taliban operations in pakistan - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

roachboy · 04-17-2009, 10:56 AM

i started looking at the new international edition of the ny times/iht rather than at the us oriented one...i'm not sure if this was a lead story in both editions, either way, have a look:

Quote:

Taliban Exploit Class Rifts in Pakistan
By JANE PERLEZ and PIR ZUBAIR SHAH

PESHAWAR, Pakistan — The Taliban have advanced deeper into Pakistan by engineering a class revolt that exploits profound fissures between a small group of wealthy landlords and their landless tenants, according to government officials and analysts here.

The strategy cleared a path to power for the Taliban in the Swat Valley, where the government allowed Islamic law to be imposed this week, and it carries broad dangers for the rest of Pakistan, particularly the militants’ main goal, the populous heartland of Punjab Province.

In Swat, accounts from those who have fled now make clear that the Taliban seized control by pushing out about four dozen landlords who held the most power.

To do so, the militants organized peasants into armed gangs that became their shock troops, the residents, government officials and analysts said.

The approach allowed the Taliban to offer economic spoils to people frustrated with lax and corrupt government even as the militants imposed a strict form of Islam through terror and intimidation.

“This was a bloody revolution in Swat,” said a senior Pakistani official who oversees Swat, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation by the Taliban. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it sweeps the established order of Pakistan.”

The Taliban’s ability to exploit class divisions adds a new dimension to the insurgency and is raising alarm about the risks to Pakistan, which remains largely feudal.

Unlike India after independence in 1947, Pakistan maintained a narrow landed upper class that kept its vast holdings while its workers remained subservient, the officials and analysts said. Successive Pakistani governments have since failed to provide land reform and even the most basic forms of education and health care. Avenues to advancement for the vast majority of rural poor do not exist.

Analysts and other government officials warn that the strategy executed in Swat is easily transferable to Punjab, saying that the province, where militant groups are already showing strength, is ripe for the same social upheavals that have convulsed Swat and the tribal areas.

Mahboob Mahmood, a Pakistani-American lawyer and former classmate of President Obama’s, said, “The people of Pakistan are psychologically ready for a revolution.”

Sunni militancy is taking advantage of deep class divisions that have long festered in Pakistan, he said. “The militants, for their part, are promising more than just proscriptions on music and schooling,” he said. “They are also promising Islamic justice, effective government and economic redistribution.”

The Taliban strategy in Swat, an area of 1.3 million people with fertile orchards, vast plots of timber and valuable emerald mines, unfolded in stages over five years, analysts said.

The momentum of the insurgency built in the past two years, when the Taliban, reinforced by seasoned fighters from the tribal areas with links to Al Qaeda, fought the Pakistani Army to a standstill, said a Pakistani intelligence agent who works in the Swat region.

The insurgents struck at any competing point of power: landlords and elected leaders — who were usually the same people — and an underpaid and unmotivated police force, said Khadim Hussain, a linguistics and communications professor at Bahria University in Islamabad, the capital.

At the same time, the Taliban exploited the resentments of the landless tenants, particularly the fact that they had many unresolved cases against their bosses in a slow-moving and corrupt justice system, Mr. Hussain and residents who fled the area said.

Their grievances were stoked by a young militant, Maulana Fazlullah, who set up an FM radio station in 2004 to appeal to the disenfranchised. The broadcasts featured easy-to-understand examples using goats, cows, milk and grass. By 2006, Mr. Fazlullah had formed a ragtag force of landless peasants armed by the Taliban, said Mr. Hussain and former residents of Swat.

At first, the pressure on the landlords was subtle. One landowner was pressed to take his son out of an English-speaking school offensive to the Taliban. Others were forced to make donations to the Taliban.

Then, in late 2007, Shujaat Ali Khan, the richest of the landowners, his brothers and his son, Jamal Nasir, the mayor of Swat, became targets.

After Shujaat Ali Khan, a senior politician in the Pakistan Muslim League-Q, narrowly missed being killed by a roadside bomb, he fled to London. A brother, Fateh Ali Mohammed, a former senator, left, too, and now lives in Islamabad. Mr. Nasir also fled.

Later, the Taliban published a “most wanted” list of 43 prominent names, said Muhammad Sher Khan, a landlord who is a politician with the Pakistan Peoples Party, and whose name was on the list. All those named were ordered to present themselves to the Taliban courts or risk being killed, he said. “When you know that they will hang and kill you, how will you dare go back there?” Mr. Khan, hiding in Punjab, said in a telephone interview. “Being on the list meant ‘Don’t come back to Swat.’ ”

One of the main enforcers of the new order was Ibn-e-Amin, a Taliban commander from the same area as the landowners, called Matta. The fact that Mr. Amin came from Matta, and knew who was who there, put even more pressure on the landowners, Mr. Hussain said.

According to Pakistani news reports, Mr. Amin was arrested in August 2004 on suspicion of having links to Al Qaeda and was released in November 2006. Another Pakistani intelligence agent said Mr. Amin often visited a madrasa in North Waziristan, the stronghold of Al Qaeda in the tribal areas, where he apparently received guidance.

Each time the landlords fled, their tenants were rewarded. They were encouraged to cut down the orchard trees and sell the wood for their own profit, the former residents said. Or they were told to pay the rent to the Taliban instead of their now absentee bosses.

Two dormant emerald mines have reopened under Taliban control. The militants have announced that they will receive one-third of the revenues.

Since the Taliban fought the military to a truce in Swat in February, the militants have deepened their approach and made clear who is in charge.

When provincial bureaucrats visit Mingora, Swat’s capital, they must now follow the Taliban’s orders and sit on the floor, surrounded by Taliban bearing weapons, and in some cases wearing suicide bomber vests, the senior provincial official said.

In many areas of Swat the Taliban have demanded that each family give up one son for training as a Taliban fighter, said Mohammad Amad, executive director of a nongovernmental group, the Initiative for Development and Empowerment Axis.

A landlord who fled with his family last year said he received a chilling message last week. His tenants called him in Peshawar, the capital of North-West Frontier Province, which includes Swat, to tell him his huge house was being demolished, he said in an interview here.

The most crushing news was about his finances. He had sold his fruit crop in advance, though at a quarter of last year’s price. But even that smaller yield would not be his, his tenants said, relaying the Taliban message. The buyer had been ordered to give the money to the Taliban instead.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/17/wo...ef=global-home

now i am no fan of the war in afghanistan. i am not entirely sure how it gradually turned into the americans et al acting as a faction in a civil war. i don't really understand what these troops are doing there. i don't think anyone really does at this point--something vague about al-qaeda i remember hearing once upon a time--but obviously that's long since been tossed out the window.

but this cannot be good. i don't see any way in which this is good.

the taliban have positioned themselves as populist heros in regions of pakistan and are gaining support by instituting land reforms etc--undoing the class structure of pakistan--now i dont see a problem with the action per se--but i cannot imagine a scenario in which it is a desirable thing that the taliban is doing this.

but it seems a logical extension of the changing situation along the pakistan/afghanistan border...if for example the americans are stepping up the pressure on the taliban (how did we get into this war with them again?) and is pressuring pakistan to do the same....and if the class structure of pakistan is such that this option presents itself (which it obviously does)...it certainly takes pressure off the taliban to extend this direction of action with the idea of---well, from what this article says, inciting a revolution in pakistan.

it is a very very bad thing for pakistan to be destabilized, particularly by these people, because pakistan has nukes. there are other reasons as well, but really---pakistan has nukes. i cannot imagine india not being freaked out by this--there's already a pretty extensive history of conflict with pakistan both direct (kashmir) and indirect (afghanistan)---i think ANY real threat to pakistan's overall political stability animated by the taliban would trigger a really bad response from india--which also has nukes.

hooray for nuclear proliferation! what a great fucking idea that was!

anyway...it does not seem an exaggeration to see in this the potential for a regional meltdown.

what if anything do you think the response of the international commuity should be?
what the american response?
what do you see as resulting from this movement?

