border with Afghanistan and fiercely independent tribes who have long resisted government interference. With winter snows just weeks away, the army has limited time to pursue a major ground attack there, and even if it does manage to wipe out its intended targets, it's unclear whether troops will occupy the area or for how long.
> 
> Even if the operation is largely successful in South Waziristan, many of the militants could escape to Afghanistan or other parts of Pakistan's semi-autonomous tribal belt.
> 
> The officials Saturday — two with intelligence, three with the government and one senior army official — gave few details but said the troops were pursuing militants holed up in the region, including in major trouble spots such as Ladha and Makeen towns.
> 
> The army has sent more than 30,000 troops to the region to participate in the combat, said one of the intelligence officials. He said the ground forces were attacking from different directions while helicopter gunships and other aircraft also were bombing various sites.
> 
> The military already has said it already has sealed off many supply and escape routes.
> 
> All the officials spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information or because they did not have authority to release it to media on the record. It is nearly impossible to verify information from the region independently. Foreigners require special permission to enter tribal areas and many Pakistani journalists from other parts of the country are at risk there.
> 
> The army has tried three times since 2001 to dislodge Taliban fighters from South Waziristan. All three previous attempts ended in negotiated truces that left the Taliban in control. This time the military has said there will be no deals, partly to avoid jeopardizing gains won earlier this year when Pakistani soldiers overpowered the Taliban in the Swat Valley, another northwest region.
> 
> In a previous interview with AP, army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said the assault would be limited to slain Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud's holdings — a swath of territory that stretches roughly 1,275 square miles (3,310 square kilometers). That portion covers about half of South Waziristan, which itself is slightly larger than the U.S. state of Delaware.
> 
> The plan is to capture and hold the area where Abbas estimates 10,000 insurgents are headquartered and reinforced with about 1,500 foreign fighters, most of them of Central Asian origin. "There are Arabs, but the Arabs are basically in the leadership, providing resources and expertise and in the role of trainers," he said.
> 
> Taliban spokesmen could not immediately be reached for comment Saturday. Communications in and around the region appeared jammed, making it difficult to reach local residents or other witnesses.
> 
> The army expects the militants to use guerrilla tactics including ambushes, suicide attacks and roadside bombs. A roadside bomb hit a security convoy in Ladha early Saturday, killing one soldier and wounding three others, two other intelligence officials said.
> 
> Despite sometimes rocky relations with the Pakistani military, the U.S. is trying to rush in equipment that would help with mobility, night fighting and precision bombing, a U.S. Embassy official told The Associated Press in a recent interview, speaking on condition of anonymity because the issue is politically sensitive.
> 
> In addition to night-vision devices, the Pakistan military has said it is seeking additional Cobra helicopter gunships, heliborne lift capability, laser-guided munitions and intelligence equipment to monitor cell and satellite telephones.
> 
> The army has considered the weather in the timing the offensive. Snows in the region could block major roads. At the same time, a harsh winter could work to the army's advantage by driving fighters out of their unheated mountain hideouts.
> 
> Amnesty International said Friday that its research teams in the area report 90,000 to 150,000 residents have fled South Waziristan since July, when the military began a long-range artillery and aerial bombardment in the region.
> 
> Although the military has been hitting targets in South Waziristan for the past three months, it waited until two weeks ago to say it would definitely go ahead with a major ground offensive into the region.
> 
> What followed was a rash of major bombings that killed 175 people and demonstrated the militants' ability to attack cities across the county. One attack involved a siege of the army's headquarters that lasted 22 hours and left 23 people dead. In the latest bombing, three suicide attackers, including a woman, struck a police station in the northwestern city of Peshawar on Friday, killing 13 people.


----------



## CougarKing

And the battle continues:

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/091018/world/international_us_pakistan_violence



> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - Pakistani forces fought fierce battles with Taliban militants on Sunday, a day after launching a long-awaited offensive aimed at bringing the writ of state to lawless tribal lands on the Afghan border.
> 
> 
> The offensive on the global Islamist hub of South Waziristan follows a string of brazen militant attacks in different parts of the country, including an assault on army headquarters, in which more than 150 people were killed.
> 
> 
> *About 28,000 soldiers are battling an estimated 10,000 hard-core Taliban, including about 1,000 tough Uzbek fighters and some Arab al Qaeda members, after surrounding militant territory and pushing in from three direction.
> 
> 
> Heavy clashes erupted on Saturday as soldiers backed by aircraft and artillery encountered resistance, and four soldiers were killed and 12 wounded, the military said. There was no information about militant casualties.
> 
> 
> Security forces captured a Taliban stronghold at Spinkai Raghzai on Saturday after the militants withdrew from their fortifications and took refuge in nearby mountains, officials said.*
> "It is a flat area so whenever they tried to put up resistance, the helicopter gunships fired at them so they decided to flee to the mountains," said a senior government official in the northwest. In a show of unity before the offensive, government and political party leaders gave the military full backing on Friday, vowing to weed out militants.
> 
> 
> Nuclear-armed Pakistan has been under U.S. pressure to crack down on Islamist militancy as President Barack Obama considers a boost in troop numbers fighting in neighboring Afghanistan.
> 
> 
> Many al Qaeda and Taliban members fled to northwest Pakistan after U.S.-led troops ousted the Taliban in Kabul in 2001 and the region has become a global hub for Islamist militancy.
> 
> 
> *The offensive could be the army's toughest test since the militants turned on the state and it will be hoping Afghan Taliban factions elsewhere in South Waziristan and in North Waziristan stay out of the fight.
> 
> 
> Up to 100,000 civilians have fled from South Waziristan in anticipation of the offensive, the army said, while the United Nations said 500 people were leaving every day.*
> 
> 
> Security force are on alert across the country in case of retaliatory strikes.


----------



## CougarKing

Another update: US Gen. Petraeus and Sen. John Kerry bringing new US aid?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091019/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – *Pakistani soldiers killed at least eight advancing Taliban fighters as they waged a major offensive against militants along the Afghan border Monday, intelligence officials said, while a top U.S. senator and general met with officials in the nuclear-armed nation.*
> 
> Both the Pakistani army and the Taliban have claimed early victories in the clashes in South Waziristan, a tribal region that al-Qaida and other Islamist extremists use as a base to plot attacks on the Pakistani state, Western troops in Afghanistan and civilian targets throughout the world. The U.S. has backed the military offensive in the remote, rugged area.
> 
> *The army said Sunday that 60 militants and six soldiers have been killed since the offensive began Saturday. Two intelligence officials said at least eight more militants died Monday in a fierce battle in the Khaisur area, where they were coming closer to troop positions.*
> 
> The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to divulge the information to media on the record. They did not speak of any military casualties.
> 
> The Taliban claimed Sunday to have inflicted "heavy casualties" and pushed advancing soldiers back into their bases. It is nearly impossible to independently verify any of the claims because the army is blocking access to the battlefield and surrounding towns.
> 
> The military offensive is focused on eliminating Pakistani Taliban militants linked to the Mehsud tribe, who control roughly 1,275 square miles (3,310 square kilometers) of territory, or about half of South Waziristan. Part of the strategy involves striking deals with other militant groups and tribes in the region.
> 
> Some 10,000 Pakistani militants and about 1,500 foreign fighters are believed to operate in the region, though many are likely to avoid conventional battles in favor of guerrilla attacks.
> 
> (...)
> 
> 
> *U.S. Central Command chief David Petraeus, who oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, was in Pakistan on Monday visiting top officials, while U.S. Sen. John Kerry also was meeting political and military leaders, the U.S. Embassy said.
> 
> Kerry in particular was expected to try to ease tensions with Islamabad and the army over a multibillion dollar U.S. aid package for the country that some here says comes with unacceptable strings attached.*
> 
> ____
> 
> Associated Press Writers Rasool Dawar from Mir Ali, Zarar Khan in Islamabad and Hussain Afzal in Parachinar contributed to this report.


----------



## MarkOttawa

Taliban are Taliban, or, mashing Mr Margolis.  If at first you don't succeed (see 2) here), 
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/89771/post-882787.html#msg882787
try again: a letter of mine in the _Ottawa Sun_ (comment in parentheses theirs):

Terror by any name 
http://www.ottawasun.com/comment/letters/2009/10/18/11443796.html



> RE “War next door creates havoc in Pakistan” (Oct. 18)
> http://www.ottawasun.com/comment/columnists/eric_margolis/2009/10/18/11439631-sun.html
> Eric Margolis writes that the Pashtun insurgents — who are also terrorists, note their suicide bombings of civilians — the Pakistani government is fighting are ‘wrongly called “Taliban.”
> 
> I guess Mr. Margolis has somehow managed to avoid noticing that the umbrella group for these people is called “Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan” (the Taliban Movement of Pakistan).
> 
> Seems pretty clear to me who they are. But then there are none so blind as those who will not see. And who would rather ceaselessly criticize the United States than recognize real enemies.
> 
> Mark Collins
> 
> (We aren’t sure how much a name is worth, but the results seem awfully similar)



And this _poseur_ has been nominated for a Governor General's Literary Award--for non-fiction!

An award for a true prince of darkness?
http://dustmybroom.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=12621:an-award-for-a-true-prince-of-darkness&catid=100:hating-america

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## The Bread Guy

Shared in accordance with the "fair dealing" provisions, Section 29, of the _Copyright Act._

*TTP gets Afghan Taliban support*
Mazhar Tufail, The News, 18 Oct 09
Article link

The Pakistani militants based in South Waziristan Agency committed the terrorism acts in the past couple of weeks or so with the help of the Afghan Taliban, The News learnt here on Saturday.

“Leaders of various militant groups active in Pakistan under the banner of the banned Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) have succeeded in winning support of the Afghan Taliban for committing terror acts in Pakistan,” a source in the security forces disclosed on condition of anonymity.

“They have mounted the deadly attacks in Peshawar, Bannu, Rawalpindi and Lahore with the help of Afghan Taliban,” he said.

The source said the top leaders of outlawed Lashkar-e-Jhangvi have established links with the Afghan Taliban and all its operatives who have been operating in the Punjab have reached South Waziristan or Afghanistan to evade arrests as the law-enforcement agencies have launched a crackdown on such elements in the Punjab province.

“Initially, this group was involved in sectarian violence and has been targeting people belonging to a particular religious sect but now it is targeting the security forces,” the source said.

According to the source, the security forces have, however, launched the operation - codenamed Rah-e-Nijat - in South Waziristan with full determination to eliminate the terrorists from the restive tribal region. He said majority of the troops participating in the operation have an extensive experience of warfare in mountainous terrain and have earlier been fighting terrorists in Swat, Malakand and elsewhere.

“As directed by the army chief and other commanders involved in the military operation in South Waziristan, the security forces will exercise utmost care to avoid collateral damage during the operation. The commanders are very optimistic about the completion of the operation well before the end of the stipulated time and its positive outcome,” the source said.

The Pakistan Army launched operation against the extremists in South Waziristan Agency on the night between Friday and Saturday. According to military sources, 1,000 to 1,500 militants are present in South Waziristan and the operation has been launched after three-month siege of the militants.

The political administration of South Waziristan has, however, said that over 4,000 to 5000 terrorists are present in the area with most of them hiding in Mahsuds-inhibited area.

South Waziristan is the nerve centre of the TTP and the main source of terrorism across Pakistan. It is from here that TTP renders support to other terrorist groups operating from the nearby Khyber, Bajaur, Orakzai and Mohmand agencies.

“The root of the terror is in South Waziristan where this group is present. It is a must to root out this terror and curse,” the source said.

After the death of Baitullah Mahsud in a drone strike on August 5, TTP is being led by Hakimullah Mahsud with the assistance of Waliur Rehman and Qari Hussain, who runs a suicide training camp in Kotkai area of the region.

According to the source, in the last three months, the TTP militants intensified attacks on security forces deployed in South and North Waziristan agencies, including five suicide missions in Razmak area, kidnapping of 15 security personnel, killing three of them, over 300 rocket attacks and 78 improvised explosive device (IED) attacks.

“Given all of the recent terrorism acts in various parts of the country, a final showdown against Taliban and their al-Qaeda Uzbek allies in South Waziristan has become an absolute necessity,” the source said.

The source said no doubt the country’s security forces were faced with a far stronger enemy in South Waziristan than one they have confronted and overcame in Swat.


----------



## CougarKing

Divide and conquer:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091020/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> DERA ISMAIL KHAN, Pakistan – Pakistan's army, in the midst of a major new offensive against Taliban militants, has struck deals to keep two powerful, anti-U.S. tribal chiefs from joining the battle against the government, officials said Monday.
> 
> The deals increase the chances of an army victory against Pakistan's internal enemy No. 1, but indicate that the 3-day-old assault into the Taliban's strongholds in South Waziristan may have less effect than the U.S. wants on a spreading insurgency across the border in Afghanistan.
> 
> Under the terms agreed to about three weeks ago, Taliban renegades Maulvi Nazir and Hafiz Gul Bahadur will stay out of the current fight in parts of South Waziristan controlled by the Pakistani Taliban. They will also allow the army to move through their own lands unimpeded, giving the military additional fronts from which to attack the Taliban.
> In exchange, the army will ease patrols and bombings in the lands controlled by Nazir and Bahadur, two Pakistani intelligence officials based in the region told The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because revealing their identities would compromise their work.
> 
> An army spokesman described the deal as an "understanding" with the men that they would stay neutral. The agreements underscore Pakistan's past practice of targeting only militant groups that attack the government or its forces inside Pakistan.
> 
> Western officials say South Waziristan is also a major sanctuary and training ground for al-Qaida operatives. The mountain-studded region has been under near-total militant control for years and is considered a likely hiding place for Osama bin Laden.
> 
> The United States has responded cautiously to the initial Pakistani strategy, publicly welcoming the offensive but saying little about the specific choice of targets.
> 
> "We have a shared goal here, and the shared goal is fighting violent extremism," State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Monday.
> 
> Kelly said he was unaware of an agreement to keep some militant factions out of the fight for now, but other U.S. officials said the strategy is not surprising or necessarily worrisome.
> 
> Because the faction loyal to Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud poses the most direct threat to the Pakistani government and army, it is the logical first target, U.S. officials briefed on the offensive said.
> 
> While a broad offensive that takes on all comers at once might be ideal, it is not practical, U.S. military officials said. They spoke on condition of anonymity because the United States has no direct role in the operations of another country.
> 
> U.S. officials are watching the offensive closely with the hope that the Pakistani army will not pull back after the initial onslaught, and will eventually widen the offensive to cover other militant factions and the more forbidding ground of North Waziristan.
> 
> The army's offensive in South Waziristan is pitting some 30,000 troops against 11,500 militants belonging to the Pakistani Taliban, an umbrella grouping of the country's main militant factions blamed for 80 percent of the attacks in this nuclear-armed nation over the last three years.
> 
> The Taliban have claimed responsibility for a surge in strikes over the past two weeks that has killed more than 170 people. The attacks have included a 22-hour siege of the army headquarters and a bombing of the U.N. building in the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> Pakistani security analysts said the army had little choice but to cut deals with rival Taliban factions to have a chance of success. The campaign will likely be far tougher than in the Swat Valley, a northwest region where government troops overpowered insurgents this year. The army has conducted three previous offensives in South Waziristan since 2004, all unsuccessful.
> "If the army opens up multiple fronts, they will be deluged," said Khalid Aziz, a former top administrator in the northwest. "It's like having a patient suffering from multiple diseases — you tend to treat those that are life-threatening first."
> 
> The army is setting its sights on Hakimullah Mehsud, who became leader of the Pakistani Taliban after its former chief, Baitullah Mehsud, was killed in a U.S. missile strike in August.
> 
> Bahadur's area of influence lies in North Waziristan just across the border from South Waziristan, abutting land controlled by the Pakistani Taliban. He and his followers come from a different tribe than the Mehsuds, who make up the majority of the Pakistani Taliban. Nazir controls territory in South Waziristan.
> 
> Both allow their lands to be used by fighters who cross into Afghanistan and are loyal to the Mullah Omar, the head of the Afghan Taliban. Omar is believed to be living in Pakistan.
> 
> As the region's British colonial rulers did decades ago, the army is exploiting tribal rivalries to try to gain control in the region. Nazir is an old-time opponent of the Mehsud tribe, while Bahadur is reportedly angry over the appointment of Hakimullah as Taliban chief.
> 
> Being able to move unimpeded through their territory gives the Pakistani army a massive boost in its current campaign.
> 
> Army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said there was no agreement with the two men, but "there is an understanding with them that they will not interfere in this war."
> 
> He said the army "had to talk to the devil" to isolate its main target.
> 
> Asked whether the agreements were holding, he said: "Obviously, they are not coming to rescue or to help" the Pakistani Taliban.
> 
> The army said Monday that troops backed by aerial bombing were steadily advancing on three fronts into the region and meeting stiff resistance in places. It said 78 militants and nine soldiers were killed over the last three days. Militants were not available for comment, but said Sunday they had the upper hand.
> 
> It is nearly impossible to verify independently what is going on in South Waziristan because the army is blocking access to it and surrounding towns. There are no reporters traveling with the army, and few — if any — local journalists in the area.
> 
> Residents, some fleeing, reported fierce fighting and said Pakistani forces were using artillery and air attacks.
> 
> "There is lots of bombardment: on houses, on mosques, on Islamic boarding schools, on everything," said Fazlu Rehman as he arrived in the town of Dera Ismail Khan, which lies close to South Waziristan.
> 
> As many as 150,000 civilians — possibly more — have left South Waziristan in recent months after the army made clear it was planning an assault, with several thousand over the last few days. Authorities say that up to 200,000 people may flee in the coming weeks, but don't expect to have to house them in camps because most have relatives in the region.
> 
> In Dera Ismail Khan, government employees registered hundreds of people who lined up for cash handouts and other aid.
> 
> "The situation in Waziristan is getting worse and worse every day," said Haji Sherzad Mehsud, one of the refugees.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Zarar Khan in Islamabad and Anne Gearan and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

Good. The offensive has made progress:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091021/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> PARACHINAR, Pakistan –* Soldiers fought for control of the Pakistani Taliban chief's hometown Wednesday, pressing forward with a major offensive targeting an insurgent stronghold along the Afghan border, authorities said.
> 
> The battle raged as intelligence officials said suspected U.S. missiles killed two militants in a neighboring region — a potentially troubling strike because it hit territory controlled by another militant faction the army has coaxed into neutrality during its offensive.*
> 
> (...)
> 
> The military is advancing on three fronts in South Waziristan. The fight for Kotkai town is symbolically key because Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud and a top deputy, Qari Hussain, hail from there. It also lies on the way to the major militant base of Sararogha.[/B]
> 
> An army statement Wednesday said forces were engaged in "intense encounters" in heights surrounding Kotkai and had secured an area east of it. Two intelligence officials said troops had secured parts of the town and also destroyed houses belonging to Mehsud and Hussain in controlled explosions, but army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas denied that late Wednesday, saying most of the fighting was on hillsides and the outskirts of the town.
> 
> Security forces also cleared Khaisura, a village on another front in the offensive, according to the army statement. Heavily fortified bunkers were found, some with two-meter thick concrete walls, the army said.
> 
> *It reported three more soldiers were killed, bringing the army's death toll so far to 16, while 15 more militants were slain, bringing their overall death toll to 105.*
> 
> 
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

The ongoing campaign:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091022/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Residents fleeing a 6-day-old Pakistani army offensive in a Taliban stronghold along the Afghan border reported Thursday that the insurgents are digging in for a fight and travel the roads freely.
> 
> Tired and dusty refugees arriving in this northwestern town Thursday from different parts of South Waziristan reported intense army bombing by jets and helicopters but said they had seen no ground troops.
> 
> The accounts by a dozen refugees to Associated Press reporters are a sign of just how much fighting remains before the military can even hope to clear the area, which in recent years has become a major global hub for al-Qaida and other extremist groups who carry out attacks against U.S. troops in Adghanistan.
> 
> The militants were believed to control roughly 1,275 square miles of territory before the offensive began. That portion covers about half of South Waziristan, which itself is slightly larger than Delaware.*
> 
> The military say its troops are progressing steadily and retaking land on three fronts. But officers have made it clear that the campaign will be long and bloody and acknowledged resistance is tough.
> 
> As the army presses into their heartland, the militants are trying to bring the war to the rest of Pakistan.
> 
> Over the last 20 days, they have killed more than 170 people in a series of suicide bombings and raids on Western, civilian and security-force targets across the country.
> 
> In the latest attack, suspected insurgents on a motorbike shot and killed a senior army officer and a soldier Thursday in a residential part of the capital, Islamabad. The slain officer, Ahmed Moinuddin, was on leave from his job as deputy commander of the U.N. peacekeeping mission in Sudan.
> 
> The attack came despite ramped-up security nationwide. It was believed to be the first targeted killing of an army officer in the capital, a sign of evolving militant strategies.
> 
> The United Nations says 110,000 people have fled South Waziristan in recent months as speculation rose of an army offensive, about 30,000 of them in the last few days. Most are staying with relatives or in rented homes in Dera Ismail Khan and nearby districts.
> 
> New arrivals said the Taliban were preparing for a fight.
> 
> "We saw no ground forces on the way, nothing except helicopters and airplanes. But we saw a lot of Taliban movement," said Awal Jan, a refugee from the town of Sarwakai. "They were roaming around in their vehicles and digging trenches in the mountains."
> 
> Pakistan is under intense pressure to eliminate Islamist militant groups sheltering in its northwest that also attack U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan. The military has battled them in various districts, losing hundreds of soldiers, but questions remain about its overall strategic commitment to the fight.
> 
> The army has previously moved into South Waziristan three times since 2004. Each time it has suffered high casualties and signed peace deals that left insurgents with effective control of the region. Western officials say al-Qaida now uses it and neighboring North Waziristan as an operations and training base.
> 
> One refugee said Taliban fighters had told villagers they must join them or flee.
> 
> "They said, 'If you want to side with us, you may. If you are scared of death, then leave immediately,'" said Habibullah, who gave only a single name.
> 
> Maadi Shah, his wife and five children walked for a day to escape.
> 
> "Earlier there was aerial bombing once a day, but now it is happening countless times," he said. "We saw the Taliban shifting to the mountains toward Makeen (the main town). They are well-entrenched there," said Shah, who stopped talking after a man warned him of possible Taliban retaliation for meeting reporters.
> 
> The current offensive pits 28,000 troops against some 12,000 militants, 1,000 of them believed to be foreign fighters, mostly Chechens and Arabs. They are fighting in an unforgiving landscape of hulking mountains, rock-strewn valleys and sparse vegetation.
> *A military statement Thursday reported two more soldiers were killed, bringing the army's death toll to 18, and that 24 more militants were slain, bringing their death toll to 129. Reporters are blocked from entering the region, meaning verifying information is all but impossible. *
> 
> Authorities say they are not expecting a major humanitarian crisis like the one triggered by an offensive in the northwestern Swat Valley earlier this year. Still, many refugees have complained of receiving little or no government assistance.
> 
> In Paharpur town, some 30 miles outside Dera Ismail Khan, police clubbed refugees swarming an aid distribution center run by Pakistani authorities. The lines were long, and some refugees tried to climb a wall to get inside. Several people were injured, one with a bloodied head.
> 
> "We came here for bread, but the police beat us up," said Rahmatullah Mehsud. "There, the Taliban were messing with things and the army was showering bombs. Here, we have to bear the clubs."
> 
> Aid administrator Javed Shaikh said there was plenty of food, but that the refugees were "impatient."
> 
> ___
> 
> AP reporter Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

Yet another reminder of this threat to the security of Pakistan's nukes:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091023/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> ISLAMABAD –* A suicide bomber struck a checkpoint near a military complex reportedly linked to Pakistan's nuclear weapons program Friday, killing seven people as the army pressed ahead with a major anti-Taliban offensive in the northwest.*
> 
> The attack took place near the sprawling aeronautical complex in Kamra, around 30 miles (50 km) from the capital, Islamabad, and is sure to raise renewed concerns about the safety of Pakistan's nuclear program.
> 
> *The Kamra site is often mentioned by foreign military experts and researchers as a likely place to keep planes that can carry nuclear warheads. The army, which does not reveal where its nuclear weapons are stored, has denied that the facility is tied to the program.
> 
> The attacker was apparently riding a bicycle and detonated his explosives at a checkpoint on a road leading to the complex, police officer Akbar Abbas said, blaming the Taliban. The seven dead included two security troops, while 13 people were wounded.*
> "The attacker wanted to go inside. He exploded himself when officials wanted to search his body," Attock police chief Fakhar Sultan Raja told The Associated Press.
> 
> *The attack is the latest in a wave of violence sweeping Pakistan as its army pushes forth with its offensive against Islamist militants in the northwestern tribal region of South Waziristan. More than 170 people have died in bombings and raids on Western and security-related targets in the past three weeks.
> 
> One of the attacks included a 22-hour standoff at the army's headquarters, an embarrassing breach of security that also raised worries about its ability to protect the country's nuclear weapons.
> 
> The complex at Kamra or its workers have been targeted at least once before. In December 2007, a suicide car bomber struck near a bus carrying children of Pakistan Air Force employees, wounding five of them.
> 
> Pakistan has long insisted its nuclear program is safe and secure, and has sought to protect it from from attack by militants by storing the warheads, detonators and missiles separately in facilities patrolled by elite troops.*
> 
> U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently expressed confidence in Pakistan's nuclear safeguards, but analysts are divided on how secure the weapons are. Some say the weapons are less secure than they were five years ago.
> 
> Security plans aside, much could depend on the Pakistani army and how vulnerable it is to infiltration by extremists, according to some observers. One possible scenario that could endanger the program would involve militant sympathizers getting work as scientists at the facilities and passing information to extremists.
> 
> *Pakistan is estimated to have between 70 and 90 warheads, according to Hans Kristensen, director of the Nuclear Information Project of the Federation of American Scientists.
> 
> Shaun Gregory, an expert on Pakistani security at the University of Bradford in Britain, said in a recent interview that militants have struck near an air base in Sargodha, where nuclear missiles are believed to be stored, and the Wah cantonment, where missiles that could carry nuclear weapons are believed to be assembled.*
> 
> He added that the attacks did not appear to have targeted nuclear weapons, but said there is evidence of threats to the program.
> 
> Pakistan hopes that its week-old army offensive in South Waziristan will go a long way toward eliminating the militant menace on its soil, but residents fleeing the region reported this week that the insurgents are digging in for a fight.
> 
> Tired and dusty refugees arriving Thursday in the northwestern town of Dera Ismail Khan from different parts of South Waziristan reported intense army bombing by jets and helicopters but said they had seen no ground troops.
> 
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

Good. The Pakistani Army just captured Taliban leader Hakimullah Mehsud's hometown.

http://www.military.com/news/article/paktaliban-leaders-hometown-captured.html



> *Pak-Taliban Leader's Hometown Captured*
> October 24, 2009
> Associated Press
> 
> ISLAMABAD - *Officials say Pakistan's army has captured the hometown of the country's Taliban chief in a major offensive.
> 
> Elsewhere in the northwest, officials said a suspected U.S. missile strike has killed at least 14 people.
> 
> Two army and one intelligence official said Saturday that the military has taken the town of Kotkai in South Waziristan after days of fighting. *
> 
> They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to media.
> 
> *Kotkai is strategically important because it lies on the way to the major militant base of Sararogha. It's also the hometown of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud. *
> Government official Mohammad Jamil said the missile strike hit the Bajur, a tribal region farther north.
> 
> THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
> 
> ISLAMABAD (AP) -* Pakistani leaders say the military offensive in a Taliban stronghold along the Afghan border is succeeding and have resolved to press ahead despite a ferocious wave of retaliatory attacks that have killed some 200 people this month.
> 
> The government statement came as a spate of bombings in northwest Pakistan on Friday killed 24 people, including 17 headed to a wedding. The onslaught appears aimed at sapping public support for the army's offensive in South Waziristan, a lawless tribal region under the sway of the Taliban and al-Qaida.
> 
> Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani declared that "failure is not an option despite the ferocity of these attacks," according to the statement released late Friday after a meeting of top government and military officials.
> 
> The army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, told participants that the offensive is moving ahead successfully and is trying to keep civilian casualties to a minimum, according to the statement. Some 155,000 civilians have fled the region, the United Nations says.*
> 
> Pakistan's civilian government and powerful military are under intense international pressure to root out Islamist militants who are also blamed for rising attacks on U.S. and NATO troops across the frontier in Afghanistan.
> 
> The militants have promised to carry out strikes across the country if the offensive in South Waziristan doesn't stop, and the attacks have put many Pakistanis on edge.
> 
> In a sign it is sensitive to popular support, the government statement appealed to the media "not to glorify the terrorists and acts of terrorism in any form and to avoid live coverage of such incidents as it created panic and despondency in the public."
> 
> In one of Friday's attacks, a suicide bomber struck a checkpoint on a road leading to the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex at Kamra, about 30 miles (50 kilometers) from the capital, Islamabad. The complex is the country's major air force maintenance and research hub, servicing and building jet fighters and radar systems.
> 
> The blast killed two security officers and five civilians who were on their way to work at the base, said police officer Akbar Abbas. Some 13 people were hurt.
> 
> Hours later, an explosion struck a bus traveling in the Mohmand tribal region, north of South Waziristan.
> 
> Four women and three children were among the 17 killed, said Zabit Khan, a local government official. He said it was unclear whether the bus struck a buried bomb or the explosive device was detonated by remote control.
> 
> Also Friday, a car bomb exploded in the parking lot of a recreational facility housing a restaurant and a marriage hall in Peshawar, the main city in the northwest. Fifteen people were wounded.
> 
> Pakistan reported fighting in several parts of South Waziristan on Friday and said its soldiers had seized some high ground from militant control. A statement reported two soldiers were killed, bringing the army's death toll to 20, and that 13 militants were killed - six of them Uzbeks - bringing their death toll to 142.
> 
> Reporters are blocked from entering the region, meaning independently verifying the information is all but impossible.
> 
> *Around 100,000 more civilians are expected to join the 155,000 who have already fled the region, according to a U.N. statement Friday. Security concerns complicate delivering humanitarian aid to nearby regions, but the U.N. says it is managing the work through local partners.*


----------



## CougarKing

The advance continues. Good.

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/reuters/091025/world/international_us_pakistan_violence



> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - *Pakistani aircraft attacked Taliban in the South Waziristan region on Sunday a day after the army said it had captured a strategic town on an approach to main militant base area.
> 
> Separately, gunmen on a motorcycle shot dead the minister of education in the provincial government in Baluchistan, a gas-rich southwestern province where separatist rebels have been waging a low-level insurgency for decades.
> 
> 
> The army assault in the ethnic Pashtun tribal region of South Waziristan on the Afghan border is seen as a test of the government's determination to tackle Islamists responsible for a string of attacks against government and other targets.*
> 
> 
> The United States and other powers embroiled in neighboring Afghanistan's growing conflict want Pakistan to eliminate militant sanctuaries in its lawless northwest.
> 
> 
> *The latest bombardment in the week-old offensive was against militant bases in the three villages of Sam, Badr and Ladha, government and security officials said.
> 
> 
> "It was intense bombing and later helicopter gunships attacked," said an intelligence agency official who declined to be identified.
> 
> 
> Several militant hideouts had been destroyed in the bombing, said a government official, adding he had no information about casualties. Military spokesman were not available for comment.*
> 
> 
> South Waziristan, a rugged land of rocky mountains and patchy forest, is a global hub of Islamist militancy. Foreign fighters including Uzbeks and Arab al Qaeda supporters are fighting alongside the Taliban.
> 
> 
> *Soldiers are advancing on the militants' main stronghold area from three directions.
> 
> 
> HEAVY CLASH
> 
> 
> Forces moving in from the southeast had taken control of Kotkai town, the birthplace of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud and the home town of Qari Hussain Mehsud, a senior commander known as "the mentor of suicide bombers," the army said on Saturday.
> 
> 
> The small town is a gateway to important militant strongholds and intelligence officials in the region said government forces killed at least 15 militants in a heavy clash as they pushed beyond Kotkai.
> 
> 
> Reporters do not have access to the area.
> 
> 
> About 150,000 people have fled their homes in South Waziristan but aid officials do not expect the exodus to become a humanitarian crisis, as did a similar offensive in the Swat valley this year.*
> 
> 
> In Baluchistan, there was no claim of responsibility for the killing of provincial education minister Shafiq Ahmed Khan, who was shot near his home in the provincial capital, Quetta.
> 
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

> Reporting from Kanju, Pakistan - Members of the 40-day-old tribal militia in this Swat Valley village come in all shapes, from all walks of life.
> 
> Some struggle to fasten bandoleers around pot bellies; some haven't finished high school. They are doctors and teachers, wealthy landowners and dirt-poor wheat farmers.
> 
> Some make their way with Kalashnikov rifles slung over their shoulders, others with only a wooden stick in hand.
> 
> What unites them is the memory of the Taliban's brutality, a time when the militant organization took over Kanju and the rest of the Swat Valley. Taliban militants beheaded perceived enemies, flogged women and bombed school buildings.
> 
> With most of Swat back in the hands of the government after a military operation that drove the Taliban into hiding, thousands of Pakistanis in towns like Kanju have been banding together to form lashkars, or tribal militias, to help keep trouble from coming back.
> <more>
> 
> http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-pakistan-lashkars26-2009oct26,0,4719846.story?page=1


While this article is about Pakistan, if I understand correctly, similar tribal militias are a significant component of McChrystal's long term COIN strategy for Afghanistan.


----------



## CougarKing

Wow. Tragic.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091028/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan




> PESHAWAR, Pakistan – A car bomb struck a busy market in northwestern Pakistan on Wednesday, killing 93 people — mostly women and children — as visiting Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pledged U.S. support for Islamabad's campaign against Islamic militants.
> More than 200 people were wounded in the blast in the main northwestern city of Peshawar, the deadliest in a surge of attacks by suspected insurgents this month. The government blamed militants seeking to avenge an army offensive launched this month against al-Qaida and Taliban in their stronghold close to the Afghan border.
> 
> The bombing was the deadliest since explosions hit homecoming festivities for former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto in Karachi in October 2007, killing about 150 people. Bhutto was later slain in a separate attack.
> 
> Wednesday's bomb destroyed much of the Mina Bazaar in Peshawar's old town, a warren of narrow alleys clogged with stalls and shops selling dresses, toys and cheap jewelry that drew many female shoppers and children in the conservative city.
> 
> The blast collapsed buildings, including a mosque, and set scores of shops ablaze. The wounded sat amid burning debris and parts of bodies as a huge plume of gray smoke rose above the city.
> 
> Crying for help, men tried to pull survivors from beneath wreckage. One man carried away a baby with a bloody face and a group of men rescued a young boy covered in dust, but others found only bodies of the dead. A two-story building collapsed as firefighters doused it with water, triggering more panic.
> 
> "There was a deafening sound and I was like a blind man for a few minutes," said Mohammad Usman, who was wounded in the shoulder. "I heard women and children crying and started to help others. There was the smell of human flesh in the air."
> 
> Clinton, on her first visit to Pakistan as secretary of state, was a three-hour drive away in the capital, Islamabad, when the blast took place. Speaking to reporters, she praised the army's anti-Taliban offensive in South Waziristan and offered U.S. support.
> 
> "I want you to know this fight is not Pakistan's alone," Clinton said. "These extremists are committed to destroying what is dear to us as much as they are committed to destroying that which is dear to you and to all people. So this is our struggle as well."
> 
> Standing beside her, Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said the violence would not break his government's will to fight back.
> 
> "The resolve and determination will not be shaken," Qureshi said. "People are carrying out such heinous crimes — they want to shake our resolve. I want to address them: We will not buckle. We will fight you. We will fight you because we want peace and stability in Pakistan."
> 
> Peshawar, the economic hub of the northwest and the seat of the provincial government, has long been a favorite target of militants who control large parts of territory to the west in tribal regions near the Afghanistan border. Extremism has flourished there since it was used as a staging ground in the 1980s for U.S.-funded fighters preparing to battle the Soviet-installed regime in Afghanistan.
> 
> No group claimed responsibility for the bombing, but that is not unusual, especially when the victims are Pakistani civilians. Sahib Gul, a doctor at a nearby hospital, said 93 people were killed and more than 200 injured. He said 60 of the dead were either women or children.
> 
> Three bombs have exploded in Peshawar this month, including one that killed more than 50 people. They are part of at least 10 major attacks in Pakistan that have killed 250 people either claimed by or blamed on Taliban militants.
> 
> Most have targeted security forces, but some bombs have gone off in public places, apparently to undercut support for the army's assault on the border and expose the weakness of the government.
> 
> The Taliban have warned Pakistan that they would stage more attacks if the army does not end its ground offensive in the South Waziristan tribal region, where the military has sent 30,000 troops to flush out insurgents. South Waziristan is a major base for the Pakistani Taliban and other foreign militants.
> North West Frontier Province Information Minister Mian Iftikhar Hussain blamed the militants for Wednesday's attack.
> 
> "We are hitting them at their center of terrorism, and they are hitting back targeting Peshawar," he said. "This is a tough time for us. We are picking up the bodies of our women and children, but we will follow these terrorists and eliminate them."
> 
> (This version CORRECTS direction of tribal areas to west, not north.)


----------



## CougarKing

Good.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091101/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> *Security forces fighting their way through a mountainous Taliban stronghold killed at least seven militants Sunday and injured several more, officials said, while Pakistan's foreign minister said the offensive in tribal South Waziristan should finish sooner than originally expected.*
> 
> As part of the government's ramping up of its fight against the militants, it will offer bounties of up to 50,000,000 rupees ($600,000) for each of the top three Taliban leaders, according to an official advertisement to be published Monday in Pakistani newspapers and obtained by The Associated Press.
> 
> But the recent successes of the campaign in South Waziristan — and the optimism of Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi that it would soon achieve its objectives — were offset by a string of anti-government attacks in other tribal regions, where militants kidnapped and killed a prominent pro-government activist and blew up a girls' school.
> 
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

A belated update on this front on the War on Terror:



> *Pakistan captures two Taliban strongholds in South * Waziristanhttp://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/11/pakistan_captures_tw.php
> 
> By Bill Roggio
> November 3, 2009 11:21 AM
> 
> *The Pakistani Army has captured two more Taliban strongholds in South Waziristan and is close to taking another, while a Taliban spokesman claimed the group has conducted tactical withdrawals and is prepared to fight "a long war" in the tribal agency.
> The military has killed 33 Taliban fighters and lost only one soldier during two days of fighting, according to the Inter Service Public Relations, or ISPR, the public affairs office of the Pakistani military.*
> Pakistani troops are now in *full control of Kanigoram*, a town that served as a stronghold for Uzbek and other central Asian fighters. "Hundred percent of the town has been cleared and secured," the ISPR reported.
> The Army has also *secured the village of China*, which is just outside the town of Makeen, one of the Taliban's largest bases in South Waziristan. The military disabled 20 roadside bombs in China.
> *Pakistani soldiers have also begun to clear the town of Sararogha, where South Waziristan Taliban leader Waliur Rehman Mehsud is said to be directing operations. Two days ago, the military said Sararohga and Makeen were surrounded.
> The military has claimed that more than 330 Taliban fighters and 35 soldiers have been killed since the operation began on Oct. 17. But no senior Taliban commanders have been killed or captured during the current offensive. And in stark contrast to the military's reports, the Taliban claim that only 11 of their fighters have been killed so far in the operation.
> The Taliban are refuting the military's claims of success and said Taliban forces "are drawing government soldiers into a trap," according to a report in the Associated Press.*"We are prepared for a long war," Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq told the Associated Press. "The areas we are withdrawing from, and the ones the army is claiming to have won, are being vacated by us as part of a strategy. The strategy is to let the army get in a trap, and then fight a long war."
> The real story in South Waziristan is difficult to discern, as the Pakistani Army has closed off communications from the region and has denied journalists the ability to report from the battle zone. Journalists are taken on closely orchestrated battlefield tours and are given a glimpse of what the Army wants them to see.
> The military is evidently taking and holding ground in South Waziristan, but the Taliban clearly are not putting up a serious fight against the Army as they have done in the past.
> At the outset of the South Waziristan operation, US intelligence officials told The Long War Journal that all indications were that the main body of the Taliban force and its commanders have left the region while a rearguard force was left behind to harass the Army [see LWJ report, "Pakistan launches South Waziristan operation"].
> "The Taliban appear to want to deny the military a decisive victory so they have pulled up some units and key leaders," a US intelligence official said on Oct. 17. "A substantial rearguard unit will be left to bleed the Army."
> 
> (...)
> Read more: http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2009/11/pakistan_captures_tw.php#ixzz0VpgUWwJX


----------



## MarkOttawa

Ominous:

Pakistan Taliban taps Punjab heartland for recruits
Pakistanis are increasingly concerned over the deadly collaboration between Punjabi militants from Sargodha and the Taliban.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-pakistan-punjab16-2009nov16,0,3306802.story



> Reporting from Sargodha, Pakistan -  One by one, recruits from Pakistan's Punjab heartland would make the seven-hour drive to Waziristan, where they would pull up to an office that made no secret of its mission.
> 
> The signboard above the office door read "Tehrik-e-Taliban." In a largely ungoverned city like Miram Shah, there was no reason to hide its identity.
> 
> The trainees from Sargodha would arrive, grab some sleep at the Taliban office and afterward head into Waziristan's rugged mountains for instruction in skills including karate and handling explosives and automatic rifles.
> 
> "Someone recruits them, then someone else takes them to Miram Shah, and then someone in Miram Shah greets them and takes them in," said Sargodha Police Chief Usman Anwar, whose officers this summer arrested a cell of returning Punjabi militants before they could allegedly carry out a plan to blow up a cellphone tower in this city of 700,000. "It's an assembly line, like Ford Motors has."
> 
> The arrests of six Punjabi militants in Sargodha in two raids Aug. 24 illustrated a burgeoning collaboration between Punjabi militants and northwestern Pakistan's Taliban that has Pakistanis increasingly concerned as the government focuses its military resources on Taliban and Al Qaeda militants in South Waziristan...



Pakistan's war on terror at risk
Furor expected over the end of legal amnesty for politicians as ministers could be hauled before the courts over decade’s old criminal cases



> Pakistan faces fresh political turmoil with the end of a legal amnesty for politicians, a move that will divert Islamabad from the anti-terrorism fight and create an uproar aimed at ousting the pro-Western President.
> 
> A controversial law, brought in by military ruler Pervez Musharraf back in 2007, wiped away long-standing criminal charges pending against many political and bureaucrats, including current President Asif Zardari, the widower of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, who became leader last year. But a court ruling means that the amnesty will end November 28, creating a legal minefield as old charges are suddenly revived.
> 
> Ministers and other senior officials who benefited from the amnesty, known as the National Reconciliation Ordinance, including Mr. Zardari, top presidential aide Salman Farooqui, Interior Minister Rehman Malik, and prominent Home Minister in the Sindh provincial government Zulfiqar Mirza. Altogether, about 5,000 people saw charges dropped against them as a result of the ordinance.
> 
> Soon ministers could find themselves hauled before the courts over criminal cases dating back to the 1990s, ranging from murder to corruption, or they could rush to seek pre-arrest bail.
> 
> Although Mr. Zardari enjoys legal immunity as President in theory, some believe that this does not protect him from cases instituted before he became head of state, and it brings into question his eligibility to have become President in the first place. His opponents contend that without the amnesty, now declared invalid, he could not have stood for president. Lawsuits that challenge Mr. Zardari's right to be president are already primed to go.
> 
> The President, for his part, is determined to hang on, telling friends that he'll only leave the presidency “in an ambulance.” It means that, just as the United States is trying to persuade Islamabad to sign on to its new Afghanistan policy and Pakistan is fighting Taliban extremists within its own borders, Islamabad will be consumed by political intrigue...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## CougarKing

Perhaps this new political crisis might complicate US efforts to help stabilize Pakistan:  

From the Associated Press via Yahoo News



> Pakistani court deals US-backed president big blow
> By ZARAR KHAN and NAHAL TOOSI, Associated Press Writers Zarar Khan And Nahal Toosi, Associated Press Writers
> 53 mins ago
> 
> ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's top court struck down an amnesty Wednesday that had protected U.S.-allied President Asif Ali Zardari from corruption charges, setting the stage for political turmoil at a time when America seeks a united front against militants along the Afghan border.
> The ruling is a major blow to the desperately unpopular Zardari and could mark the beginning of his downfall, analysts said. While he enjoys immunity from prosecution as president, Zardari's opponents now plan to challenge his eligibility to hold the post.
> 
> A political crisis could complicate U.S. efforts to encourage Pakistan to step up military operations against al-Qaida-linked extremists. Effective action against those militant groups is seen by the U.S. as a linchpin of its war strategy.
> 
> A weakened Zardari would face a huge challenge in responding to U.S. pressure for a broad crackdown. Elements of the armed forces and much of the Pakistani public oppose a major offensive against Afghan militants who use Pakistan as a base. They instead blame Washington for stirring up turmoil in this country.
> 
> Minutes after the ruling, the opposition party called on Zardari to resign on moral grounds. His aides scoffed at the suggestion.
> 
> The court's decision also left thousands of others who had been shielded by the amnesty vulnerable to reopened corruption and other criminal cases. Interior Minister Rehman Malik, the country's top civilian security officer, and at least two other ministers loyal to Zardari are among those now at risk of prosecution.
> 
> The amnesty "seems to be against the national interest," and "violates various provisions of the Constitution," Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry said in announcing the decision of the 17-member bench.
> 
> The amnesty was part of a U.S.-brokered deal with former military ruler Pervez Musharraf that paved the way for former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto to return home from self-exile and participate in politics without facing charges her party says were politically motivated. Zardari, Bhutto's husband, took control of the party after Bhutto was assassinated in 2007.
> The party won parliamentary elections in February 2008, and lawmakers elected Zardari president that September.
> 
> Despite his immunity from prosecution, Zardari's opponents are now expected to challenge his qualification for the post, arguing that if it were not for the amnesty he would not have been able to run for president. Roedad Khan, a former government employee and a petitioner in the amnesty case, said he would pursue that avenue.
> 
> "This man has looted the wealth of this nation," Khan said, comparing Zardari's case to the Watergate scandal that led to the resignation of U.S. President Richard Nixon. "This is Islam-gate for Zardari," Khan declared.
> 
> Analysts and legal experts were divided over whether the push for Zardari's ouster will succeed. The process is likely to take months. Even some of Zardari's critics argue that stopping his tenure at midterm — which would likely require a nod from the powerful army — would represent a setback to Pakistan's transition to democratic rule after years of military government.
> 
> Zardari, 54, has long been haunted by corruption allegations dating back to governments led in the 1990s by his late wife. He spent several years in prison under previous administrations. There are allegations he misappropriated as much as $1.5 billion.
> 
> Zardari has routinely denied any wrongdoing, and the president's office has declared the cases "unproven politically motivated allegations."
> 
> The court on Wednesday singled out an alleged money laundering case involving Zardari and his late wife that had been heard in a Swiss court until the attorney general under Musharraf withdrew proceedings against them as a result of the amnesty. Chaudhry said this was illegal and ordered the government to ask Swiss authorities to reopen the case.
> 
> Many civil rights activists and ordinary Pakistanis have bristled over the amnesty, known as the National Reconciliation Ordinance, saying it protected the wealthy elite who govern the impoverished, corruption-plagued nation from being punished for their alleged crimes.
> 
> The court decreed that the reopened cases against all those covered by the amnesty would be monitored by special judges. The Supreme Court said it would also monitor the cases.
> 
> Pakistani political analyst Rasul Bakhsh Rais doubted that Cabinet ministers and other politicians affected by the ruling would simply step down. He noted that investigative and prosecuting entities in Pakistan are not really independent of the government — making real justice for lawmakers potentially elusive.
> 
> "They will play all these tricks and they will stay in power," Rais said, predicting many messy court battles ahead.
> 
> Pakistan's original constitution envisioned a parliamentary system in which the presidency is a ceremonial role, but the balance of power shifted under Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 military coup. Ever since Zardari took the presidency, the opposition has demanded he give up sweeping powers he inherited from Musharraf.
> 
> A few weeks ago, amid mounting pressure, Zardari relinquished command of the country's nuclear arsenal and said he would give up more powers soon. But that's a promise he's made before, including in a major speech to lawmakers just days after being sworn in.
> 
> Earlier this year, Zardari gave in to street protests and reinstated Chaudhry as the chief justice after he was fired by Musharraf. Many analysts took Zardari's reluctance to restore Chaudhry as a sign he worried the judge would try to undermine him by reviewing the amnesty.
> 
> ___
> 
> Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad in Islamabad and Robert Burns in Washington contributed to this report.


----------



## CougarKing

US Predator/UAV strikes in Pakistan continue.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091217/ap_on_re_as/as_pakistan



> * Officials: US missile barrage kills 17 in Pakistan
> 
> Two U.S. missile strikes pummeled targets inside the main sanctuary used by al-Qaida and the Taliban along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, killing 17 people Thursday, local intelligence officials said.*
> 
> The latest drone attacks came amid the prospect of renewed political instability in Pakistan, with President Asif Ali Zardari facing calls for his resignation after the Supreme Court struck down an amnesty that had protected him and thousands of other political officials from corruption charges.
> 
> (...)
> 
> *The missiles rained down Thursday on North Waziristan, a haven for many militants including groups determined to push the U.S. and NATO out of Afghanistan. The second, bloodier attack involved five drones and 10 missiles — an unusually intense bombardment, they said.*
> 
> The strikes in North Waziristan are especially sensitive because they risk angering Afghan-focused militant groups who have agreed to be neutral as Islamabad cracks down on Taliban fighters in neighboring South Waziristan who have threatened the Pakistani state.
> 
> (...)


----------



## The Bread Guy

Gotta start somewhere - more, from _The News_ (PAK):


> Minister for Interior Rehman Malik on Monday said religious scholars belonging to different schools of thought were of the view that terrorism and suicide bombings were un-Islamic and funeral prayer of a suicide bomber was not permissible.
> 
> Addressing a press conference after attending a meeting with Ulema here at the Chief Minister House, the minister said the participants of the meeting exchanged views in detail about terrorism and all were unanimous in condemning acts of terrorism and suicide bombings.
> 
> He said Ulema offered about 20,000 seminary students to fight against terrorism. He said the Pakistan armed forces were capable of defeating terrorists, but the government needed the support of religious scholars on ideological front to frustrate the designs of extremists and terrorists, who were misusing the name of Islam.
> 
> Rehman Malik said such meetings with religious scholars would also be held in Lahore and Peshawar under the instructions of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani. He said he would hold such meetings with the scholars in Lahore on Dec 10, adding after holding meetings with the religious scholars in all provinces, he would submit a detailed report to the prime minister to counter terrorism. He said the religious scholars belonging to a Madrassa (seminary) in Islamabad extended help to the government, where a terrorist had stayed. He said some heads of the Madrassa have handed over suspected extremists to the government ....


----------



## VinceW

According to US Defence secretary Robert Gates,he believes that Al Qaeda is trying to start a war between India and Pakistan.
 He's probably right considering that Al Qaeda stoked the fire in Iraq between the Sunni's and Shi'ites in their civil war.

 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/8470357.stm


----------



## CougarKing

The war against the Taliban in Pakistan now claims American lives:

Associated Press link



> SHAHI KOTO, Pakistan – *A roadside bomb killed three U.S. soldiers and partly destroyed a girls' school in northwest Pakistan on Wednesday in an attack that drew attention to a little-publicized American military training mission in the al-Qaida and Taliban heartland.*
> They were the first known U.S. military fatalities in Pakistan's lawless tribal regions near the Afghan border and a major victory for militants who have been hit hard by a surge of U.S. missile strikes and a major Pakistani army offensive.
> 
> *The blast also killed three schoolgirls and a Pakistani soldier who was traveling with the Americans. Two more U.S. soldiers were wounded, along with more than 100 other people, mostly students at the school, officials said.*
> The attack took place in Lower Dir, which like much of the northwest is home to pockets of militants. The Pakistani army launched a major operation in Lower Dir and the nearby Swat Valley last year that succeeded in pushing the insurgents out, but isolated attacks have continued.
> 
> *The Americans were traveling with Pakistani security officers in a five-car convoy that was hit by a bomb close to the Koto Girls High School.*
> 
> "It was a very huge explosion that shattered my windows, filled my house with smoke and dust and also some human flesh fell in my yard," said Akber Khan, who lives some 50 yards (45 meters) from the blast site.
> 
> *The explosion flattened much of the school, leaving books, bags and pens strewn in the rubble.*
> "It was a horrible situation," said Mohammad Siddiq, a 40-year-old guard at the school. "Many girls were wounded, crying for help and were trapped in the debris."
> 
> Siddiq said the death toll would have been much worse if the blast had occurred only minutes later because most of the girls were still playing in the yard and had not yet returned to classrooms, some of which collapsed.
> 
> "What was the fault of these innocent students?" said Mohammed Dawood, a resident who helped police dig the injured from the debris.
> 
> *The soldiers were part of a small contingent of American soldiers training members of the paramilitary Frontier Corps, Pakistan's army and the U.S. Embassy said. The mission is trying to strengthen the ill-equipped and poorly trained outfit's ability to fight militants.*
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

Fears of further instability renewed with this development:



> From the Associated Press
> 
> 
> *Pakistan's top court strikes down presidential order, raising fears of instability *
> Sat Feb 13, 2:48 PM
> 
> 
> By Asif Shahzad, The Associated Press
> 
> 
> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan - *Pakistan's Supreme Court suspended the presidential appointment of two top judges in an emergency ruling late Saturday that could cause a destabilizing clash between the judiciary and the unpopular, Western-backed government. *
> As local media reported the country was headed into a political and judicial crisis following the decision, President Asif Ali Zardari's spokesman issued a statement dismissing rumours the government was planning to declare a state of emergency.
> 
> 
> The development will concern Pakistan's western allies who want the country to concentrate on battling al-Qaida and Taliban militants in the northwest. The stability of the nuclear-armed nation is also key to Washington's hopes of defeating the insurgency just across the border in Afghanistan.
> 
> 
> *Zardari is already facing the prospect of legal challenges to his rule after the Supreme Court struck down an amnesty in December that had been shielding him from graft allegations dating back to the 1980s. Earlier last year, he was forced to reinstate the Supreme Court chief justice fired by former president Gen. Pervez Musharraf after demonstrations that exposed his political vulnerability and the clout of the judiciary.
> 
> 
> Saturday's ruling came after Zardari appointed a new Supreme Court judge and chief of the Lahore High Court, going against the recommendation of the Supreme Court. Pakistan's constitution says the president must consult with the Supreme Court over the appointment of new judges. *
> 
> The court order said no consultation had taken place and that the appointment "appeared to be in violation of the provision of the constitution"
> 
> 
> Deputy Attorney General of Pakistan Shah Khawar said government officials had been summoned to appear on Feb. 18 to explain why the order had been issued against the court's recommendations.
> 
> 
> Some TV channels quoted government critics as saying the appointment of the judges in apparent violation of the constitution could be used as the basis for a fresh challenge against Zardari's hold on the presidency.
> 
> 
> Information Minister Qamar Zaman Kaira said the president issued the order only after consulting the chief justice.
> 
> 
> "We have always acted constitutionally," he said. "We will take any step in future as required by the law and constitution."
> *
> 
> Pakistan' lawyers and judges have always played a role in the political life of the country. Protests by lawyers were credited with helping oust Musharraf.
> 
> 
> While undertaking operations against militants in the northwest, the Zardari government had been widely criticized for failing to make a dent in the country's major economic and social problems. Elements within the military are also believed to be angry at him for being too close to the United States and longtime foe India. *


----------



## CougarKing

Pakistan's security services foil another bombing attack on foreigners/Western targets.

Reuters link



> ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - *Pakistani police have foiled a plot to blow up a restaurant in Islamabad's diplomatic enclave that is frequented by foreigners, and government buildings, a police official said on Monday.
> 
> 
> Militants tied to Qari Hussain, known as the Taliban's "mentor of suicide bombers," were arrested before they could attack the Serena Hotel and the French Club restaurant in the heavily guarded diplomatic zone, Bani Amin Khan, Islamabad's acting police chief, told a news conference.*
> 
> Taliban insurgents have previously attacked Western targets in a bid to destabilize the U.S.-backed government of President Asif Ali Zardari, part of a violent campaign that has scared away foreign investors.
> 
> 
> An alleged militant wearing a black hood stood up beside police officials and told the news conference that he helped carry out the suicide attacks on the U.N. World Food Programme and near Pakistan's Naval Complex in the capital city last year.
> 
> 
> "I was part of the planning. I provided logistics and suicide jackets to the bombers and in return, the Taliban paid me," said the man, who said he was a former paramilitary soldier named Noor Jahan.
> 
> 
> *Police said they arrested two militants, Noor Jahan and a second man, Rehmat Gul, and seized a suicide jacket and pistol from their possession.*
> 
> (...)


----------



## Yrys

Pakistan and U.S. Pledge to Work Together

WASHINGTON — Pakistan and the United States wrapped up two days of 
high-level talks on Thursday, with a raft of economic development initiatives, 
an agreement to hasten deliveries of military hardware and a promise to put 
their often mistrustful relationship on a new footing. In a communiqué issued 
after the talks, the countries said they would “redouble their efforts to deal
 effectively with terrorism” and would work together for “peace and stability 
in Afghanistan.”

Administration officials said Pakistan was likely to get swifter delivery of F-16 
fighter jets, naval frigates and helicopter gunships, as well as new remotely 
piloted aircraft for surveillance missions. But the United States was silent 
about Pakistan’s most heavily advertised proposal: a civil nuclear agreement 
similar to the one the Bush administration signed with Pakistan’s archrival, 
India. Given Pakistan’s history of selling nuclear technology to Iran, Libya and 
North Korea, such an agreement would realistically be 10 or 15 years away, 
a senior administration official said Thursday. Still, the administration was 
careful not to dismiss the idea out of hand.

“This is a new day,” Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said in greeting 
Pakistan’s foreign minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi. “For the past year, the 
Obama administration has shown in our words and our deeds a different 
approach and a different attitude toward Pakistan.”

The “strategic dialogue” was by itself meant to send a message: The administration 
used the term reserved for the substantive, wide-ranging exchanges it carries on 
with important countries like China and India. Pakistan and the United States held 
three such dialogues during the Bush administration. But last year, Mr. Qureshi 
asked Mrs. Clinton to upgrade the exchange to the level of foreign minister. On 
Wednesday, he said he hoped the two days of higher-level talks would help Pakistan 
and the United States overcome a history that “did not always enjoy a sunny side.”
Mr. Qureshi said the United States had agreed to put on a fast track some 
longstanding Pakistani requests for military hardware.

Although Mrs. Clinton deflected a question about civil nuclear cooperation, she said, 
“We’re committed to helping Pakistan meet its real energy needs.” Among specific 
announcements was an agreement for the United States Agency for International 
Development to help Pakistan upgrade three thermal power plants. The administration 
said it would try to push through legislation creating so-called reconstruction 
opportunity zones in Pakistan. And it hopes to set up a fund to stimulate direct foreign
investment.

Pakistan’s military campaign against Taliban insurgents in the Swat Valley and South 
Waziristan has improved the tenor of its relationship with Washington. But success 
on the battlefield cuts both ways for Pakistan, analysts said. It gives the country’s 
government in Islamabad a more credible argument for increased military aid. 
But it also imposes greater expectations from the United States about Pakistan’s 
counterinsurgency efforts and military cooperation.

“Yes, you get a pat on the back,” said Bruce O. Riedel, an expert on Pakistan at the 
Brookings Institution. “But now that you’ve shown you can do something, you’ve 
got to do more.”

Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan also remains a subject of intense scrutiny in the 
United States. The Pakistani authorities cooperated with the Central Intelligence 
Agency to capture the Taliban’s military chief, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar. But 
some analysts question whether the Pakistanis are rounding up other Taliban leaders, 
including shadow Afghan governors, simply to make sure that Pakistan has leverage 
in any future political bargaining in Kabul.

Mr. Qureshi insisted that Pakistan wanted Afghanistan to lead this process. “If they feel 
we can contribute, if we can help, we’ll be more than willing to help,” he said. “But we 
leave it to them.”

On this subject, however, administration officials are more interested in hearing from 
Pakistan’s chief of army staff, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, who was part of the delegation. 
General Kayani recently held talks in Islamabad with Afghanistan’s president, Hamid Karzai, 
and the general is viewed as critical to determining the role Pakistan will play. Of all the raw 
nerves in the relationship, Pakistan’s nuclear ambitions may be the most sensitive.
Islamabad yearns for an agreement with the United States because it would confer legitimacy 
on Pakistan’s existing program.

But Washington does not formally recognize Pakistan as a nuclear power. The selling of nuclear 
secrets by the father of its nuclear program, Abdul Qadeer Khan, and the country’s refusal to 
allow American investigators to have access to him ensures that this recognition may be a 
long way off.

“The question is, can you move somewhere toward giving legitimacy to a Pakistani nuclear 
program?” said Daniel S. Markey, senior fellow for India, Pakistan and South Asia at the Council 
on Foreign Relations. “Is there space between a civil nuclear deal and just saying ‘no’?”


----------



## CougarKing

The latest attack on a US consulate in Pakistan:

Reuters link



> Mon Apr 5, 12:20 PM
> 
> 
> By Alamgir Bitani
> 
> 
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) -* Militants using a car bomb and firing weapons attacked the U.S. consulate in the Pakistani city of Peshawar on Monday hours after a suicide bomber killed 38 people elsewhere in the northwest, officials said.
> 
> 
> Pakistani Taliban militants claimed responsibility for the attack on the consulate, in which eight people, including three militants, were killed but no one in the mission was hurt. They vowed more violence.*
> 
> 
> Islamist attacks have raised fears for the future of the nuclear-armed U.S. ally, also beset by economic problems and chronic political wrangling.
> (...)


----------



## Yrys

Same events :

U.S. Consulate in Pakistan Is Attacked by Militants, NY Times

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — In the most direct attack on an American facility in Pakistan in years, 
militants mounted a multipronged assault against the United States Consulate in this northern 
city on Monday, using a truck bomb, machine guns and rocket launchers, Pakistani and American 
officials said. At least five attackers, all suicide bombers, failed to breach the outer perimeter of the 
compound, according to a Pakistani intelligence official, but they demolished part of an exterior wall 
with a large truck bomb that shook the city and sent huge plumes of brown dust and smoke into 
the sky. At least 6 Pakistanis were killed and 20 wounded. No Americans were killed or hurt.

The United States Embassy in Islamabad, Pakistan’s capital, confirmed the attack. The coordinated 
assault involved, the embassy said, “a vehicle suicide bomb and terrorists who were attempting to 
enter the building using grenades and weapons fire.” Employees of the consulate were evacuated 
after the attack, according to a Pakistani official. Pakistani television reported that the consulate 
would be closed Tuesday, but an embassy spokeswoman could not immediately confirm that.

A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban, Azam Tariq, claimed responsibility for the attack, saying it 
was in retaliation for Pakistani military operations in the western tribal areas that border Afghanistan, 
and for American missile strikes in the area that killed dozens of militants over the past several months.

The assault is a chilling reminder that the militants are still able to strike at prominent targets in Pakistan, 
even as operations by the Pakistani military in Taliban-controlled northern areas have brought a lull in 
violence over the past three months. “They are trying to demonstrate that they are still alive and kicking,” 
said Hasan Askari Rizvi, a defense analyst.

A Pakistani militant commander issued a veiled threat last week to attack important installations in Pakistan 
“to refresh the memories” of an attack on an American base in Khost, Afghanistan, in which seven Americans 
working for the Central Intelligence Agency were killed.

Militants have taken aim at Americans, and even the consulate in Peshawar in the past, but the commando-style 
siege that unfolded Monday was new. Similar tactics were employed last year in attacks on Pakistani targets: 
police training centers in and near Lahore, an eastern city, and the army headquarters in Rawalpindi. The strike 
was the second on Monday. A few hours earlier, a suicide bomber detonated his payload at a political ceremony 
in another northern area, killing 42 people. A police officer tried to overpower the bomber, and was shouting to 
a crowd of more than 500 when the bomb exploded.

The ceremony — in Dir, where several American soldiers were killed this year in a bomb attack at the opening 
of a girls’ school — was to celebrate a measure in Parliament to change the name of the North-West Frontier 
Province to Khyber-Pakhtoonkhwa, and was held by a Pashtun political party, the Awami National Party. More 
than 100 people were wounded. In the assault in Peshawar, officials there said, a squad of well-armed militants 
attacked the outer security perimeter of the well-fortified consulate from the main intersection that connects 
Peshawar with the highway to Afghanistan and a military area.

According to television reports, witnesses said the attackers wore uniforms of the Pakistani security forces, 
though officials did not confirm that. The militants drove to the outer security wall in pickup trucks, two 
intelligence officers and a senior government official said. The first bomber walked toward the entrance while 
firing his automatic assault rifle, they said in separate interviews, and he later blew himself up near an
armored personnel carrier close to the checkpoint. Three other bombers followed closely, the officers and the 
government official said, and one of them fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the armored personnel carrier, 
causing an explosion, but missing his target.

“They used Russian-made Rocket-Propelled Grenade-7,” said a senior official from the bomb disposal squad. 
“Had it hit the A.P.C., it would have dug a hole in it.”

As the three bombers moved forward, the vehicle that had taken them to the consulate blew up, sending a 
plume of smoke into the sky, the officials said. Security officials believe that this explosion killed several of the 
other bombers. Two bombers still wore live suicide jackets, and bomb squad officials later defused them. A 
bomb squad official said the jackets were typical of those made by the Taliban.

One intelligence official said it appeared that the bomber sitting in the vehicle had detonated the explosives 
prematurely, killing the other attackers in the process. That blast left a crater seven feet long and three and 
half feet wide, said the leader of the bomb disposal squad, Sahfqat Malik.

The dead included one police officer and two security guards from the Frontier Corps. Most of those killed or 
wounded were civilians.

There was no major damage to the consulate building, though the explosions smashed the windshields of several 
cars in the parking lot, the official said. The consulate is in a busy area in the main part of the city. Peshawar, which 
was tormented almost daily by bomb strikes last fall, remains a vulnerable target. “It is very easily accessible,” said 
Mr. Rizvi, the defense analyst. “From tribal area you can walk right into Peshawar.”

Militants attacked the United States Consulate in Karachi in 2002, killing more than 10 people, none of them 
Americans, and in 2008, militants fired at the top American diplomat in Peshawar as her armored car was leaving 
her residence for the consulate, but failed to harm her.

_Ismail Khan reported from Peshawar, and Sabrina Tavernise from Islamabad, Pakistan. Pir Zubair Shah and 
Carlotta Gall contributed reporting from Islamabad._


----------



## Yrys

Drones Batter Al Qaeda and Its Allies Within Pakistan, NY Times

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A stepped-up campaign of American drone strikes over the past 
three months has battered Al Qaeda and its Pakistani and Afghan brethren in the tribal 
area of North Waziristan, according to a mid-ranking militant and supporters of the 
government there.

The strikes have cast a pall of fear over an area that was once a free zone for Al Qaeda 
and the Taliban, forcing militants to abandon satellite phones and large gatherings in 
favor of communicating by courier and moving stealthily in small groups, they said. The 
drones, operated by the C.I.A., fly overhead sometimes four at a time, emitting a beelike 
hum virtually 24 hours a day, observing and tracking targets, then unleashing missiles 
on their quarry, they said.

The strikes have sharpened tensions between the local tribesmen and the militants, who 
have dumped bodies with signs accusing the victims of being American spies in Miram Shah, 
the main town in North Waziristan, they said. The impact of the drone strikes on the militants’ 
operations — on freedom of movement, ability to communicate and the ease of importing new 
recruits to replace those who have been killed — has been difficult to divine because North 
Waziristan, at the nether reaches of the tribal area, is virtually sealed from the outside world.

None of those interviewed would allow their names to be used for fear for their safety, and all 
were interviewed separately in a city outside the tribal areas. The supporters of the government 
worked in positions where they had access to information about the effects of the drone campaign.

Along with that of the militant, the accounts provided a rare window on how the drones have 
transformed life for all in the region. By all reports, the bombardment of North Waziristan, and to 
a lesser extent South Waziristan, has become fast and furious since a combined Taliban and 
Qaeda suicide attack on a C.I.A. base in Khost, in southern Afghanistan, in late December.

In the first six weeks of this year, more than a dozen strikes killed up to 90 people suspected of 
being militants, according to Pakistani and American accounts. There are now multiple strikes on 
some days, and in some weeks the strikes occur every other day, the people from North Waziristan 
said. The strikes have become so ferocious, “It seems they really want to kill everyone, not just the 
leaders,” said the militant, who is a mid-ranking fighter associated with the insurgent network headed 
by Jalaluddin and Sirajuddin Haqqani. By “everyone” he meant rank-and-file fighters, though civilians 
are being killed, too.

Tactics used just a year ago to avoid the drones could not be relied on, he said. It is, for instance, no 
longer feasible to sleep under the trees as a way of avoiding the drones. “We can’t lead a jungle 
existence for 24 hours every day,” he said. Militants now sneak into villages two at a time to sleep, 
he said. Some homeowners were refusing to rent space to Arabs, who are associated with Al Qaeda, 
for fear of their families’ being killed by the drones, he said.

The militants have abandoned all-terrain vehicles in favor of humdrum public transportation, one of 
the government supporters said. The Arabs, who have always preferred to keep at a distance from 
the locals, have now gone further underground, resorting to hide-outs in tunnels dug into the 
mountainside in the Datta Khel area adjacent to Miram Shah, he said. “Definitely Haqqani is under 
a lot of pressure,” the militant said. “He has lost commanders, a brother and other family members.”

While unpopular among the Pakistani public, the drone strikes have become a weapon of choice for 
the Obama administration after the Pakistani Army rebuffed pleas to mount a ground offensive in 
North Waziristan to take on the militants who use the area to strike at American and NATO forces 
in Afghanistan.

The Pakistani military says it is already overstretched fighting militants on other fronts. But the militants 
in North Waziristan — the Haqqani network backed by Al Qaeda — are also longtime allies of Pakistan’s 
military and intelligence services. The group may yet prove useful for Pakistan to exert influence in 
postwar Afghanistan.

The army maintains a division of soldiers in North Waziristan, but, the militant said, the Pakistani soldiers 
do little to hinder militant operations, which, though under greater pressure from the drones, have by no 
means stopped. Training sessions on how to make improvised explosive devices for use against American 
and NATO soldiers in Afghanistan continue, the militant said. At one eight-day “crash course” in March, 
the militant said he learned how to mix explosive chemicals and how to load a car with explosives that 
would be used in suicide bombings.

In public, the Pakistani government opposes the drones, citing a violation of sovereignty. Under American 
pressure, however, the Pakistani intelligence agency, Inter-Services Intelligence, has provided important 
intelligence for targets, American and Pakistani officials have said. But increasingly the Americans appear 
to have developed their own sources, the militant said.

An influx of young Arabs turned up in North Waziristan recently, presumably to replace some of the older 
Arabs who had been killed by the drones. But many militants assumed that some of these Arabs were 
actually American agents, he said. “Al Qaeda is very careful who they take among the new Arab recruits 
because they are informants for America,” the militant said.

Perhaps the most disturbing strike for the Haqqanis was the killing of Sirajuddin Haqqani’s younger brother, 
Mohammad, on Feb. 16. One government supporter in the area said he witnessed the attack. “I was walking 
when I saw two drones, one going in one direction, one in another direction. I had a feeling they were 
preparing,” he said.

There were “two blasts” when a car was hit about 1,200 feet in front of him, he said. “There was total dust, 
everything was hazy,” he said. Suddenly, Haqqani fighters appeared out of nowhere. “All these vehicles 
rushed up, cordoned the site so no outsider could come. They took away the dead bodies.” The question 
of civilian deaths is an almost daily worry, all four men said. “Civilians are worried because there is hardly 
a house without a fighter,” the militant said.

Two of the government supporters said they knew of civilians, including friends, who had been killed by being 
in the wrong place at the wrong time. But, they said, they are prepared to sacrifice the civilians if it means 
North Waziristan will be rid of the militants, in particular the Arabs. “On balance, the drones may have killed 
100, 200, 500 civilians,” said one of the men. “If you look at the other guys, the Arabs and the kidnappings 
and the targeted killings, I would go for the drones.”


----------



## CougarKing

Associated Press link


> ISLAMABAD –* Pakistan and U.S. intelligence wrongly reported the death of the head of the Pakistani Taliban in a CIA drone strike and the brash, ruthless commander is now believed to be alive, Pakistani spies said Thursday in an apparent propaganda coup for the insurgents.
> 
> The reports that Hakimullah Mehsud survived the January missile attack in an area close to the Afghan border will raise questions about the quality of the intelligence being gathered in the region.*
> 
> U.S. officials were not immediately available for comment.
> 
> The Taliban had always claimed Mehsud was alive and dismissed the earlier reports of his death as lies.
> 
> The militant network said it was not going to offer any evidence such as a video recording because doing so could help security forces hunt Mehsud down. But until there is proof he is alive, questions may linger about his fate, given the apparently patchy nature of intelligence in the tribal regions.
> 
> *One senior Pakistani official said Mehsud was no longer the major force in the Taliban movement, which has carried out scores of attacks in Pakistan in recent years and is allied with al-Qaida and militants in Afghanistan fighting U.S. and NATO troops. He said other Taliban commanders, such as Waliur Rehman, were now overshadowing him.*
> (...)


----------



## CougarKing

The Pakistani Army renewing its drive against the Taliban:

Associated Press link



> *PARACHINAR, Pakistan – Army helicopter gunships pounded insurgent hideouts in northwest Pakistan on Sunday, killing at least 22 militants, a government official said.*
> Samiullah Khan said the hideouts hit were in the Dabori area and its neighboring villages of the Orakzai tribal region near the Afghan border. He added the aerial strikes also destroyed six militant compounds.
> 
> Khan said the militants fired mortars at an army checkpoint in Mishti Mela area in Lower Orakzai, wounding two soldiers.
> 
> *Pakistani forces launched an operation in Orakzai in mid-March to flush out militants who last year fled an army offensive in South Waziristan. The troops are believed to have retaken several areas from the Taliban in the region.*
> 
> Thousands of people have fled the area. Most of them have moved in with relatives in nearby districts.
> 
> Independent confirmation of the casualties and the identities of those killed is virtually impossible because the region is remote and dangerous and media access there is restricted.
> 
> The tribal region is the primary base of Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud.
> 
> Mehsud was believed killed in a mid-January suspected U.S. missile strike, but intelligence officials now say he is thought to have survived.
> 
> The Taliban had always denied the strike killed Mehsud, though failed to offer any evidence such as video footage of him.
> 
> 
> (...)


----------



## MarkOttawa

This is an excellent account of Pakistani realities (usual copyright disclaimer):

Islam's Nowhere Men
Millions like Faisal Shahzad are unsettled by a modern world they can neither master nor reject. 
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703338004575230142684329162.html



> By FOUAD AJAMI
> 
> 'A Muslim has no nationality except his belief," the intellectual godfather of the Islamists, Egyptian Sayyid Qutb, wrote decades ago. Qutb's "children" are everywhere now; they carry the nationalities of foreign lands and plot against them. The Pakistani born Faisal Shahzad is a devotee of Sayyid Qutb's doctrine, and Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Fort Hood shooter, was another.
> 
> Qutb was executed by the secular dictatorship of Gamal Abdel Nasser in 1966. But his thoughts and legacy endure. Globalization, the shaking up of continents, the ease of travel, and the doors for immigration flung wide open by Western liberal societies have given Qutb's worldview greater power and relevance. What can we make of a young man like Shahzad working for Elizabeth Arden, receiving that all-American degree, the MBA, jogging in the evening in Bridgeport, then plotting mass mayhem in Times Square?
> 
> The Islamists are now within the gates. They fled the fires and the failures of the Islamic world but brought the ruin with them. They mock national borders and identities. A parliamentary report issued by Britain's House of Commons on the London Underground bombings of July 7, 2005 lays bare this menace and the challenge it poses to a system of open borders and modern citizenship.
> 
> The four men who pulled off those brutal attacks, the report noted, "were apparently well integrated into British society." Three of them were second generation Britons born in West Yorkshire...
> 
> A year after the London terror, hitherto tranquil Canada had its own encounter with the new Islamism. A ring of radical Islamists were charged with plotting to attack targets in southern Ontario with fertilizer bombs. A school-bus driver was one of the leaders of these would-be jihadists. A report by the Canadian Security Intelligence Service unintentionally echoed the British House of Commons findings. "These individuals are part of Western society, and their 'Canadianness' makes detection more difficult. Increasingly, we are learning of more and more extremists that are homegrown. The implications of this shift are profound."
> 
> And indeed they are, but how can "Canadianness" withstand the call of the faith and the obligation of jihad?..
> 
> ... the Old Country, is never far. Pakistani authorities say Faisal Shahzad made 13 visits to Pakistan in the last seven years. This would have been unthinkable three or four decades earlier. Shahzad lived on the seam between the Old Country and the New. The path of citizenship he took gave him the precious gift of an American passport but made no demands on him.
> 
> From Pakistan comes a profile of Shahzad's father, a man of high military rank, and of property and standing: He was "a man of modern thinking and of the modern age," it was said of him in his ancestral village of Mohib Banda in recent days. That arc from a secular father to a radicalized son is, in many ways, the arc of Pakistan since its birth as a nation-state six decades ago. The secular parents and the radicalized children is also a tale of Islam, that broken pact with modernity, the mothers who fought to shed the veil and the daughters who now wish to wear the burqa in Paris and Milan.
> 
> In its beginnings, the Pakistan of Faisal Shahzad's parents was animated by the modern ideals of its founder, Muhammad Ali Jinnah. In that vision, Pakistan was to be a state for the Muslims of the subcontinent, but not an Islamic state in the way it ordered its political and cultural life. The bureaucratic and military elites who dominated the state, and defined its culture, were a worldly breed. The British Raj had been their formative culture.
> 
> But the world of Pakistan was recast in the 1980s under a zealous and stern military leader, Zia ul-Haq. Zia offered Pakistan Islamization and despotism. He had ridden the jihad in Afghanistan next door to supreme power; he brought the mullahs into the political world, and they, in turn, brought the militants with them.
> 
> ***
> 
> This was the Pakistan in which young Faisal Shahzad was formed; the world of his parents was irretrievable. The maxim that Pakistan is governed by a trinity—Allah, army, America—gives away this confusion: The young man who would do his best to secure an American education before succumbing to the call of the jihad is a man in the grip of a deep schizophrenia. The overcrowded cities of Islam—from Karachi and Casablanca to Cairo—and those cities in Europe and North America where the Islamic diaspora is now present in force have untold multitudes of men like Faisal Shahzad.
> 
> This is a long twilight war, the struggle against radical Islamism. We can't wish it away. No strategy of winning "hearts and minds," no great outreach, will bring this struggle to an end. America can't conciliate these furies. These men of nowhere—Faisal Shahzad, Nidal Malik Hasan, the American-born renegade cleric Anwar Awlaki now holed up in Yemen and their likes—are a deadly breed of combatants in this new kind of war. Modernity both attracts and unsettles them. America is at once the object of their dreams and the scapegoat onto which they project their deepest malignancies.
> 
> _Mr. Ajami, a professor at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies and a senior fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution, is the author of "The Foreigner's Gift" (Free Press, 2007). _
> http://www.sais-jhu.edu/faculty/directory/bios/a/ajami.htm
> http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/61936/l-carl-brown/the-dream-palace-of-the-empire-is-iraq-a-noble-failure



*Update thought*: An Islamist victory in Afstan, despite the efforts of the West, would give a huge boost to the creation/recruitment of "home grown" terrorists in the West.  A perceived triumph for bin Laden's "strong horse".    Just as the withdrawal of the Soviets (undefeated militarily but politically exhausted) in the face of the Mujahedin gave great encouragement to the first major wave of violent international jihadism (the blowback).

By the way, there seem to be almost no homegrown terrorists of Bangladeshi origin--a reflection of the fact that the country was created on the basis of ethnicity, not Islam?

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Two useful pieces at Foreign Policy's "AfPak Channel": 

Muddying the 'Taliban' 
http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/06/11/muddying_the_taliban 

Pakistan's New Networks of Terror 
It's not just about Waziristan anymore. How the country's various militias are joining forces -- and what it could mean for attacks within the United States. (by Imtiaz Gul) 
http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2010/06/10/pakistans_new_networks_of_terror 

Mark 
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Meanwhile, in downtown Pakistan:

Illusions in Punjab, by Huma Imtiaz
http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2010/06/19/illusions_in_punjab



> On the economic and security fronts, it is safe to say, Pakistan is going through a tough time. To say that the Taliban are a threat to the country's present and future status is oversimplifying the issue. Economically, Pakistan faces a severe deficit as the cost of the war in the country's northwest grows and development funds get slashed.
> 
> Which is why it was rather startling to read a report that the government of Punjab province was handing over millions of rupees to madrassas run by the infamous Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Lashkar-e-Taiba's charity wing.
> 
> India accused JuD of carrying out the attacks in Mumbai in November 2008, following which the United Nations added four LeT leaders to its consolidated list and imposed "an assets freeze, travel ban and arms embargo" on them. The Pakistani government then sealed the JuD offices as part of a series of moves to assure India that it was serious about cooperating with investigation into the Mumbai attacks. It also put JuD leader Hafiz Saeed under house arrest, a move the Lahore High Court later declared unconstitutional.
> 
> However, attempts to remove JuD from the public sphere may have just been a smokescreen. Journalists travelling to camps housing internally displaced people who had left the Swat Valley because of the army offensive against militants in 2009 discovered that the JuD was at the forefront of disbursing aid, albeit under a new name -- the Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation.
> 
> While the priorities of provincial governments in fighting terrorism have often been questioned, the Punjab government has one-upped itself this time.
> 
> On June 14, Dawn reported that the provincial government of Punjab "gave more than Rs82 million to the Jamaat-ud-Dawa during the outgoing financial year, according to the budget documents for 2010-11." Additionally, Rs79 million were given to the JuD headquarters Markaz-i-Tayyaba in Muridke, and another Rs3 million went to different schools run by the JuD in Punjab. According to the Guardian, "The provincial law minister Rana Sanaullah said the funds were for charitable purposes and would be administered by government officials. A spokesman for Jamaat-ud-Dawa said the group had not yet received any official funds." ..



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## CougarKing

Associated Press link



> *AP Interview: Zardari open to Taliban talks *
> 
> 1 hour, 13 minutes ago
> 
> 
> By Paisley Dodds, The Associated Press
> 
> LONDON - Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari said Friday he's willing to consider reopening negotiations with the Taliban in his country — a statement that came amid a flurry of criticism that some elements within Pakistan remain sympathetic to the extremist movement.
> 
> 
> *Zardari told The Associated Press that his country never closed the door to talks with the Taliban.*
> 
> 
> "We never closed the dialogue," Zardari told the AP, skirting the question of when talks could actually resume. "We had an agreement, which they broke. (Talks will resume) whenever they feel we're strong enough and they realize they can't win, because they won't win. It will be a painful difficult task, but defeat is not an option."
> 
> 
> *Last year, the Pakistani government struck a deal with the Taliban in the Swat Valley that gave them effective control over the region. The militants violated the agreement and moved into another region, prompting an all out offensive by the Pakistani army.*
> 
> Although some U.S. and British politicians have suggested talking to the "enemy" may be the only way to win the war, many in the U.S. administration and Pakistan's other Western allies have publicly urged the country to continue fighting the Pakistani Taliban, not talk to them.
> 
> (...)




Associated Press link



> *US targets militant group in Asia*
> 
> 1 hour, 5 minutes ago
> 
> 
> By The Associated Press
> 
> 
> WASHINGTON - The United States is targeting a group called *Harakat-ul Jihad* Islami it says supports al-Qaida operations and has been involved in attacks against the Pakistani government.
> 
> 
> The U.S. says the group is a terrorist organization and is freezing the assets of its commander*, Mohammad Ilyas Kashmiri*.
> 
> 
> The United Nations took similar actions against the group and Kashmiri.
> 
> 
> *Kashmiri is believed to have been behind numerous terrorist attacks, including a 2009 attack against the offices of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence and the Pakistani police in Lahore that killed 23 people and left hundreds injured.*
> 
> 
> The group has also provided fighters for the Taliban in Afghanistan battling U.S forces.


----------



## MarkOttawa

"Talibanization" in Karachi?

Ethnic strife threatens tinderbox city of Karachi 
http://www.france24.com/en/20100806-karachi-pakistani-politician-killing-ethnic-strife-threatens-tinderbox-violence



> The August 2 killing of a local politician at a Karachi mosque sparked deadly violence in Pakistan’s commercial capital. But the ethnic tensions that underlie this port city are often overlooked, as more and more bad news comes out of the country.
> 
> It was a precise, planned attack, executed with deadly professionalism, and the outcome was devastating.
> 
> On Monday evening at around 5pm, a local Pakistani politician was entering a mosque in the middleclass Nazimabad area of Karachi - Pakistan’s teeming, financial capital - when gunmen stormed the premises.
> 
> The bodyguard of Raza Haider, a provincial parliamentarian and member of the secular Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) party, was quickly gunned down.
> 
> Armed with at least one pistol and an automatic rifle, the assailants then chased Haider into the mosque premises, where they shot him dead. Witnesses say the gunmen then fled on motorbikes and vanished into the congested streets of this old part of town.
> 
> “Within minutes, it was all over,” Faisal Sabzwari, a senior MQM official, told FRANCE 24 in a phone interview from Karachi. “And this was in an area (Nazimabad) where the MQM has been winning elections for years. It’s a pro-MQM area.”
> 
> Within hours, Karachi was up in flames. Rioters set fire to shops, vehicles and houses, bringing Pakistan’s largest city to a halt. Gun battles ripped through the city’s troubled eastern and western suburbs. By the end of the week, the death toll had climbed to 85  according to police officials, prompting Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani to rush to Karachi on Friday for talks between rival political parties.
> 
> While the government blamed the Taliban and a banned militant group, the Sipah-e-Sahaba Pakistan (SSP) for the attack, few gave much credence to the claim...
> 
> Leaders of the MQM, a party that represents the Urdu-speaking “mohajirs” - or Muslim migrants who fled India during the 1947 partition of the subcontinent - have blamed the rival Awami National Party (ANP).
> 
> The ANP represents Karachi’s ethnic Pashtun community, which has grown in recent years due to mass migration of people fleeing the Pakistani military’s counter-terror offensive in the tribal areas near the Afghan border.
> 
> Overnight, the spectre of ethnic strife haunted Karachi, a sprawling metropolis home to around 18.5 million people from diverse backgrounds. The city is no stranger to violence - sectarian killings, ethnic strife, crime and kidnappings have plagued this city for decades.
> 
> The late 1980s and early 1990s were a particularly bloody period, when a cycle of massacres and brutal police crackdowns traumatised the country’s financial hub. But while the bad old days are over, violence has been increasing in recent months. Rights groups say 260 targeted killing cases were reported in Karachi during the first six months of the year, compared with 156 during the same period in 2009...
> 
> Created in the mid-1980s, the MQM was founded on a platform of highlighting the marginalisation of the city’s mohajirs.
> 
> Karachi, the capital of Pakistan’s Sindh province, saw a large influx of mohajirs who, unlike their ethnic Sindhi brethren, were not traditional landowners or tillers. Nor did they speak the native Sindhi language.
> 
> A largely urban group, mohajirs tended to gravitate toward small businesses and were politically sidelined in a country where politics is dominated by affluent, land-owning families, and the military by ethnic Punjabis.
> 
> But while a host of ethnic groups compete for influence and resources in the ethnic tinderbox that is Karachi, the MQM’s chief target has been the city’s Pashtuns, who have traditionally dominated the critical transportation business in this port city...
> 
> The influx of Pashtuns fleeing the Pakistani army offensives against the Taliban has opened new rifts between the two communities.
> 
> The MQM has long spoken out against the alleged ''Talibanisation'' of the city. “We have been trying to tell the civilized world that there is a threat of Talibanisation,” senior MQM official Sabzwari told FRANCE 24. “But the first to reject our concerns is the ANP. For sure the ANP gives support to the extremists.”
> 
> Leaders of the liberal, nationalist ANP reject the criticism however, and note that ANP officials in the Pashtun-dominated areas of Pakistan have been prime targets for the Taliban.
> 
> Many experts suspect that the current wave of targeted killings and the violence following Haider’s assassination is more likely linked to gangland turf battles for the control of lucrative economic sectors such as real estate rather than Islamist violence...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Pak government in trouble?

Will slow response to Pakistan flood threaten democracy? 
http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Asia-South-Central/2010/0812/Will-slow-response-to-Pakistan-flood-threaten-democracy



> ...
> Anger is spreading throughout this flooded region at the local politicians who have been missing from a scene in which Pakistan's Red Crescent, Red Cross branches and even the US Marines have been providing aid. The feeling of abandonment by local politicians is common among Pakistan's poorest, and raises questions about future support democracy in Pakistan. Militant groups who have challenged central government authority have been quick to jump in with promises of aid...
> 
> On Thursday, Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, who has been harshly criticized for not canceling a trip to France and Britain during the flooding, made his first visit to the flood affected areas. The president visited his home province of Sindh and was shown on state television patting the head of an elderly woman before inspecting a flood barrier...
> 
> But stepping in to fill a perceived void  have been groups such as the Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation, allegedly a front organization for banned militant outfit Lashkar-e-Taiba, which is believed to have been behind the Mumbai attacks in 2008, as well as the Al Khidmet foundation, the charitable wing of Pakistan’s hardline Jamaat-e-Islami.
> 
> At a medical camp on Muzaffargarh’s main road, Ghulam Mustafa, chief of the Falah-e-Insaniat medical team, sits with several helpers and dispenses drugs. In between prescribing diarrhea medication to a small infant who has been brought along by his mother, Dr. Mustafa explains: “Only we and the Jamaat-e-Islami have camps in the villages and far flung areas. It is our Islamic duty” to help, he said. In a text message to the Monitor, the Al Khidmet foundation makes similar boasts about its efforts in Layyah, Sindh. “In one area we have 10 boats busy rescuing those affected. Here there are no Army or civilian government representatives.”..
> 
> The perceived failure of public officials ultimately weakens Pakistan's civilian institutions, especially when contrasted with the high-profile efforts of the Army, says Dr. Raes.
> 
> “The Army isn’t acting with some political objective in mind. But if you look at the character and level of integrity of the political class it seems they don’t belong to Pakistan,” he says, adding that through their perceived corruption and negligence, politicians are cutting away at the future of democracy here...
> 
> The United States has pledged $71 million in emergency assistance to the Pakistan, and Thursday a shipload of Marines and US helicopters arrived to help, amid more calls from the Pakistan government for assistance.
> 
> Also on Friday, Pakistani Taliban spokesman Azam Tariq denounced foreign aid, "We condemn American and other foreign aid and believe that it will lead to subjugation," he told AFP.
> 
> "The government should not accept American aid and, if it happens, we can give $20 million to them as aid for the flood victims," he continued offering to distribute relief, instead of the US in exchange for a promise not to be arrested.
> 
> On Wednesday, United Nations humanitarian chief John Holmes launched an appeal for $459 million to provide immediate help to millions of flood victims. The disaster has claimed some 1,600 lives and affected up to 14 million people...



More:

Pakistan floods: an emergency for the West
Unless we act decisively, large parts of flood-stricken Pakistan will be taken over by the Taliban, writes Ahmed Rashid.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/7941820/Pakistan-floods-an-emergency-for-the-West.html

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

From Terry Glavin:

Goodbye Pakistan? 
http://transmontanus.blogspot.com/2010/08/goodbye-pakistan.html

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Lengthy piece in _NY Times_ worth the read (F-16 base involved):

Pakistan, Drowning in Neglect
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/opinion/26sethi.html?ref=todayspaper

Plus:

Crush of Refugees Inflames Karachi
Local government says it can accommodate one million, but with some 30,000 in camps, ethnic tensions are rising
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704540904575451512217585010.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLENexttoWhatsNewsSecond



> KARACHI, Pakistan—Hundreds of thousands of refugees from Pakistan's devastating floods are seeking refugee in this city of 18 million, exacerbating ethnic strife that has already escalated this year and threatens to destabilize the government of President Asif Ali Zardari.
> 
> Most of the refugees are ethnic Sindhis from areas outside Karachi, the capital of Sindh province, whose homes and livelihoods have been destroyed in the flooding that began more than three weeks ago.
> 
> The United Nations says 800,000 people are stranded by the flooding, which has severed major roads in Sindh and nearby Baluchistan province. Some 1,500 people have been killed and six million made homeless by the deluge, which started in the north but swept south along the Indus River and continues to threaten to submerge towns and villages in Sindh and Baluchistan.
> 
> Sindh's provincial government has set up camps on the outskirts of Karachi, where 30,000 people are trying to keep their families together under tarpaulins in the searing heat.
> 
> The local administration says it is expecting and can cope with up to one million of the refugees. But many others who have made it to Karachi say they are being turned away from shelters on the outskirts and are pouring in to the city, deepening ethnic rivalries with Karachi's majority ethnic community that have simmered for years...
> 
> For Karachi's dominant group, the Urdu-speaking Muhajirs, the influx of Sindhi refugees poses a threat to the established order.
> 
> "If they come in hundreds of thousands, how will they survive?" says Khawaja Izhar ul Hassan, a member of the provincial assembly from the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, or MQM, which is largely a Muhajir political party and forms part of Sindh province's ruling coalition government.
> 
> The refugee crisis is adding a new dimension to a running struggle for control of Karachi between the MQM and ethnic Pashtuns, a group with origins in northwest Pakistan. The number of Pashtuns in Karachi has swollen in the past few years as many have fled fighting between the Pakistan Taliban and the military in their homelands bordering Afghanistan.
> 
> Almost 1,000 people have died in Karachi since the start of the year, many in violence largely between Muhajir and Pashtun armed groups. Mr. Zardari's administration has been unable to stem the violence...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

How much longer for Zardari?

Generals in Pakistan Push for Shake-Up of Government
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/29/world/asia/29pstan.html?ref=todayspaper



> The Pakistani military, angered by the inept handling of the country’s devastating floods and alarmed by a collapse of the economy, is pushing for a shake-up of the elected government, and in the longer term, even the removal of President Asif Ali Zardari and his top lieutenants.
> 
> The military, preoccupied by a war against militants and reluctant to assume direct responsibility for the economic crisis, has made clear it is not eager to take over the government, as it has many times before, military officials and politicians said.
> 
> But the government’s performance since the floods, which have left 20 million people homeless and the nation dependent on handouts from skeptical foreign donors, has laid bare the deep underlying tensions between military and civilian leaders.
> 
> American officials, too, say it has left them increasingly disillusioned with Mr. Zardari, a deeply unpopular president who was elected two and a half years ago on a wave of sympathy after the assassination of his wife, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto.
> 
> In a meeting on Monday that was played on the front page of Pakistan’s newspapers, the army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, confronted the president and his prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, over incompetence and corruption in the government.
> 
> According to the press and Pakistani officials familiar with the conversation, the general demanded that they dismiss at least some ministers in the oversized 60-member cabinet, many of whom face corruption charges.
> 
> The civilian government has so far resisted the general’s demand. But the meeting was widely interpreted by the Pakistani news media, which has grown increasingly hostile to the president, as a rebuke to the civilian politicians and as having pushed the government to the brink.
> 
> After the meeting, the president’s office issued a statement, approved by all the men, saying they had agreed “to protect the democratic process and to resolve all issues in accordance with the constitution.”
> 
> ...Washington, not unlike Pakistan’s military, is caught, American officials say, because there is no appetite for a return of military rule. Nor is there desire to see the opposition politician and former prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, resume power.
> 
> Mr. Sharif, who has also faced corruption charges during his career, is considered by Washington to be too close to some of Pakistan’s militant groups, whose members vote in Punjab, the Sharif electoral base...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Lots of background to the assassination of Punjab's governor:

Pakiban?
http://unambig.com/pakiban/



> Three worth reading:
> 
> 1) _Foreign Policy’s_ “AfPak Channel“
> ...
> 2) _Wall St. Journal_
> ...
> 3) _The Economist_
> ...
> *Predate*: Do you think this sort of, er, context from ace _Globeite_ Graeme Smith (of Taliban reporting renown) is worth reading?
> 
> "…
> Some analysts expressed hope that the death might ease the in-fighting among political elites, forcing them to confront the broader division between Pakistan’s wealthy urbanites [and the rural, feudal landowners like the Bhuttos] and the poorer, conservative masses. The spot where Mr. Taseer lay bleeding to death could not have been more symbolic of that divide, a row of expensive shops and restaurants known as Kohsar Market. Not far from the presidential palace, it’s one of the rare places in Islamabad that overflows with Christmas decorations during the holiday season [how terribly provocative, eh?], and where stylish cafés rival their European counterparts.
> 
> Such places stand a world apart from the village outside Islamabad where Mr. Taseer’s bodyguard reportedly grew up…"
> 
> Guess he deserved it. But it is true that those few who have effectively ruled the country since 1947 have done a dreadfully dismal job for their people whilst mesmerizing them with the Indian menace.



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## sean m

Here is a great documentary from Frontline about the Pakistani government, army, Intelligence agencies involvement with the Taliban and the tribal area.  It is a couple of years old yes it seems like it is still relevant.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/video/flv/generic.html?s=frol02s40eq5d&continuous=1


----------



## MarkOttawa

It will be a long time, if ever, for much major to come of this:

India, Pakistan to restart wide-ranging talks
The dialogue ended after the 2008 attack in Mumbai by Pakistan-based terrorists. Senior officials will meet to talk about issues such as peace, the economy and Kashmir. 
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-india-pakistan-20110211,0,4115082.story



> Reporting from New Delhi —
> 
> India and Pakistan said Thursday [Feb. 10] that they would resume talks suspended after the 2008 terrorist attack in the Indian city of Mumbai that saw nearly 170 people killed and hundreds injured by militants based in Pakistan.
> 
> The Mumbai assault continues to loom large. But the two sides decided to move ahead during a meeting of their foreign secretaries on the sidelines of a regional gathering in Bhutan this week.
> 
> Despite the two-year gap in formal talks, the format and the issues for the most part will be the same. Senior diplomats will discuss counter-terrorism, humanitarian issues, peace and security, the divided Kashmir region, water resources and the regional economy. The talks will be capped by a meeting, supposedly before July, of the two countries' foreign ministers who will attempt to consolidate the gains.
> 
> After three wars and more than six decades of tension between the nuclear neighbors since independence from Britain in 1947, expectations are muted at best...
> 
> The two sides also have been under pressure from Washington to lower the temperature on a rivalry that complicates U.S.-led efforts to stabilize neighboring Afghanistan, where India and Pakistan vie for influence.
> 
> Analysts say that weak governments in both India and Pakistan make it difficult for officials to sell compromises to their respective electorates.
> 
> *India's ruling Congress Party has been battered by corruption scandals* [emphasis added--see this post "Corruption? What stinking corruption? And what stinking torture?"
> http://www.cdfai.org/the3dsblog/?p=44  ]
> involving real estate, telecommunications and sporting events that have paralyzed Parliament. It also has come under sharp criticism over the rising cost of food, making Prime Minister Manmohan Singh look increasingly ineffective.
> 
> The ruling Pakistan People's Party, meanwhile, has been criticized domestically for its handling of last summer's devastating flooding disaster, growing extremism and for allowing attacks by unmanned U.S. aircraft against militants based in Pakistani territory...



Mark
Ottawa


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## MarkOttawa

Lengthy piece at _Foreign Policy's_ "AfPak Channel", worth a read, lots of further links:

Diplomatic duplicity
http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/02/18/diplomatic_duplicity



> LAHORE -- This much is clear about the latest convulsion in U.S.-Pakistan relations: an American man, operating under the name of Raymond Davis, shot and killed two men in Lahore in the populous province of the Punjab. After the event, an "emergency vehicle," presumably from the U.S. consulate, rushed to rescue Davis and careened into a crowd. The as yet unidentified driver of the rescue vehicle killed a third person. Davis is currently being held in Pakistani custody in Lahore. He has been added to Pakistan's exit control list while his status is being determined in Pakistan's courts, which precludes his exit from the country.
> 
> The U.S. government maintains a simple account: he was an employee of the U.S. consulate in Lahore who shot two men in self defense. Since he has "diplomatic immunity," he should be released under the Geneva Convention immediately. President Obama has himself argued that he should be released for these reasons. Concurrent with Obama's appeals for the man's diplomatic immunity, U.S. Senator John Kerry travelled to Pakistan this week to resolve the ever more complicated row. With such high-level demands, the very credibility of the U.S. presidency is at stake. This is not lost upon Pakistan or its citizens.
> 
> Pakistan has its own stylized, yet starkly divergent, account from that heard in the United States. Whereas Raymond Davis is a niche topic of the chattering classes in Washington D.C. in the United States, he is the mainstay of conversation across all stratum of Pakistani society and has become a national obsession in Pakistan's print and television media. Pakistanis have called for the hanging of Davis in public rallies.
> 
> From the Pakistani viewpoint, the "facts" are far less clear. Davis was first described in peculiar, ambiguous terms as a "U.S. consulate employee." He was driving his own unarmored vehicle and carrying a gun. Most diplomats in Pakistan -- American or otherwise -- now travel in armored cars. They certainly do not drive their own cars, and they generally don't carry guns.
> 
> Despite Pakistanis' assertions that he is a spy, he does not have the profile of a bona fide operative of the Central Intelligence Agency...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## Edward Campbell

I don't know how this got transposed.

Mark's post says (my *emphasis* added): "The U.S. government maintains a simple account: he was an employee of the U.S. consulate in Lahore who shot two men in self defense. Since he has "diplomatic immunity," he should be released under the *Geneva Convention* immediately. President Obama has himself argued ..." The original account, at the link says, correctly: "The U.S. government maintains a simple account: he was an employee of the U.S. consulate in Lahore who shot two men in self defense. Since he has "diplomatic immunity," he should be released under the *Vienna Convention* immediately. President Obama has himself argued ..."

The original article is, as I said, correct, it is the Vienna Convention that provides, _inter alia_, immunity from prosecution for accredited diplomats. The original article is also correct is saying that the US, especially the US "intelligence community" plays fast and loose with the letter and spirit of the Vienna Convention. That means, to be clear, they lie and cheat and misuse the Convention and, in the process, endanger the business of diplomacy for all of us.


----------



## MarkOttawa

From the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, 1963:
http://www.sos.state.tx.us/border/intlprotocol/vienna.shtml



> ...
> *Article 19
> Appointment of Members of Consular Staff*
> 
> 1. Subject to the provisions of Articles 20, 22 and 23, the sending State may freely appoint the members of the consular staff.
> 2. The full name, category and class of all consular officers, other than the head of a consular post, shall be notified by the sending State to the receiving State in sufficient time for the receiving State, if it so wishes, to exercise its rights under paragraph 3 of Article 23.
> 3. The sending State may, if required by its laws and regulations, request the receiving State to grant an exequatur to a consular officer other than the head of a consular post.
> 4. The receiving State may, if required by its laws and regulations, grant an exequatur to a consular officer other than the head of a consular post.
> ...
> 
> *Article 23
> Persons Declared "Non Grata"*
> ...
> 3. A person appointed as a member of a consular post may be declared unacceptable before arriving in the territory of the receiving State or, if already in the receiving State, before entering on his duties with the consular post. In any such case, the sending State shall withdraw his appointment...
> 
> *Article 24
> Notification to the Receiving State of Appointments, Arrivals and Departures*
> 
> 1. The Ministry for Foreign Affairs of the receiving State or the authority designated by that Ministry shall be notified of:
> 
> 1. the appointment of members of a consular post, their arrival after appointment to the consular post, their final departure or the termination of their functions and any other changes affecting their status that may occur in the course of their service with the consular post...
> 
> Article 41
> Personal Inviolability of Consular Officers
> 
> 1. Consular officers shall not be liable to arrest or detention pending trial, except in the case of a grave crime and pursuant to a decision by the competent judicial authority.
> 2. Except in the case specified in paragraph 1 of this Article, consular officers shall not be committed to prison or liable to any other form of restriction on their personal freedom save in execution of a judicial decision of final effect.
> 3. If criminal proceedings are instituted against a consular officer, he must appear before the competent authorities. Nevertheless, the proceedings shall be conducted with the respect due to him by reason of his official position and, except in the case specified in paragraph 1 of this Article, in a manner which will hamper the exercise of consular functions as little as possible. When, in the circumstances mentioned in paragraph 1 of this Article, it has become necessary to detain a consular officer, the proceedings against him shall be instituted with the minimum of delay.
> 
> *Article 42
> Notification of Arrest, Detention or Prosecution*
> 
> In the event of the arrest or detention, pending trial, of a member of the consular staff, or of criminal proceedings being instituted against him, the receiving State shall promptly notify the head of the consular post. Should the latter be himself the object of any such measure, the receiving State shall notify the sending State through the diplomatic channel.
> 
> *Article 43
> Immunity From Jurisdiction*
> 
> 1. Consular officers and consular employees shall not be amenable to the jurisdiction of the judicial or administrative authorities of the receiving State in respect of acts performed in the exercise of consular functions...
> 
> *Article 45
> Waiver of Privileges and Immunities*
> 
> 1. The sending State may waive, with regard to a member of the consular post, any of the privileges and immunities provided for in Articles 41, 43 and 44...



Two questions seem most pertinent to a claim to immunity in this case:

1) Were the Pakistani authorities properly notified of Mr Davis' appointment and arrival, and of any change in his status?
2) Was he carrying out (legitimate?) official consular functions at the time of the incident?

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

If you think the Middle (Near) East is scary...:

An alarming South Asia powder keg, By Juan C. Zarate
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/18/AR2011021807465.html



> In 1914, a terrorist assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo - unleashing geopolitical forces and World War I. Today, while the United States rightly worries about al-Qaeda targeting the homeland, the most dangerous threat may be another terrorist flash point on the horizon.
> 
> Lashkar-i-Taiba holds the match that could spark a conflagration between nuclear-armed historic rivals India and Pakistan. Lashkar-i-Taiba is a Frankenstein's monster of the Pakistani government's creation 20 years ago. It has diverse financial networks and well-trained and well-armed cadres that have struck Indian targets from Mumbai to Kabul. It collaborates with the witches' brew of terrorist groups in Pakistan, including al-Qaeda, and has demonstrated global jihadist ambitions. It is merely a matter of time before Lashkar-i-Taiba attacks again.
> 
> Significant terrorist attacks in India, against Parliament in 2001 and in Mumbai in 2008, brought India and Pakistan to the brink of war. The countries remain deeply distrustful of each other. Another major strike against Indian targets in today's tinderbox environment could lead to a broader, more devastating conflict.
> 
> The United States should be directing political and diplomatic capital to prevent such a conflagration...
> 
> This is among the thorniest U.S. national security and counterterrorism problems. It requires officials to focus on imagining the "aftershocks" of a terrorist attack and act before the threat manifests - even as other national security issues such as unrest in the Middle East boil over. Yet without political attention, diplomatic capital and sustained preventative actions, a critical region could descend into chaos...
> 
> _The writer, a senior adviser at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, was deputy assistant to the president and deputy national security adviser for combating terrorism from 2005 to 2009. _



Time for Canada to play that leadership role, I guess .

Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Confirmed.  _NYT_ being responsible--and US in pretty deep:

American Held in Pakistan Shootings Worked With the C.I.A.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/world/asia/22pakistan.html



> WASHINGTON — The American arrested in Pakistan after shooting two men at a crowded traffic stop was part of a covert, C.I.A.-led team of operatives conducting surveillance on militant groups deep inside the country, according to American government officials.
> 
> Working from a safe house in the eastern city of Lahore, the detained American contractor, Raymond A. Davis, a retired Special Forces soldier, carried out scouting and other reconnaissance missions as a security officer for Central Intelligence Agency case officers and technical experts conducting surveillance operations, the officials said.
> 
> Mr. Davis’s arrest and detention, which came after what American officials have described as a botched robbery attempt, has inadvertently pulled back the curtain on a web of covert American operations inside Pakistan, part of a secret war run by the C.I.A. It has exacerbated already frayed relations between the American intelligence agency and its Pakistani counterpart, created a political dilemma for the weak, pro-American Pakistani government, and further threatened the stability of the country, which has the world’s fastest growing nuclear arsenal.
> 
> Without describing Mr. Davis’s mission or intelligence affiliation, President Obama last week made a public plea for his release. Meanwhile, there have been a flurry of private phone calls to Pakistan from Leon E. Panetta, the C.I.A. director, and Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, all intended to persuade the Pakistanis to release the secret operative. Mr. Davis has worked for years as a C.I.A. contractor, including time at Blackwater Worldwide, the controversial private security firm (now called Xe) that Pakistanis have long viewed as symbolizing a culture of American gun slinging overseas.
> 
> *The New York Times had agreed to temporarily withhold information about Mr. Davis’s ties to the agency at the request of the Obama administration, which argued that disclosure of his specific job would put his life at risk. Several foreign news organizations have disclosed some aspects of Mr. Davis’s work with the C.I.A.
> 
> On Monday, American officials lifted their request to withhold publication* [emphasis added]. George Little, a C.I.A. spokesman, declined to comment specifically on the Davis matter, but said in a statement: “Our security personnel around the world act in a support role providing security for American officials. They do not conduct foreign intelligence collection or covert operations.”..
> 
> Several American and Pakistani officials said that the C.I.A. team in Lahore with which Mr. Davis worked was tasked with tracking the movements of various Pakistani militant groups, including Lashkar-e-Taiba, a particularly violent group that Pakistan uses as a proxy force against India but that the United States considers a threat to allied troops in Afghanistan. For the Pakistanis, such spying inside their country is an extremely delicate issue, particularly since Lashkar has longstanding ties to Pakistan’s intelligence service, the Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI.
> 
> Still, American and Pakistani officials use Lahore as a base of operations to investigate the militant groups and their madrasas in the surrounding area.
> 
> The officials gave various accounts of the makeup of the covert task force and of Mr. Davis, who at the time of his arrest was carrying a Glock pistol, a long-range wireless set, a small telescope and a headlamp...
> 
> Even before his arrest, *Mr. Davis’s C.I.A. affiliation was known to Pakistani authorities* [emphasis added], who keep close tabs on the movements of Americans. His visa, presented to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in late 2009, describes his job as a “regional affairs officer,” a common job description for officials working with the agency.
> 
> According to that application, Mr. Davis carried an American diplomatic passport and was listed as “administrative and technical staff,” a category that typically grants diplomatic immunity to its holder.
> 
> American officials said that with Pakistan’s government trying to clamp down on the increasing flow of Central Intelligence Agency officers and contractors trying to gain entry to Pakistan, more of these operatives have been granted “cover” as embassy employees and given diplomatic passports...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Consular
http://forums.milnet.ca/forums/threads/69230/post-1019800.html#msg1019800

or diplomatic?  That is the question:

Pakistan Case Tests Laws on Diplomatic Immunity
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/23/world/asia/23immunity.html



> WASHINGTON — An American C.I.A. contractor is accused of killing two men at a crowded intersection in Pakistan. Can Pakistani officials lawfully prosecute him for murder?
> 
> In debating the fate of Raymond A. Davis, who is charged with gunning down two people in Lahore last month under circumstances that remain murky, the United States and Pakistan are writing a new chapter in the long history of operatives who work under diplomatic cover...
> 
> ...this case also rests on legal technicalities, with confusion arising from contradictory statements by the State Department in the first days after Mr. Davis’s arrest. Those statements have called into question whether Mr. Davis was working — officially, at least — as a diplomatic official or a consular one. Consular officials are afforded somewhat weaker legal protections because they are thought of as administrators, rather than diplomats.
> 
> Initially, State Department officials described Mr. Davis as a staff member for the United States Consulate in Lahore.
> 
> Days later, however, the United States government said that Mr. Davis was actually listed with the administrative and technical staff of the United States Embassy in Islamabad — and that it had formally notified the Pakistani Foreign Ministry of his status there on Jan. 20, 2010.
> 
> The distinction is crucial. If Mr. Davis was listed as a technical staff member for the embassy’s diplomatic mission, then he would be covered by a 1961 treaty that gives diplomats total immunity to criminal prosecution. In that case, Pakistan should be allowed only to expel him. Victims’ families, however, might still be able to sue him for civil damages.
> 
> But if Mr. Davis were instead listed as a staff member for the consulate in Lahore, then he would be covered by a 1963 treaty that governs the rights of consular officials and that allows host countries to prosecute them if they commit a “grave crime.”..



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## MarkOttawa

Thank goodness:

Daily brief: American CIA contractor in Pakistan freed
http://afpak.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2011/03/16/daily_brief_american_cia_contractor_freed



> *Day in court*
> 
> Raymond Davis, the CIA contractor who shot and killed two Pakistanis in Lahore in late January, has just been released by Pakistani authorities after the families of the victims agreed to accept compensation from him (BBC, Reuters, AP, AFP, ET). A lawyer for the family said they were "forcibly taken" to the jail and "made to sign papers" pardoning him (ET, Reuters). Davis has flown to London, according to some reports.  Earlier today, a judge in Lahore had formally charged Davis with two counts of murder (AJE, Reuters, Dawn, ET)...



Mark
Ottawa


----------



## old medic

Pakistan issues arrest warrant for former president Musharraf in Bhutto’s death

By Pamela Constable, Saturday, March 26, 10:39 AM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/pakistan-issues-arrest-warrant-for-former-president-musharraf/2011/03/26/AFF6VBcB_story.html?hpid=z2



> ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — An anti-terrorism court in Pakistan on Saturday ordered the arrest of exiled former military president Pervez Musharraf, whom prosecutors accuse of involvement in the assassination of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto in December 2007, while he was still in power.
> 
> Musharraf, who lives in London, appeared unlikely to face imminent arrest or extradition. However, the court action and the prosecution case linking him to Islamic extremists arrested in the killing could prove a major setback to the retired general’s plans to return home and run for office.
> 
> Fawad Chaudhry, a spokesman for Musharraf reached in the city of Lahore, called the arrest order “politically motivated rubbish” and said the prosecution did not have “a single iota of evidence” against the former leader.
> 
> “It is strange behavior for an anti-terrorist court to issue a warrant for a former head of state who always fought terrorism,” Chaudhry said.
> 
> Prosecutors have alleged that Musharraf, who strongly opposed Bhutto’s return to Pakistan, took part in a complicated conspiracy to kill her that included ordering purposeful police negligence in her public security and colluding with Islamist insurgents who allegedly shot Bhutto at an outdoor political rally in the city of Rawalpindi on Dec. 27, 2007.
> 
> Two senior police officials have been arrested in the case, as well as five alleged members of the Pakistani Taliban. A U.N. investigation into Bhutto’s death did not name Musharraf or anyone else as ordering the slaying, but it concluded that there was high-level interference by state security agencies in the police investigation afterward..........


----------



## CougarKing

link



> *Pakistan PM Warns of 'Full Force' Response to Future U.S. Raids *
> 
> Published May 09, 2011
> | FoxNews.com
> 
> *Pakistan's prime minister warned the United States Monday that his country could respond to any future U.S. raids on its soil with "full force," in the latest escalation of rhetoric in the wake of Usama bin Laden's death.
> 
> Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, like other officials in Islamabad, said the killing of bin Laden in northern Pakistan was a positive step. But, reflecting concerns that the unilateral strike violated his country's sovereignty, Gilani sent a clear message to the United States. He warned any "overt or covert" attack would be met with a "matching response" in the future. *
> 
> "Pakistan reserves the right to retaliate with full force. No one should underestimate the resolve and capability of our nation and armed forces to defend our sacred homeland," Gilani said.
> 
> Pakistani officials are taking a firm stance on the raid, as the United States analyzes the trove of evidence collected from the bin Laden compound. That evidence -- described as the largest intelligence find ever from a senior terror leader -- could lead the United States to other terrorists on Pakistani soil, once again forcing President Obama to decide whether to go around the Pakistanis to capture or kill a high-value terror target.
> White House Press Secretary Jay Carney has said the president reserves the right to enter Pakistani territory to act against terror suspects if Pakistan will not, and reiterated that message when asked about Gilani's speech. He said Monday that while the U.S. takes Pakistanis' concerns seriously, the U.S. does "not apologize" for the raid.
> 
> "It's simply beyond doubt in his mind that he had the right and the imperative to do this," Carney said Monday.
> With analysts combing through the bin Laden files for clues on the whereabouts of Al Qaeda's Ayman al-Zawahiri or Taliban chief Mullah Omar, some are calling on Obama to strike again while Al Qaeda and its allies are staggering.
> "We have no right to keep our troops on the defense dying, when we know where some of the highest-ranking people in the Taliban are," Bing West, former assistant defense secretary, told Fox News on Monday.
> 
> Former CIA Director Michael Hayden said that if the U.S. gets bin Laden's deputy -- presumed to be al-Zawahiri -- in its sights, "the same calculus" that was used on bin Laden should apply.
> But the thought already has Pakistani leaders fuming.
> 
> Husain Haqqani, Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S., told ABC's "This Week" that the Pakistani government wants to continue "joint operations," but is concerned about the nature of the raid last weekend.
> 
> "Nobody said that we didn't want Usama bin Laden taken out. What we are offended by is the violation of our sovereignty," he said. "Now, we've heard the American explanation. But at the same time, try and put yourself in the position of a Pakistani leader who has to go to votes from the same people who will turn around and say, 'You know what? You can't protect this country from American helicopters coming in.'"
> 
> U.S. officials have made clear that they did not loop in the Pakistanis on the raid out of concern that somebody would tip off bin Laden.
> 
> Asked about the Pakistanis' concerns, Carney said repeatedly Monday that the U.S. continues to view its relationship with the country as "important."
> Obama, in an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes," confirmed that he did not inform Pakistani officials of the raid in advance, though he praised Pakistan's cooperation considering "we've been able to kill more terrorists on Pakistani soil than just about any place else."
> 
> However, Obama also questioned whether anybody inside the Pakistani government might have known about bin Laden's location all along.
> "We were surprised that he could maintain a compound like that for that long without there being a tip-off," Obama said. "We think that there had to be some sort of support network for bin Laden inside of Pakistan. But we don't know who or what that support network was. We don't know whether there might have been some people inside of government, people outside of government, and that's something that we have to investigate and, more importantly, the Pakistani government has to investigate."


----------



## Rifleman62

> Pakistan PM Warns of 'Full Force' Response to Future U.S. Raids



....including the withdrawal of cab drivers.

'Full Force' to me means nuclear weapons. I rather doubt it, but as a contingency, it is possible new targeting info is being programed by the US.


----------



## 57Chevy

from The Montreal Gazette and shared with the provisions of The Copyright Act

Pakistan troops wounded in NATO helicopter strike
Agence France-Presse / 17 May 
http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Pakistan+troops+wounded+NATO+helicopter+strike/4794686/story.html
MIRANSHAH, Pakistan — Two NATO helicopters on Tuesday launched a cross-border attack on a Pakistan army checkpoint in a restive tribal region, wounding two security personnel, local security officials said.

The attack took place in Wacha Bibi, 50 kilometres west of Miranshah, on Tuesday morning with two NATO helicopters entering Pakistani airspace from Afghanistan and attacking the checkpoint, they said.

"Two NATO helicopters committed the airspace violation and shelled an army checkpoint, injuring two soldiers," a senior security official told AFP.

The incident came after the United States launched a raid from Afghanistan on May 2 that killed al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden near Islamabad, in an attack that embarrassed and angered the Pakistani military and leadership.

A spokesman for the international military alliance in Afghanistan said ISAF "had reports of a possible incident. We are looking into it".

"I can't confirm any of the details of press reports," Lieutenant-Colonel John L. Dorrian said.

The Pakistani military often accuses a NATO force of violating of Pakistan's air space, in the hunt of Taliban who launch attacks across the border.

Pakistan temporarily shut the main land route for NATO supplies into Afghanistan last September after officials accused NATO of killing Pakistani troops in a cross-border attack.

The region is being targeted by a record number of U.S. drone strikes, the number of which has doubled in the last year, with more than 100 strikes killing over 670 people, according to an AFP tally. The CIA says the covert program has severely disrupted al-Qaida's leadership.

U.S. drone strikes inflame anti-American feeling in Pakistan, which has worsened since a CIA contractor shot dead two Pakistani men in a busy Lahore street in January.

Two such U.S. drone strikes targeting a militant compound and a vehicle in Pakistan's lawless tribal district of North Waziristan on Monday killed at least nine people.

Washington considers Pakistan's tribal belt the global headquarters of al-Qaida and the most dangerous place on Earth, where Taliban and other militants plot attacks on U.S. troops in Afghanistan and on Western targets.

Photo:
A Pakistani policeman walks past the wreckage of charred NATO supply oil tankers after a bomb blast in the Torkham area of the troubled Khyber tribal region near the Afghan border on May 14, 2011. Two NATO helicopters on Tuesday launched a cross-border attack on a Pakistan army checkpoint in a restive tribal region on May 17, wounding two security personnel, local security officials said.

Photograph by: Getty Images


----------



## callsign

BS like this is only making Islamic extremism seem ever more appealing over there.


----------



## HavokFour

*Officials: NATO clashes with Pakistani troops*​
Article



> Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- Tensions mounted Tuesday when NATO helicopters flying in eastern Afghanistan fired across the border into Pakistan after being fired on twice, according to a NATO official.
> 
> NATO's International Security Assistance Force later received reports that two Pakistani soldiers were wounded.
> 
> Two coalition helicopters supporting operations at U.S. Forward Operating Base Tillman in Afghanistan were fired upon from the Pakistani side of the border, said the NATO official, who did not want to be identified because the information has not yet been released publicly. After being fired upon a second time, the helicopters returned fire, the official said.
> 
> Tillman is a few kilometers from the Pakistan border.
> 
> The NATO-led force issued a brief official statement saying the alliance is "aware of the incident and is assessing it to determine what happened."
> 
> Pakistani officials confirmed that two soldiers were wounded. The Pakistani military said it has lodged a "strong protest" and called for a meeting of the two sides.
> 
> A NATO spokeswoman offered little detail about the incident.
> 
> "We're aware of a cross-border incident. We're still assessing the situation," said Lt. Commander Kaye Sweetser, a spokeswoman for the coalition troops.
> 
> Pakistani intelligence officials said the incident started when a NATO fighter jet entered Pakistani airspace near the border with Afghanistan. Pakistani troops began firing at the jet from the ground, said the officials who did not want to be named because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
> 
> The jet retreated and then returned, accompanied by helicopters, and fired on a military check post in a village in North Waziristan, the officials said.
> 
> The incident comes at a time of increased tension between Pakistan and the United States. Pakistani officials have bristled over an unauthorized U.S. raid into Pakistan to kill al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden. U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan have also been a source of concern, as Islamabad says the strikes have killed civilians.
> 
> The Pakistani parliament recently condemned the raid and adopted a resolution calling for a review of its counterterrorism cooperation agreement with the United States. The resolution also ordered the immediate end of drone attacks that targets militants in a tribal region of Pakistan near the Afghan border.
> 
> U.S. Sen. John Kerry has been visiting Pakistan this week and said Pakistan on Tuesday will return the tail of a U.S. helicopter damaged during the bin Laden raid -- a move aimed at improving cooperation between the two nations.
> 
> The helicopter crashed during the May 2 raid of the al Qaeda leader's compound. Navy SEALs were able to destroy much of it, but the tail remained largely intact. In photos of the wreckage, aviation experts said they saw several telltale signs of stealth technology.
> 
> Kerry said Monday that the United States need not apologize to Pakistan for the raid but said it's important the countries find a way to heal their relationship.


----------



## callsign

Well now this is starting to get quite awkward..


----------



## Container

Really the Pakistan thing, based on my limited knowledge- based mostly off some foreign service folks who have been posted there, third hand I guess, has been waiting to happen for some time. This may not be it- but the government can only keep the peace for so long. Im sure American diplomats are working overtime.


----------



## GAP

Pakistan wants to walk a fine line....being distracted into bashing the Americans, may take it's eye off the ball in the Kasmir, and I'm sure India is not going to twiddle it's thumbs if they see an opening to create mischief....


----------



## CougarKing

> link
> 
> 
> 
> *Militants attack Pakistani naval base in Karachi, triggering gunbattles and fiery explosions*
> 
> KARACHI, Pakistan - *Islamist militants stormed a naval base in the Pakistani city of Karachi late Sunday, rocking the facility with fiery explosions and battling commandos dispatched to subdue them in one of the most brazen attacks in years, security officials said.
> 
> At least two navy officers were injured and a naval airplane recently given to Pakistan by the United States was damaged, navy spokesman Salman Ali said, but the total number of casualties was unclear. Many ambulances were being held back because of the fighting inside the base that was still going on more than 2 1/2 hours after the attack began on Pakistani Naval Station Mehran.*
> 
> The co-ordinated strike, reportedly involving up to 15 attackers, came just under three weeks after the death of Osama bin Laden in an American raid on in the northwest city of Abbottabad, an event al-Qaida allied extremists here have vowed to avenge.
> 
> The unilateral American raid triggered a strong backlash against Washington, which is trying to support Pakistan in its fight against militants, as well as rare domestic criticism against the armed forces for failing to detect or prevent the operation.
> 
> Pakistan's army, which has received billions of dollars in U.S. aid since 2001, has launched several operations against militants in their heartland close to the border with Afghanistan over the last three years. The militants have struck back against police and army targets around the country.
> 
> Sunday's raid appeared to be most serious against the military since October 2009, when militants attacked the army headquarters close to the capital, Islamabad. They held dozens hostage in a 22-hour standoff that left 23 people dead, including nine militants.
> 
> It began with at least three loud explosions, which were heard by people who live around the naval base, one of the largest military facilities in the country. It was unclear what caused the explosions, but they set off raging fires that could be seen from far in the distance.
> 
> An Associated Press reporting team outside the base heard at least six other explosions and sporadic firing.
> 
> *Authorities sent in several dozen navy and police commandos to battle the attackers, who responded with gunfire and grenades, Ali said. At least one airplane — a P-3C Orion, a maritime surveillance aircraft that was given to Pakistan by America, — was damaged, he said.
> 
> The United States handed over two Orions to the Pakistan navy at a ceremony at the base in June 2010 attended by 250 Pakistan and American officials, according to the website of the U.S. Central Command. It said by late 2012, the Pakistan would have eight of the planes.*
> 
> At least one media report said team of American technicians were working on the aircraft at the time of the strike, but U.S. Embassy spokesman Alberto Rodriguez said no Americans were on the base.
> 
> No group claimed responsibility for the attack. But the Pakistani Taliban, an al-Qaida allied network which has previously launched attacks in Karachi, has pledged to retaliate for the death bin Laden, and has claimed responsibility for several bloody attacks since then.
> 
> Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani condemned the attack, saying such a "cowardly act of terror could not deter the commitment of the government and people of Pakistan to fight terrorism."
> 
> Karachi, the country's largest city and its commercial hub, has not been spared the violence sweeping the country, despite being in the south far from the northwest where militancy is at its strongest.
> 
> In April, militants bombed three buses taking navy employees to work, killing at least nine people.
> 
> The Pakistani Taliban and other militant groups have little direct public support, but the army and the government have struggled to convince the people of the need for armed operations against them. The militants' identification with Islam, strong anti-American rhetoric and support for insurgents in Afghanistan resonates with some in the country.


----------



## tomahawk6

No question that the Pakistani's have a fundamentalist problem amongst their population including their security forces. Looking the other way wont make the problem go away.There may not be any way to avoid a civil war,but at least crack down on the haters.


----------



## CougarKing

The siege by the militants has been lifted by Pakistani troops:

link



> *Troops end Taliban siege of Pakistan naval air base*
> 
> KARACHI (Reuters) - *Troops recaptured Pakistan's naval air force headquarters on Monday after a 16-hour battle with Taliban gunmen who had stormed the facility in the most brazen attack since the killing of Osama bin Laden.
> 
> More than 20 militants assaulted the PNS Mehran base in the city of Karachi late on Sunday, blowing up at least one aircraft and laying siege to a main building in one of the most heavily guarded bases in the unstable, nuclear-armed country.*
> 
> *The Taliban attack casts fresh doubt on the military's ability to protect its bases following a raid on the army headquarters in the city of Rawalpindi in 2009, and is a further embarrassment following the surprise raid by U.S. special forces on the al Qaeda leader's hideout north of Islamabad on May 2.*
> 
> "The operation is over. The main building has been cleared," a security official said.
> 
> "As a precaution, we are continuing to search around for any more terrorists but the main operation is over."
> 
> *At least 12 military personnel were killed and 14 wounded in the assault that started at 10.30 p.m. on Sunday (1:30 a.m. EDT), a navy spokesman said.
> 
> The Pakistan Taliban, which is allied with al Qaeda, said it had staged the attack to avenge bin Laden's death.*
> 
> "It was the revenge of martyrdom of Osama bin Laden. It was the proof that we are still united and powerful," Taliban spokesman Ehsanullah Ehsan told Reuters by telephone from an undisclosed location.
> 
> GUNS, ROCKET-PROPELLED GRENADES
> 
> Security sources had earlier said the militants had used guns and grenades to storm the base, which is 15 miles from the Masroor Air Base, Pakistan's largest and a possible depot for nuclear weapons.
> 
> PNS Mehran is ringed with a concrete wall with about five feet of barbed wire on top. An aircraft, armed with rockets, hangs on show on a stand outside.
> 
> As troops wound down their assault, some Karachi residents said they could not believe security could have been so lax.
> 
> "If these people can just enter a military base like this, then how can any Pakistani feel safe?" asked Mazhar Iqbal, 28, engineering company administrator taking a lunch break in the shade outside the complex where a crowd had gathered.
> 
> "The government and the army are just corrupt. We need new leaders with a vision for Pakistan."
> 
> Earlier, one security official said the militants had taken over a building in the base. Another official, contacted inside denied reports that hostages had been taken.
> 
> *One P-3C Orion, a maritime patrol aircraft supplied by the United States, had been destroyed and another aircraft had been damaged.*
> 
> TALIBAN DENIES MULLAH OMAR KILLED
> 
> Pakistan has faced a wave of assaults over the last few years, many of them claimed by the Pakistani Taliban.
> 
> Others have been blamed on al Qaeda-linked militant groups once nurtured by the Pakistani military and which have since slipped out of control.
> 
> The Taliban have stepped up attacks since bin Laden's death, killing almost 80 people in a suicide bombing on a paramilitary academy and an assault on a U.S. consular vehicle in Peshawar.
> 
> The group also claimed responsibility for a botched plot to bomb New York's Times Square last year.
> 
> The Pakistani Taliban are led by Hakimullah Mehsud, whose fighters regularly clash with the army in the northwest, parts of which are bases for Afghan militants.
> 
> On Monday, an Afghan television station reported Taliban leader Mullah Omar had been killed in Pakistan, but the group denied it, saying he was safe and in Afghanistan.
> 
> The United States sees Pakistan as a key, if difficult, ally essential to its attempts to root out militant forces in Afghanistan.
> 
> Pakistan, however, sees militant groups as leverage to ward off the influence of its old enemy India in Afghanistan, and the discovery that bin Laden was living in the town of Abbottabad has revived suspicion that militants may be receiving help from the security establishment.
> 
> Pakistan says its senior leadership did not know of bin Laden's whereabouts, but his presence -- and his killing -- has strained already fragile ties with the United States and deeply embarrassed Pakistan's military.
> 
> The military, for its part, has come under intense domestic pressure for allowing five U.S. helicopters to penetrate Pakistan's airspace and kill the al Qaeda leader.
> 
> Many U.S. lawmakers are questioning whether to cut the billions of dollars of aid Pakistan receives to help root out militants.
> 
> On Monday, the Pakistani rupee fell to a record low against the U.S. dollar, partly because of concerns that growing tension with the West could choke off much needed foreign aid.


----------



## The Bread Guy

Interesting description PAK's Foreign Minister gave for the dress of the attackers:


> .... In a bizarre analogy, Malik compared the attackers to characters from a Star Wars film, dressed in Western clothes.
> 
> "*They were wearing black clothes like in Star Wars movies*, (one) with (a) suicide vest. They had small beards and two of them were between 20-22 years old while the third who blew himself up was about 25." ....


More from AFP here, and the Associated Press here.


----------



## CougarKing

an update:

link



> *U.S. suspends $800M in Pakistan aid*
> CBC – 1 hour 6 minutes ago
> 
> 
> *The United States is suspending some $800 million in military aid to Pakistan amid increased tensions between between the two countries since the raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.*
> U.S. President Barack Obama's chief of staff William Daley confirmed the move in a Sunday television interview, saying his country's relationship with Pakistan is "difficult" and must be made "to work over time."
> 
> "Until we get through these difficulties, we will hold back some of the money that the American taxpayers have committed to give them," Daley told ABC's This Week.
> 
> *Pakistan receives some $1.3 billion from the United States in aid every year. But the New York Times reported senior U.S. officials as saying the Obama administration is upset with Pakistan for expelling American military trainers and wants tougher action against the Taliban and others fighting American soldiers in Afghanistan.*
> 
> Pakistan has been widely criticized by U.S. military and intelligence officials for not being fully committed to weeding out extremists.
> 
> *The mistrust is so great that U.S. operatives did not inform Pakistani authorities about the May 2 mission deep into Pakistani territory that killed bin Laden, the world's most wanted man for his role in orchestrating the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks.*...


----------



## CougarKing

These unfortunate tourist climbers remind me of writer Greg Mortensen, who did some climbing in Pakistan's Karakoram mountains before deciding to stay there to engage in aid work and write his book "Three Cups of Tea". Mortensen was then later accused of falsifying a number of his accounts in the book and for mismanaging the funds of the NGO he established...

link



> *Militants kill 10 foreign tourists, local guide at mountain base camp in Pakistan*
> 
> ISLAMABAD - Islamic militants disguised as policemen killed 10 foreign climbers and a Pakistani guide in a brazen overnight raid against their campsite at the base of one of the world's tallest mountains in northern Pakistan, officials said Sunday.
> 
> The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the attack at the base camp of Nanga Parbat, saying it was to avenge the death of their deputy leader in a U.S. drone strike last month.
> 
> *The attack took place in an area that has largely been peaceful, hundreds of kilometres (miles) from the Taliban's major sanctuaries along the Afghan border. But the militant group, which has been waging a bloody insurgency against the government for years, has shown it has the ability to strike almost anywhere in the country.
> 
> The Taliban began their attack by abducting two local guides to take them to the remote base camp in Gilgit-Baltisan, said Pakistani Interior Minister Chaudhry Nisar Ali Khan. One of the guides was killed in the shooting, and the other has been detained for questioning. The attackers disguised themselves by wearing uniforms used by the Gilgit Scounts, a paramilitary force that patrols the area, Khan said.*
> 
> Around 15 gunmen attacked the camp at around 11 p.m. Saturday, said the Alpine Club of Pakistan, which spoke with a local guide, Sawal Faqir, who survived the shooting. They began by beating the mountaineers and taking away any mobile and satellite phones they could find, as well as everyone's money, said the club in a statement.
> 
> 
> (...)


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Mortensen always struck me as a flawed character attempting to do good. I suspect his intentions were honourable, but that to need to succeed caused him to make errors in judgement. Not to mention expecting North American Standards of accounting in places like the NWF is laughable, even the US government can't do it.  North American media has a habit of biulding people up and then destroying them. Even by his own account he is a highly imperfect human being and lets face it, someone that will do such things will never fit the norm anyways.


----------



## CougarKing

Another reason why the US (and perhaps Canada as well) shouldn't have an alliance with Pakistan. A country where increasingly strong militant factions burn US flags every other day and denigrate the West...

How do we know this so-called ally in the War on Terror actually were not the ones who actually hosted Bin Laden before he was caught in his compound near the Pakistani Military Academy?

*IMO, Pakistan is the next Iran with a growing segment of the population that has anti-Western, myopic views. * Furthermore, one can argue their alliance with neighbouring China, with whom they've created close defence and economic ties as a foil to their common rival India,  is another thing we should be wary of. 

Progressive activists like Malala Yousafazai aside, I think the recent Foreign Policy journal segment, "Breaking Up is not Hard to do: Why the US-Pakistani alliance isn't worth the trouble" also applies to Canada. 

link



> *Pakistan's internet censors seek help from Canadian company*
> ReutersBy Katharine Houreld
> 
> ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - In a nondescript, creeper-draped building in the capital of Islamabad, a small team of men is purging Pakistan's Internet.
> 
> *Shadowy government officials are blocking thousands of pages deemed undesirable. But they are not fast enough. So the government is now testing Canadian software that can block millions of sites a second.
> 
> The censorship helps shape the views of 180 million Pakistanis on militancy, democracy and religion. Online debates dissect attacks by U.S. drone aircraft, the uneasy alliance with the United States and prospects for peace with arch rival India.
> 
> But activists say liberal voices are increasingly silenced while militants speak freely. They worry customised filters will only deepen that divide.*
> 
> "Secular, progressive and liberal voices are being increasingly targeted," said Shahzad Ahmad, the founder of Bytes For All, which campaigns for internet freedoms from a small, crowded office. "Anything can be banned without debate."
> 
> An internet provider who declined to be identified said the number of banned pages doubled in five years, partly a reaction to cartoons or films offensive to Muslims.
> 
> Citizen Lab, a research center at the University of Toronto, published a report in June showing the Pakistani government was testing filtering software supplied by Canadian firm Netsweeper.
> 
> The Pakistani government and Netsweeper declined to comment.
> 
> In 2012, the government circulated a five-page document seeking filtering software.
> 
> "Pakistani ISPs and backbone providers have expressed their inability to block millions of undesirable websites using current manual blocking systems," the government said in the paper, a copy of which was seen by Reuters. It said it needed a system "able to handle a block list of up to 50 million URLs".
> 
> *Activists from Bolo Bhi, an internet freedom group whose name means "Speak Up", said Pakistan wanted the strict online censorship practiced in its ally China.*
> 
> About 42 million Pakistanis can get online, the government says, and the Internet is one of the few places where they can speak freely, said Bolo Bhi director Farieha Aziz. Twitter helps voters reach leaders directly.
> 
> "Now Pakistanis can get direct access to politicians. Previously they were just on television, telling you stuff," Aziz said.
> 
> Bolo Bhi asked technology companies to refuse the bid and said U.S.-based Websense, Cisco, Verizon, OpenDNS, and Canada's Sandvine all agreed.
> 
> "Any company whose products are currently being used for government-imposed censorship should remove their technology so that it is not used in this way by oppressive governments," Websense said in an open letter seen by Reuters.
> 
> Instead, Netsweeper took the contract, Citizen Lab said. Netsweeper has categorised 5 billion URLs and offers customised blocking and blocking by keyword, it says on its website.
> 
> Activists say tests run to install the filtering system led to the temporary blocking of sites like Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr. State lawyers have referred to the tests in a court case in which the government is being sued by free-speech activists.
> 
> Many sites on human rights, news and religion are already permanently blocked.
> 
> "The internet Pakistan is seeing is not the same as the rest of the world is seeing," said Ronald Deibert of Citizen Lab.
> 
> NOT BLOCKING HATE
> 
> Pakistani officials decline to discuss Netsweeper, even with their own legislators.
> 
> "They told us they'd shelved it," said legislator Bushra Gohar, who raised the matter in the National Assembly. "There are violent groups operating openly in this country and they want to ban objectionable content?"
> 
> Officially, only sites that are blasphemous, pornographic or threaten national security are banned.
> 
> But pages banned in recent months include a Facebook group wanting to end the death penalty for blasphemy, a band whose song mocked the military, a site tracking sectarian murders, and pages a cleric who has spoken against sectarian violence, according to an official list seen by Reuters.
> 
> *Hate speech denouncing religious minorities like Shi'ites, who make up about 20 percent of Pakistan's population, is freely available online. So are pages maintained by militant groups the Pakistani government has banned.
> 
> Lawyer Yasser Latif Hamdani, who is suing the government on behalf of internet freedom activists, said while some of the hundreds of web pages he had found blocked were pornographic, most were secular or sites belonging to religious minorities.*
> 
> "I can't think of any religious extremist group that has been blocked," he said.
> 
> "They are not blocking the guys who are going to come on the road and start burning things, they are not blocking the people who are inciting violence against religious minorities."
> 
> Last year, at least 325 Shi'ites, a minority sect in Pakistan, were killed, including children shot on their way to school. About 200 more were killed in twin bombings this year.
> 
> *The government does not release statistics, but the Internet Service Providers Association of Pakistan said about 4,500 URLs were banned, including some websites like YouTube.
> 
> The Google-owned, video-sharing channel was blocked a year ago after clerics organised violent protests against an anti-Islam film posted on the site. Thousands of protesters armed with sticks and stones battled riot police in major cities.
> 
> Officials have said they hope the filters will help Pakistan to re-open YouTube, by blocking links to specific material and allowing the rest.*
> 
> In the meantime, censorship is theoretically decided by the Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC), a secretive body comprising members of the security forces, religious leaders and chaired by a secretary from the Ministry of Information Technology.
> 
> The secretary declined requests for an interview.
> 
> But the committee only meets a couple of times a year, and the authorities are directing hundreds of pages to be banned each month, an industry official said.
> 
> Sometimes the IMC retroactively approved bans from the Ministry of IT - headquartered on the fourth floor of the nondescript brick building, said a government official who was not authorised to speak to the media. He could not say who added sites to the blocked list in the first place.


----------



## CougarKing

Another cowardly act by radicals:

link



> *Suicide bombers kill 78 Christians outside Pakistani church*
> 
> By Fayaz Aziz
> 
> PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - A pair of suicide bombers blew themselves up outside a 130-year-old church in Pakistan after Sunday Mass, killing at least 78 people in the deadliest attack on Christians in the predominantly Muslim South Asian country.
> 
> Violence has been on the rise in Pakistan in past months, undermining Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's efforts to tame the insurgency by launching peace talks with the Pakistani Taliban.
> 
> *An assault of this scale is certain to give ammunition to Sharif's critics who are against his peace initiative and believe militants have to be tackled by tough military action.*
> 
> (...)


----------



## Edward Campbell

I share you concern about Pakistan, but I'm not sure it is as simple as it appears.

No one, I think, has ever governed the North West Frontier - not, at least, as we would use the term govern, so "lawless tribal areas" are fact of life for the government in Islamabad.

The spread of _fundamentalist_ Islam is bothersome and, I'm told, is quite new to Pakistan which was, I believe, a reasonable _liberal_ Islamic society 25 years ago.

Pakistan is caught between America (with whom it cooperates on e.g. drone target acquisition), India and China. China is only a friend because *a)* Pakistan is a useful bother to India, and *b)* because they, the Chinese, want a port in the Arabian Sea. India is an enemy but it is one with which Pakistan should want, and does in fact need, friendly commercial relations. And America's _strategic_ ambitions are unclear, to say the least.

In my _opinion_ Pakistan's better (there is no best) _strategic_ option is to make peace with India. But that involves solving the Kashmir problem - and the "correct" solution is beyond me, but it - Kashmir - _might_ be the key to a Sub-Continental Union of Pakistan, Kashmir, Nepal, Sikkim, India and Bangladesh, modeled on the European Union prior to the Euro.

Neither America nor China are "friends" of Pakistan; they both want to use it for their own purposes. India, and the other sub-continental states share some of Pakistan's problems and there is at least as much shared culture and history as there is between, say, Finland and Greece.


----------



## CougarKing

E.R. Campbell said:
			
		

> I share you concern about Pakistan, but I'm not sure it is as simple as it appears.
> 
> No one, I think, has ever governed the North West Frontier - not, at least, as we would use the term govern, so "lawless tribal areas" are fact of life for the government in Islamabad.
> 
> The spread of _fundamentalist_ Islam is bothersome and, I'm told, is quite new to Pakistan which was, I believe, a reasonable _liberal_ Islamic society 25 years ago.



ERC,

Here is another instance of growing anti-Western sentiment in Pakistan. I do not trust Imran Kahn's PTI party not only because they oppose the drone strikes, but because they want to make peace with the Taliban. While they are not in power now, I suspect eventually they will come to power, and Pakistan will become less of a nominal ally to the US and other western nations. 

Defense News



> *Pakistan Activists Search Trucks For NATO Supplies*
> 
> PESHAWAR, PAKISTAN — *Club-wielding activists from Imran Khan’s political party forcibly searched trucks for NATO supplies in northwest Pakistan on Sunday in protest at deadly US drone strikes.
> 
> Around 100 workers from the former cricket star’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party set up checkpoints in the northwestern city of Peshawar on a main road leading to Afghanistan.*
> 
> They stopped trucks and hauled drivers from their cabs to check their paperwork, following a call by Khan at a rally on Saturday to block supplies to NATO forces in Afghanistan in protest at the drone attacks.
> 
> The activists, carrying the PTI’s green and red flag, broke open truck containers to check their contents, an AFP reporter at the scene said.
> 
> The PTI heads the government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, of which Peshawar is the capital. But authority for the highways lies with the federal government, which has so far made no move to block NATO supplies.
> 
> Muhammad Faisal, a senior police official, said the PTI activists’ actions were illegal but he was powerless to act.
> 
> “The protesters are doing unlawful acts by checking documents and screening goods, they don’t have authority,” he told AFP.
> 
> “But we can’t take action against them because we have no instructions from the government. If the government orders us, we will stop this illegal activity.”
> 
> PTI activist Asghar Khalil, 28, told AFP they were heeding their leader’s call to action and would not stop until Washington promised to end drone strikes.
> 
> *Khan has long opposed the US campaign of drone attacks targeting Taliban and Al-Qaeda militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas.
> 
> He has intensified his rhetoric since a US drone strike killed Pakistani Taliban chief Hakimullah Mehsud on Nov. 1.
> 
> Khan says that attack was a deliberate attempt by Washington to sabotage efforts towards peace talks with the militants, who have killed thousands in a six-year campaign of violence.*
> 
> “They are doing unlawful acts. They broke the sealing of my container and forcibly examined the goods,” Faiz Muhammad Khan, a truck driver transporting sanitary items to Afghanistan, told AFP.
> 
> “If they want to block supplies for NATO forces, they should stop it in Karachi or at the border.”
> 
> Pakistan is a key transit route for the US-led mission in landlocked Afghanistan, particularly as NATO forces prepare to withdraw by the end of next year.
> 
> NATO supplies were suspended on Saturday because of a major PTI rally, which was held on the route used by the trucks.
> 
> *The drone strikes are deeply unpopular in Pakistan. Islamabad publicly condemns them as counter-productive and a violation of sovereignty, although previous governments have given their tacit support to them.*
> 
> The US regards the strikes as a highly effective tool in the fight against Islamist militancy.


----------



## Colin Parkinson

E.R. Campbell said:
			
		

> I share you concern about Pakistan, but I'm not sure it is as simple as it appears.
> 
> No one, I think, has ever governed the North West Frontier - not, at least, as we would use the term govern, so "lawless tribal areas" are fact of life for the government in Islamabad.
> 
> The spread of _fundamentalist_ Islam is bothersome and, I'm told, is quite new to Pakistan which was, I believe, a reasonable _liberal_ Islamic society 25 years ago.
> 
> Pakistan is caught between America (with whom it cooperates on e.g. drone target acquisition), India and China. China is only a friend because *a)* Pakistan is a useful bother to India, and *b)* because they, the Chinese, want a port in the Arabian Sea. India is an enemy but it is one with which Pakistan should want, and does in fact need, friendly commercial relations. And America's _strategic_ ambitions are unclear, to say the least.
> 
> In my _opinion_ Pakistan's better (there is no best) _strategic_ option is to make peace with India. But that involves solving the Kashmir problem - and the "correct" solution is beyond me, but it - Kashmir - _might_ be the key to a Sub-Continental Union of Pakistan, Kashmir, Nepal, Sikkim, India and Bangladesh, modeled on the European Union prior to the Euro.
> 
> Neither America nor China are "friends" of Pakistan; they both want to use it for their own purposes. India, and the other sub-continental states share some of Pakistan's problems and there is at least as much shared culture and history as there is between, say, Finland and Greece.



Deobandsim was imported to India in the 1700's and likely helped spark the Indian Mutiny, it didn't seem to get a lot of traction till the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan,  but it certainly found fertile ground in the Afghan refugee camps. Helped with large doses of Arab money, they were able to provide rudimentary social services and schooling when no one else did, or were prevented from doing so to ensure that only the fundamentalist could.


----------



## CougarKing

Another instance of Imran Khan's PTI party showing their disdain for the US/West, by accusing the local CIA station chief of murder over a drone attack on AQ-affiliated militants. 

Defense News



> *CIA Chief Accused Of Murder Over Pakistan Drone Attack*
> Nov. 27, 2013 - 04:08PM   |   By AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
> 
> ISLAMABAD — *The political party of former cricketer Imran Khan Wednesday named the CIA’s director and a man it said was the agency’s chief in Pakistan as murder suspects over a drone strike.
> 
> Khan’s Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaaf (PTI) party has written to police over last week’s attack on a seminary linked to the feared Haqqani militant network in Hangu district of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in the northwest.*
> The attack, which militant sources said killed the Haqqanis’ spiritual leader along with five others, was extremely unusual in that it was mounted outside Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas on the Afghan border.
> 
> The letter signed by PTI information secretary Shireen Mazari asked Hangu police to name CIA director John Brennan and a man they identified as the agency’s Islamabad station chief as suspects for murder and “waging war against Pakistan.”
> 
> It is rare for CIA operatives to be identified in public. The then-Islamabad station chief was forced to leave Pakistan in late 2010 when a Pakistani official admitted his name had been leaked.
> 
> *PTI, which leads the coalition government in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, has long campaigned against the CIA’s drone campaign targeting al-Qaida and Taliban militants in Pakistan.
> 
> Khan has stepped up his rhetoric since a drone attack killed the leader of the Pakistani Taliban on Nov. 1. He accused Washington of deliberately sabotaging fledgling efforts towards peace talks with the militants.*
> 
> (...)


----------



## GAP

> He accused Washington of deliberately sabotaging fledgling efforts towards peace talks with the militants.



They didn't make it more difficult, they just fixed him in place so it is easier to negotiate.......


----------



## a_majoor

The Islamic civil wars are spreading, but Pakistan is a special case due to its proximity to India and the ownership of nuclear weapons. Spillover into Indian States with large Muslim populations is possible, but the most worrying aspect must be who is actually in control of these nuclear weapons, and will they remain secure?

http://www.the-american-interest.com/blog/2013/12/21/another-shia-sunni-fault-line-opens-up/



> *Another Shia-Sunni Fault Line Opens Up*
> 
> Sectarian tensions in Pakistan have gone from bad to worse ever since riots broke out in Rawalpindi a month ago. On Sunday, a Shia cleric was murdered in Lahore. The killing was seen as a response to the assassination of a Sunni leader of a religious party known for its anti-Shia rhetoric. And on Wednesday, three people were killed as a suicide bomber tried to break into a Shia mosque in Rawalpindi.
> 
> The Pakistani government has called for calm, and has heightened security around Shia mosques, churches and temples, but the attacks continue. The sectarian tensions in Pakistan mimic the increasingly lethal tensions in Lebanon, Iraq and Syria. But Pakistan’s sectarian troubles are more a product of a radicalized society, and less a backlash to the geopolitical machinations of the region. Thousands of seminaries all over the country, funded by Saudi petrodollars, churn out Salafist radicals who see Shias as heretics. Organizations that fall under the Pakistani Taliban, like Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and Sipah-i-Sahaba, have targeted Shias in suicide bombings and targeted killings, particularly in urban centers that have large Shia populations. High-casualty attacks like the bombings in predominantly Shia neighborhoods in Karachi and Quetta have underlined what has been a sustained campaign to terrorize the community.
> 
> In response, loud, equally radical Shia groups have also emerged that have been carrying out revenge attacks on prominent Sunni leaders, causing a spiral that has lately threatened to veer out of control. Iraq seems to be in danger of falling back into a bloody, sectarian civil war, and Syria is already in one. To say that nuclear-armed Pakistan going down a similar path would be a very bad thing would be an understatement.


----------



## CougarKing

Not a good idea to give the Pakistani Taliban any breathing room...

Reuters via Yahoo News



> *
> U.S. sharply curtails drone strikes in Pakistan: report*
> Reuters
> 
> WASHINGTON (Reuters) - *The United States has cut back sharply on drone strikes in Pakistan after the Islamabad government asked for restraint while it seeks peace talks with the Pakistani Taliban, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday.
> *
> The Post quoted a U.S. official as saying, "That's what they asked for, and we didn't tell them no." The newspaper said there had been a lull in such attacks since December, the longest break since 2011.
> 
> The newspaper said the Obama administration indicated it would continue carrying out strikes on senior al Qaeda officials if they were to become available or to thwart any immediate threat to Americans.
> 
> Reuters was not immediately able to confirm the report.
> 
> *The Post quoted a senior Obama administration official as denying an informal agreement had been reached, saying, "The issue of whether to negotiate with the Pakistani Taliban is entirely an internal matter for Pakistan."
> 
> While some Pakistanis welcome the strikes, saying they kill fewer civilians and are more effective against Taliban militants than traditional military operations, others argue the strikes still cause civilian casualties, terrify residents and violate Pakistani sovereignty.*
> 
> Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has said he wants the drone strikes to end.
> 
> (...)


----------



## Colin Parkinson

Agreed, I have also seen more than one report that the average guy in the NWF does not mind that the local Taliban are nervous, otherwise they have a tendency to strut around and take advantage of their position.


----------



## pbi

Thucydides said:
			
		

> The Islamic civil wars are spreading, but Pakistan is a special case due to its proximity to India and the ownership of nuclear weapons. Spillover into Indian States with large Muslim populations is possible, but the most worrying aspect must be who is actually in control of these nuclear weapons, and will they remain secure?
> 
> http://www.the-american-interest.com/blog/2013/12/21/another-shia-sunni-fault-line-opens-up/



This is the bit that worries me.

The same sort of concerns were raised (if you recall) when the USSR tubed, but that didn't turn out as badly as feared. But IMHO there was something missing: bloody-minded religious fundamentalism which, in my opinion (regardless of particular religious dogma), must always kept as far away from matches, sharp objects and nuclear devices as possible.


----------



## devil39

A very interesting article in STRATFOR titled *Pakistan:The Coming Conflict in North Waziristan* 


> The Obama administration will greatly reduce the number of drone strikes the United States carries out in Pakistan since Islamabad has begun peace talks with Taliban rebels, The Washington Post reported Feb. 5. The move came at Pakistan's request as a way to help facilitate the talks between Islamabad and the Taliban rebel alliance. Despite these negotiations, both Islamabad and the Taliban know that military confrontation is unavoidable because they have very little room for compromise. The jihadists and the government are using the time bought by talks to prepare for renewed fighting, a conflict in which the jihadists have the advantage of NATO's looming departure from neighboring Afghanistan.
> 
> Analysis
> 
> Islamabad has negotiated with the rebels at least five times since war in Pakistan's tribal areas began a decade ago. Peace agreements designed to end militancy were signed every year from 2004 to 2009, but all failed, with violations occurring within days of their signing. The last deal, with Taliban forces in the Greater Swat region, actually emboldened the jihadists to try to expand the boundaries of their so-called emirate, forcing the government to launch its biggest military offensive to date against the jihadists.
> 
> Avoiding North Waziristan
> 
> After retaking Swat from the Taliban in early 2009, the government expanded the scope of the counterjihadist campaign to South Waziristan that fall. Over the next few years Islamabad further expanded its offensive to the remaining parts of the tribal belt, with the exception of North Waziristan, which has become headquarters for numerous Pakistani and international jihadist forces.
> 
> Several factors explain Islamabad's previous hesitance to enter North Waziristan. For one, its forces have been stretched thin between the Greater Swat region and the remaining six districts of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas. Moreover, North Waziristan is the home of Hafiz Gul Bahadur, a key tribal warlord who has remained neutral in the fight between Islamabad and the Taliban rebels, and it is a key base of operations for the Islamabad-aligned Haqqani subgroup of the Afghan Taliban movement. Finally, Pakistan was able to rely on the United States to take the fight to the jihadists. Washington engaged in a heavy campaign of drone strikes that eventually eliminated many key foreign and local jihadists.
> 
> But despite these losses, the Taliban rebels regained their ability to stage attacks across the country, hitting high-profile military and other security targets. The military in turn began demanding the use of unprecedented force against the jihadists in recent weeks to finally move toward launching an offensive in North Waziristan. The Pakistani air force recently began pounding militant positions in North Waziristan, and thousands have fled the area in anticipation of a large-scale military operation.
> 
> Meanwhile, in Islamabad the civil and military leadership held a key meeting Jan. 23 chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif. In addition to the army chief and the head of the country's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, three other key generals were present, signaling an impending all-out military assault in North Waziristan. A majority of lawmakers from the ruling Pakistan Muslim League had given their support for the use of force, only for Sharif to make a surprise announcement that a peaceful solution would be given one last chance and to appoint a four-member committee authorized to negotiate with the Taliban rebels. Though unexpected, Sharif's decision meshes with the majority view among the public that the insurgency ought to be dealt with through talks.
> 
> Pre-Offensive Talks
> 
> This view is especially pronounced among the prime minister's own conservative center-right constituency and from his main rival, Imran Khan, whose right-wing nationalist Pakistan Tehrik-i-Insaaf party governs Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa province. Sharif's move to appoint a four-person team of negotiators to meet with the jihadists is his way of demonstrating that he is seriously trying to resolve matters peacefully.
> 
> The committee is chaired by Sharif's adviser on national affairs, Irfan Siddiqui; a key former official from Inter-Services Intelligence, Maj. Amir Shah; former Pakistani Ambassador to Afghanistan Rustam Shah Mohmand; and prominent journalist Rahimullah Yousafzai. The chair of the committee obviously represents the interests of the Sharif government, and Yousafzai has been selected for being one of the most senior experts on the cross-border Taliban and wider jihadist phenomenon. Mohmand is a key member of Khan's party and has sympathies for the Taliban. Amir Shah is perhaps the most interesting member of the team, since during the late 1980s and early 1990s he served as station chief, when he had a reputation for being an extremely professional operative. Even so, he ultimately was dismissed from the military after differences with several army commanders and intelligence bosses.
> 
> Amir Shah likely was not chosen for his past experience as a one-time prominent ISI player, but rather for his family connections, which include close links with the Taliban. He is the son of a prominent religious figure, Maulana Muhammad Tahir, who established the Salafi Panjpir madrassa and whose students include prominent Afghan and Pakistani jihadist leaders. These leaders include the current chief of the Taliban rebel alliance, Mullah Fazlullah, who used to head the Swat Taliban movement before the 2009 army action. Amir Shah's brother succeeded their father, currently leads the madrassa and maintains close ties to the Taliban and other ultraconservative religious forces.
> 
> Even so, the committee is unlikely to make much headway with the Taliban. The members of the Taliban committee strongly suggest that the Taliban are not seriously seeking compromise but rather are manipulating the talks to advance their position -- as is the government. States negotiate with armed non-state actors to moderate the latter and bring them into the mainstream. In the case of Pakistan and its Taliban rebels, the non-state actors are not interested in moderation; they are interested in radically altering the nature of the republic.
> 
> Instead of appointing a committee of their own that will negotiate with the government's team, the Tehrik-i-Taliban announced a team composed of Khan; Maulana Sami ul-Haq, the head of a prominent Deobandi madrassa and leader of a small Islamist party; Mohammed Ibrahim Khan, a prominent Islamist academic from the country's most organized Islamist party, Jamaat-i-Islami; Mufti Kifayatullah, a key figure in Pakistan's largest Islamist party, Jamiat Ulema-i-Islam; Fazlur Rehman; and Maulana Abdul Aziz, the former imam of the Red Mosque who was arrested during the army action to storm it in 2007.
> 
> Khan and Kifayatullah declined the offer, but the remaining three accepted. That both committees contain many members sympathetic to the Taliban gives the jihadists ample room to manipulate the talks by exploiting the existing differences within the political mainstream. Already, the Taliban have an advantage in that they have been able to skillfully exploit public sentiment on issues like Islam, Pakistani nationalism and Muslim geopolitics. Separately, the Taliban have appointed a 10-member committee of their top commanders that will oversee the talks on behalf of the movement's leadership. Thus, a complex web of committees has emerged that will prevent any serious talks from taking place.
> 
> Meanwhile, Pakistan's Islamists believe they could gain from the talks, as do their right-wing allies. With the exception of the 2002 elections, which were engineered by the then-Musharraf regime to keep the mainstream parties out, the Islamists have never done well at the ballot box. Their involvement along with other religious groups in the current talks could elevate their standing while increasing state dependence on them. The Taliban see this as a positive development, as it would enhance their pool of potential supporters and create a social environment conducive to their political demands.
> 
> For their part, Islamist parties and religious groups see threats and opportunities in the Taliban's rise. The threat arises from the fact that in matter of just a few years, the jihadists have overtaken them in terms of influence despite their much longer history. The government's decision to negotiate with the Taliban could further marginalize them. By inserting themselves in the middle of these talks, these Islamist and religious forces seek to not just prevent their marginalization but also hope to make up for their electoral shortcomings.
> The opportunity lies in the chance that the Taliban could enter the political mainstream (despite maintaining a militant presence) and subsequently join forces with the Islamists and other religious elements to undermine Pakistan's non-Islamist political forces, which still dominate Pakistani politics.
> Hopes aside, the Islamist middlemen are unlikely to benefit regardless of the outcome of the Taliban insurgency. Should the state prevail over the Taliban, there would be no change in the status of these groups. And should the Taliban insurgency succeed, they will always be subordinate to the jihadists.
> 
> Afghanistan and North Waziristan
> 
> Islamabad fears the drawdown of Western forces from neighboring Afghanistan as much as the Pakistani Taliban look forward to it for the same reason, namely because this will give the Pakistani jihadists the strategic depth with which to advance their insurgency in Pakistan.
> The jihadists therefore want to drag talks out until Afghanistan becomes chaotic enough again for them to exploit the vacuum. The vacuum in Afghanistan will be hastened by the political transition in Kabul, where President Hamid Karzai will leave office after elections in April.
> 
> The government is well aware of the Pakistani Taliban's intentions. It, too, is pessimistic about the prospects of a negotiated settlement. But it hopes to use the talks to exploit divisions within the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, perhaps rendering it a more manageable entity. The chances of this happening, however, are far less than the reverse, in which the Taliban can seek to exploit the fault lines within the state and society. Islamabad also wants to establish that the government did its best to avoid war, but was left with no choice because the jihadists were not willing to compromise and join the national mainstream.
> 
> The Pakistani leadership knows that between the domestic insurgency and the one that will intensify next door once NATO forces draw down, they are looking at a long and brutal war. Part of the preparation for the coming battle is to make sure that the sizable chunk of the public that has been ambivalent and even opposed to the use of force realize that the government had no other option, particularly since the Taliban are gearing up their war machine to inflict as much damage in the core areas of the country as possible.


----------



## pbi

The answer, which will probably never be granted by Kabul nor by Islamabad, is Pashtunistan. Let them have their own miserable, rotten backward little medieval mini-caliphate and be done with it. They can flog people and chop off heads all day long until their arms are sore.


----------



## devil39

Yes.  The last three paragraphs are not a great prognosis for the short to mid term situation in Afghanistan and the tribal areas.  Not unrealistic though either in my opinion.


----------



## pbi

And now for a stunning piece of geostrategic analysis: some parts of this world are just f****ed up. 

Haiti is another one that comes to mind. How many times have we tried to salvage that place?


----------



## CougarKing

Islamabad concerned about the aftermath of a US withdrawal from their neighbour...

But yet, since their intelligence agencies/ISI were involved in Afghanistan long before 9/11, would it take much imagination to surmise that they still have a hand in trying to manipulate Afghanistan today?

Defense News



> *Pakistani Official: US Withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2014 'Means Civil War'*
> Feb. 25, 2014 - 07:19PM   |   By PAUL MCLEARY and JOHN T. BENNETT
> 
> WASHINGTON — President Obama’s warning to Afghan president Hamid Karzai on Tuesday that he may pull all US troops out of Afghanistan by the end of the year if there is no security agreement signed drew a swift response from Pakistani officials concerned about the volatile border with their neighbor.
> 
> *
> “The zero option means civil war in Afghanistan” said a senior Pakistani defense official told reporters in Washington, DC. “In my opinion zero option should not be an option.”*
> 
> (...)- EDITED
> 
> Pakistan has lost thousands of troops in recent years fighting Islamist militants in the Swat Valley and Waziristan, where the government is able to exercise little to no control.
> 
> But Pakistan is poised to yet again launch a major military sweep of the tribal region in the coming days after weeks of Taliban attacks and the failure of peace talks with the militants. The Pakistani Army has about 150,000 troops in the region, which borders the Afghan province of Khost, also a hotbed is Islamist militancy.
> 
> 
> *
> The Pakistani official was scathing in his estimation of the Afghan security forces, saying that “the inherent weakness of the Afghan National Security Forces, [is] that they have yet to mature into a cohesive fighting machine,” since they have not been able to organically grow an officer and junior non-commissioned leader corps.*
> 
> “If there is a zero option and if there is mayhem in Afghanistan,” the official continued, “I think 30 percent of forces would desert because basically they are all tribesmen, so this will be a very dangerous thing.”
> 
> (...)- END EXCERPT


----------



## Colin Parkinson

I wonder if Pakistan is afraid that if the US completely pulls out, then they lose any hold over the US and the US can then pull funding as it likes, plus the Pakistanis are going to have to deal with Taliban and NWF all on their own. I suspect the Pakistani leadership will be quickly on their knees in front of the Chinese ambassador begging for support.


----------



## CougarKing

E.R. Campbell said:
			
		

> The spread of _fundamentalist_ Islam is bothersome and, I'm told, is quite new to Pakistan which was, I believe, a reasonable _liberal_ Islamic society 25 years ago.



So much for that "liberal" society Pakistan was 25 years ago, since Islamofascist intolerance for other religions seems to be the watchword there:

Associated Press



> *Crowd sets fire to Hindu center in Pakistan*
> 
> Associated Press
> By ADIL JAWAD
> 
> KARACHI, Pakistan (AP) — *An angry crowd set fire to a Hindu community center in southern Pakistan after allegations circulated that a Hindu had desecrated Islam's holy book, police said Sunday.
> 
> The incident took place overnight in the city of Larkana in Sindh province after some people said they saw burned pages of the Quran in a garbage bin near the home of a Hindu man, said Anwar Laghari, the area police officer.*
> 
> Violence triggered by allegations of Quran desecration and other allegedly blasphemous acts is common in conservative Pakistan. A controversial Pakistani law imposes the death penalty, but sometimes crowds take the law into their own hands and attacked the accused, often members of a religious minority in the majority Sunni Muslim state
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## a_majoor

The American Interest on how Pakistan's weakness (multiple weakness actually) have deformed their foreign policy and sucked Pakistan into a situation they may have difficulty extracting themselves from. Need ing cheap energy and large doses of cash to keep the economy afloat, Pakistan has moved into the orbit of Saudi Arabia, and the possible fallout is described below:

http://www.the-american-interest.com/articles/2014/03/15/for-pakistan-siding-with-the-saudis-on-syria-is-a-bad-idea/



> *For Pakistan, Siding With the Saudis on Syria Is a Bad Idea*
> Saim Saeed
> 
> Pakistan has a habit of renting itself out to other powers. But its latest transaction, supporting Saudi efforts to remove Bashar al-Assad in Syria, could be the most dangerous foreign policy “sale” the state has made yet.
> 
> Published on March 15, 2014
> 
> The houbara bustard, an endangered species, is one of Pakistan’s national birds, the Pakistani bald eagle of sorts. The bird’s symbolic status doesn’t matter much, however, to the Gulf Princes who go on annual trips to Pakistan to hunt them to near extinction. Pakistan’s endangered national treasure, not unlike its foreign policy, is apparently up for sale to the Gulf monarchs for the right price.
> 
> Pakistan as a state has pretty much been available for rent since 1947, thanks to the conviction of its security establishment that only vast quantities of foreign money can buy an adequate defense against India. But the country’s latest transaction, supporting the Saudi effort to topple Bashar al-Assad in Syria, is potentially much more dangerous than previous instances of the old rental policy.
> 
> Until recently, Pakistan was careful to maintain a finely balanced neutrality between the assorted rebel groups and Assad—and by extension, Iran and Saudi Arabia. Then, in February, Pakistan’s national security advisor joined his Saudi counterpart to call for an interim government in Syria, essentially calling for Assad to step down. The statement was a far cry from the mild calls for a general ceasefire that preceded it, but it signaled more than just a rhetorical shift. Pakistan proved instrumental to Saudi foreign policy when it provided mercenaries and ex-military officials to help suppress the uprising in Bahrain. Lately, it has become involved in Saudi Arabia’s proxy war against Iran in Syria. There are unconfirmed reports that the same cadre of mercenaries and ex-army men is training Saudi-backed jihadist groups for deployment in Syria. In fact, GulfNews reported that Pakistan is also ready to sell anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons, via Saudi Arabia and Jordan, to various Syrian rebel groups.
> 
> Why is Pakistan coming down so heavily on the Saudi side when this opens up big risks in its relations with its large and powerful neighbor, Iran? The answer has much to do with Pakistan’s economic troubles. Unlike many emerging markets, Pakistan’s economy has yet to recover strongly from the recession. It has been posting an average growth rate of 2.9 percent since 2008 amid persistent, sky-high inflation. A terrorist insurgency and the government’s inability to deal with it has also scared off any foreign investors who might have injected money into the ailing economy. An energy crisis has slowed down work in factories and offices, and importing oil has become increasingly expensive. With dwindling reserves of foreign currency, Pakistan has been surviving from one IMF loan to the next, with some additional respite in the form of American reimbursements for money spent on the Afghan war. Pakistan has always been dependent on American aid, whether in the form of development funds or F-16s. Now the American money is dwindling, and Pakistan must look elsewhere for financial support.
> 
> Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, returning from opposition for his third term in office after winning the elections last year, came to power on the promise of solving Pakistan’s electricity and economic troubles. He has an exceptionally close relationship with the Saudis. It was Saudi Arabia that hosted him during his decade-long exile after a coup in 1999. In fact, his Saudi friends practically saved his life; reports were circulating at the time that the Pakistani military would have sentenced Sharif to death had the Saudis not brokered a deal. So, Pakistan is broke and needs electricity, and Nawaz has some really good Saudi friends able to help Pakistan out with both those problems. For Nawaz, this is a no-brainer.
> 
> The deal works out for Saudi Arabia too. The Kingdom feels that the United States has been stingy about supporting the Syrian rebel groups, and seems more interested in negotiations than overthrowing Assad. Saudi Arabia’s new approach has been to rally support from other countries to help in its bid to remove Assad and counter Iran, and Pakistan is part of it.
> 
> Saudi Arabia is also more threatened by Iran and its nuclear program than the United States is. Iran has increased its influence in Iraq and through Hezbollah in Lebanon, and if Assad stays in power, Iran wins in Syria too. Many in Saudi Arabia and other gulf monarchies are afraid that the so-called Shi‘a crescent—the Iranian sphere of influence—will expand if Assad stays in power, stretching from the Eastern Mediterranean shore to the Persian Gulf. Such fears probably explain why it was so important for Saudi Arabia to put down the predominantly Shi‘a uprising in Bahrain. The presence of a Shi‘a minority inside Saudi Arabia, concentrated in the restive, oil-rich eastern province, also threatens the regime. Of course, the Iranian-Saudi rivalry isn’t just a political one; the “Shi‘a crescent” also highlights the dangerous fault line between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shi‘a Iran. Both are theocratic regimes, and their claim to religious orthodoxy is an important part of their domestic legitimacy. Their sectarian differences compel them to view each other as heretical.
> 
> Meanwhile, the possibility of a rapprochement between the United States and Iran has made the Saudi leadership feel more isolated and vulnerable. The Saudis fear that the United States is willing to accept Iran’s position as regional leader if Iran remains a threshold state, just below the level of having nuclear weapons. This would be a horrible status quo for the Saudis, because it would mean conceding regional hegemony to Iran.
> 
> When it comes to Iran’s nuclear weapons, the Saudis are probably less worried. Saudi Arabia is widely believed to have helped finance Pakistan’s nuclear program, and there are plenty of reports that say Pakistan is ready to ship nukes to Saudi when needed. Generally speaking, Saudi Arabia believes that a Sunni Pakistan hostile to Iran would offset Iran’s large population and powerful military. Pakistan has an insecure military with a fortress mentality, and also is ready to play the anti-Shi‘a card in local politics, making it quite a suitable partner for the Sheikhs.
> 
> These geopolitical machinations should, ideally, be none of Pakistan’s concern. Syria is a long way away from Pakistan, and whatever happens there doesn’t really affect it. And as far as the Sunni-Shi‘a fault line is concerned, Pakistan also has a sizable Shi‘a population—around 20 percent of the country and second only to Iran’s—so it ought not to bend this way or that. This isn’t just a moral argument. As sectarian violence in Pakistan rises, many analysts in both Pakistan and Washington think that Sunni-Shi‘a violence poses a greater threat than the Taliban, and that it will inevitably intensify now that the state has picked a side.
> 
> Like any two neighbors, Iran and Pakistan have interests that align and diverge. They align in the region of Balochistan, which is contiguous to both of them. A nationalist insurgency there threatens both states, and there is room for cooperation to deal with it. There’s also a cultural and religious affinity. Thousands of Shi‘a pilgrims make the journey to Iran every year to visit Shi‘ism’s holy shrines, and Urdu, Pakistan’s national language, borrows heavily from Persian. In fact, Persian was the court language during the Mughal era, and is held in high esteem in Pakistani literary circles.
> 
> Pakistan had also been working with Iran to solve its energy crisis. The two countries had agreed to construct a pipeline that would transport Iranian natural gas directly to Pakistan. It was a mutually beneficial deal. In the face of growing sanctions, Iran found an outlet to export gas to, and Pakistan found a cheap, plentiful supply of gas. Counter-intuitively, the deal looked more promising when the U.S. opposed it. Before the interim deal that froze the Iranian nuclear program in exchange for a let-up on sanctions, Iran was desperate to sell its gas. Pakistan’s ties with the United States were also at rock-bottom, and it was more than willing to defy America if it meant mitigating its energy crisis.
> 
> Since the improvement in U.S.-Iran relations reduced sanctions pressure, however, Iran is less eager to sell gas to Pakistan, and Pakistan is less able to afford the pipeline. Iran cancelled a $500 million loan to Pakistan to construct its side of the pipeline, ensuring that Pakistan would fall back on its part of the deal. Concurrently, India emerged as a willing buyer of Iranian gas, and there’s already talk of bypassing Pakistan by building an underwater pipeline directly to India. India has a bigger appetite—and wallet—for Iranian gas. It has also been investing in the Iranian port of Chabahar so that its goods can bypass Pakistan to access Afghanistan and Central Asia. Pakistan’s disgruntlement with Iran, then, doesn’t come as surprise, since Iran chose India over Pakistan as a viable trading partner.
> 
> Pakistan and Iran also have divergent interests regarding who will control Afghanistan after American troops leave. Pakistan continues to support the Pushtun, Sunni Afghan Taliban, while Iran backs the Shi‘a, Persian-speaking sections. If a conflict between them escalates, as many predict, after the withdrawal, then relations between Pakistan and Iran may get worse. Neither Pakistan nor Iran should want that, whatever their interests in Afghanistan.
> 
> Recently, a series of events, culminating in reported cross-border shelling, has endangered not just the pipeline, but the Pakistan-Iranian relationship itself. After five Iranian border troops were kidnapped by a militant group and allegedly taken to Pakistan, the Iranian foreign office said that it would venture into Pakistani territory to retrieve the troops if they have to. Anti-Shi‘a groups started demonstrating outside the Iranian consulate in Karachi against “Iranian-sponsored terrorism.” Then, there was an attempted suicide attack outside the Iranian consulate in Peshawar, which killed three guards. On Wednesday, February 26th shelling took place. As border tensions escalate, one can only see further militarization and a shift from friendship to hostility.
> 
> By exchanging the pipeline for subsidized Gulf gas, Pakistan may think it has made a reasonable decision, but it is already paying the price for getting entangled in a struggle it ought to have kept clear of, and may have to pay even more in the future. Pakistan is further alienating its Shi‘a population, which is already being persecuted by sectarian groups. In recent years, attacks against Shi‘as have dramatically increased, including the horrific bombings in Quetta last year that killed 200 people altogether. Anti-Shi‘a groups like Lashkar-i-Jhangvi and Sipah-i-Sahaba have grown in both numbers and popularity.
> 
> Saudi Arabia has been funneling large sums of money into Pakistan since the 1970s to promote its puritanical, anti-Shi‘a strand of Wahhabi Islam, and is partially to blame for the rise in sectarian tension, if not outright attacks. With Pakistan’s further commitment of Saudi petrodollars, and by extension, its ideology, Pakistani Shi‘as are right to worry about their future. In fact, most Pakistanis should worry. Pakistani Shi‘as live all over the country, and are well-integrated in cities and villages. If conflict escalates, the fighting will take place on the streets of Karachi, Lahore, Quetta, and the plains of Punjab.
> 
> A wider Sunni-Shi‘a conflict within Pakistan is more dangerous to national security than an Afghanistan under Iranian influence. In fact, one can see this conflict spilling over already. Throughout this year and the last, there have been many tit-for-tat murders of Sunni and Shi‘a clerics. The riots that took place during the holy days of Ashura, sacred particularly for Shi‘as, are glimpse of how bad things could get in the future. Radicals on both sides continue to draw further appeal, as evidenced by the rise of the anti-Shi‘a Sipah-i-Sahaba and the anti-Sunni Tehrik-i-Jafaria. A radicalized Shi‘a population will then inevitably look to Iran for support.
> 
> Finally, Pakistan simply cannot afford to have a hostile Iran on its western frontier. Amid a heavy deployment of troops and artillery in the east (India), north (Kashmir) and northwest (Afghanistan), the Pakistani military would have to be even further stretched. Even on its bloated budget, the military cannot effectively maintain and secure its borders against hostile countries and terrorist groups in the northwest, especially when the border is as forbidding, porous and long as the Pakistan-Iran frontier. The Frontier Corps, the law enforcement agency designated to protect the Pakistan-Iran border, is comparatively ill-equipped and poorly trained compared to Pakistan’s other paramilitary organizations. Also, because of the insurgency in Balochistan, they have been mostly tasked with keeping the peace within the province rather than with manning the border. They are hardly in any position to counter Iran.
> 
> So while various geopolitical shifts have made Pakistan-Iranian ties weaker, particularly regarding energy and Afghanistan, many factors should have compelled Pakistan to maintain its neutrality over Syria. It risks a serious escalation of sectarian conflict within the country, and risks starting its own proxy war with Iran in Afghanistan, which, unlike the Saudis, it cannot bankroll.
> 
> Ultimately, Pakistan is giving too much, and getting too little in return. If it is only cheap power and aid that it wants, there are other ways to get them. The United States promised to develop all sources of domestic energy in Pakistan to keep it from building the pipeline with Iran; Pakistan’s distrust of the United States stopped that from happening. With a thaw in relations between Sharif and the Obama Administration, these options should be explored again. Pakistan also has vast coal reserves that it has yet to exploit, and Sharif should court investors to develop them. To his credit, Sharif has diversified his quest for energy. Pakistan is importing subsidized natural gas from Qatar, and is working with the Chinese to develop more nuclear power plants. Given this diversification, he should know that Saudi Arabia’s energy offer cannot be the be all, end all of Pakistan’s energy policy. It may sound appealing, but it will cost Pakistan its ties with Iran—ties it cannot afford to lose.
> 
> Pakistan, broke and desperate, doesn’t have a strong hand to play. Pakistani foreign policy may have doomed the houbara bustard, but it isn’t too late to salvage its national security or the security of the wider region.


----------



## CougarKing

More on why the US/west should not trust this nominal ally in the war on terror:

Yahoo News



> *'Double dealing': How Pakistan hid Osama Bin Laden from the U.S. and fueled the war in Afghanistan*
> 
> By Martha Raddatz, Richard Coolidge & Jordyn Phelps
> 6 hours ago
> 
> Power Players
> 
> the Radar
> 
> What if the United States has been waging the wrong war against the wrong enemy for the last 13 years in Afghanistan?
> 
> *Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times journalist Carlotta Gall, who spent more than a decade covering Afghanistan since 2001, concludes just that in her new book, “The Wrong Enemy: America in Afghanistan, 2001-2014.”
> 
> Gall told “On the Radar” that Pakistan – not Afghanistan – has been the United States’ real enemy.*
> 
> “Instead of fighting a very grim and tough war which was very high in casualties on Afghans, as well as NATO and American soldiers, the problem wasn't in the Afghan villages,” Gall said. “The source of the problem, the radicalization, the sponsoring of the insurgency, was all happening in Pakistan.”
> 
> Gall said she first had the realization that Pakistan was fueling the insurgency in Afghanistan “very soon” after the Sept. 11 attacks.
> 
> “I went to Quetta and found Taliban resting up there and regrouping,” she said. “They had assistance, some of them talked about being forced and threatened and told to go in and fight the Americans … and when you're there, on the ground, seeing every bombing, the suicide bombing had started, the insurgency that grew, and you investigate where it's coming from, it kept leading back to Pakistan.”
> 
> *Gall said that Pakistan’s leaders, and especially former President Pervez Musharraf, were “very clever” and tricked the United States into believing that Pakistan was an ally.*
> 
> “I think the politicians, not all of them, but the diplomats … it took ages for them to understand that actually the persuasion wasn't working; the engagement wasn't bringing them on board; they were actually double dealing,” she said. “And now diplomats will tell you very plainly, ‘Yes, Musharraf was double dealing.’”
> 
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## tomahawk6

The gist of the article seemed to me to be an attempt to put a wedge between the US and Pakistan.What the article fails to cover is that yes the ISI protected Bin Laden,but Pakistan also suffered from Taliban attacks on security forces.The real prize for Al Qaeda would have been overthrowing the Pakistani government and gaining control of the nukes.


----------



## CougarKing

...and speaking of Bin Laden. This update should make us in the west question whether a nominal alliance with Pakistan- where many idolize Bin Laden- is even worth it. "Keep one's friends close, but keeping one's enemies closer"? At one point does "playing with fire" become too hazardous? 

Military.com



> *Pakistani Madrassa Names Library After Bin Laden*
> 
> Associated Press | Apr 18, 2014 | by Munir Ahmed
> 
> ISLAMABAD — Most didn't notice the new library at this Islamic seminary for girls near Pakistan's capital, until locals saw the paper sign in Urdu posted on its wooden door: "Library of Osama bin Laden, the Martyr."
> 
> *Cleric Maulana Abdul Aziz, a radical preacher who runs the Jamia Hafsa madrassa, wanted to honor the memory of the al-Qaida leader, killed in a May 2011 raid by U.S. Navy SEALs on his hiding place in Abbottabad, a garrison town about 125 kilometers (75 miles) north of the capital, Islamabad.
> 
> But while the library's name has garnered attention across Pakistan, a country where public opinion remains strongly anti-American and religious students today still idolize the man behind the Sept. 11 terror attacks, his image increasingly has faded from public view in recent years.* As Pakistan has seen thousands killed in its own war against its local Taliban, a public that once named its own children after the Saudi millionaire has grown increasingly angry with militant violence.
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## CougarKing

One of the larger airports in that country is under attack...


Yahoo News



> *Pakistan's Karachi airport under attack: officials*
> AFP
> 2 hours ago
> 
> Karachi (AFP) - Heavily armed militants attacked Pakistan's busiest airport in the southern city of Karachi Sunday night, forcing the suspension of all flights, officials said.
> 
> Senior police official Rao Muhammad Anwar said the militants were armed with automatic weapons and grenades and were exchanging gunfire with security officials.
> 
> "Exchange of fire is continuing. We don't know the exact number of the attackers but suspect four to six terrorists have attacked the airport," he said.
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## tomahawk6

The Taliban want to control Pakistan and its nuclear weapons.Pakistan will reap what they have sown.


----------



## George Wallace

Reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from the _Globe and Mail_:

LINK



> CTV NEWS
> 
> Five dead after gunmen attack Karachi's international airport
> 
> Adil Jawad, The Associated Press
> Published Sunday, June 8, 2014 4:15PM EDT
> Last Updated Sunday, June 8, 2014 6:20PM EDT
> 
> KARACHI, Pakistan -- Gunmen disguised as police guards stormed an airport terminal used for VIPs and cargo in Pakistan's largest city Sunday night, killing at least nine people as explosions echoed into night, officials said.
> 
> Meanwhile, suicide bombers in southwestern Pakistan killed 23 Shiite pilgrims returning from Iran in a separate incident, underscoring how fragile security is Pakistan.
> 
> The airport attack still was ongoing early Monday in Karachi, a sprawling port city on the southern coast of Pakistan, although officials said all the passengers had been evacuated. Heavy gunfire and at least two large explosions could be heard coming from the terminal at Jinnah International Airport as authorities scrambled to secure the area.
> 
> Dr. Seemi Jamali from Jinnah Hospital in Karachi said nine bodies had been brought so far to the hospital from the fighting. She said seven were from the Airport Security Force personnel, one was an employee of the Civil Aviation Authority and another was from the state-run Pakistan International Airlines.
> 
> Gunmen attacked the terminal late Sunday, said Shaukat Jamal, a spokesman for the Airport Security Force. A major fire rose from the airport, with the silhouette of jets seen.
> 
> Jamal said the Pakistani military had been called in and that police were fighting the attackers.
> 
> The attack happened at a terminal not generally used for commercial flights but for special VIP flights and for cargo.
> 
> "I was working at my office when I heard big blasts -- several blasts -- and then there were heavy gunshots," Sarmad Hussain, a PIA employee, told The Associated Press after escaping the building. He said he and a colleague jumped out one of the windows to get away, and his colleague broke his leg.
> 
> When Hussain came out of the building, he said he saw smoke billowing from the terminal.
> 
> Jamal, the ASF official, said army commandos have confined the attackers to a maintenance area, and that they hadn't been able to get onto the tarmac.
> 
> Jamal said the police and army commandos were still fighting with the attackers. He said he was not sure how many attackers there were nor whether any of them had been killed.
> 
> An official who spoke to journalists near the airport said at least some of the militants were wearing Airport Security Force uniforms and all were strapped with explosives. He said one of them tried to capture a vehicle used by the Civil Aviation Authority and when a guard shot at him, the explosives strapped to his body went off. The official said another attacker also blew up after being shot at by security forces.
> 
> He said he had seen the bodies of three attackers and that an additional three or four attackers were believed to be alive. The official described himself as being with one of the country's intelligence agencies but declined to give his name.
> 
> The country's military said in a statement that all the passengers had been evacuated and that three gunmen had been killed.
> At least two domestic flights have been diverted and all flight operations had been suspended at the airport. A spokesman for the Civil Aviation Authority said the airport would be closed until at least Monday night.
> 
> Karachi is Pakistan's largest city and has been the site of frequent militant attacks in the past. It is the country's economic heart and any militant activity targeting the airport likely would strike a heavy blow at foreign investment in the country.
> 
> In May 2011, militants waged an 18-hour siege at a naval base in Karachi, killing 10 people in an assault that deeply embarrassed its armed forces.
> 
> There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Sunday night's attack. Pakistan's government has been trying to negotiate a peace deal with local Taliban fighters and other militants mostly based in the northwest who have been waging war against the government. But the talks have had little success, raising fears of a backlash of attacks across the country.
> 
> Security officials in Karachi had feared that if the talks broke down, their city would be a likely spot for militant groups to strike back as the Pakistani Taliban and their allies increasingly have gained a foothold in the city in recent years.
> 
> In the suicide bombing, four bombers targeted Shiite pilgrims staying at a hotel in the town of Tuftan near the Iranian border, said Baluchistan Home Minister Mir Sarfraz Bugti. One bomber was killed by security officials travelling with the pilgrims, but the other three managed to get inside the hotel where they blew themselves up in an attack that also wounded 10 people, he said.
> 
> It wasn't immediately clear whether there was a connection between the airport assault and the Baluchistan attack.
> 
> Associated Press writer Abdul Sattar in Quetta, Pakistan, contributed to this report.


----------



## jollyjacktar

tomahawk6 said:
			
		

> The Taliban want to control Pakistan and its nuclear weapons.Pakistan will reap what they have sown.


How true.  They deserve each other.


----------



## CougarKing

More violence at another Pakistani airport:

Reuters



> *Gunmen fire on plane at Pakistan's Peshawar airport*
> BY JIBRAN AHMAD
> PESHAWAR Pakistan Tue Jun 24, 2014 8:28pm EDT
> 
> (...FULL ARTICLE AT LINK ABOVE)


----------



## CougarKing

A change in government or coup under way?

Defense News



> *Military Secures Sensitive Sites in Pakistan Capital; Political Instability Grows*
> Aug. 19, 2014 - 06:52PM   |   By USMAN ANSARI
> 
> ISLAMABAD — The Army has assumed security responsibility of the sensitive “Red Zone” in Pakistan’s capital as opposition forces camped out in the capital enter it demanding the government’s resignation.
> 
> *Some 55,000 supporters of populist opposition politician Imran Khan’s Movement for Justice Party (PTI), and cleric Tahir ul Qadri’s of the Pakistan People’s Movement (PAT), have been in the capital since the night of Aug.14. Both demand the resignation of the government on unproven vote-rigging allegations in last year’s election, and claims of widespread corruption and mismanagement.*
> 
> As reports of isolated clashes with the police emerge, and the fear of bloodshed increases, analysts are concerned the military could stage a coup to restore security.
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## CougarKing

While the world's eyes are focused mainly on Iraq, Syria and Ukraine in the past few weeks, the political crisis in Pakistan continues...

*Reuters video: "The Battle for control in Pakistan"*



> *The battle for control in Pakistan*
> 1:04pm EDT - 01:30
> 
> Pakistan's prime minister, weakened by weeks of opposition protests calling for him to resign, distances himself from an army move to intervene in the crisis. Deborah Lutterbeck reports.


----------



## CougarKing

A waterborne terror attack? Reminds me of the attack on the USS Cole in 2000.

Defense News



> *Pakistan Navy Foils Terrorist Attack on Naval Base*
> Sep. 9, 2014 - 05:40PM   |   By USMAN ANSARI
> 
> ISLAMABAD — *The Pakistan Navy last night revealed it had foiled a waterborne terrorist attack on a naval facility in Karachi on Sept. 6, killing two of the attackers and apprehending four more. However, a Navy petty officer was killed in the attack, and an officer and six sailors lightly wounded.*
> 
> The attack on the Pakistan Navy Dockyard is the first time that a naval facility in Pakistan has been attacked by terrorists from the sea.
> 
> Though armed with grenades and assault rifles, they could have done considerable damage to any naval assets with the rocket-propelled grenades they were carrying if they had had the opportunity.
> 
> According to a Navy spokesman, the interrogation of the apprehended terrorists resulted in the apprehension of a number of accomplices elsewhere, which may explain the delay in reporting the attack.
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## jollyjacktar

Here's hoping their interrogation was conducted with the utmost vigor and gusto.


----------



## CougarKing

For those wondering about Pakistani Army's COIN campaign against the Taliban in Waziristan:

Defense News



> *Pakistani Official: Waziristan Operations Close to Finished*
> Sep. 9, 2014 - 03:45AM   |   By AARON MEHTA
> 
> WASHINGTON — *Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States told an audience Tuesday that his country is about a month away from finishing its operations in North Waziristan.*
> 
> “I am pleased to share that the operations against extremists and terrorists in North Waziristan have been a huge success,” Ambassador Jalil Abbas Jilani said. “We are absolutely confident that in the next four to five weeks we will be able to clear the entire area of all these elements, and this is something that enjoys the overwhelming support of the people of Pakistan.”
> 
> Jilani’s comments came during a celebration of Pakistan’s annual Armed Forces Day, held at that nation’s embassy in Washington, DC.
> 
> *In June, Pakistan began a major military operation, dubbed Operation Zarb-e-Azb, in the North Waziristan region of its country. Located on the border with Afghanistan, North Waziristan has been a haven for insurgent activities.*
> 
> (...EDITED)


----------



## CougarKing

It seems that these Al Qaeda terrorists who made the attack described 2 posts above actually intended to storm what they thought was a US aircraft carrier, only to find a Pakistani warship in the same anchorage.  :facepalm:

Huffington Post



> The first ever attack by the newly-announced Indian Subcontinent branch of Al Qaeda went really, really poorly. The attack launched last Saturday In Pakistan seems to have targeted the wrong ship.
> 
> *Fighters of the Islamic terror group branch that was unveiled two weeks ago had planned to storm an American aircraft carrier at a Karachi port, but found a Pakistani Navy ship in its place, The Telegraph reports. The attackers suffered heavy casualties as the Pakistani Navy easily overpowered their attempt.* Three of the Al Qaeda fighters were killed and seven were arrested according to Pakistani officials. Two Pakistani Naval guards were wounded.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


----------



## CougarKing

Al-Qaeda sympathizers within the Pakistani Navy helped militants in the attack described above:

Reuters



> *In al Qaeda attack, lines between Pakistan military, militants blur*
> 
> By Syed Raza Hassan and Katharine Houreld
> 
> KARACHI Pakistan/ISLAMABAD (Reuters) - Months after Owais Jakhrani was sacked from the Pakistan navy for radical Islamist views, he led an audacious mission to take over a warship and turn its guns on a U.S. naval vessel in the open seas.
> 
> The early September dawn raid at a naval base in the southern city of Karachi was thwarted, but not before Jakhrani,* two officers and an unidentified fourth assailant snuck past a patrol boat in a dinghy and engaged in an intense firefight on or around the ship.
> 
> Four people were killed in the attempt to hijack the warship Zulfiqar, including Jakhrani and two accomplices, who were serving sub-lieutenants, according to police reports seen by Reuters.
> 
> Officials are divided about how much support the young man in his mid-20s had from inside the navy. They also stress that Jakhrani and his accomplices were a long way from achieving their aim when they were killed.*
> 
> But the attack, claimed by al Qaeda's newly created South Asian wing, has highlighted the threat of militant infiltration into Pakistan's nuclear-armed military.
> 
> The issue is a sensitive one for Pakistan's armed forces, which have received billions of dollars of U.S. aid since 2001 when they joined Washington's global campaign against al Qaeda.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


----------



## CougarKing

A horrifying attack...

CNN 



> *At least 126, mostly children, slaughtered as Taliban storm Pakistan school*
> By Sophia Saifi and Greg Botelho, CNN
> December 16, 2014 -- Updated 1251 GMT (2051 HKT)
> 
> Islamabad, Pakistan (CNN) -- The Taliban stormed a military-run school in northwest Pakistan on Tuesday, gunning down at least 126 people -- most of them children -- in one of the volatile Asian nation's deadliest attacks.
> 
> Hours after the attack, Pakistani troops were still exchanging gunfire with the militants inside the Army Public School and Degree College in the violence-plagued city of Peshawar, about 120 kilometers (75 miles) from the country's capital, Islamabad.
> 
> Two explosions were also heard.
> 
> By around 4 p.m. (6 a.m. ET), the Pakistani military had pushed the attackers back to four blocks of the school, military spokesman Gen. Asim BajwaI tweeted. BajwaI over an hour later said that six assailants had been killed.
> 
> It was unclear, by then, how many of the hundreds of students at the co-ed school -- which is for children of army personnel and has a capacity of 1,000 -- were still inside, not to mention how many more were dead or alive. More than 100 people were injured, ministers in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province said.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)
> 
> The military offensive in the region has spurred deadly retaliations.
> 
> Mohammed Khurrassani, a TTP spokesman, told CNN that the latest attack was revenge for the killing of hundreds of innocent tribesmen during repeated army operations in provinces including South Waziristan, North Waziristan and the Khyber Agency.


----------



## Colin Parkinson

The sole purpose of this attack is to kill children and they want to rule a country....


----------



## Rifleman62

ColinP: 





> The sole purpose of this attack is to kill children and they want to rule a country the World....


----------



## Retired AF Guy

May be the stick that finally breaks the camels back. The Taliban may rue the day they ever carried out this attack.


----------



## Edward Campbell

Retired AF Guy said:
			
		

> May be the stick that finally breaks the camels back. The Taliban may rue the day they ever carried out this attack.




Maybe, even hopefully, but, _in my opinion_, unlikely ... there are too many people in that region, stretching from Morocco on the Atlantic coast of Africa all the way to Indonesia, who will actually approve of steps aimed at returning the world to the 7th century and too many more who, from fear or indifference, will not object. Those "too, too manys" are not a majority, I'm reasonably comfortable with the notion that most Muslims oppose the Taliban and IS** and so on, but they, the "too manys" are enough provide a firm base of support for the _Wahhabis_ and their spawn.

I am 100% certain that I do not understand Africa, the Middle East, and South West Asia ... I doubt there are more than a few hundred Westerners who actually do, and few of them are ever given a voice in Washington or London, Ottawa or Canberra ... not even him:






Bernard Lewis ... University of London,* Royal Armoured Corps,** Princeton, Cornell, etc

_____
*   PhD
** Cpl


----------



## The Bread Guy

Interesting response from the Afghan Taliban franchise (statement attached) ....


> An attack has occurred on a school in the city of Peshawar in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province of Pakistan this morning at around 10:00 am local time. Information from the area suggests that so far some 200 people have been killed and wounded in the incident most of whom are said to be children.
> 
> The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan expresses its condolences over the incident and mourns with the families of killed children.
> 
> The intentional killing of innocent people, women and children goes against the principles of Islam and every Islamic government and movement must adhere to this fundamental essence.
> 
> The Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan has always condemned the killing of children and innocent people at every juncture. Messages of condolences were also released a while back regarding the blasts at a playground in Yahya Khel district of Paktika province and a mosque in Nangarhar province and those acts were considered against the principles of Islam.


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## jollyjacktar

That's rich,  coming from the likes of those turd tampers.  How many untold innocent people have they butchered?


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## George Wallace

Let's see.  In a Region where feuds, "Honour Killings", and retaliation in the name of revenge is common; do you really think it is a good idea to kill family members of members of the nations military?  How big a hornets nest do you want to stir with your stick?


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## a_majoor

Coming to grips with groups like the Taliban will be difficult in Pakistan (despite the horror and desire for revenge that such actions like killing schoolchildren evokes) because at the heart, Pakistan is internally divided and a large faction of Pakistan's power brokers actually created and to a certain extent condone and control what the terrorists do:

http://theweek.com/article/index/273946/why-pakistan-wont-hunt-down-the-terrorists-within-its-borders



> *Why Pakistan won't hunt down the terrorists within its borders Pakistan's civilian leaders are terrified of the country's real power brokers*
> By Shikha Dalmia | December 19, 2014
> 
> 
> If there is anything approaching a silver lining in the horrific slaughter of 132 school children in Peshawar, it is the united outrage in Pakistan against Tehreek-e-Taliban (or the Pakistan Taliban) that perpetrated this gruesome attack. Virtually every newspaper in the country — left, right, and center — demanded that the Pakistani establishment declare a "zero tolerance" policy toward all Islamist terrorists, no ifs, ands, or buts.
> 
> Pakistan's largest English-language newspaper, The News, asked Pakistanis to think about what support for Islamist extremists has done to them. "Nothing matters more than ending the militancy and brutality it has brought to our society." Dawn, Pakistan's oldest newspaper, editorialized that military and counterterrorism operations will amount to "little more than firefighting unless there's an attempt to attack the ideological roots of militancy and societal reach of militants." The liberal Daily Times demanded a "chapter-turning decision" that brings a "final end to this terror."
> 
> But the most scathing was The Nation, which excoriated Pakistani leaders by name, reserving special scorn for Gen. Raheel Sharif, a bold move given that the terrorists had deliberately targeted an army-run school, and that many of the kids killed at point-blank range came from army families, as did the school principal, who was torched alive. "The country is reaping what it [the army] has sown over decades," the newspaper deplored.
> 
> This is absolutely correct. But the problem is that the mindset that sowed this poisonous fruit will make it difficult to root it out. Hence, these newspapers' noble calls are unlikely to be heeded.
> 
> Regimes change course only when the cost of maintaining the status quo exceeds the cost of enacting change. This is not to minimize the cost of scores of innocent young lives. But to Pakistan's political leaders, the price of these children's lives is still lower than the toll of a veritable civil war with an intelligence service that has long played footsie with extremist groups it finds geopolitically useful.
> 
> Ever since its inception over six decades ago, Pakistan has been obsessed with countering its neighbor, India. Some fear is obviously warranted given that nuclear-armed India is six times bigger in both size and population, and its predominantly Hindu population has no love lost for Pakistan. But Pakistan's fears have taken almost pathological proportions. And India's secular democracy has done a relatively decent job of keeping its own belligerence in check (even when the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party has been in power, although the jury is out on the party's current prime minister, Narendra Modi, who has a track record of tolerating anti-Muslim violence).
> 
> Thanks partly to exaggerated fears about India, Pakistan has built its army and its intelligence arm, the Inter-Intelligence Service (ISI), into all-powerful entities that are scarcely answerable to civilian rulers. Indeed, no Pakistani government can survive without their support. The army and ISI know it, and demand free rein over the nation's foreign and defense priorities.
> 
> They threw in Pakistan's lot with America during the Cold War not because they appreciated American democracy and freedom, but simply as a counterweight to India's alliance with the Soviet Union. But after the U.S.-backed Afghani guerrillas defeated Russian forces in the 1980s, Pakistan helped the Taliban defeat its rivals and take control rather than allowing Kabul to return to secular monarchical rule, lest it ally with India. Furthermore, although Pakistan denies it, ISI has colluded with the Taliban to train and arm Islamist terrorist groups to conduct a proxy war in Kashmir, the Muslim-dominated border state that Pakistan wants to wrest out of India's control.
> 
> This is also why it was vital for ISI to reinstate the Taliban in Afghanistan after NATO forces toppled the group in the wake of 9/11. Even though the Taliban had become a pariah in the world thanks to its retrograde ideology and harboring of al Qaeda, ISI offered it sanctuary, training, camps, expertise, and fundraising advise. "ISI support was critical to the survival and revival of the Taliban after 9/11," notes the Brooking Institute's Bruce Riedel, "just as it was critical to its conquest of Afghanistan in the 1990s."
> 
> ISI even allowed a rump group of Pashtun Taliban fighters driven out of Afghanistan by American forces to settle in North Waziristan and open a Pakistani chapter. Since then, however, this group has chafed at the ignominy of having to live under Pakistani rule and wants to impose sharia on the whole province — if not all of Pakistan.
> 
> Following multiple terrorist attacks, including two particularly deadly assaults against the Marriott Hotel in Islamabad and Pearl Continental in Peshawar — not to mention the shooting of Malala Yousafazi — the Pakistani army finally launched Operation Zarb-e-Azb, or Operation Sword, in June to bring this noxious outfit under control. The Peshawar school attack was its answer to that initiative.
> 
> Pakistan's instinct will be to mount more such initiatives to avenge the carnage. But this won't buy the country enduring relief so long as extremists continue to receive aid and comfort from their Afghani overlords, who themselves are under ISI's protection. For example, Mullah Omar, the Taliban ringleader to whom all Taliban chapters swear fealty and on whose head America has a multimillion-dollar bounty, is widely believed to be holed up in Quetta or Karachi with ISI's blessing. ISI is also in bed with the Afghanistan Taliban's right-arm, the Haqqani network, which allegedly runs its jihadi operations in Kashmir.
> 
> Pakistan can't rid itself of Islamist terrorists without going after their ISI protectors. However, it is hard to see how the country's civilian rulers — who serve at the pleasure of the army and ISI — can undertake such a task and still survive to tell the tale.
> 
> The first thing they would have to do is dial down the India threat and turn their back on the jihadi outfits that have terrorized their neighbor, even if that means defying ISI. That they are far from ready to do so became abundantly clear on Thursday morning, when a Pakistani court handed bail to the mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai attack.
> 
> Enduring periodic mass casualties, even of young children, ultimately might be less politically painful to Pakistani rulers than taking on powerful defense and intelligence interests that thrive on playing "good terrorist" and "bad terrorist." Sadly, Peshawar probably isn't the last tragedy of this scale on Pakistani soil.


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## CougarKing

Seems Pakistan's power infrastructure is more vulnerable than previously thought...

Sky News



> *Attack Leaves 80% Of Pakistan Without Power*
> 
> Millions of homes have been plunged into darkness following one of the worst blackouts in Pakistan's history.
> 
> *More than 140 million people - up to 80% of the population - lost electricity after militants attacked a transmission tower and caused a massive power surge.*
> 
> Earlier today, disruption had been reported at Lahore's international airport, and two nuclear power plants remain offline.
> 
> Pakistan's Energy Minister tweeted: "On the Prime Minister's directive, we are not to sleep until this problem is resolved."
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

A hard choice taken by POTUS that needed to be done? 

Reuters



> *U.S. strike inadvertently killed U.S., Italian hostages; Obama apologizes*
> 
> By Will Dunham and Julia Edwards
> 
> WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. drone strike in January targeting *an al Qaeda compound in Pakistan near the Afghan border* inadvertently killed an American and an Italian who had been held hostage for years by the group, U.S. officials said on Thursday.
> 
> President Barack Obama apologized and took "full responsibility" for all counterterrorism operations, including this one.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

The first step in correcting a mistake made by US/West in working with this nominal ally in the first place?

Diplomat



> *US Set to Suspend Military Aid to Pakistan*
> 
> The U.S. government will withhold certification of Pakistan’s counter-terrorism operations against the Haqqani network.
> 
> By Ankit Panda
> August 21, 2015
> 
> The United States government will not certify Pakistan’s counter-terrorism operations in North Waziristan over recent months as adequately damaging to the Haqqani network, a U.S.-designated terror group. The U.S. Department of Defense has reportedly notified the Pakistani embassy in Washington of the development, according to a report by Dawn. *The non-certification of the Pakistani counter-terror campaign, known as Operation Zarb-e-Azb, will block the release of a new tranche of U.S. financial assistance for the Pakistani military from the Coalition Support Fund (CSF). *CSF support had been extended for a year with a specific stipulation that the U.S. Department of Defense would certify the effectiveness of Pakistani military operations in North Waziristan against the Haqqani network.
> 
> The development would drive a major wedge between the United States and Pakistan, two allies who have grown apart over their divergent interests and priorities in stabilizing the broader Afghan-Pakistan border. Beyond the financial implications of the blocked CSF tranche, the development will deal Islamabad a politically damaging blow. As the Dawn report notes, given the recent deterioration in ties with Kabul amid allegations from the Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, that Pakistani has inadequately reigned in cross-border terrorists, including militants affiliated with the Haqqani network, the U.S. government’s decision to withhold certification vindicate Afghan perceptions.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

The nightmare scenario of nuclear-armed terrorists revisited:

Reuters



> *Obama to discuss nuclear security concerns with Pakistan*
> Thu Oct 15, 2015 6:39pm EDT
> 
> By David Brunnstrom
> 
> WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States will discuss concerns about the security of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal during a visit to Washington next week by Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, the White House said on Thursday.
> 
> The News York Times reported on Thursday that the *Obama administration was concerned that Pakistan might be on the verge of deploying a small tactical nuclear weapon that would be harder to protect from falling into hands of militants.*
> 
> The paper said the administration was also seeking to prevent Pakistan deploying missiles that could reach beyond its main foe India, and was thus exploring a possible deal to limit the Pakistani arsenal that could involve relaxing restrictions on access to nuclear technology.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

Militant Chinese Uighurs in Pakistan:

Diplomat



> *Pakistan Announces That It Has Defeated ETIM. So What?*
> 
> In a bid to please China, Pakistan says it has defeated a major Uyghur militant group within its borders.
> 20150704_200326
> By Benjamin David Baker
> October 22, 2015
> 
> Pakistan is known for being a refuge for transnational terrorism. The Taliban has long used the country’s inaccessible border regions as staging points for cross-border strikes into Afghanistan, and Osama bin Laden was killed in a compound just outside of Abbottabad.
> 
> Pakistani society has been fairly ambivalent about its relationship with Islamic extremist groups. As The Diplomat’s cover issue this month shows, various factions within Pakistan have different feelings about organizations such as the Pakistani Taliban, the Tehrik-i-Taliban.
> 
> Two political parties, Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan and Jamiat-e-Ulema Pakistan, have a history of being sympathetic towards violent Islamic groups. Other Pakistani organizations, notably the military under the command of General Raheel Sharif, have tried to stamp out armed Islamic extremist groups in the country.
> 
> One such organization is the East Turkestan Independence Movement (ETIM). This group, which is an umbrella organization for numerous extremist groups fighting for the independence of China’s western Xinjiang province, is aligned with al-Qaeda and is responsible for several terror attacks throughout China in the last decade. These include a car bomb attack in Beijing, a police station raid in Lukqun (both in 2013), and. more recently, a deadly attack on a train station in Kunming last year.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

A young Winston Churchill's own experiences of the savagery of war in Pakistan decades ago:

Diplomat



> *How Churchill Fought The Pashtuns in Pakistan*
> 
> Before the Soviets and before the Americans, the British were in Afghanistan.
> 
> By Franz-Stefan Gady
> October 24, 2015
> 
> “Horrible and revolting” – that’s how 22-year-old British cavalry officer turned war correspondent for The Daily Telegraph and Pioneer newspapers, Winston Churchill, described in a dispatch what he saw when entering the ruins of the village of Desemdullah in the Mohmand Valley in British India’s Northwest Frontier (today’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province  in northwestern Pakistan) on the morning of September 22, 1897.
> 
> Pashtun tribesmen had unearthed the 36 bodies of fallen British and Indian soldiers, hastily buried a few days earlier in unmarked graves, and mutilated them beyond recognition. “The tribesmen are among the most miserable and brutal creatures on earth. Their intelligence only enables them to be more cruel, more dangerous, more destructible than the wild beasts. (…) I find it impossible to come to any other conclusion than that, in proportion that these valleys are purged form the pernicious vermin that infest them, so will the happiness of humanity be increased, and the progress of mankind accelerated,” a shaken and sulfurous Churchill jotted down in his notebook that day.
> 
> The Pashtun tribesmen, the forebears to today’s Pashtun insurgents in Afghanistan and Pakistan, had risen against the British in 1897 due to the division of their tribal territory by the Durand line in 1893, as well as the gradual British occupation of Pashtun lands.* They rallied under the leadership of the Pashtun fakir Saidullah, nicknamed “Mad Mullah,” by the British, who declared a “jihad” against British India and rallied more than 10,000 warriors to his cause.*
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

An ISIS foothold in Pakistan?

Diplomat



> *Can ISIS Gain a Foothold in Balochistan?
> 
> There is growing evidence that it is trying to do just that.*
> 
> By Muhammad Akbar Notezai
> January 07, 2016
> 
> On August 28, 2014, Abdul-Rauf Rigi, alleged to be leading a Sunni sectarian organization called Jaish-al-Nasr, was assassinated in Quetta, the provincial capital of Balochistan. The motive for his killing could not be ascertained, but Jaish-al-Nasr had been accused by Iranian officials of carrying out attacks on Iranian Revolutionary Guards. Soon after Rigi’s assassination in Quetta, Iranian Press TV was claiming that he had sworn allegiance to the Islamic State (ISIS).
> 
> A reliable source told The Diplomat that the Jaish-al-Adl is a splinter group of Jundullah, which was spearheaded by Rigi’s brother Abdul-Malik. While on a flight from Dubai to Kyrgyzstan in 2010, Abdul-Malik Rigi was arrested by Iranian authorities and subsequently hanged. The source added that soon after his execution in Iran, Jundullah, which Abdul-Malik Rigi had founded in 2003, split into three groups: the Jaish-al-Adl, the Jaish-al-Nasr, and the Lashker-e-Khorasan.
> 
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

Pakistan ending the Taliban's grip on Waziristan?

Defense News



> *Pakistan Launches Final Drive on Taliban Bastion*
> By Usman Ansari, Defense News 7:41 p.m. EST February 24, 2016
> 
> ISLAMABAD — Pakistan on Wednesday launched a push on the remaining pockets of Pakistani Taliban (TTP) fighters holed up in the remote Shawal Valley bordering Afghanistan. Though the advance had long been expected, the timing was surprising.
> 
> News of the assault came from the military’s Inter Services Public Relations media branch as the head of the army, Chief of Army Staff (COAS) Gen. Raheel Sharif, flew to the Shawal Valley to meet troops stationed in forward areas before ordering the operation to commence.
> 
> Addressing the troops, Sharif said: “The sacrifices of the soldiers will not go to waste and we will achieve our ultimate objective of a terror free Pakistan.”
> 
> (....SNIPPED)


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## Kat Stevens

Mostly women and children killed or injured.  Cowardly pricks.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/suicide-bomber-kills-dozens-mostly-women-kids-celebrating-easter-pakistan-n546231


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## CougarKing

A further reminder of why the US should not sell more arms to Pakistan such as that new batch of F16s mentioned in another thread:

Canadian Press



> *Hundreds of Islamic extremists protest in Pakistan's capital*
> 
> Munir Ahmed, The Associated Press
> The Canadian Press
> March 29, 2016
> 
> ISLAMABAD - *Hundreds of Islamic extremists resumed protests in Pakistan's capital on Tuesday over the execution of a man who killed a secular governor*, in a show of defiance amid a government crackdown following a suicide attack two days earlier.
> 
> The rally by Pakistan's Sunni Tehreek group brought more than 10,000 protesters into the streets of Islamabad on Sunday, where they clashed with police. On Tuesday, local police official Mohammad Kashif said some 700 remained, bringing parts of the capital to a standstill.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


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## CougarKing

Al Qaeda in the news again:

Associated Press



> *Pakistan arrests prominent al-Qaida financier*
> Zarar Khan, The Associated Press
> The Canadian Press
> April 25, 2016
> 
> ISLAMABAD - Pakistani authorities have arrested an al-Qaida financier who has been on a U.N. sanctions list since 2012, police said Monday.
> 
> *Abdur Rehman Sindhi* was detained during a raid by intelligence agencies in the southern port city of Karachi last week, said police officer Muqaddas Haider. He said a joint team of police and intelligence agents was questioning the suspect on what role he might have played in militant attacks in Pakistan in recent years.
> 
> Sindhi appeared before a court which allowed the police to interrogate him for two weeks, the police official said. He said he didn't have any evidence so far that the suspect was linked to the U.S. reporter Daniel Pearl's 2002 killing.
> 
> Much of al-Qaida's senior leadership fled to Pakistan following the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of neighbouring Afghanistan.
> 
> (...SNIPPED)


----------

