Trouble on the Afghan-Pakistan Border
Maybe, Congressman Thaddeus McCotter notes dryly, the United States has no right to preach to other countries about border security.
“After all, look what happens on our own southern border with Mexico,” points out the Michigan Republican.
But American lives depend on whether Pakistan takes policing their border with Afghanistan — which is three-quarters the size of the U.S.- Mexican line — seriously. And the dangers on the Asian border far outweigh anything going on in the U.S.
McCotter recently returned from a bipartisan congressional delegation trip through the region, led by Democratic Rep. Gary Ackerman, a trip that included meetings with both Afghan and Pakistani heads of state.
The trip took place as the numbers of US and other NATO troops were on the rise; for the first time, exceeding the number of casualties in Iraq.
“Why are the numbers so high? It’s because NATO forces are going into places where they weren’t going before. They are now in a position to get to the border with Pakistan, trying to get to places that have become sanctuaries for terrorists. You can consider it either a good sign or a bad sign…. that fighters from other Arab lands are choosing go to Afghanistan rather than Iraq to wage war,” McCotter said in a telephone interview with PJM during his trip.
For anyone invested in the success of the mission in Afghanistan, it’s obviously a bad sign — and needs to be dealt with on both sides of the border — which is why the delegation’s meetings with the new Prime Minister and chief of the army in Pakistan focused to a great extent on how to stop the flow of arms and jihadists into Afghanistan via the porous border, which on the Pakistani side, includes the Federally Administered Tribal Areas, the haven for terrorists where Osama Bin Laden has been believed to be hiding for years. It is a region where the Pakistani government has preferred to negotiate settlements with the extremist forces — not root them out.
For now, the Pakistani military is cooperating with this policy for political reasons.
“The military wants public support to deal comprehensively with the nation’s problems — it doesn’t want to act alone. Public opinion in Pakistan right now is focused on fuel, food insecurity, worries about economic stagnation and their relationship with India, not on border security and Afghanistan. With a government is in a holding pattern, and elections on the horizon, everyone is sensitive when it appears that money and time and attention is diverted from the needs of the population.”
Our troops fighting the “right” war in Afghanistan need far more than the diplo-speak of Messieurs McCotter and Ackerman. Pakistan “could do far more” is, IMHO, an insulting joke; they have been barely in the fight for the past two six years.
Pakistan has little to no control of the tribal areas and federally administered area next to the Afghanistan border from South Waziristan to Chitral (folks, start your search engines). What ‘federally administered’ actually means is Pakistan has ceded control to mostly unfriendly locals.
American taxpayers are partially funding the very people who are conducting major infiltrations in Afghanistan and threatening our troops and effort there. Seventy (70) percent of the supplies both U.S. and NATO need to sustain operations in Afghanistan travel by truck through the Kybher Pass. Yet within the past month, when Kybher and Orakzai (the area leading to Kybher) came under threat, Pakistan made peace deals with the Taliban and tribal agencies, leaving the enemy in charge of them both; the Taliban promptly set up tollbooths of the traffic.
The “right” war in Afghanistan is another ‘must win’ our Global War on Terror. Yet the situation there will only deteriorate if we cannot even speak honestly about it. Pakistan’s sensitivities will not and should be appeased by political rhetoric. We have been funding them, in effect, to not fight. Let’s have this debate with all cards on the table.
Correction: Two (not six) years in the first paragraph was what I meant to type.
“And the dangers on the Asian border far outweigh anything going on in the U.S.”
Factually inaccurate. More Americans are dying on the Mexican border then on the Paki-’gani border.
Look it up.
No, the Media doesn’t want to make public the carnage on the Border because the Democrats hope to convert all those illegal aliens to good little Socialist voters. Shutting the border would prevent that.
“The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act as the destroyer of liberty. Plainly, the sheep and the wolf are not agreed
upon a definition of liberty.”