Slims · 04-17-2009, 12:37 PM

Well, without getting sucked into the whole "why are we in AF" thing, I will say that since we are already there, and since our departure would leave a huge vacum which the Taliban is already in place to fill, we are stuck working towards an alternative solution.

Remember the Taliban are an extremist organization which have always attempted to seize power wherever they can. They took Afghanistan several years after the Russians left and then imposed their brand of fundamental sharia law (much to the surprise of the average Afghan who supported them simply to cut down on corruption). They are doing the same in Pakistan now. They modify their rules and tenents to fit whatever is most expedient for them. When they were in power in Afghanistan, they considered opium and the opium smugglers to be a threat and clamped down on it, but they are now heavily involved in the drug trade.

Just as Mao did not really resonate with the Chinese people until he essentially rebranded Industrial Communism into something a rural farmer could recognize, the Taliban are beginning to enjoy more widespread success in PK now that they have begun adapting to the people around them and picking up causes which resonate with the local communities.

Right now, most of the senior insurgent leadership is operating out of PK and that is where the supplies, etc. are coming from. If they have their safe havens taken away they will be unable to continue to function.

The solution?

I don't really have a good answer for you. We have made a commitment to the Afghans who have staked their lives on our promise to help them create a new Afghanistan. At the same time it is definitely not in our best interest to hasten civil war in PK by invading the SWAT and NWFP and dealing with the problem ourselves.

I think if you loosened the rules of engagement again for SOF and allowed them to focus primarily on border interdictions you might be able to restrict the movement of men, weapons and supplies across the border enough to give the Afghan government time to become quasi-competent and strong enough to stand against the pressure of the Taliban.

Right now many officials are playing both sides of the fence because they (very likely correctly) believe we will end up pulling out and leaving them hanging high and dry. If they do not stay in good favor with the Taliban they will be executed as soon as we are gone. The solution there is obvious...make a strong commitment and show we are not going to abandon them. If we continue to sway back and forth on the issue we will never receive the full support of our Afghan allies. (or, alternatively we need to decide enough is enough and leave now.)

roachboy · 04-17-2009, 01:33 PM

understood---but that presupposes that aghanistan is still the central theater of operations for the taliban. what i wonder is whether that's starting to change--or has been changing and we collectively haven't noticed particularly because the way information is sorted regarding the taliban. from this, it's early to say what'll happen--but analyses of pakistan have consistently pointed out its internal instability, its dividedness etc...in a way, this could work against what the article implies could be a quite radical problem from tha pakistani state because changing around who controls areas in a space that's already divided is different from taking over spaces in an area that's centrally controlled---the political implications are more limited.

what is worrisome in this is obvious--the appears to be a kind of chain reaction that is a result of the afghanistan action in the broad sense--and of the apparent impasse that has been in effect between the us et al and pakistan about dealing one way or another with the taliban in pakistan. so if this represents a strategic change on the part of the taliban, it seems that it is happening in an area outside any meaningful control of the us et al and poses a very real problem in regional political--and potentially military terms.

what i guess this comes to really is whether the us et al now find themselves bracing against the wrong door.

it's a perplexing set of consequences. and they can't be good. this really can't be good.

so options---increasing military aid to the pakistani government. but if the government is already in such a weak position that this movement in swat can be interpreted as a threat to it, there are obvious risks in increasing military aid. but if the us doesn't do it, what consequences follow from that? same set of questions with economic aid, really--the objective might be to attempt to bolster the government's position--but is that necessarily a good thing to do except in geopolitical terms? wouldn't the us find itself backing the wrong horse? but it's already backing the wrong horse.

the really alarming prospects involve military intervention.
and there are nukes.

great fucking idea, nuclear proliferation.
sorry, but i can't seem to get by it.
this would be serious enough without them--but it is with them.

Slims · 04-17-2009, 01:49 PM

If the Taliban had been strong enough, they would have assumed control in PK as well as Afghanistan.

They have always been competing against (sometimes violently) the PK government.

If the theater has shifted, it is only because the US is actually providing a strong presence in Afghanistan while PK is growing weaker due to all the recent political turmoil.

I know you feel I am a bit of a statist/nationalist so my opinion may be no surprise to you, but I feel the turmoil in PK was inevitable. As soon as the Taliban were strong enough they would have begun to do what is taking place now.

PK also shot themselves in the foot by bulldozing refugee camps in SWAT and NWFP, displacing hundreds of thousands of people. The average fighter is not politically/religiously motivated over there (at least it isn't the primary reason they fight). Rather, your average rank and file 'insurgent' is simply some poor bastard who agrees in principle with the TB and who really needs money. By bulldozing those refugee camps PK forced a lot of people to make some really hard choices about where their next meal would come from, and additionally motivated them against the PK Gov. by destroying their 'houses.' The money in PK and AFG IS controlled primarily by religous groups, so it is no wonder that people who fight (for money) do so under the banner of radical Islam.

On a side note, I recently read a book titled "The Accidental Guerilla" and I think you would find it illuminating and not-distasteful in it's presentation. It attempts to show how complex this situation really is as well as why different groups in AF/PK are behaving as they are.

roachboy · 04-23-2009, 06:04 AM

things are getting curiouser and curiouser here.

Quote:

Taliban oust Pakistani authorities in Swat Valley sharia zone

• Fighters force out judiciary, police, politicians and aid agencies
• Clinton attacks Islamabad's appeasement of Islamist militants

* Declan Walsh in Mingora
* guardian.co.uk, Thursday 23 April 2009 09.34 BST

Students in Mingora sift through the rubble of their school allegedly destroyed by Taliban militants. Photograph: BK Bangash/AP

Taliban fighters spilling out of the Swat Valley have swept across Buner, a district 60 miles from Islamabad, as Hillary Clinton warned the situation in Pakistan now poses a "mortal threat" to the security of the world.

The US secretary of state told Congress yesterday that Pakistan faced an "existential" threat from Islamist militants. "I think the Pakistani government is basically abdicating to the Taliban and the extremists," she said. Any further deterioration in the situation "poses a mortal threat to the security and safety of our country and the world", she said.

In Buner, Taliban fighters occupied government buildings, ransacked the offices of aid agencies and ordered aid employees to leave. Fighters brandishing guns and rocket launchers patrolled villages, forcing beleaguered local police to retreat to their stations. Local courts have stopped functioning and judicial officials have gone on indefinite leave.

This morning the provincial government said it was deploying six platoons of paramilitaries – between 180 and 300 troops – to retrieve control of the government installations.

