October 04, 2009 02:58 PM UTC

Response to Afganistan/Pakistan:There isn't much of a border or remember the Ho Chi Minh Trail

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• by: Ray Springfield

There isn’t much of a border

In May the Taliban were 60 miles outside of Islamabad. The President approved 500 million in immediate military assistance and 1 billion in immediate economic assistance that week.

Afghanistan and Pakistan as a region are tribal. The tribes tend to control areas rather than the official government. This gives rise to my suggestion that the border is like the Cambodian border in Vietnam, or Laos, as part of the Ho Chi Minh trail.

This comes from www.stratfor.com

Some stratfor:

“The United States has indicated the possibility of drone strikes in the city of Quetta, where Washington says high-level Taliban and al Qaeda figures like Mullah Mohammad Omar probably are hiding. But such strikes in a densely populated part of Pakistan proper would enrage Pakistani nationalists, to say nothing of inflaming Balochi separatist sentiment, meaning the U.S. is not likely to carry out such strikes. Instead, Washington is probably trying to pressure Pakistan to cooperate more strongly against the Afghan Taliban. But such cooperation is not likely.

Analysis

The head of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) directorate, Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha, remained in Washington on Oct. 1 for meetings with U.S. military and intelligence officials, who are seeking improved Pakistani cooperation against al Qaeda and an enhanced Pakistani offensive against both the Afghan and Pakistani Taliban. During Pasha’s visit, U.S. Ambassador to Pakistan Anne W. Patterson said in an interview that ran in The Washington Post on Sept. 29 that the Quetta region of Pakistan is a major haven for the Afghan Taliban leadership, adding that the “Quetta Shura is high on Washington’s list.” Patterson acknowledged that U.S. intelligence on Quetta is weak, and that the United States has “no Predators” there.

Her comments have sparked great apprehension in Pakistan about any U.S. move to expand drone strikes from Pakistan’s Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA) to Quetta, the capital of Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest province in terms of area, especially as this is not the first time the United States has made noises about targeting Quetta. Similar media reports appeared in March, something STRATFOR first discussed in June 2008. The ensuing public uproar has put Islamabad on the defensive, with Pakistani officials saying they will not allow U.S. unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to operate in the Quetta area. The issue also comes during a period of extensive clamor within the Pakistani media by right-wing nationalist elements over how the Kerry-Lugar aid package for Pakistan approved by Congress allegedly renders Pakistan subservient to the United States. Moreover, in a poll conducted by the International Republican Institute between July 15 and Aug. 7, as many as 80 percent of Pakistanis said Islamabad should not cooperate with Washington in the “war against terrorism.”

My read on Sratfor:

To suggest that the war does not involve Pakistan is folly. They do have nuclear weapons. If you think that AL-Queda or Iran having nuclear weapons is fine, then leaving the region could be suggested.

I don’t share that view. It’s complicated.