Obama Talks Tough On Pakistan

Pakistan is disgruntled over our “hot pursuit” style policy of going after terrorists within their borders. Obama doesn’t care: “If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won’t act, we will,” Obama said.

Well, the fact is, he said that back in 2007 and doubtless has a meeker policy now that consequences are  imminent.

“No incursion will be tolerated anymore,” said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, chief military spokesman. The prospect of allies fighting each other as they hunt down Islamist militants still appears remote, given the Pakistani government’s desire to receive billions of dollars in aid from the U.S. But the repeated warnings against U.S. troop raids reflect the strong anger felt among Pakistan’s senior ranks that the U.S. is overstepping its bounds with a close ally.

Do we really want war with Pakistan?  Pakistan has nukes.  The truth is, I can understand their complaint – I certainly wish the U.S. enjoyed a little territorial sovereignty.

Allahpundit notes,  Pakistan to U.S.: Cross our border again and we’ll blow you out of the sky

Adm. Mullen’s in Islamabad as I write this, hopefully giving them an updated version of Armitage’s alleged warning to Musharraf after 9/11. I can only assume Abbas’s statement is pro forma tough talk designed to save face with the public after the U.S. raid two weeks ago, not unlike Maliki ushering the U.S. towards the door with an eye to Iraq’s eventual provincial elections. Surely the Pakistanis understand what the consequences would be if America’s hit again by an attack planned in their country; better to let us deal with it quietly now if they’re unwilling or unable to, lest events ultimately require a more “vigorous” response.

But Hitchens provides some context and some history -

When the Clinton administration sent cruise missiles into Afghanistan in reprisal for the attacks on our embassies in East Africa, the missiles missed Osama Bin Ladin but did, if you remember, manage to kill two officers of the ISI. It wasn’t asked loudly enough: What were these men doing in an al-Qaida camp in the first place? In those years, as in earlier ones, almost no tough questions were asked of Pakistan. Successive U.S. administrations used to keep certifying to Congress that Pakistan was not exploiting U.S. aid (and U.S. indulgence over the anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan) to build itself a nuclear weapons capacity. Indeed, it wasn’t until after Sept. 11, 2001, that we allowed ourselves to learn that at least two of Pakistan’s top nuclear scientists—Mirza Yusuf Baig and Chaudhry Abdul Majid—had been taken in for “questioning” about their close links to the Taliban. But then, in those days, we were too incurious to take note of the fact that Pakistan’s chief nuclear operative, A.Q. Khan, had opened a private-enterprise “Nukes ‘R’ Us” market and was selling his apocalyptic wares to regimes as disparate as Libya and North Korea, sometimes using Pakistani air force planes to make the deliveries.

While I’m definitely not up for open war with Pakistan at this point, there’s no reason why we can’t rattle the change purse before we rattle the saber.  Pakistan is the beneficiary of BILLIONS of American taxpayer dollars, about 70% of which is totally unaccounted for and misspent.  To borrow from Richard Daley, an honest country is one who stays bought.  Or, if you like, the other golden rule: he who has the gold, makes the rules.  I can think of a lot of ways to spend that money if Pakistan is no longer feeling cooperative.