The turmoil in Buner, a district of about 1 million people, does not pose an immediate threat to Islamabad, which lies across a mountain range and the river Indus. But the speed and aggression of the militant advance has stoked a sense of alarm across the country, even among normally conservative forces.

"If Taliban continue to move at this pace they will soon be knocking at the doors of Islamabad," Maulana Fazlur Rehman, leader of the pro-Taliban Jamiat Ulema e Islam party, told the national assembly yesterday.

The Taliban could soon seize control of Tarbela Dam, a strategic reservoir, Rehman warned.

Blame for the turmoil has focused on a controversial peace deal the provincial government signed with militants in February. Hoping to defuse the insurgency, the Awami National party-led government acceded to demands for sharia law in Swat and seven surrounding districts, known collectively as Malakand Division.

The changes were ratified by the national parliament last week with cross-party consensus. Since then, the Taliban have moved to establish much more than judicial control.

In Mingora, the commercial hub of Swat, the police retain a low-key presence, reduced to directing traffic. Most politicians have fled, many under death threats. Many residents said it was not clear who was in control of the town.

In Imam Dheri, the Taliban headquarters near Mingora, a Taliban spokesman, Muslim Khan, told the Guardian their goal was the establishment of an Islamic caliphate first in Pakistan and then across the Muslim world.

"Democracy is a system for European countries. It is not for Muslims," he said. "This is not just about justice. It should be in education, health, economics. Everything should be under sharia."

The drive into Buner signals the next step in that strategy. Khan said Taliban fighters were being deployed to ensure sharia law was implemented there too.

They are also muscling in on other areas. On Wednesday, militants kidnapped a senior government official in Upper Dir, west of Swat, for a few hours before releasing him.

Defending the government, Pakistan's ambassador to the US, Hussain Haqqani, said Islamabad was pushing for a negotiated peace just as the US had done with Iraqi militants.

"To think that that strategy somehow represents an abdication of our responsibility towards our people and towards the security of our country and the region is incorrect," he told CNN.

Taliban oust Pakistani authorities in Swat Valley sharia zone | World news | guardian.co.uk

hillary clinton's statement is alarming...it appears that this movement in swat, which is about 60 miles from the capital, is now being seen as a basic threat to the stability of pakistan.

so the scenario that i was concerned with when i saw the first article seems to be taking shape.

what do you think the options are?
so you see the possibility that some sort of military action will result inside of pakistan?
i do.
and there is nothing about it that seems a good thing.

do you see other options?
because this isn't really so much about afghanistan any more....

roachboy · 04-23-2009, 11:21 AM

Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia

some background in the form of an hour-long talk by ahmed rachid.

other bits here:

The Roots of Pakistan’s Taliban Problem - The Lede Blog - NYTimes.com

ring · 04-23-2009, 11:30 AM

It is difficult for me to formulate coherrent thoughts on this matter,
right at the moment....
(it's a nuke thing)
I am old enough to remember the drills we had in grade school-
sitting on the cold dusty floor - arms over head - teachers full of tense fear - 1966

I have no idea if this matter could still be handled by say, perhaps, SAD/SOG

It may too late for surgical precision tactics, maybe not.

Back in the day when Pakistan first bacame a nuclear power,
I do remember the ruckus.

This link gives some history.

Pakistan Nuclear Weapons

This latest news is very alarming indeed.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009...-nuclear-talks

Willravel · 04-23-2009, 11:37 AM

Well obviously the US can't nation-build in the Middle East. We simply can't. We can try to be peace-keepers and prop up democratic movements, but in the end we could be propping up the extreme minority as the vast majority fights against us. We've tried working with the Pakistani government, but that's not really done any good at all. What are we left with? As much as I hate to say it, we can't really just leave. Iraq stands a chance of eventually becoming stable as we withdraw, but probably not Afghanistan and certainly not Pakistan.

It pains me to say it, but I keep thinking we need India and China... maybe even Russia. This level of instability in a nuclear-capable nation is simply unacceptable, and the thought of a radical, anti-West theocracy with proven nuclear weapons can't be comforting to anyone in the US or Europe, not to mention India and China. If I were Obama (and thank god I'm not, we could be bogged down in universal health care and reduced military spending by now if I were), I'd arrange for NATO to sit down with Russia, China, India, and Pakistan to talk viable solutions. This can't continue on its present course.

Charlatan · 04-23-2009, 04:00 PM

The West cannot nation build in the sense that they have been doing for the past... forever. The West needs to take a page from the charities in Saudi Arabia and Iran that have built schools (madrases) in rural Pakistan. They are funding nation building from the grassroots. They are funding the changing perceptions of youth and culture.

The West can continue to change the leadership in regime change after regime change. They can provide weapons to insurgents or government forces, support whichever side they currently favour. But without changing the foundation of a society or culture they will never succeed.

Of course grassroots change is a long game that will not show results for many years. Most Western democracies cannot think beyond the next election cycle.

Tully Mars · 04-23-2009, 04:58 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Charlatan

The West cannot nation build in the sense that they have been doing for the past... forever. The West needs to take a page from the charities in Saudi Arabia and Iran that have built schools (madrases) in rural Pakistan. They are funding nation building from the grassroots. They are funding the changing perceptions of youth and culture.

The West can continue to change the leadership in regime change after regime change. They can provide weapons to insurgents or government forces, support whichever side they currently favour. But without changing the foundation of a society or culture they will never succeed.

Of course grassroots change is a long game that will not show results for many years. Most Western democracies cannot think beyond the next election cycle.

Will you please change occupations and take a high level position with the US State Dept?

Slims · 04-23-2009, 04:58 PM

A curious tidbit.

There are many extremist movements in PK, but this one is TNSM which basically means "fighters for the establishment of Sharia law." The PK government can hardly act surprised when they did just that.

The PK government recently gave them a permanent foothold by allowing them to operate without being challenged by the government in the FATA. Predictably, it just gave them a base of operations and the stability they needed to expand. They will continue to expand until they are challenged as they have no problem forcing Pakistanis under Sharia Law at the point of a gun.

roachboy · 04-24-2009, 04:11 AM

the story line in the rachid clip i posted above is quite sobering. and there are many elements to it, so the best thing is to watch it--the talk itself is about 25 minutes followed by a q & a session, which has some interesting bits to it---but it also has That Guy, the Guy who always shows up at ay given conference and under the pretext of posing a question rattles on for an extended duration about himself. yes yes, but let's talk about me. anyway:

you can bookend this as he does, by noting, as he does, that right now in kabul people still only have electricity about 4 hrs/day.
once upon a time, i remember that it was meet to refer to the bush people as mayberry machiavellians. but had they actually read the prince, they'd have understood that invading is easy--the problems really start once you've invaded. you have to establish legitimacy and it is simply the case that the main way an existing order establishes legitimacy is via the continuity of basic services....he argues that as of the time of the speech, june 08, about a third of afghanistan was under taliban control....and this is not even the Problem.

the focus of the talk is really the situation on the border between afghanistan & pakistan.

the outline goes:

after the initial invasion of afghanistan, the coalition went into what amounts to a 3 year holding pattern. everything just kinda stopped. can you say iraq?
it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see in the wreckage that is now unfolding a consequence of the iraq debacle.