- Abraham Lincoln
Tim, count your blessings. When Pakistan ‘officially’ enters the GWoT, it will be against the USA. Remember the Talibsn is a creation of the Pakis Intelligence service. The CIA helped them out with money, although the two agencies were working to different ends. As always the CIA got fukked on that one.
What Ohhhhh……BAMA and his brian trust can’t seem to grasp is this little thing called ‘Logistics’. Pakistan controls our supply lines into Afghanistan. Once we get enough troops in , they will cut those supply lines and give the USA it’s worst ever military defeat.
That simple military fact is why NATO doesn’t want to put more troops in ‘gani. Those troops will either die or be captured when they run out of ammo, food, water fuel, etc. It will make the Batan death march look like a Sunday stroll thru the park.
When you’re wounded out on Afghanistan’s plains
And the women come out to cut up what remains,
Then just roll to your rifle and blow out your brains
And die like a good British soldier!
-Rudyard Kipling
John, I have to ask, regardless of who gets elected in November, if either would stand idly by and let Diem Bien Phu II occur in Afghanistan with our troops replacing the French? No. We need not and must not lose in Afghanistan; the American people will not forgive a President or political party that chooses that option.
The situation there is poor headed to bad yet the sooner we fix it, the less casualties we’ll take. The Hotel Jihad in Pakistan must be closed, the time to flush out the problems there is now, and we need to hear both candidates beating the politicians in Pakistan over the head with that drum.
I wonder whether the forces arrayed against us will be able to convert the moral quiescence of the transnational intelligentsia and their sheeple into some sort of outrage, eventually, and from that political base into a quagmire. I’m not sure how it could occur, but it’s their best weapon outside of simultaneous urban nukes in the USA, so it begs consideration.
Secondly, Pakistan is a problem because the Pakistanis who make up the military and the tribes are often related, at least in a notional way and often in a cultural or familial-tribal way. We have a problem because it is reasonable that they should not see why they should fight against their ethnic, religious, and political brothers, or at least cousins, for the sake of American strategic goals. This is a bad problem to have, and may be the “damn fool thing in the Balkans” of the present era. Nothing short of a good old fashion Roman pacification effort will quell the blood of these folks, who are pretty much bandito scum, and that of course is not allowed in today’s world.
The one good thing that Obama’s proposed militia might produce is a re-familiarity of the American people with things military. It might the way back into a reasonable fear of the slippery slope that supposedly leads to National Socialist Genocide – which is after all not at all very steep, and certainly won’t be initiated on the obviously reasonable premise that these illiterate a-historical tribal fuckfaces with AK47s really just need to be beaten like savage dogs until they go back to being satisfied with simply murdering and seling each other and keep their bullshit well short of international dimensions.
I agree wholeheartedly dan, what it is going to take is something we (America) aren’t up for currently. Yet, America, so often smacked, ridiculed, spit upon and maligned even by those who have most benefited from her existence, endures.
Were a tragedy to occur again on American soil say, similar to what you prophesy in your first paragraph, I’m confident America’s children, (not necessarily those who were born here mind you) would stand and fight, in ways the world hasn’t seen in a very long time.
Not many in warfare can be as barbarous as Americans it’s who we are underneath, and have been all along it’s our reluctance to let loose that others should fear. We are not so fat, dumb and happy as the world and her misbegotten children would believe. Personally at my age I’m some of those, but I am paying very close attention to the Mexican/American border AND the Paki one. To me they’re the same. Symptomatic. I’m simple really.
Don’t Tread On Me,
Or Mine.
“John, I have to ask, regardless of who gets elected in November, if either would stand idly by and let Diem Bien Phu II occur in Afghanistan with our troops replacing the French? No.”
I disagree. Twice. As far as sacrificing some troops to gain a politicl asdvanatage, the US government has done that MANY times and in many places. There might not be much we can do about it.
