I don’t doubt it’s true; but the timing was clearly meant to embarass the White House.

Good. President Bush, despite his commitment to fighting the war, kept making friends with the absolute worst people possible. How many times do “allies” like the Pakistanis and Saudis have to betray him and secretly support our enemies before he realizes that he has only one friend in the Middle East, and that’s Israel? If Bush has to be bapped in the face with a newspaper now and then to help him come to that realization, I’m all for it.

No, no, no! Feed ‘em false information,

I R A Darth Aggie on August 1, 2008 at 9:47 AM

That is actually the best way to go about it. Instead of telling them what you know, don’t share intelligence or share false intelligence. Tell them you will be conducting operations in one area but do it in another area.

That’s fighting fire with fire. . . I like your thinking.

No, no, no! Feed ‘em false information, at least til they wise up. Getting the insurgents to act on bad but tasty information may help in drawing them out into the open in large numbers. Then the usual sorry for dropping a couple of JDAMs on your side of the border, so sorry disclaimer.

When Gilani was here, someone leaked to the press the story that ISI was infiltrated with Taliban supporters.

I don’t doubt it’s true; but the timing was clearly meant to embarass the White House.

But what kind of connection, if any, does ISI have over Pakistan’s nukes?

JiangxiDad on August 1, 2008 at 8:58 AM

Well, I don’t think there ISI controls the nukes. But I will be very much surprised if it is under full civilian control either.

I think to make any sense in Pakistan, US should

1. Make peace with tribal.
2. Weaken the religious stranglehold.

Bring in the Indian Intelligence service and make an example of the leadership of the ISI. A few Hellfire missiles from the new Reapers, a couple of well placed rifle shots, and I suspect the survivors might get the idea that retirement would be a good thing.

And if you want to get really nasty, go after the families of the ISI collaberators as well. (Something for the Indians to take care of)

Covert wars of this type are especially nasty.

But there was never any control on ISI in the way US or India has over its apparatus. I have said this many times here but will repeat, but in Pakistan it is military establishment, which includes which is the ultimate authority over state. To find an answer it is important to gain knowledge about power struggle between diff power centers viz. Military, Bureaucracy, Landed aristocracy, Tribal and Religious authority.

Gaurav on August 1, 2008 at 8:18 AM

Thanks for your info. Yes we know the military controls the state. But what kind of connection, if any, does ISI have over Pakistan’s nukes?

Wouldn’t just parking a bunch of troops on the borders to the tribal areas with specific orders to do nothing cause the Pakis to do the same thing – and perhaps having enough of the Paki army in the tribal areas would help enough….
……

acat on August 1, 2008 at 8:06 AM

Well, how many American and Afghani troops do you imagine it would take to patrol 1400 miles of Pakistan-Afghanistan border, most of which is Himilayan mountains, above 5,000 ft in the air. Imagine running a 10 mile race in Denver….every day, and you’ll have an idea how the US military would have to perform. How many folks would it take to cover that border? We do such a bang up job here on the Southwest border of the US with lots of local police and border patrol, and many sympathetic US ranchers, that hundreds of thousands of illegals cross it every year.

Plus, how is the Pakistani Army going to fight its way into these places to secure the border. They aren’t omnipotent and they would be fighting their own tribes in most cases. That’s sure to go over well, ain’t it? It seems most of the border police belong to the local tribes anyway.

Let’s all just snap our fingers, place hundreds of thousands of troops on the borders and wait for bin Hidin and his donkey to show up. Meanwhile our guys “do nothing”, including training, lose their edge, waste our money, and pretty much feel they aren’t contributing much to the general welfare of the country.

This is time for targeted strikes, covert missions, and money thrown at the tribes to convince them that TVs and new cars will show up when they get rid of Wahhabiism. The target needs to be the madrassa. Remove the indoctrination and let time change their views. A lot of time. I don’t know how you get rid of Wahhabiism without showing the people the difference between life under radical Islam, and life under something more moderate. That’s gonna require some hard times (beheadings, killings, bombings, rapes, etc….) from the terrorists (which they invariably do when threatened) and for the local populace before they get the general idea. Right now they all think they have to support the Taliban to get to Heaven. Unless you show them that living a good life is what gets them to Heaven, they will always choose to kill, rape, pillage, plunder, and burn to get there.

Until we are ready to keep up the pressure on Pakistani tribal society for a long time (years), moderation ain’t gonna happen. Lots of their tribesmen need to die when opposing us, and be enriched when they help us. And that’s gonna take time that Americans just ain’t willing to spend without a WMD attack as the motivator. Until we are really hurt again, the status quo is the best we can expect.

Subsunk

we need to add the ISI to the list of terrorist groups… just like the Revolutionary Guard is to Iran…

This story should stir the pot between the Pakistanis and the Indians

Ed, not really. Look in India it’s common knowledge, and except for our secular liberal establishment no one has really illusions about the pathology of land of pure. But the problem remains same, for present the consensus in India is we can not fight a war with Pakistan owing to nukes. Pakistani establishment knows this, and hence it will continue with terrorism against India.

It is somewhat similar to attack on Don Vito Corleone, Don knew it was Barzini, however the situation remained such that no retribution was possible. When it came it was swift.
Trust me, when it comes for Pakistan, it will be same.

So, if Pakistan has lost control of its’ equivalent of what, the CIA, the DOD? my next question is what access the ISI has to the nukes?
acat on August 1, 2008 at 8:06 AM

But there was never any control on ISI in the way US or India has over its apparatus. I have said this many times here but will repeat, but in Pakistan it is military establishment, which includes which is the ultimate authority over state. To find an answer it is important to gain knowledge about power struggle between diff power centers viz. Military, Bureaucracy, Landed aristocracy, Tribal and Religious authority.

So, if Pakistan has lost control of its’ equivalent of what, the CIA, the DOD? my next question is what access the ISI has to the nukes?

One conclusion I disagree with, Captain, is that a border war may become necessary. Getting into a shooting war with Pakistan seems like a Bad Idea.

Wouldn’t just parking a bunch of troops on the borders to the tribal areas with specific orders to do nothing cause the Pakis to do the same thing – and perhaps having enough of the Paki army in the tribal areas would help enough….

Mew