the relationship with musharraf undertaken by the bush people was such that despite the fact that pk offered sanctuary along its borders to al qeada, to the taliban(s) etc., and allowed it from the highest levels of government, and despite the fact that everyone--and i mean everyone--knew this was the case, what musharraf said went and so these sanctuaries were allowed to operate, dig in, expand.

he outlines the relations between pashtoons across the afghan/pk border--the extent to which this was a very old kind of relation, one that shaped much about afghanistan as a largely fictional western-style nation-state, how it rendered the notion of foxed borders absurd because it's a similar pattern that you see everywhere.

he outlines the dynamic in which the afghanistan taliban was able to fashion a pk correlate of itself, which is what you see now moving into swat, which is just outside the national capital.

he outlines a brief flurry of american activity just before the 04 election and the way that flurry petered out.

in the q&a, he talks about an ancillary problem, one related to the bookend narrative, which concerns the lack of co-ordination between the various militaries that occupy afghanistan in a kind of jurisdictional mosaic...

the storyline he unfolds ends as does that of the book he's hawking, with the assassination of benzir bhutto.

the results of the actions--more non-actions---that he describes points to what looks like an unfolding strategic catastrophe.
what you're seeing in the string of articles that have been appearing about this situation over the past week is a kind of giant what the fuck? moment.

i still dont see any obvious move that can be made here, but maybe i'm thinking about it too much through the process of trying to make sense of how this happened.
what's clear is that while charlatans point is excellent in principle, in fact, at the moment, the shit may be about to hit the fan and while it nonetheless makes sense for the strategy he outlines to be adopted in other contexts, in this one the time may be passed.

i don't know.
how do you parse this?
i hope i'm missing something....

Derwood · 04-24-2009, 04:16 AM

Isn't the basic (and most important) upshot of this the fact that if the Taliban gained full control of Pakistan, they would have a nuclear weapon at their disposal?

roachboy · 04-24-2009, 04:20 AM

that's what makes this a potentially catastrophic situation.
that's why i really really hope i'm missing something when i try to think this through.
because it looks like what we like to call a clusterfuck is taking shape.

what i can see as an option is a proxy civil war being launched in pakistan.
but if the sanctuaries on the border were in place and continued because of co-operation at high levels of the government/military, how the hell would that work?

Slims · 04-24-2009, 07:23 PM

I haven't watched the video yet, I will get around it, but based on your description, a few points:

When I left about a year ago Kabul had (relatively) steady and reliable power.

If the electricity is only available for 4 hours a day, it is likely because people can afford AC for the first time in their lives and are out-pacing gains in electricity production. There were several hydroelectric projects in progress where I operated...I would assume they were elsewhere as well.

That, or things have deteriorated far more quickly than I would have anticipated.

Quote:

Originally Posted by roachboy

after the initial invasion of afghanistan, the coalition went into what amounts to a 3 year holding pattern. everything just kinda stopped. can you say iraq?
it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see in the wreckage that is now unfolding a consequence of the iraq debacle.

the relationship with musharraf undertaken by the bush people was such that despite the fact that pk offered sanctuary along its borders to al qeada, to the taliban(s) etc., and allowed it from the highest levels of government, and despite the fact that everyone--and i mean everyone--knew this was the case, what musharraf said went and so these sanctuaries were allowed to operate, dig in, expand.

he outlines the relations between pashtoons across the afghan/pk border--the extent to which this was a very old kind of relation, one that shaped much about afghanistan as a largely fictional western-style nation-state, how it rendered the notion of foxed borders absurd because it's a similar pattern that you see everywhere.

he outlines the dynamic in which the afghanistan taliban was able to fashion a pk correlate of itself, which is what you see now moving into swat, which is just outside the national capital.

i still dont see any obvious move that can be made here, but maybe i'm thinking about it too much through the process of trying to make sense of how this happened.
what's clear is that while charlatans point is excellent in principle, in fact, at the moment, the shit may be about to hit the fan and while it nonetheless makes sense for the strategy he outlines to be adopted in other contexts, in this one the time may be passed.

i don't know.
how do you parse this?
i hope i'm missing something....

Hope you don't mind, I pared down your quote for readability.

The 'holding pattern' is not particularly accurate. We did not push large numbers of troops into Afghanistan, but we did focus on getting at least the framework of a workable government/military in place and we trained up the Afghan Army/Police enough to be useful in a fight. We wasted time for sure by not putting all our assets on the problem, but so it goes.

Despite the two-faced-nature of the PK government, it appears they have at the very least tolerated our attacks on targets in PK (they hem and haw but dont' actually do anything about it). Truth be told they never really controlled the NWFP or SWAT in the first place. They have used the Frontier Corps as a means to maintain some government influence, but they are ultimately loyal to their local tribes rather than to a central government (which is of a different ethnic group).

The idea of the border being an artificial construct is spot on. That area is often referred to as "Pashtunistan" and is more or less Pashtu with little loyalty to any state whatsoever. The people are loyal to their families, tribes and villages. If you ask one of them to tell you where he is from he will tell you what tribe he is from, and what village he is from but will likely make no reference to what country, regardless of whether you are interviewing him in Afghanistan and he just crossed the border. It isn't deception (well, sometimes it is) but rather a very different sense of identity. Though, the PK Pashtuns have integrated somewhat successfully into the PK government (as evidenced by the continued support of high ranking gov members of the Taliban).

However, Pashtunistan is too volatile to make a successful state. If it were to happen (and PK volunteered to give up half it's territory and most of it's natural resources) fighting would likely break out almost immediately between those on the AF side and those on the PK side as they are (while still Pashto) very different and Afghans tend to be xenophobes in the extreme.

The solution?
It has to be a long term one, because you can't change how people live their entire lives overnight. It also have to be cheap or it won't be sustained. Your guess is as good as mine on exactly how that should be structured.

Edit: With regard to nuclear weapons. If the PK government fell and the extremists acquired or were about to acquire nuclear weapons, India would be on them immediately. Most Pakistani's are far more concerned with India than the US (and rightly so).

roachboy · 04-29-2009, 06:54 AM

from this morning's ny times.
it's hard to say whether this is an "insurgency" in the meaningless pentagon-speak of the past few years, or if it's more like a civil war...

Quote:

Pakistan Claims to Retake Town
By CARLOTTA GALL and ELISABETH BUMILLER

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — After a week of strong criticism here and abroad over its inaction, the Pakistani military claimed on Wednesday to have reasserted control of Daggar, a key town just 60 miles from the capital in the strategic district of Buner which was overrun by hundreds of Taliban militants last week.

The development came one day after the military deployed fighter jets and helicopter gunships against the insurgents. It was not immediately clear what level of resistance the Taliban had offered.

Pakistan also agreed to move 6,000 troops from its Indian border to fight militants on its western border with Afghanistan, according to a Pakistani official who did not want to be identified discussing troop movements in advance.

But American officials, who welcomed the redeployment, said Pakistan was still not doing enough to fight the insurgents, who are tightening their hold on the country. The Americans expressed frustration that Pakistan was still rebuffing their offers to train more Pakistanis to fight Al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, a military spokesperson, said that government forces had reasserted control of Buner by 8 a.m. on Wednesday. One member of a government security force and two were injured in the operation, and more than 50 militants were killed, he said.

“We are facing stiff resistance in the area of Amabala,” General Abbas said, referring to part of Buner. “Our constraint,” he said, “is that we are launching an operation in an area where militants have held local population hostage. We are trying to ensure there is minimum collateral damage and minimum displacement of local people.”