I don’t have current logistic statistics, but those I remember from the 80′s are around 150lbs per day per man for light units such as are in Afghanistan. The Air Force could keep about 200 flights a day going into ‘gain, with a maximun effort and some luck. Each C-17 carries about 88 tons maxed out, or 176,000 Lbs. I doubt that they would make max flights so lets round down to 150,000 Lbs. That is enough to support DAILY operations for 1,000 soldiers. So a maximum air effort might be able to support 150,000 troops (allowing for wastage). It would be very expensive, several billion dollars a day.
So one of two things would have to happen. Either the USA goes home because we can’t afford to stay, or we take the war to Pakistan. That would create the war on Asia that the US Army has feared for the last century.
Plus Pakistan has a nice little army.
The Paki’s are a martial and proud people that live in a rough neighborhood. Pakistan would be tough. Tougher then Iran or the Rooskies or even the Chinese.
My second disagreement is your assumption that we are losing in Afghanistan. That is the way the media is trying to spin it. They are putting that spin on it so Obamessiah can claim victory there after they declare it a win.
We are doing VERY VERY well in Afghanistan. ‘gani is a different fight then Iraq, a different land with different people. What they have in common is religion.
What worked in Iraq won’t necessarily work in ‘gani. ‘gani will take longer. MUCH longer.
The terrain and population in ‘gani lends itself more to ‘clear and hold’ then ‘fortified hamlet’.
The distinction is more a matter of emphasis then function but it is important.
We need more troops in ‘gani, but NOT as a ‘surge’. We need them as a ‘trickle’. As an area is cleared the trickle troops should be used in holding it. This is a time consuming process, but the one with the greatest record of success. 20 or 30 years should do it, but once it is done, it will stay done.
“Gentlemen, you may be sure that of the three courses open to the enemy, he will always choose the fourth.”*
*
_Field Marshall Helmuth von Moltke to his staff
“‘gani is a different fight then Iraq, a different land with different people….‘gani will take longer. MUCH longer.”
Exactly – remember one of the premises of OIF was that Iraq’s people were relatively developed, educated, with a reasonably large middle class. (This was true – but unfortunately we decided not to follow a strategy of population protection, and the middle class was repressed by the tribes or fled.) Afghanistan, on the other hand, was never developed – reporters like to remind people Karzai’s government exercises little control outside the cities, but of course outside the cities there is nothing but Nothing, which is difficult to control. Afghanistan will have to be built in ways in which Iraq, despite its degredation, was already built (even ruins can be useful).
One strategy I wish we could pursue is the Cleisthenes strategy which transformed tribal Greece into a nascent democracy: you move the tribes around, and you appoint governors of limited tenure in zones where they have no tribal roots. Of course this would be too easy a target for the transnational intelligentsia, and would involve real pain even if it were possible, but short of this it’s hard to see how a country like Afghanistan can be denatured and then reformed into a self-perpetuating set of reasonably democratic institutions. It could very well be that we’re simply going to have to see the policies of imperialism, as the British might have conceived them but as reformed by American norms and international requirements, continue, simply because there’s no other way the international system to which most nations subscribe can survive these barabrians’ incursions otherwise.
“He [Ackerman] experienced himself why the population was concerned about its own well-being: in his hotel room and during meetings, the room would suddenly go dark — the rolling blackouts that are an ongoing feature of the summer.”
Not just “the summer”. Not just THIS summer. All summers. For all time since infidels built power plants for the Muslims and tried to teach them how to operate them!
Good lord. Americans go over to these Islamic sewers and infer that the state of affairs they witness on the spot, the sewage running in the streets, the burning smell of filth everywhere — they assume that this deplorable statewhich greets them is a sign of recent degradation, or an easy explanation for why the Muslims of Islam are so filled with rancor and hatred for everything. If they had any clue at all they’d know that these things are the consistent backdrop of Islamic societies everywhere, and they’re examples of how average Muslims have lived forever. This isn’t new. These “rolling blackouts” aren’t a harbinger of a failing infrastructure — they’re the face of Islamic management, Islamic incompetence, Islamic “society” itself.
