Log In | Register
As the number of casualties from deadly bombings increases, the news from Pakistan seems pretty grim. A day doesn't go by without civilians being killed and maimed by Pakistani Taliban explosives. Many of these attacks have been thwarted by the army and the police, but the Taliban and other loosely allied organizations continue to use terror to dissuade Islamabad from launching a long-anticipated offensive in South Waziristan, the principal Taliban stronghold.
Months ago, the Pakistani government decided on a strategy of appeasement with Muslim resolutionaries in the Swat valley: rather than try to control the area, it ceded authority instead. But the strategic goal of extremists is not local control but suzerainty over all of Pakistan (and all other Muslim countries as well), and it came as no surprise that the revolutionaries subsequently attacked and occupied a city only 60 miles from the capital before finally being routed by the army.
More than most things, it was this failure of appeasement that brought in sharp relief the bankrupty of Islamabad's ostrich-like approach. With great fanfare, Pakistan has been planning its offensive for some time, noisily advertising it in the hope that the Taliban and its allies will feel sufficiently threatened that when the offensive actually begins they may put up little resistance and thus produce something that looks like an army victory. In any case, nobody expects the Pakistani army to stay in South Waziristan long enough to establish control, and the result of a hit-and-run government offensive will be no more stability than Pakistan enjoys now.
Meanwhile, extremists belonging to a large and diverse assortment of fragmentary organizations have coalesced to terrorize the country, and the one bit of good news is that the Taliban's indiscriminate killing has made many previously complacent Pakistanis recognize the revolutionary threat to the nation. Unfortunately, this will not result in a steelier resolve. For one thing, Pakistan, to its great peril, will continue to view India, not revolutionary Islam, as its principal enemy. For another, some Pakistani government organizations, including its intelligence apparatus, number among their members people who are sympathetic to the revolutionaries.
The Obama administration may eventually make a strategic decision about our objectives in Afghanistan, and the role, stability and resolve of Pakistan will be a major consideration. (Along those lines, one finds unpersuasive Secretary Clinton's assertion that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are in good hands.) But 2010 is an election year, the Congress and the electorate are restive and skeptical, and the president is likely to make a decision will satisfy few. A sub-optimal approach to southwest Asia may be the least politically uncomfortable solution, but the result is liable to leave events in this dangerous area of the world in the hands of an irresolute Pakistan and its own internal adversaries.
Start Tracking
Stop Tracking
I advocate nothing of the kind. My advice is that one should expect very little in the way of justice in a procedure that is not designed to administer it.