General Abbas said he expected the operation to continue for at least one week.

The campaign in Buner began Tuesday after government forces completed a two-day operation against Taliban militants in Dir, a neighboring district, said a military spokesman, Maj. Gen. Ather Abbas.

The Taliban advance into Buner has brought heavy pressure on the military from the United States and other Western countries. It has also fortified a growing consensus among Pakistani politicians and the public that the Taliban have gone too far and that the military should act to contain the spread of the insurgency.

Under threat of military action, the Taliban staged a show withdrawal from Buner at the end of last week, General Abbas said. But he said the militants were trying to expand the space they controlled beyond the Swat Valley, which borders Dir and Buner.

At a news conference, he played three tapes of what were described as telephone intercepts of the main Taliban leader, Mullah Fazlullah, talking to one of his commanders about making a show withdrawal for the news media while telling the fighters to put away their weapons and lie low.

“In Buner, people are living under coercion and in fear,” General Abbas said. “There was no reason to intimidate people in Buner, and the militants started intimidating people and forcibly recruiting young people to take them back to Swat for military training.”

“The government acted with patience,” he added, “but eventually there was no other way except to launch an operation.”

Earlier in the day, the new interior minister, Rehman Malik, said the Taliban had ignored repeated requests from the government of President Asif Ali Zardari to leave Buner. “I warn them to vacate the area,” Mr. Malik told reporters. “We are not going to spare them. Action will be taken if anyone tries to block our efforts to re-establish the writ of the government in Buner and other areas.”

Several events contributed to the shift among politicians and the public. Video of the flogging of a 17-year-old woman in Swat by the Taliban several weeks ago shocked many in the country. A radical cleric who helped negotiate the peace deal in Swat, Maulana Sufi Muhammad, said recently that Pakistani institutions like Parliament and the high courts were un-Islamic, a comment that angered politicians from all parties.

Finally, the militants’ move into new districts last week impelled the Pakistani Army to move against the Taliban.

The 6,000 troops to be shifted had originally been on Pakistan’s western border but were sent to the Indian border in December, after the terrorists’ attack in Mumbai in which 163 people were killed the previous month. India had responded to the attack, which Indian and American officials concluded was planned in Pakistan and carried out by Pakistanis, by massing troops on the Pakistani border.

The promised redeployment, which will essentially return Pakistan’s military presence in the northwest to pre-Mumbai levels, comes as American and Pakistani officials are preparing for what are likely to be tense meetings in Washington next week between President Obama, President Zardari and President Hamid Karzai of Afghanistan.

American officials have alternately criticized and praised Pakistan, in the hope of goading it into taking tougher action against the Taliban, and on Tuesday they engaged in both strategies.

Early in the day, a senior military official, one of several American officials who spoke on condition of anonymity in order to discuss the security strategy of an ally, expressed anger about what he saw as Pakistan’s fecklessness in trying to combat militants within its borders.

“It is reasonable for Pakistanis and Americans alike to ask why there has not been a more robust, sustained and serious response to elements that assassinated Benazir Bhutto, blew up the Marriott Hotel, attacked a visiting cricket team and assaulted a police academy,” the official said, ticking off a series of violent events that began with the killing of the former prime minister. He said it was “inexplicable” that the incidents had not “galvanized the Pakistani military and civilian leaders to link arms in a comprehensive, sustained campaign to fight back.”

But later in the day, after the United States received word of the troop movement, the official took a different tone. “It’s too soon to say how it’s going to turn out,” the official said. “But it’s a promising sign that they finally recognize the existential threat to their country.”

American officials said they were continuing to press Pakistan to accept more American trainers, an issue likely to come up in the meetings next week. More than 70 American military advisers and technical specialists are already working in Pakistan to help its armed forces battle militants in the lawless tribal areas, but the United States would like to expand the effort.

Pakistan has balked, American officials said, because it does not want a large American presence in its country.

“There’s a red line about our advisers and any foreign boots on the ground in Pakistan right now,” a senior administration official said. He said that the United States was “doing everything we can within the constraints that are currently placed on our engagement to be as helpful as we can.”

The Pakistani military may have a difficult fight ahead. The Taliban have already been digging trenches and fortified positions, General Abbas said.

There are indications that the fighting in Dir has been heavier than Pakistani officials have acknowledged, and that the civilian cost has been high. The military said some 70 militants had been killed in three days of fighting.

But more than 30,000 civilians have fled their homes in the region, and some of them reported seeing bodies lying in the streets and the fields as they fled, Amnesty International said Tuesday.

“Neither the Taliban nor the government forces seem to care about the well-being of the residents of Lower Dir,” Sam Zarifi, Amnesty International’s Asia-Pacific director, said in a statement.

Carlotta Gall reported from Islamabad, and Elisabeth Bumiller from Washington. Salman Masood contributed from Islamabad. Helene Cooper, Mark Mazzetti and Mark Landler contributed reporting from Washington. Alan Cowell contributed from London.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/30/wo...ef=global-home

i'm still thinking about this information, but for the moment it's interesting and alarming the extent to which longer-term ambivalences/fractures within pakistan are exposed through this---particularly over the question of american "trainers" or "advisors" working inside pk with the military.

it's also obviously difficult to know exactly what's going on here---if i have time later, i'll try to root around and see if i can find something that feels less--um---tenuous.

slims: the post i made above was basically just a teaser for the clip...

roachboy · 05-07-2009, 05:30 AM

Quote:

UN warns of refugee crisis as thousands flee fighting in Swat valley

Fighting between government forces and Taliban intensifies as Pakistan prepares for extra 500,000 refugees

* Declan Walsh in Pakistan, Peter Walker and agencies
* guardian.co.uk, Thursday 7 May 2009 11.15 BST

Boys in a refugee camp in Peshawar, where hundreds are living in tents after fleeing fighting between the government and the Taliban. Photograph: Greg Baker/AP

Officials and aid workers in Pakistan were today facing a fresh influx of people fleeing fighting between government forces and Taliban militants in the Swat valley as the UN warned that the situation was fast becoming a crisis.

Following heavy ground and air assaults, which reached the outskirts of the region's main town, Mingora, many people took advantage of a brief lull in the violence to load their families into cars and trucks and flee.

Thousands have arrived in the town of Mardan, further south inside the North-West Frontier province.

The government is preparing for up to 500,000 internal refugees, the largest displacement crisis in Pakistan's history.

According to one UN official in Mardan, up to 60,000 displaced people have already registered at centres in the town.

The figure is likely to be only a fraction of the real total as most fleeing families stay with relatives or friends rather than seek official help.

Several thousand people are already based at camps around Mardan. Hundreds more are waiting to register for assistance with shelter and food.

"The international community needs to realise that this is becoming one of the major displacement crises in the world and it needs to be dealt with," Killian Kleinschmidt, deputy head of the UN refugee agency in Pakistan, said. "We need money now for what is going to happen through the summer."

More than 500,000 Pakistanis driven out by fighting in other regions of the country's north-west are already living in camps or with relatives elsewhere.

Washington sees the fighting as a key test of Pakistan's commitment to tackling an increasingly powerful Taliban insurgency.