Naive Westerners go over to Islamic nations and meet the Western educated elite. Those elite have a vested interest concealing the horrors of Islam in every regard. They use Islam to rule their slave populations. These gullible Westerners are served sweet tea by these elites, and treated to that putative Islamic hospitality. Some of those Muslims PR agents have even learned to disarm by mimicking our ways, they laugh at the jokes, they talk about sports cars, some have even mastered the unpleasant art of touching filthy kaffir hands with hail-fellow-well-met! handshakes. They’ve mastered the convincing smiles that always fool the stupid infidels.
Other Muslims can’t or don’t try so hard. Some won’t meet with women, or, if they do, they reguire (blamed always on those “conservative religious beliefs”) that said women cover themselves. And even President’s wives comply. The Muslims laugh. Some Muslims don’t do too much at all, they won’t be touched by unclean infidel hands. When they’re asked about it (*never confronted — you must be nuanced with the Muslims, after all…!), the infidels are given the boilerplate false apologys: “It is forbidden! My religion forbids it!” (forfend that the Muslim should ever explain the truth: It’s because I consider you to be unclean, like the pig, like excrement, like the saliva of a dog!) This is sufficient to disarm.
We used to know how to deal with our enemies. We didn’t set about “winning their hearts and minds” until we had utterly annihilated the mind shackles of their poisonous ideology. But with Islam and Muslims, we parrot their PR back to them and assure them we have no problem with Islam.
Look at Pakistan. Look at the ISI. Look at the nukes already in the Taliban hands — for Pakistan in many ways IS the Taliban — now look at Iran — look at nukes in Iran and their calls for genocide of Israel and America by their highest religious clerics — no look at Saudi Arabia — look at the hundred billion they’ve spent so far in the West spreading Islam — look at 15 of the 19 hijackers — look at the billions Saudis place in the Jihadists across the globe.
No problem with Islam?
We have a BIG problem with Islam.
Word, Morton.
Your observation about ignorant Western appraisals of the state of Muslim societies reminds me of a nice Rumsfeldian rejoinder – he just said something like, “my goodness, some people seem to assume the natural state of mankind is riches, and that only the USA keeps them down. nonsense – the natural state of mankind is *poverty.*”
which is obviously true – but not to the miseducated.
mort,
I suppose you’ll have a similar issue with us Jews seeing that our practices of ritual purity will forbid those of us who keep The Laws from doing some of the same things. If a woman, any woman, were to visit an orthodox neighborhood it would be considered rude if she did not dress modestly. A traditional Jew will not eat food you prepared. A traditional Jew will not touch a woman other then his closest family members for fear of being made unclean.
I’m all for devestating our Islamic enemies. I am all for pointing out the various ways in which the Left hypocriticly holds hands with the illiberal Muslims while painting Conservatives as a shade away from Jim Crow. There are traditions that are odd to the Doodslags of the world but which pose no threat worthy of that vitriol. Your issues with Islam can very easily be extended to other circumcising people and with all you know and rightfully despise in Islam you will have to work quite hard to reconcile in the good and godly Jewish communities.
P Ami — create straw men and slay them all day if it makes you feel better, but kindly leave me out of it.
If Jews had a supremacist genocidal ideology which animated them and prompted them to spread their religion through violence, strap on bombs, or fly planes filled with innocents into skyscrapers, then I’d have a problem with that too — wouldn’t you? I don’t see that happening. Do you?
So if I’m not making the equation Jew = Muslim, or Judaism = Islam — then why in God’s name would you? Unless you’re somehow addicted to your sense of victimhood, and so much so, that you enjoy inventing buggaboos where there are none, or misconstrue menace where there is none. Take heed, for in so doing, you engage in a dangerous obscuring of genuine threats. Why would you do that? One can only wonder at such posters.
