Terrorist Islamic Republic of Pakistan (TSP): 29 March 2012

[nachiket]

That paki doctor is an idiot if he did not see this coming. He should have asked for a green-card and covert extraction to khanland before giving the SeeAyeYay any help.

[Rangudu]

That paki doctor is an idiot if he did not see this coming. He should have asked for a green-card and covert extraction to khanland before giving the SeeAyeYay any help.

Apparently he was caught at the Afghan border during a CIA extraction op.

[SureshP]

Rohrabacher on Afridi verdict: ‘Pakistan sees itself at war with US’
By Huma Imtiaz
Published: May 23, 2012

WASHINGTON:
US Congressman Dana Rohrabacher said that Dr Shakil Afridi’s prison sentence is “decisive proof that Pakistan sees itself as being at war” with the US.

In a press statement, Republican Rep. Rohrbacher said, “there is no shared interest against Islamic terrorism. On 9/11, Pakistan was coordinating the efforts of the Taliban who were in league with Osama bin Laden. In 2012, Pakistan is still working very closely with the Taliban, whose leader Mullah Omar was plotting with Bin Laden right up until he was killed, according to documents taken from Bin Laden’s Pakistan home. Pakistan was and remains a terrorist state.”

Rep. Rohrabacher, who is also the chairman for the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, had earlier this year introduced two bills calling for Afridi to be given US citizenship, and that he be awarded the Congressional Gold Medal.

The press release said that the US congressman was “dismayed” that the bill had not been brought to the House floor for a vote. “Dr Afridi came through for the American people, now it is our time to come through for him.”

“Advocates of aid argue we should draw a distinction between the civilian government and the military-intelligence cabal who are supporting terrorist groups that murder Americans, but President [Asif Ali] Zardari’s behavior at the Nato summit in Chicago indicates that he is either in league with the military or under their domination. Any money that goes to Islamabad will continue to end up in the pockets of people actively and deadly hostile to America.

“Secretary Clinton will have to do more than voice protests over the Afridi case. Both the Departments of State and Defense need to take punitive actions against Pakistan. Carrots are not enough when dealing with an adversary. Sticks are needed to prove we are serious. Cutting off aid to the regime while providing support to groups like the Balochi people who are oppressed by Islamabad will send a message that it doesn’t pay to confront America,” said Rep. Rohrabacher.

“Pakistan was invited to the Nato summit to foster cooperation, but no cooperation was evident. Pakistan is still keeping supply lines to Nato forces in Afghanistan blocked. As Nato withdraws, Pakistan sees its chance to increase its use of terrorist groups as its vanguard for taking over Afghanistan and spreading radical Islam throughout the region. We need to enlist Russia and India to support anti-Pakistan forces in Afghanistan such as the Northern Alliance. The Taliban is only the tip of the spear, the real enemy is Pakistan,” he added.

Rep. Rohrabacher’s amendment to the NDAA proposing all aid be cut off to Pakistan was defeated last week in a vote on the House floor.

http://tribune.com.pk/story/383094/rohr ... r-with-us/

[Prem]

Dollars and sense of American desis
Musings of Inbred Poaq
( Jihad is more important than Job and Ejjucation)

Immigrants born in India outdo others in achieving economic success in the Untied States. Pakistan-born immigrants, while trailing behind Indians, do better than the native-born Americans.The estimates reported in the 2010 American Community Survey revealed that the median salaried household income of India-born immigrants was around $94,700. In comparison, the median household income of native-born Americans was estimated at $51,750. Unlike the Pakistan-born immigrants in Canada, who lagged behind others in economic prosperity, Pakistanis in America are relatively thriving where the median household income of Pakistan-born immigrants is 18 per cent higher than that of the native-born Americans.
The American Community Survey for 2010 (latest data available from the US Census Bureau) reveal that amongst South Asians living in the US, India-born immigrants are far ahead of Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, and Afghanis. Even when compared with immigrants from Egypt, a country known for supplying highly educated immigrants to the US, Indians report exceptionally higher indicators of economic progressIndian-born immigrants also reported one of the lowest poverty rates at 4 per cent. Afghanistan-born immigrants reported the highest poverty rate where one in five Afghan immigrants was deemed below the poverty line in the US.
These poverty statistics raise several questions. For instance, despite having similar South Asian heritage, Pakistan-born immigrants report a 2.4-times higher rate of poverty than their Indian counterparts. Furthermore, poverty among younger cohorts (18 years old or younger) is even worse amongst immigrants from Pakistan than from India. At the same time almost 50 per cent of under-18 Afghan immigrants are reportedly below the poverty line in the US. These statistics necessitate the need to explore the reasons behind disparities amongst immigrants from South Asia.I am presenting here a socio-economic comparison of South Asians in the US. I have restricted the reporting to immigrants from India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Afghanistan. This is done because India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and to some extent Afghanistan have more in common in culture and recent history than other countries in South Asia. I have thrown in Egypt for good measure to serve as a control for immigrants from another Muslim country with a different cultural background.It should come as no surprise that immigrants from India are one of the most educated cohort in the United States. Almost 42 per cent of immigrants from India over the age of 25 reported having a graduate (Masters) or a professional degree. In comparison, only 10 per cent of the native-born adults reported having a graduate or professional degree. Approximately 23 per cent of adult immigrants from Egypt and Pakistan reported having a graduate or professional degree.The correlation between higher education attainment and higher median household incomes is explicitly presented in the graph below. India-born immigrants with professional degrees also reported significantly higher incomes than the rest. In comparison, immigrants from Afghanistan with one of the lowest incidence of professional degrees reportedly the lowest median household incomes.In the rest of South Asia, especially in Pakistan and Bangladesh, education has never been a national priority. The results of such conflicting priorities are obvious. Graduates from Indian universities are outdoing others in competitivelabour markets at home and abroad.If education is not made a national priority, the gap between Indians and other South Asians will grow at home and in diaspora