In February, the government in Islamabad agreed to the introduction of Islamic sharia law in Swat, formerly a tourist destination, prompting US concern about what is saw as capitulation to Taliban pressure.

But the pact broke down and, 11 days ago, security forces began an operation to remove militants from several districts, resulting in heavy fighting.

According to the government, more than 60 militants have been killed. The Taliban says 30 civilians have died.

Yesterday, the Pakistani president, Asif Ali Zardari, met the US president, Barack Obama, and the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, in Washington.

Both Zardari and Karzai "fully appreciate the seriousness of the threat" posed by al-Qaida and its allies, Obama said later.

The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, praised the operation in Swat.

"I'm actually quite impressed by the actions the Pakistani government is now taking," she said. "I think that action was called for, and action has been forthcoming."

The US defence secretary, Robert Gates, told US troops in Afghanistan today that there was no prospect of their being deployed across the border.

During a question and answer session at a US base, Gates told a sergeant he did not have to "worry about going to Pakistan".

The last battle in Swat, over a period of 18 months from late 2007, saw militants fight the army to a standstill, resulting in the now-collapsed February peace deal.

UN warns of refugee crisis as thousands flee fighting in Pakistan's Swat valley | World news | guardian.co.uk

boy o boy what a mess.

i'm still gathering information about this and may post something more substantive later on...

Strange Famous · 05-08-2009, 11:48 AM

I never understand how come you guys spell Taleban with an "i" (or Usama with an O for that matter)

But anyway... Pakistan had a strong man in charge, who may have been a dictator (in the true and original meaning of the word - and emergency governer), but was at least able to hold the country together and maintain law & order.

With the assistance of Western pressure and influance a democratic process put in place a popularist crook, and the country is on the verge of falling apart.

I expect the army will step in before long again... people might not like to admit it, but without security, without the rule of law, democracy isnt much help or value to anyone.

Slims · 05-08-2009, 02:21 PM

Taliban, or Taleban comes from the Arabic word for student, طالب 'Talib' and is pronounced different from place to place. For instance, 'Marhaban' an arabic greeting is often pronounced 'Mirhaban' depending on the region of the world in which it is spoken. (I know Arabic isn't really spoken in afghanistan, but the root is still Arabic).

Strange: I don't think you are right about your premise, but I do agree with your conclusion, unfortunately.

Seaver · 05-08-2009, 02:28 PM

Quote:

I never understand how come you guys spell Taleban with an "i" (or Usama with an O for that matter)

When two languages do not have a common alphabet nothing between the two is ever mis-spelled as only the phonetic interpretation within said alphabet is possibly translated or is actually important.

roachboy · 05-28-2009, 09:10 AM

Quote:

May 29, 2009
Taliban Warn of ‘Major Attacks’ in Pakistan
By SALMAN MASOOD and MARK McDONALD

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Taliban groups claimed responsibility on Thursday for the bombing that killed at least 26 people and injured several hundred in Lahore a day earlier, and issued an extraordinary warning for people to evacuate Pakistani cities, saying they were preparing “major attacks.”

Hours after the threat, as many as three blasts, including two at crowded bazaars, rocked the northwestern city of Peshawar, killing at least four people and wounding dozens, Pakistani news media reported. In telephone calls to Reuters and The Associated Press, a Pakistani insurgent commander, Hakimullah Mehsud, said that the attack in Lahore and the others threatened by the Taliban were “a reaction” to the Pakistani Army’s campaign against the Taliban in the northwestern Swat Valley.

“We have achieved our target,” he said of the Lahore attack, in which gunmen and suicide bombers rammed a car laden with explosives into a police emergency-response unit, after failing to breach the defenses of the local headquarters of the nation’s premier intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI. “We were looking for this target for a long time.”

“We want the people of Lahore, Rawalpindi, Islamabad and Multan to leave those cities, as we plan major attacks against government facilities in coming days and weeks,” he said in the call to Reuters.

Mr. Mehsud, who is known to be aligned with the Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud, did not give his location, and it was unclear if he was linked to another Taliban group that claimed responsibility for the attack.

That group, the Tehrik-i-Taliban Punjab, said Thursday in a posting on a Turkish militant Web site that it had staged the assault.

General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, the army chief, who was in Lahore on Thursday, said that Pakistan would not be terrorized and that the army remained committed to defeating insurgents, according to a statement by a spokesperson for Pakistan army.

An initial investigation report by Lahore police, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times, stated that six attackers in a white colored Toyota van sprayed bullets at officials in the emergency-response unit. Three attackers managed to escape while the other three detonated the explosives-laden van, the report said.

The attack at the ISI command center Wednesday was the third attack in three months in or near Lahore, the principal city of Punjab, Pakistan’s most populous and affluent province.

The previous attacks — against the visiting Sri Lankan cricket team and a police academy — led officials to worry that Taliban insurgents might be teaming up with local militants, including Lashkar-e-Taiba, the group suspected of conducting the attacks in Mumbai, India, in November that killed 163 people.

The government announced bounties in newspaper advertisements on Thursday, with rewards starting at $12,400, according to The A.P. Heading the most wanted list was Maulana Fazlullah, the Taliban leader in the Swat district, with a bounty of $62,000.

In Peshawar, details of the death toll from Thursday’s explosions remained unclear and there were contradictory accounts of the number of fatalities.

“We have shifted five dead bodies to the hospital trauma center and about 30 wounded are now in the emergency room,” Zulfiqar Ahmed, an official with the Ehdi Rescue Center, told Reuters. But GEO, a private television network, reported fewer casualties. News reports said the bombs were hidden on motorcycles and detonated by timers.

Two terrorists were killed in gun fight with police, Safwat Ghayur, the Peshawar police chief said while talking to private television news channels. The gun battle lasted for one hour. One injured terrorist was arrested by police.

One explosion tore through the Kisakhawani Bazaar, or storytellers’ market, one of Peshawar’s best known, and reputedly named for the traders and voyagers who once tarried in its narrow streets to exchange their travelers’ tales. Another blast shook a nearby electronics market in the Kabari Bazaar.

Television images on private networks showed firefighters trying to control fires as people fled the blasts and ambulance sirens wailed across the neighborhood.

“I was buying sweets from a store. Suddenly, there was a loud blast,” one witness who identified himself as Shafqat told GEO television. “I lay down on the ground. There was smoke everywhere.”

Salman Masood reported from Islamabad, Pakistan. Reporting was contributed by Waqar Gilani from Lahore, Pakistan; Mark McDonald from Hong Kong; and Alan Cowell from Paris.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/29/wo...ef=global-home

i haven't time to say much about this at the moment

but i continue to see the situation in pakistan as far most dangerous and unsettling. and i continue to see no real options other than to watch what happens. which sometimes seems like watching a car travel at high speed toward a wall.

except with nukes.

Slims · 05-28-2009, 02:36 PM

Unfortunately, the people of PK typically blame the PK government for such bombings, rather than the people who are blowing them up.

The TB may very well get the government to back down if they can pull off several more high-profile bombings.

Run of the mill suicide bombings which only kill a few people happen all the time over there and are more or less commonplace...but big ones will get a lot of attention.

The attack on the ISI is very interesting as the ISI has long been accused of being complicit with the Taliban. Are we seeing hard feelings over a rough break up?

