[quote="abhishek_sharma"]
Take this pro-Paki trash from C. CHRISTINE FAIR
My reply:
It is possible that Pakistan's military and intelligence agencies succumbed to a profound level of incompetence. But ultimately such speculation is nonproductive. Judgment should be deferred until the numerous investigations are done.
Q: Why defer judgment? Look at it from bin Laden's point of view. Do you seriously think he was willing to risk his life based on a belief in the "profound level of incompetence" of Pakistan's military and intelligence agencies?
Only a few Pakistanis would have known about bin Laden's whereabouts - the temptation to sell out would have hit with probability one if a larger number knew. But what bin Laden had to count on is that anyone who stumbled upon the secret or began investigating the compound in Abbotabad, would be stopped cold in their tracks; i.e., bin Laden's Pakistani partners had to be really high up the food chain, and very powerful.
We now know that she did so even while U.S. intelligence agencies and the White House were gathering a picture of this important al-Qaeda safe-house sprawled out comfortably amidst Pakistan's military and intelligence agencies.
To avoid letting the cat out of the bag?
The threat posed by al-Qaeda and other international and regional terrorist groups is not. The United States must resist all immediate impulses and remain stone-cold focused on the longer term goal of regional stability.
And opening the US checkbook to the Pakistani Army to continue to aid and abet these terrorists mitigates the threat how?
Withdrawing aid from Pakistan would hurt Pakistanis more than the Pakistani Army.
This presupposes that aid to Pakistan reaches Pakistanis and not just the Army, assorted Taliban, LeT types and so on.
Third, even if someone in the Pakistani government helped bin Laden remain in Pakistan undetected, it is highly unlikely that the civilian government was involved.
....It would be a mistake to again punish Pakistan's civilians for the crimes of omission and commission by the security agencies that have done much to vitiate these same institutions.
And continuing US aid to Pakistan aids the supposedly innocent and hapless civilian government just how?
The United States has not yet learned the limits of diplomacy: it cannot engage India strategically (namely, the provision of the civilian nuclear deal) without considering the negative impact on its engagement with Pakistan. After the U.S. civilian-nuclear deal, Pakistan has set its own nuclear machinery into overdrive. It now has the fastest growing arsenal in the world. Equally important, Pakistan will remain a locus of terrorist groups operating in and beyond the South Asia region for time to come.
I.e., succumb to nuclear blackmail - that is the policy you advocate.
Pakistanis have generally been fed anti-American rhetoric infused with a stylized history of bilateral ties and outright fictions.
And this innocent and hapless civilian government that you support has done precisely what to stop this rhetoric??????
Pakistanis have genuine gripes about U.S. policies towards Israel and its treatment of Palestinians, U.S. relations with Middle East dictators and Gulf State autocratic monarchs, and wars to promote democracy while simultaneously bolstering Pakistan's string of military dictators at the expense of its parliamentary democratic moorings.
Why are such gripes genuine or legitimate? If e.g., the US was discriminating against blacks, would the US have a "genuine gripe" against some other country that was doing the same? We all would say "NO", it is utter hypocrisy. How is Pakistani policy in Gilgit-Baltistan or to Baluchistanis different from Israeli policy towards Palestinians? Pakistanis have legitimate gripes about the drone attacks and the violations of their sovereignty. Their gripes about what happens thousands of miles away - Israel, Palestine, Danish cartoons, etc. - are all bakwaas.
The only way to disprove Pakistanis' deepest doubts about U.S. commitment to Pakistanis and their democratic development is to remain focused on the goal of a democratic, civilian-governed Pakistan, however elusive and fraught that goal may be. That is the most likely -- albeit far from certain -- route to a Pakistan that is increasingly at peace with itself and its neighbors.
No, the most likely route to a Pakistan that is at peace with itself may be to disintegrate it. Democratic politics in Pakistan is also always going to be prone to the "I'm more Islamic than you" syndrome. It started even during Jinnah's lifetime with Mamdot and Daultana in the Punjab Muslim League. Dictatorial politics is also prone to the appeal to religious fundamentalism in order to keep the regime in place.
The flaw in the core is the very ideology of Pakistan - its raison d'etre - "Islam will perish from the subcontinent without Pakistan". Or to paraphrase King Farouk of Egypt - to hear Pakistanis talk you would think Islam was invented on August 14, 1947.
Pakistan has long asked for access to U.S. textile markets and has long been denied. It is an absurd commentary upon U.S. legislative functioning that the interests of U.S. textile lobbies have trumped those of U.S. national security interests.
Will WTO rules allow the US to give trade concessions to Pakistan that it can deny to other countries that are just as friendly if not more? Basically, you're advocating - they have nukes, so give them a trade deal you won't give anyone else. Once again your clarion call is - succumb to nuclear blackmail.
...the United States needs to help Pakistanis help themselves.
But what if Pakistanis are neither able nor willing? Then Pakistan itself has to be reconstituted.
I hope this will be a turning point in the right direction. The Pakistani Prime Minister assured me of his will to cooperate 
) who was smuggling weapons into Balochistan and shuttling between Delhi and Kabul.
Only this time it happened to be "Prestige and Dignity" P&D.