[Prem]

Intellectuals in Pakistan
Inbreeding Intellectual Individuals

If the genuine intellectual is he ‘who not only interprets the world, but actively changes it’, then Pakistan has never been empty of intellectuals.Here myriads of Pakistani intellectuals can be named in every notable field such as history, law, education, science, religion, etc., like Dr Ishtiaq Hussain Qureshi, Mubarak Ali, Justice M.R. Kayani, Justice Rana Bhagwandas, Allama I.I. Kazi, Dr Nabi Bux Baloch, Hakeem Muhammad Saeed, Dr Samar Mubarakmand, Akhter Hameed Khan (social scientist), Mualana Shabbir Ahmad Usmani, Maulana Abul Ala Maududi, Israr Ahmed, Javed Ghamidi, etc.In purely Pakistani products are Aitzaz Ahsan, Ansar Burney, Syed Rehan Azmi (Guinness Book of World Records recorded him as seventh speediest writer of poetry in the world in 1997). The list goes on. The world is glad to recognise this but we are still in self-deception.Another point that the Muslim League did not have high intellectual acumen is no more but display of poor knowledge from the history of Pakistan Movement. Here is the list again: Chaudhry Khaliquzzaman, A.K Fazalul Haq, Chaudhry Muhammad Ali, Ghazanfar Ali Khan, I.I. Chundrigar, Abdur Rab Nishter, Joginder Nath Mandal, M. Zafarullah Khan, Rana Liaquat Ali Khan, Syed Shamsul Hassan, Pir Ali Muhammad Rashdi, Bahadur Yar Jung, Ghulam Ali Kamboh, etc. Were they not intellectual? They were not, if you consider popularity as intellectualship. They are not as popular as Nehru. One can ask whether making a country, creating a nation, building and sustaining a moth-eaten and resourceless state is intellectualship or giving not due share to that country is.Finally, if our country is not on the ‘right track’, it does not mean it has no intelligentsia. We should not place Greece’s national problems as a proof for denial of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle’s wisdom and intellect.Pakistan is not intellectually poor but poorly managed. As far as our comparison with India is concerned, we always find the grass to be greener on the other side.

[Theo_Fidel]

If education is not made a national priority, the gap between Indians and other South Asians will grow at home and in diaspora

Hmmm! I thought it had. What happened to those 4000 phd's in Islamic studies. With such intense social pressure for phds the pureland shall surely rise again...

[RajeshA]

Dollars and sense of American desis

He has thrown in Afghanistan into his comparisons just so that Pakistanis don't look at the bottom of the pit.

[Prem]

Dollars and sense of American desis
He has thrown in Afghanistan into his comparisons just so that Pakistanis don't look at the bottom of the pit.

Paoqs are like Bakras who are aware of the impending Halal Cut yet cant do nothing as they dont want leave the secure cuccoon of their dumbness casued by social and imported ritual practices. 10 yeare of peace in Afghanistan and they will beat Poaqers in every field of education and economy. Indians need to esatblish Afghan software industry just to spite Poaqstan .