Charlatan · 05-28-2009, 03:46 PM

The allied forces that invaded Afghanistan could have done a lot more if the biggest partner in that venture hadn't got distracted by another invasion. I wonder if things would be different now if that partner had spent 100% of its efforts on Afghanistan instead of the other sideshow.

Slims · 05-28-2009, 04:03 PM

...maybe we could have, but nation building takes time, regardless of how many soldiers are on the ground.

Charlatan · 05-28-2009, 04:15 PM

It would have taken time to build a nation but it takes a lot less time to smash a regime.

04-17-2009, 12:37 PM	#2 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	Well, without getting sucked into the whole "why are we in AF" thing, I will say that since we are already there, and since our departure would leave a huge vacum which the Taliban is already in place to fill, we are stuck working towards an alternative solution. Remember the Taliban are an extremist organization which have always attempted to seize power wherever they can. They took Afghanistan several years after the Russians left and then imposed their brand of fundamental sharia law (much to the surprise of the average Afghan who supported them simply to cut down on corruption). They are doing the same in Pakistan now. They modify their rules and tenents to fit whatever is most expedient for them. When they were in power in Afghanistan, they considered opium and the opium smugglers to be a threat and clamped down on it, but they are now heavily involved in the drug trade. Just as Mao did not really resonate with the Chinese people until he essentially rebranded Industrial Communism into something a rural farmer could recognize, the Taliban are beginning to enjoy more widespread success in PK now that they have begun adapting to the people around them and picking up causes which resonate with the local communities. Right now, most of the senior insurgent leadership is operating out of PK and that is where the supplies, etc. are coming from. If they have their safe havens taken away they will be unable to continue to function. The solution? I don't really have a good answer for you. We have made a commitment to the Afghans who have staked their lives on our promise to help them create a new Afghanistan. At the same time it is definitely not in our best interest to hasten civil war in PK by invading the SWAT and NWFP and dealing with the problem ourselves. I think if you loosened the rules of engagement again for SOF and allowed them to focus primarily on border interdictions you might be able to restrict the movement of men, weapons and supplies across the border enough to give the Afghan government time to become quasi-competent and strong enough to stand against the pressure of the Taliban. Right now many officials are playing both sides of the fence because they (very likely correctly) believe we will end up pulling out and leaving them hanging high and dry. If they do not stay in good favor with the Taliban they will be executed as soon as we are gone. The solution there is obvious...make a strong commitment and show we are not going to abandon them. If we continue to sway back and forth on the issue we will never receive the full support of our Afghan allies. (or, alternatively we need to decide enough is enough and leave now.) __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

04-17-2009, 01:33 PM	#3 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	understood---but that presupposes that aghanistan is still the central theater of operations for the taliban. what i wonder is whether that's starting to change--or has been changing and we collectively haven't noticed particularly because the way information is sorted regarding the taliban. from this, it's early to say what'll happen--but analyses of pakistan have consistently pointed out its internal instability, its dividedness etc...in a way, this could work against what the article implies could be a quite radical problem from tha pakistani state because changing around who controls areas in a space that's already divided is different from taking over spaces in an area that's centrally controlled---the political implications are more limited. what is worrisome in this is obvious--the appears to be a kind of chain reaction that is a result of the afghanistan action in the broad sense--and of the apparent impasse that has been in effect between the us et al and pakistan about dealing one way or another with the taliban in pakistan. so if this represents a strategic change on the part of the taliban, it seems that it is happening in an area outside any meaningful control of the us et al and poses a very real problem in regional political--and potentially military terms. what i guess this comes to really is whether the us et al now find themselves bracing against the wrong door. it's a perplexing set of consequences. and they can't be good. this really can't be good. so options---increasing military aid to the pakistani government. but if the government is already in such a weak position that this movement in swat can be interpreted as a threat to it, there are obvious risks in increasing military aid. but if the us doesn't do it, what consequences follow from that? same set of questions with economic aid, really--the objective might be to attempt to bolster the government's position--but is that necessarily a good thing to do except in geopolitical terms? wouldn't the us find itself backing the wrong horse? but it's already backing the wrong horse. the really alarming prospects involve military intervention. and there are nukes. great fucking idea, nuclear proliferation. sorry, but i can't seem to get by it. this would be serious enough without them--but it is with them. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

04-17-2009, 01:49 PM	#4 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	If the Taliban had been strong enough, they would have assumed control in PK as well as Afghanistan. They have always been competing against (sometimes violently) the PK government. If the theater has shifted, it is only because the US is actually providing a strong presence in Afghanistan while PK is growing weaker due to all the recent political turmoil. I know you feel I am a bit of a statist/nationalist so my opinion may be no surprise to you, but I feel the turmoil in PK was inevitable. As soon as the Taliban were strong enough they would have begun to do what is taking place now. PK also shot themselves in the foot by bulldozing refugee camps in SWAT and NWFP, displacing hundreds of thousands of people. The average fighter is not politically/religiously motivated over there (at least it isn't the primary reason they fight). Rather, your average rank and file 'insurgent' is simply some poor bastard who agrees in principle with the TB and who really needs money. By bulldozing those refugee camps PK forced a lot of people to make some really hard choices about where their next meal would come from, and additionally motivated them against the PK Gov. by destroying their 'houses.' The money in PK and AFG IS controlled primarily by religous groups, so it is no wonder that people who fight (for money) do so under the banner of radical Islam. On a side note, I recently read a book titled "The Accidental Guerilla" and I think you would find it illuminating and not-distasteful in it's presentation. It attempts to show how complex this situation really is as well as why different groups in AF/PK are behaving as they are. __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

04-23-2009, 11:21 AM	#6 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	Descent into Chaos: The United States and the Failure of Nation Building in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia some background in the form of an hour-long talk by ahmed rachid. other bits here: The Roots of Pakistan’s Taliban Problem - The Lede Blog - NYTimes.com __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

04-23-2009, 11:30 AM	#7 (permalink)
ring ░ Location: ❤	It is difficult for me to formulate coherrent thoughts on this matter, right at the moment.... (it's a nuke thing) I am old enough to remember the drills we had in grade school- sitting on the cold dusty floor - arms over head - teachers full of tense fear - 1966 I have no idea if this matter could still be handled by say, perhaps, SAD/SOG It may too late for surgical precision tactics, maybe not. Back in the day when Pakistan first bacame a nuclear power, I do remember the ruckus. This link gives some history. Pakistan Nuclear Weapons This latest news is very alarming indeed. http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009...-nuclear-talks Last edited by ring; 04-23-2009 at 11:54 AM.. Reason: more

04-23-2009, 11:37 AM	#8 (permalink)
Willravel ... a sort of licensed troubleshooter.	Well obviously the US can't nation-build in the Middle East. We simply can't. We can try to be peace-keepers and prop up democratic movements, but in the end we could be propping up the extreme minority as the vast majority fights against us. We've tried working with the Pakistani government, but that's not really done any good at all. What are we left with? As much as I hate to say it, we can't really just leave. Iraq stands a chance of eventually becoming stable as we withdraw, but probably not Afghanistan and certainly not Pakistan. It pains me to say it, but I keep thinking we need India and China... maybe even Russia. This level of instability in a nuclear-capable nation is simply unacceptable, and the thought of a radical, anti-West theocracy with proven nuclear weapons can't be comforting to anyone in the US or Europe, not to mention India and China. If I were Obama (and thank god I'm not, we could be bogged down in universal health care and reduced military spending by now if I were), I'd arrange for NATO to sit down with Russia, China, India, and Pakistan to talk viable solutions. This can't continue on its present course.

