“SMART DIPLOMACY” UPDATE: Pakistan Report on Abbottabad Raid: Never Let The US Do That Again.

A couple news agencies released leaked copies today of the Abbottabad Commission Report, the Pakistani government’s investigation into the May 2 raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound. The report is scathing. It slams the Pakistani government on two fronts: for allowing an international fugitive to hide, ostensibly without anyone knowing, in Pakistani territory for nine years, and for allowing the US to conduct the raid without any defense or retaliation.

The report, available here in full, attributes bin Laden’s ability to escape detection to the government’s ”gross incompetence,” and finds that the “collective failure” of the military and intelligence agencies allowed the US to carry out an ”act of war”: “Culpable negligence and incompetence at almost all levels of government can more or less be conclusively established….this [was] a case of nothing less than a collective and sustained dereliction of duty by the political, military and intelligence leadership of the country.”

Among its recommendations, which include police reforms and increased intelligence cooperation, the report also seems to focus heavily on preventing the US from conducting another deadly raid on Pakistani soil. “The alarming expansion and reconstruction of the US Embassy in Islamabad may pave the way for deeper US penetration in Pakistan,” the report reads. It urges a fundamental rethink in the relationship between the two countries.

Richard Armitage’s nuclear threats on 9/11 seem to have worn off. Plus, from the comments: “Here’s an idea: let’s dump the wretched hellpit known as Pakistan and support India instead. Thriving, much more prosperous, a genuine (if troubled) democracy, and most importantly, not run by crackpot Islamic loonies.” In 2001 I regarded Pakistan as a reasonably civilized country. I was misinformed.

UPDATE: Reader Mike Churchill has a different view:

Hi Glenn … I run a hedge fund and research shop in Virginia and Pakistan is my second-largest country position. The stock market is booming – up 31% this year. I’ve been to both Karachi and Lahore over the past two years. They are grungy, difficult cities – but they are not crazy or downright scary cities. I was in Cairo once three years ago and that WAS a crazy and scary city.

I find the Pakistanis to be reasonably normal people. Company managements are good – and very, very honest. IQs and literacy rates both are rising sharply in Pakistan, too, which also is helpful.

So, personally, I think the whole notion that Pakistan is a cesspit is out of date. The country is actually improving.

Let’s hope.