Listen Doodslag, what you are doing is attacking folk for traditional behavior that does not threaten us when we simply need to focus on the behavior that is threatening. You didn’t focus on the flight patterns of the planes they hijack, the bombs they strap to themselves, their oil extortion, and their religion of the sword. You brought up their expected mode of dress when folk visit them in their homes. You brought up their supposed distaste with touching our hands. That is a bugaboo if ever I saw one.
I brought up Jews because we have some of the same traditions. Men and women do not touch. You are expected to respect the codes of decency of those you visit in their home and in their country. Jews avoid touching unclean things and people as well. So what. So long as Jews don’t make war with America and follow the basic parameters of common business practices then who cares what strange customs I hold dear? I don’t care that women are treated as they are in Muslim countries so long as they don’t export that behavior into mine. The second they start threatening my well being, my economy, my way of life, then we have a problem and those are the issues whose focus is worthy of our attention. I agree that Islam is and has been a major problem in the world and that we need to defeat them as quickly as we can. I just don’t dig crapping on Beethoven because I’m at war with Hitler.
I’m not going to force you to tailor your writing to my taste or sense of propriety. I can only advise that you exude more then a warriors wish to protect his family, his city, and his nation. There is an irrational aspect to your criticism and if you have any reason to wonder at this poster, I would be curious as to what irrational notions your sense of wonder has created seeing that you can identify my addictive personality all from a two paragraph comment.
The self-absorbed poster above seems to have a pathological need to depict herself as a victim. I deplore the way she’s attempted to hijack this thread with her feverish, maudlin off-topic drivel. To other readers, I apologize for engaging this particular troll.
Doodslag,
So, this is how you respond to reasonable criticism? You are a Leftist in Conservative clothing. You think just because you agree with our War on Terror that you’ll get away with unsubstantiated accusations, ad hominum attacks, and illogical arguments. You only make sense to a reasonable mind if we think of you only as a fictional character invented by the famous Leftist Kurt Vonnegut.
Given the nature and dimensions of the current geopolitical morass, I don’t think these people can be exculpated simply by referring to the habits that distinguish them from us as “traditional.”
Yes – they are traditional. And the conservative temperment acknowledges the accumulated wisdom in tradition, and seeks to defend it from the contemporary delusionaries who believe they should sweep all or much of it away. But this traditional behavior of the Muslim world does have its own moral content, and it is connected with the the international system that has prevailed since WWII under American sponsorship. Several billion people – including hundreds of millions of Muslims – depend on this system.
It is the considered opinion of most conservatives and neo-conservatives that the relationship of these traditional Muslim societies is essentially parasitical: after all, the contribution of oil has only to do with geography, not culture. The point is that, given the efficacy and ubiquity of the system on which so many people depend and towards which so many peoples contribute so much, where that system conflicts with traditional Muslim practices, traditional Muslim practices must give way. And after all, we are not talking about private morality here: we are talking about a severe cultural chauvanism, militarism, and rejection of knowledge that at best reminds the historically literate Westerner of the picture that prevailed in his own 18th century.
Had the terrorism we experience today not gained such ascendancy, and not demonstrated hundreds of millions of Muslims’ tolerance or affection for it, we could have gone on muddling along with the recalcitrant Muslim world indefinitely. But the fact is, this jihadism is the characteristic feature of this culture – it is the organizing political, cultural and spiritual impetus that distinguishes this culture from the other major civilizations. It is not some aberation.
That this is so is plain from the governing texts to the people who call in on World Have Your Say. The fact that Europeans in general and on a governemntal level especially choose to regard this analysi as a figment of an “imperialistic” imagination are either lying or ignorant. And the fact that we are not at war with – indeed, are positively indifferent to – the majority of illiterate and simple workaday individuals who subscribe to Islam in one way or another does not undermine the thesis that we do in fact have a Big Problem with Islam – and it’s not a conflict we would have chosen, and would gladly end at any minute that the jihadis and their Sino-Soviet sponsors and directors would relent.