04-23-2009, 04:00 PM	#9 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	The West cannot nation build in the sense that they have been doing for the past... forever. The West needs to take a page from the charities in Saudi Arabia and Iran that have built schools (madrases) in rural Pakistan. They are funding nation building from the grassroots. They are funding the changing perceptions of youth and culture. The West can continue to change the leadership in regime change after regime change. They can provide weapons to insurgents or government forces, support whichever side they currently favour. But without changing the foundation of a society or culture they will never succeed. Of course grassroots change is a long game that will not show results for many years. Most Western democracies cannot think beyond the next election cycle. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

04-23-2009, 04:58 PM	#11 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	A curious tidbit. There are many extremist movements in PK, but this one is TNSM which basically means "fighters for the establishment of Sharia law." The PK government can hardly act surprised when they did just that. The PK government recently gave them a permanent foothold by allowing them to operate without being challenged by the government in the FATA. Predictably, it just gave them a base of operations and the stability they needed to expand. They will continue to expand until they are challenged as they have no problem forcing Pakistanis under Sharia Law at the point of a gun. __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence Last edited by Slims; 12-05-2010 at 11:23 AM..

04-24-2009, 04:11 AM	#12 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	the story line in the rachid clip i posted above is quite sobering. and there are many elements to it, so the best thing is to watch it--the talk itself is about 25 minutes followed by a q & a session, which has some interesting bits to it---but it also has That Guy, the Guy who always shows up at ay given conference and under the pretext of posing a question rattles on for an extended duration about himself. yes yes, but let's talk about me. anyway: you can bookend this as he does, by noting, as he does, that right now in kabul people still only have electricity about 4 hrs/day. once upon a time, i remember that it was meet to refer to the bush people as mayberry machiavellians. but had they actually read the prince, they'd have understood that invading is easy--the problems really start once you've invaded. you have to establish legitimacy and it is simply the case that the main way an existing order establishes legitimacy is via the continuity of basic services....he argues that as of the time of the speech, june 08, about a third of afghanistan was under taliban control....and this is not even the Problem. the focus of the talk is really the situation on the border between afghanistan & pakistan. the outline goes: after the initial invasion of afghanistan, the coalition went into what amounts to a 3 year holding pattern. everything just kinda stopped. can you say iraq? it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see in the wreckage that is now unfolding a consequence of the iraq debacle. the relationship with musharraf undertaken by the bush people was such that despite the fact that pk offered sanctuary along its borders to al qeada, to the taliban(s) etc., and allowed it from the highest levels of government, and despite the fact that everyone--and i mean everyone--knew this was the case, what musharraf said went and so these sanctuaries were allowed to operate, dig in, expand. he outlines the relations between pashtoons across the afghan/pk border--the extent to which this was a very old kind of relation, one that shaped much about afghanistan as a largely fictional western-style nation-state, how it rendered the notion of foxed borders absurd because it's a similar pattern that you see everywhere. he outlines the dynamic in which the afghanistan taliban was able to fashion a pk correlate of itself, which is what you see now moving into swat, which is just outside the national capital. he outlines a brief flurry of american activity just before the 04 election and the way that flurry petered out. in the q&a, he talks about an ancillary problem, one related to the bookend narrative, which concerns the lack of co-ordination between the various militaries that occupy afghanistan in a kind of jurisdictional mosaic... the storyline he unfolds ends as does that of the book he's hawking, with the assassination of benzir bhutto. the results of the actions--more non-actions---that he describes points to what looks like an unfolding strategic catastrophe. what you're seeing in the string of articles that have been appearing about this situation over the past week is a kind of giant what the fuck? moment. i still dont see any obvious move that can be made here, but maybe i'm thinking about it too much through the process of trying to make sense of how this happened. what's clear is that while charlatans point is excellent in principle, in fact, at the moment, the shit may be about to hit the fan and while it nonetheless makes sense for the strategy he outlines to be adopted in other contexts, in this one the time may be passed. i don't know. how do you parse this? i hope i'm missing something.... __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

04-24-2009, 04:16 AM	#13 (permalink)
Derwood Who You Crappin? Location: Everywhere and Nowhere	Isn't the basic (and most important) upshot of this the fact that if the Taliban gained full control of Pakistan, they would have a nuclear weapon at their disposal?

04-24-2009, 04:20 AM	#14 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	that's what makes this a potentially catastrophic situation. that's why i really really hope i'm missing something when i try to think this through. because it looks like what we like to call a clusterfuck is taking shape. what i can see as an option is a proxy civil war being launched in pakistan. but if the sanctuaries on the border were in place and continued because of co-operation at high levels of the government/military, how the hell would that work? __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite

05-08-2009, 11:48 AM	#18 (permalink)
Strange Famous follower of the child's crusade?	I never understand how come you guys spell Taleban with an "i" (or Usama with an O for that matter) But anyway... Pakistan had a strong man in charge, who may have been a dictator (in the true and original meaning of the word - and emergency governer), but was at least able to hold the country together and maintain law & order. With the assistance of Western pressure and influance a democratic process put in place a popularist crook, and the country is on the verge of falling apart. I expect the army will step in before long again... people might not like to admit it, but without security, without the rule of law, democracy isnt much help or value to anyone. __________________ "Do not tell lies, and do not do what you hate, for all things are plain in the sight of Heaven. For nothing hidden will not become manifest, and nothing covered will remain without being uncovered." The Gospel of Thomas

05-08-2009, 02:21 PM	#19 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	Taliban, or Taleban comes from the Arabic word for student, طالب 'Talib' and is pronounced different from place to place. For instance, 'Marhaban' an arabic greeting is often pronounced 'Mirhaban' depending on the region of the world in which it is spoken. (I know Arabic isn't really spoken in afghanistan, but the root is still Arabic). Strange: I don't think you are right about your premise, but I do agree with your conclusion, unfortunately. __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

05-28-2009, 02:36 PM	#22 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	Unfortunately, the people of PK typically blame the PK government for such bombings, rather than the people who are blowing them up. The TB may very well get the government to back down if they can pull off several more high-profile bombings. Run of the mill suicide bombings which only kill a few people happen all the time over there and are more or less commonplace...but big ones will get a lot of attention. The attack on the ISI is very interesting as the ISI has long been accused of being complicit with the Taliban. Are we seeing hard feelings over a rough break up? __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

05-28-2009, 03:46 PM	#23 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	The allied forces that invaded Afghanistan could have done a lot more if the biggest partner in that venture hadn't got distracted by another invasion. I wonder if things would be different now if that partner had spent 100% of its efforts on Afghanistan instead of the other sideshow. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

05-28-2009, 04:03 PM	#24 (permalink)
Slims Eccentric insomniac Location: North Carolina	...maybe we could have, but nation building takes time, regardless of how many soldiers are on the ground. __________________ "Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery." - Winston Churchill "All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act out their dream with open eyes, to make it possible." Seven Pillars of Wisdom, T.E. Lawrence

05-28-2009, 04:15 PM	#25 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	It would have taken time to build a nation but it takes a lot less time to smash a regime. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke