Developments in Pakistan the past few days could prove to be a blessing in disguise if the United States, NATO, Afghanistan and -- most of all -- the Pakistani government take advantage of the opportunity.
When the Pakistani army raided a militant-held mosque in the usually quiet capital of Islamabad, last week, it signaled a willingness on the part of the government to crack down on radical mullahs and the schools in which they indoctrinate young children, the madrassas. Taliban supporters in the lawless northern sections of Pakistan, who sympathized with the radicals in the mosque, announced that they were ending an agreement with the government that had limited a military presence in their areas. Suicide bombings and many deaths followed over the weekend.
That deal between the government and the militants had brought some relative peace to the region, but at the cost of an unfettered Taliban that rebuilt its strength in order to attack Afghanistan, and the building of new terrorist training camps. Essentially, it was a deal with the devil.
The U.S., which has been less than pleased with the Pakistanis recently, has to convince the government to return security forces to their mountainous frontier in force and clear these people out once and for all. If it comes down to it, we need to threaten to take on the task ourselves.
Our need for Pakistan is debatable at this point. Just after 9/11, we needed the Pakistanis for the simple reason that we had to fly through their airspace to reach the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan. A sometimes cooperative Pakistan in the years since has proven helpful. The obstinate Pakistan in the last year or so, up until last week, was of no use. Our need for the nation's airspace is no longer.
Doubting that the Pakistani government, with a tenuous grip on power, will want to be tossed overboard, I'd say the time is now to play hardball with them.
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There's been a lot of reflecting among political pundits regarding the collapse of the presidential campaign of Arizona Sen. John McCain. The talk has been all strategic. And it's missed the point, for the most part. The problem with McCain hasn't been his ideology, his early spending, or his under-rating of Rudy Giuliani. It's simply his record as a U.S. Senator. He pushed through a campaign finance bill that turned out to be a disaster. He compounded that by supporting an immigration bill that was going to lead to citizenship for 12 million illegal immigrants, plus untold numbers of their relatives. For GOP voters, he was wrong. For the general population, he was wrong on Iraq. Case closed.
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That politics rules the Iraq war was in evidence as Senate leaders were forcing an all-night session to force the GOP to defend the operation. Maybe the commitment of more than a hundred thousand armed services members should be debated in a less haphazard manner. Who knows what an 80-year-old eight-term member of the chamber might say at 4 a.m.? Republicans are no better, with the shameful defections of Pete Domenici of New Mexico and several others. Maybe continuing the fight is a bad idea. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska has said that all along. But why abandon the surge now when it's just started? Yeah, the bill was on the way from the House. Politics.