[Prem]

Nato summit: what next?
Na Samajuddin A Shaikh
The writer is a former foreign factory

This has not happened in Chicago and will probably not happen in the next few weeks before the Tokyo conference in July where pledges are expected for funding Afghan reconstruction and development. There too it is hard to visualise that the donors will come up with the approximately $6bn a year the Afghans believe they need.Much of the burden will fall on the Americans. First, they have to finance the additional $2bn to $2.5bn annually that the ANSF will need during the 2014 to 2017 period while the drawdown of the ANSF is under way. Second, they will willy-nilly have to make up the shortfall in the Nato contribution — possibly $750m annually. Third, they will have to give $3bn to $4bn annually for Afghan reconstruction if a collapse of the Afghan economy is to be avoided and if the shortfall in contributions from others is to be made up.
One can argue that this is a small price given the $120bn annually that the Americans are now spending on the military presence in Afghanistan. But the mood in America now is such that very few in Congress will be prepared to take on this burden.This does not mean that American forces in Afghanistan post 2014 will not continue their counterterrorism operations within and outside Afghanistan.
The target will be the border between Afghanistan and Pakistan where the Americans are convinced Al Qaeda and its local allies who endorse its global agenda are located. The American intervention in Vietnam was justified by the ‘domino theory’ — if the communists won in Vietnam then all of East Asia would go ‘red’. When public opinion so dictated, this theory was discarded and American allies in South Vietnam were abandoned but only after millions of bombs had devastated neighbouring Laos and Cambodia to destroy the Ho Chi Minh trail.
For Pakistan it would be prudent to assume that this pattern could be repeated in Afghanistan where it can be argued that what remained of the terrorism threat could be controlled through other means.This is one facet of the continued American presence. The other is the pressure it will bring to bear on the Taliban to engage seriously in reconciliation talks with the Karzai administration.To me, the summit suggested that America and its Nato partners, despite the hoopla and the brave words, are quite prepared to cut their losses in Afghanistan and treat it as a lost cause. It is quite conceivable, even in today’s world, that they will in the process wreak the same havoc that impoverished not just Vietnam but also Cambodia and Laos. The equivalent of the Khmer Rouge and the killing fields could easily emerge in this disturbed region. This may be an exaggeration. The global consequences of the creation of such chaos in this region would be horrendous but let us not dismiss the possibility out of hand.So what is the solution? It lies in the words of our president who in his speech at the summit said, “We firmly believe that only an inclusive intra-Afghan dialogue can lead to sustainable peace in Afghanistan”. He also recalled that parliament had said that “foreign fighters and non-state actors seeking to destabilise Afghanistan and the region, if found on our soil, must be expelled”.

[abhijitm]

Huffingtonpost reports
Shakil Afridi, Pakistan Doctor Who Helped Find Osama Bin Laden, Sentenced To Prison
Read comments

[ramana]

^^ Being tough on Afridi makes up for do nothing (Kiyanahi) during the raid.

[Kanishka]

Circulation of FICN in India by Pakistan is an example of how everybody in Pakistan works together in subverting India. The FICN project is handled by the PA/ISI. The GoP imports extra (much above their requirements) currency-standard papers from Europe for this purpose and government's currency printing presses are used to print FICN. The diplomats, PIA and ISI contacts & cells are used to push them into India. Pakistani diplomatic missions in the region such as in Nepal, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Thailand are used for this purpose. There is absolutely no intention on Pakistan's part to seek a normal state-to-state relationship with India. Pakistan will not stop unless and until it brings India down to its knees. It may ( and will) perish in the process but that hardly matters to the momin. There is absolutely no scope for aman with the barbarians.

Printing and/or distributing fake Indian currency is an act of war against India and Pakistan should be made to pay for this. GOI should return the
favor by doing everything it can to damage Pakistan. No stone must be left unturned.

[Prem]

Munter back in Pakistan till conclusion of Nato supply talks
http://dawn.com/2012/05/23/munter-back- ... ply-talks/

ISLAMABAD: United States’ ambassador to Pakistan Cameron Munter, who had earlier decided to quit his post, returned to Pakistan on Wednesday to continue his duties on the directives of the US government, DawnNews reportedEarlier, Munter announced that he had decided not to extend his contract to an extra year and decided to quit Pakistan’s mission after completion of his initial two-year tenure.He had left Pakistan after that announcement two weeks earlier.Pakistan is considered as a hard posting station and while the normal tenure for any ambassador posted here is two years, the incumbent has the option of continuing for another year. Most of the previous ambassadors served here for three years, while quite a few left after two years.Diplomatic sources told DawnNews that the US State department has directed Munter to remain in Islamabad till the completion of ongoing diplomatic negotiations between the two countries.Spokesman of US embassy in Islamabad, Mark Stroh, has confirmed the return of the US ambassador in Islamabad.

[Prem]

Lhali Bhoja Khali Bheja ,Khali Haath Poaqars

Clueless at Chicago

Washington - whose foreign policy for the region is no longer dictated by Foggy Bottom alone, but has major inputs from Pentagon and Langley - managed to outfox Islamabad. The same mandarins, who were behaving like David after firing the biblical slingshot at Goliath’s forehead, like the fable, were willing to have their “heads smacked with a shoe as well as swallow the onions.” The US had carried out its own inquiry into the Salala incident concluding that it was an unfortunate incident, but was triggered by Pakistani troops. One could have poked holes in this incongruous conclusion, since apparently the Salala attack was a premeditated assault where gunship helicopters operated for 150 minutes, targeting Pakistani soldiers akin to a Turkey shoot. But instead of taking the case to the International Court of Justice, we continued our haranguing in the local media only. An emboldened US has now refused to render a formal apology on the tragic incident; it has put its foot down on discontinuing the drone attacks; and Leon Panetta has gone to the extent of stating that he would never agree to Pakistan’s demands of transit fees that he terms exorbitant, citing USA’s poor economy as an excuse. He has conveniently ignored the fact that the same cash-strapped US is paying an arm and a leg for the 6,000-mile-long Northern Distribution Network, but will not pay a fraction for the 500-mile-long supply route through Pakistan.The US State Department spurned Pakistan’s request for President Zardari to meet President Obama in a one-on-one conference, although they briefly met on the sidelines. Also, the meeting with Nato’s Secretary General was missed, but, reportedly, all others apart from President Hamid Karzai were to bear pressure on Pakistan. In an unmistakable snub, the US President left Pakistan off the list of nations he thanked for “getting the war supplies into Afghanistan.” President Zardari, however, maintained his “Cheshire Cat” grin despite the pressure, promising $20 million to Afghanistan from Pakistan’s empty coffers. The presidential spokesman had us believe that Mr Zardari will demand $1 billion at Chicago as compensation for the war on terror, but he remained clueless.

[Charlie]

National Post: Time to call Pakistan what it is — a state supporter of terrorism

Here in the West, the killing of Osama Bin Laden was considered a triumph. In Pakistan, where the al-Qaeda leader lived out his final years, attitudes are very different: On Wednesday, a Pakistani court brought down a guilty verdict against the Pakistani doctor who helped the CIA locate bin Laden in May, 2011. Having been convicted of treason, Shakil Afridi now faces a 33-year prison sentence.

Each story like this brings fresh evidence that Pakistan, a nominal Western ally in the war on terrorism, actually is doing more to enable the jihadis than fight them. We don’t yet have definitive evidence to suggest that the Pakistani military and intelligence establishment was actively housing and protecting bin Laden in the garrison town of Abbottabad. But that certainly would have been in keeping with long-standing Pakistani policies.

And those policies won’t change any time soon: With the Americans, Canadians and others having announced their exit date in Afghanistan, Pakistan has less incentive to co-operate in the war on terrorism than at any time since 9/11. In coming years, the better way to deal with Pakistan will be to acknowledge the reality that the country is nothing less than a full-blown state sponsor of terrorism.

This is not a new idea: It goes back almost 20 years. As former U.S. diplomat Peter Tomsen recently noted in an insightful essay published by the World Policy Institute, George H.W. Bush-era Secretary of State James Baker wrote a letter to Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in 1993, warning him that Pakistan could soon be put on America’s list of terror-sponsoring nations. But the threat proved hollow.

At the time, Pakistan’s spy agency, the ISI, was actively supporting militant groups in Indian Kashmir. To this day, three of those groups — Harakat ul Mujahidin, Lashkar-I Taiba and Jaish-I Mohammad — are on the U.S. State Department’s list of terrorist organizations. Add in the groups that the ISI assists on the Afghanistan front — the Taliban, the Haqqani network, and the Hekmatyar outfit — and it becomes plain that Pakistani spooks effectively are co-ordinating a horizontally diversified terrorist empire spanning three nations.

As Mr. Tomsen argues, the United States — and the West, more generally — shares some of the blame for the expansion of Pakistan’s malign influence. The U.S. diplomat served as a special envoy to elements of the Afghan resistance (most notably, Tajik commander Ahmed Shah Masood, who was killed by al-Qaeda two days before 9/11) during the early 1990s. In that capacity, he bore witness to America’s policy of reckless indifference to developments in the region.

“From 1993 to September 11, 2001 — in perhaps one of the greatest blunders in American diplomatic history — the United States government outsourced America’s Afghan policy to Pakistan, which meant to the Pakistani military and the powerful ISI. American policy was, in practice, giving free rein to the fox in the chicken coup,” Mr. Tomsen wrote in the Journal of the World Policy Institute. “The unholy alliance of the ISI, al-Qaida, and Taliban radicals burrowed into Afghanistan. While bin Laden launched global terrorist attacks against the United States, Pakistan’s military and the ISI organized, armed, and supplied the annual military offensives besieging Masood’s northern enclave. American ignorance of Pakistan’s radical Islamist course in Afghanistan reinforced the isolation of the most successful Afghan commander fighting al-Qaeda and the Taliban.”

Pakistan’s motives in supporting terrorism and attacking its neighbours typically are described as a play for “strategic depth” against India. Mr. Tomsen argues that there are other goals as well — including the expansion of the military’s power within domestic Pakistani politics, and the creation of a unified Islamic power base in Central Asia.

Destabilizing Afghanistan through Taliban-led terrorism is consistent with each of these goals. And the ISI’s strategy for doing so, Mr. Tomsen notes, is a carbon copy of its playbook from 1994 to 1998, when it built up the Taliban the first time around.

For years, Western diplomats have been unable to speak freely about Pakistan, because we’ve depended on the country for logistical support in the Afghan mission. At the same time, the American campaign of drone strikes, which has decimated the senior ranks of Pakistani-based terrorists, has remained a low-profile affair, lest Pakistani sensitivities be offended.

Following the West’s phased withdrawal from Afghanistan, however, we will no longer have tens of thousands of soldiers being fed, housed, and air conditioned in the Afghan outback. No longer will the United States have to go through the cynical pantomime of “co-ordinating” border operations with the Pakistani military, an exercise that inevitably leads to the Taliban learning of America’s plans in advance.

It is a pity that the West will not be leaving Afghanistan in better shape. But having departed the country, the United States and its allies at least will be able to deal with Pakistan, the greater threat, for what it is: a country that is a haven for terrorists; and which punishes men, such as Shakil Afridi, who fight them.

jkay@nationalpost.com

— Jonathan Kay is Managing Editor for Comment at the National Post, and a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C.

[Prem]

http://dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?pa ... 2012_pg3_2
For a few dollars more: from Jinnah to GHQ

that Pakistan thought it had over the US. It was unrealistic of the Pakistani policy planners (read military brass), and their cohorts in the media or Difa-e-Pakistan, to assume that the NATO blockade would be a showstopper, especially when NATO/ISAF had been gradually diverting critical supplies to the Northern Distribution Network (NDN).The delusional thinking in Pakistani circles leading up to Chicago was astounding. Days before the summit, one Pakistani analyst-anchor wrote in a US publication, “First, Pakistan needs an immediate apology, which the US president himself must issue at his Chicago meeting with his Pakistani counterpart. Second, the United States must draw up measures to ensure Pakistan’s prior knowledge of planned drone strikes, as well as its clearance of intended targets, areas of operation, and the number of attacks. Third, both nations need to agree on fair payments for the use of Pakistani ground supply routes to Afghanistan. And fourth, NATO must make comprehensive guarantees that a repeat of Salala never happens.” Is it just me or does this sound like a headmistress chastising her students?

To be fair, the Pakistani junta, President Zardari and his current coterie of advisors and the analysts calling for blood, blood-money and money, in one breath no less, are not the first ones to eye the deep US pockets. None other than the father of the Pakistani nation, Quaid-e-Azam Muhammad Ali Jinnah was the first one to have articulated the idea of milking the US. Mr Jinnah’s widely quoted 1947 interview with Life magazine journalist/photographer, Margaret Bourke-White is worth remembering today. Bourke-White chronicled, “(Mr. Jinnah said) America needs Pakistan more than Pakistan needs America. Pakistan is the pivot of the world, as we are placed — he revolved his long forefinger in bony circles — on the frontier on which the future position of the world revolves.” He leaned toward me, dropping his voice to a confidential note. “Russia,” confided Mr Jinnah, “is not very far away”...”America is now awakened,” he said with a satisfied smile. “Since the US was now bolstering up Greece and Turkey, she should be more interested in pouring money and arms into Pakistan” (Halfway to freedom: A report on the New India — pp 92-93).

The NATO summit in Chicago has exposed — quite brutally and rather humiliatingly — the extent of leverage.
GHQ thought they were milking the Cow but it tuned out to be Bull.

[lakshmikanth]

TSPA and ISI should arrest themselves for treason.

Dr Shakil helping America to capture OBL is the same as ISI/TSPA help to America to use drones. If what Dr. Shakil did was treason, so is what ISI/TSPA are doing. Hypocricy to the highest extent.


All in Sarcasm onleee.

EDIT: Added later, this also should now show the Amrikhans what BRF always knew, that TSPA/ISI knew where OBL was all along. Killing him was a major H&D blow and also a huge loss of future revenue (hunt for OBL was a money maker). All the statements that this was a joint operation between TPSA and Unkil is just pure unadulterated Pakhana from Pakhanastan.

[Kanishka]

Surely a landlocked country like Afghanistan must have some international transit rights?

True to their nature the Pakistanis are exploiting the situation to the maximum. Nothing surprising here.
I am however surprised at the speed of change in ground realities. What happened to "you are with us or against us" and "bomb pakistan back to the stone age" threats? What has changed?
Since the Pakis were never with the USA and played a double game all along, is it not time to implement the threats?

Patiently waiting ....

[shiv]

TSPA and ISI should arrest themselves for treason.

Dr Shakil helping America to capture OBL is the same as ISI/TSPA help to America to use drones. If what Dr. Shakil did was treason, so is what ISI/TSPA are doing. Hypocricy to the highest extent.

When I was a little (terror of a) boy, I would tease a cousin and make her cry and my grandmother would admonish me with a really strange sentence. The voice was one of threat and anger but the meaning was funny enough to cause cognitive dissonance and not frighten the admonished child.

In Kannada, she would say "Bisilalli manay kattisi mosaranna kodona", which literally means that the punishment i would receive is to have a house built for me in the sun and be fed curd-rice. Not a punishment at all of course but designed to satisfy the crying cousin and yet not needlessly punish a brainless brat.

The Pakistani army and establishment treat their Islamic terrorists in exactly the same way. They make threatening noises and use American style rhetoric like "freeze accounts" and "bring them to justice" "put them under house arrest" etc

The Pakistan army is too scared to punish Islamists and is happy to punish anyone else. The arrest and punishment of this doctor is designed to please the Islamists. But chances are not much harm will come to the doctor because the Americans will hold that against the Pakis.

The ISI and army are playing a double game - that is well known. They are running with the hares and hunting with the hounds. But they do that sccessfully only because they have the space/opportunity to do tat and no one can do anything about it.

BRF laboured under a self imposed delusion for nearly a decade in which it was assumed that "Indian pressure on the Paki amy of the type that the US applies would sort out Pakistan, but India was too spineless". The fact that the US, a country with the (fake?) reputation of a rigid spine with a gun also can do nothing about the Paki army's games should be an eye opener.

This is not about spine, brass balls, long hard penis etc. It's about a complete and utter inability to stop the Pakistan army from doing what it is doing within territory that it occupies. Neither the US nor India can do much. I think approaching the issue via that lens makes it easier to understand what we are up against.

And the fact hat the Pakistan army is scared of its own Islamists is causing even more distress in Washington and Delhi. It's Catch 22. Support the Pakistan army and they will screw you. Don't support them and the worry (in Washington/Delhi) is that the Islamists will take over.

It is for this reason that I have felt and stated for a long time that

1. Islamists without dangerous weapons are less of a threat than Islamists with dangerous weapons
2. The Pakistan army supports Islamists and their actions are often one and the same
3. Therefore the US should first stop funding and supporting the Pakistan army with dangerous weapons. It will be decades before the current new weapons will have degraded sufficiently to make the Paki army less of a threat.

But the US has got itself into a mess and may well continue following a policy of funding and fighting Islamic terrorists. India has to deal with this on its own. India's policy seems to be to befriend Pakistani civilians who are able to show some sign of being able to oppose army policy. This is a game fraught with uncertainty, but perhaps the biggest trump card that India has is that Indian citizens hate this friendship policy and any policy can be pulled back stating public opposition. If I was a politician i would use that tactic.

[svenkat]

Zardari is the wild card in the pack.The pakis and amirkhans(ISI and State Dept) will patch up to contain India.

But Zardari is raising the pitch to play the populist Islamist game and win support from the fanatic brainless pakis.The TSPA cannot oppose Zardari in Islamic posturing and he has little stakes in upping the ante to a point of no return which will break CIA-ISI alliance.

By stopping the trucks,Pakistan has sent the message it cares little for afghanisthan.That was well known.Zardari does not care for US too.He endangering US exit from afghanistan.What we require now is a Haqqani offensive on americans in afghanistan,amirkhans taking a visible bloody hit on their echanddee while there is inflamed passions in pakisatan.If Haqqanis oblige,they would be doing a favour for India accelerating the disposition of the toxic corpse and its antyeshti so that India can return to real issues like petrol price hike etc.

[Prem]

“From 1993 to September 11, 2001 — in perhaps one of the greatest blunders in American diplomatic history — the United States government outsourced America’s Afghan policy to Pakistan, which meant to the Pakistani military and the powerful ISI. American policy was, in practice, giving free rein to the fox in the chicken coup,” Mr. Tomsen wrote in the Journal of the World Policy Institute. jkay@nationalpost.com
— Jonathan Kay is Managing Editor for Comment at the National Post, and a fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington, D.C.

Well, Mr Tomsen, Past is Past and Mr Musharraf is still the " friend" of Colin Powell. How can we forget Mr Powell hugging the terrorist dictator after 911and annoiting Pakistan as Munna .Lets not be naive here and not recall the author of this policy.

[svinayak]

That is the key here. 1993-2001 will be remembered in history forever.

[Charlie]

From Twitter

farahnaz ispahani ‏@fispahani
Creeping apartheid culture in Pakistan? Wapda Ahmedi employees being made to eat at sep tables with sep utensils. Not Islamic. Inhumane.

Everytime we see a Paki, we, the casteist Hindooos, the daaaleeet oppressors should ask the Paki if they are preparing Ahmedis (or Qadianis) for a wholesale genocide in keeping with the egalitarian nature of the True Book.

[r_subramanian]

Yet another drone strike

US drone strike kills 9 in N. Waziristan
At least nine people were killed when a US drone hit a house in North Waziristan here on Thursday morning, Geo News reported.
...
It was the second such strike after Chicago conference.

link

[surinder]

Pakistani doctor jailed for helping CIA find Osama bin Laden

This is an example of how the Punjabi exploits the Pathan.

My heart cries at the pathetic condition of the once brave and proud Pathans under the domination and mercy of the Punjabi. I hope the Pashtouns regain their past glory and escape from slavery at the hands of the Punjabi.

[Rajdeep]

According to Najam Sethi the pakis have been printing 300 Crore everyday to bring up economy as well as present a good budget in coming days. So that they can spend the non existent money can be spent on buying votes.

What effect does it have on the devaluation of the currency ?

They want to spend the whole years budget in the coming 6 months (expecting elections are in Jan 2013) and once the time for payment comes (and if PPP is in power) they expect the money to come from massa or else the next government can take care of the problem

Also per his program the average household size in poakland is 7 or 8 people.

[partha]

OK, confirmed. Aiyar is a RAW agent.

http://www.thenews.com.pk/Todays-News-1 ... -Indian-MP

LAHORE: Indian Rajya Sabha member Mani Shankar Aiyar has said Pakistan was a model, not failed, state, Geo Tv reported Wednesday.

[prahaar]

According to Hajam Sethi the pakis have been printing 300 Crore everyday to bring up economy as well as present a good budget in coming days.

By request to posters to not use Hajam as a derogatory term. Hajam is performing a legitimate profession that benefits the society and is an honest means of living just like a doctor, a scientist, etc.

[SSridhar]

“From 1993 to September 11, 2001 — in perhaps one of the greatest blunders in American diplomatic history — the United States government outsourced America’s Afghan policy to Pakistan, which meant to the Pakistani military and the powerful ISI. American policy was, in practice, giving free rein to the fox in the chicken coup,” Mr. Tomsen wrote in the Journal of the World Policy Institute.

What about the period before that ? The acceptance by the US of the pre-conditions by Pakistan for the American pursuit of the Bear Trap were far more dangerous as they allowed nuclear and terror proliferation, justification of jihad, army-jihadi nexus, terrorism as state policy etc. whose cumulative effects came back to singe the US on 26/11. The US even colluded with the Pakistanis in these activities rather than simply being smug just turning a blind eye.

[Rajdeep]

According to Hajam Sethi the pakis have been printing 300 Crore everyday to bring up economy as well as present a good budget in coming days.

By request to posters to not use Hajam as a derogatory term. Hajam is performing a legitimate profession that benefits the society and is an honest means of living just like a doctor, a scientist, etc.

I meant as Hajam (to digest) and not Hajjaam (hair dresser). I always thought it was like that

[jamwal]

http://napoleonlive.info/did-you-know/our-friends-in-pakistan/

A collection of some articles on Pakistan

[Pranav]

But Zardari is raising the pitch to play the populist Islamist game and win support from the fanatic brainless pakis.The TSPA cannot oppose Zardari in Islamic posturing and he has little stakes in upping the ante to a point of no return which will break CIA-ISI alliance.

Zardari does not want to be the fall guy.

Nawaz Sharif took the fall for downhill skiing from Kargil and was promptly rewarded with a coup.

[Sanku]

TSPA and ISI should arrest themselves for treason.

Dr Shakil helping America to capture OBL is the same as ISI/TSPA help to America to use drones. If what Dr. Shakil did was treason, so is what ISI/TSPA are doing. Hypocricy to the highest extent.

The Pakistani army and establishment treat their Islamic terrorists in exactly the same way. They make threatening noises and use American style rhetoric like "freeze accounts" and "bring them to justice" "put them under house arrest" etc
......
The fact that the US, a country with the (fake?) reputation of a rigid spine with a gun also can do nothing about the Paki army's games should be an eye opener.
.......
Neither the US nor India can do much. I think approaching the issue via that lens makes it easier to understand what we are up against.
........
But the US has got itself into a mess and may well continue following a policy of funding and fighting Islamic terrorists.

Shiv-ji; I think we can extend your model further. What TSPA/Paki civvys are to their more bearded cousins; so is US to TSPA etc.

I think they make threatening noises etc etc, but really have no intention whatsoever of hurting TSPA interests.

They are quite willing to lose a few dumb joes out there Afg war if the overall balance is maintained.

This is still, all posturing.

[Kanishka]

US senators say Pakistan on path of confrontation

WASHINGTON, May 23: US lawmakers warned on Wednesday that Pakistan was moving rapidly on a path leading to a direct confrontation with the world’s sole superpower as Pakistan convicted and sentenced a man considered a hero in America.

On Tuesday, a US Senate panel voted to cut aid to Pakistan by 58 per cent in fiscal 2013 and threatened to withhold even more cash if Islamabad did not reopen Nato supply routes.

“Shocking and outrageous,” said Senators John McCain and Carl Levin — one a senior Republican, the other a senior Democrat — as a tribal court in Pakistan sentenced Dr Shakil Afridi to 33 years in prison for the crime of treason.

The United States saw “no basis” for continuing to hold Dr Afridi, said US State Department spokesperson Victoria Nuland.

[harbans]

Weren't the Pakis saying a few days back only that the ISI tipped the Americans on Osama? So is the ISI also guilty of treason? Anyways i think this incident is not going to die down easily. Americans will harden there stance for sure.

[RamaY]

^ that is the outcome of so-called strategic partnership.

If you are a strategic partner, you cannot even convict someone if they spy on you on behalf of your strategic partner.

It is a slippery slope only...

[anupmisra]

Indian IB chief coming to Pakistan

In an unprecedented move, Indian Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh has ordered the head of country’s Intelligence Bureau (IB) to join the 12-member delegation led by Home Secretary RK Singh for a bilateral visit to Pakistan, according to a report. Nehchal Sandhu will be a surprise member of this high-level delegation.

The Indian Cabinet Committee on Security (CCS), headed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, which met last Friday, insisted on the IB chief to be part of the delegation along with CBI Director AP Singh and National Investigation Agency (NIA) Director SC Sinha.

The heavy-weight delegation for the two-day visit starting today has been carefully chosen to send a message to Pakistan – that India is serious on issues such as cross-border terrorism, the 26/11 probe and fake Indian currency.

All three heads to be part of the delegation? This must be a first. What gives? Is any Indian newspaper reporting this as well? Meanwhile:

Earlier, Chidambaram declined the invitation by Malik to visit Pakistan. The Indian Home and External Affairs Ministry advised Chidambaram that until there was concrete progress on the issue of terrorism and bringing the Mumbai attacks’ perpetrators to justice, there was no point in he visiting Pakistan.

[RamaY]

^ IKG II?

[shiv]

US senators say Pakistan on path of confrontation

The US is too stupid to understand Pakis. They will be willing to exchange this doc of a doc of their own - Dr. Aafia.

[Neela]

Hunting with the hounds and running with the hares - the same thing can be said of Amreekis no? They also hunted with Pakis for a long time no? And even while Pakis were making fertilizer of Amreekis, Washington was taken the to the cleaners..he he washington became Cleanington .
Yesterday because of Salalalalala Paki was angry. Today because of extra $250 dollahs per truck Omabanama wont pose with Gimmeo Duspercenti ( I like his Italian suits). I dont see any difference between the two - of course except that one is more prone to melanoma!