Pakistan Criticizes Barack Obama
Friday August 3, 2007 8:31 PM
By ROHAN SULLIVAN
Associated Press Writer
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) - Pakistani officials called Democratic
presidential hopeful Barack Obama irresponsible for saying that, if
elected, he might order unilateral military strikes in Pakistan against
al-Qaida.
Hundreds chanted anti-U.S. slogans and burned an American flag in
the street to protest the remark.
Obama's comment turned up the heat on already simmering anger among
Pakistanis about the issue, after senior Bush administration officials
said last week they too would consider such strikes if intelligence
warranted them.
Further inflaming the situation was a comment by Tom Tancredo, a
Colorado Republican whose bid for the White House is considered unlikely
to succeed, that the best way he could think of to deter a nuclear
terrorist attack on America would be to threaten to retaliate by bombing
the holiest of Islamic sites, Mecca and Medina.
U.S. officials quickly distanced themselves from Tancredo's remarks.
In Miran Shah, a major town in the lawless region that borders
Afghanistan, about 1,000 tribesmen condemned recent Pakistani military
operations in the area and vowed to repel any U.S. attack.
``We are able to defend ourselves. We will teach a lesson to America
if it attacks us,'' local cleric Maulvi Mohammed Roman told the rally.
In Karachi, Pakistani's largest city, about 150 people chanted
slogans against the United States, Obama and Tancredo at a demonstration
organized by Mutahida Majlis-e-Amal, a coalition of six hard-line
religious parties. Protesters set fire to a U.S. flag.
``Those who are talking about attacking our holiest places are
committing blasphemy. The punishment for this offense is death, and death
only,'' said coalition lawmaker Mohammed Hussain Mahanti.
In a major policy speech Wednesday, Obama said as president he might
order strikes in Pakistan's tribal zone to get terrorists, including those
responsible for the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States.
``There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered
3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again,'' Obama said. ``If we
have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and
President Musharraf will not act, we will.''
Top officials in the government of Pakistan President Gen. Pervez
Musharraf, a key U.S. ally in the fight against terrorism, bristled at
Obama's comment.
``It's a very irresponsible statement, that's all I can say,''
Foreign Minister Khusheed Kasuri told AP Television News. ``As the
election campaign in America is heating up we would not like American
candidates to fight their elections ... at our expense.''
Bush called Musharraf Friday to congratulate him on the 60th
anniversary of Pakistan's independence from India, but also mentioned
``recent statements emanating from the U.S. regarding possible U.S. action
inside Pakistani territory,'' the foreign ministry said .
Bush ``said that such statements were unsavory and often prompted by
political considerations in an environment of electioneering,'' the
statement said, adding that Bush said the United States fully respected
Pakistan's sovereignty.
Tancredo told a gathering in Iowa on Tuesday he believes a nuclear
terrorist attack on the U.S. could be imminent.
``If it is up to me, we are going to explain that an attack on this
homeland of that nature would be followed by an attack on the holy sites
in Mecca and Medina. Because that's the only thing I can think of that
might deter somebody from doing what they otherwise might do,'' he said.
In Washington, the State Department reacted with unusual venom to
Tancredo's remarks, which some diplomats fear could damage U.S. ties with
the Muslim world and hurt efforts to counter Islamist extremism.
``Let me just say that it is absolutely outrageous and reprehensible
for anyone to suggest attacks on holy sites, whether they are Muslim,
Christian, Jewish or those of any other religion,'' deputy spokesman Tom
Casey told reporters.
Pakistan used to be a main backer of the Taliban, but threw its
support behind Washington following the Sept. 11 attacks. It has deployed
about 90,000 troops in its tribal regions, hundreds of whom have been
killed fighting militants.
But a controversial strategy to make peace with militants and use
tribesmen has fueled U.S. fears that al-Qaida has been given space to
regroup.
Minister for Parliamentary Affairs Sher Afgan said Friday he would
open a debate in the national assembly next week on recent U.S. criticism
of Pakistan.
It was a matter of ``grave concern that U.S. presidential candidates
are using unethical and immoral tactics against Islam and Pakistan to win
their election,'' Afghan said.
---
Associated Press writers Munir Ahmad in Islamabad and Zarar Khan in
Karachi contributed to this report.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6825889,00.html
Now, contrast the above story with this story appearing only a week
ago....
Is The US Preparing
To Attack Pakistan?
By Eric Margolis
26 July, 2007
Ericmargolis.com
The Bush Administration may be preparing to lash out at old ally Pakistan,
which Washington now blames for its humiliating failures to crush
al-Qaida, capture its elusive leaders, or defeat Taliban resistance forces
in Afghanistan.
One is immediately reminded of the Vietnam War when the Pentagon, unable
to defeat North Vietnamese Army and Viet Cong forces, urged invasion of
Cambodia.
Sources in Washington say the Pentagon is drawing up plans to attack
Pakistan's "autonomous" tribal region bordering Afghanistan. Limited "hot
pursuit" ground incursions by US forces based in Afghanistan, intensive
air attacks, and special forces raids into Pakistan's autonomous tribal
region are being evaluated.
This weekend, the US national intelligence chief and other intelligence
spokesmen confirmed that strikes against "terrorist targets" in Pakistan's
tribal belt are increasingly possible. These warnings were designed to
both further pressure Pakistan's beleaguered strongman, President Pervez
Musharraf into sending more troops to the tribal areas to fight his own
people, and to prepare US public opinion for a possible widening of the
Afghanistan war into Pakistan.
Pakistan's 27,200 sq km tribal belt, officially known as the Federal
Autonomous Tribal Area, or FATA, is home to 3.3 million Pashtun tribesmen.
It has become a safe haven for al-Qaida, Taliban, other Afghan resistance
groups, and a hotbed of anti-American activity, thanks mostly to the
US-led occupation of Afghanistan which drove many militants across the
border into Pakistan. Osama bin Laden is very likely sheltered in this
region, as US intelligence claims.
I spent a remarkable time in this wild, medieval region during the 1980's
and 90's, traveling alone where even Pakistani government officials dared
not go, visiting the tribes of Waziristan, Orakzai, Khyber, Chitral, and
Kurram, and meeting their chiefs, called "maliks."
These tribal belts are always referred to as "lawless." Pashtun tribesmen
could shoot you if they didn't like your looks. Rudyard Kipling warned
British Imperial soldiers over a century ago, when fighting cruel,
ferocious Pashtun warriors of the Afridi clan, if they fell wounded, "save
your last bullet for yourself."
But there is law: the traditional Pashtun tribal code, Pashtunwali, that
strictly governs behavior and personal honor. Protecting guests was
sacred. I was captivated by this majestic mountain region and wrote of it
extensively in my book, "War at the Top of the World."
The 40 million Pashtun - called "Pathan" by the British - are the world's
largest tribal group. Imperial Britain divided them by an artificial
border, the Durand Line, which went on to become, like so many other
British colonial boundaries, today's Afghanistan-Pakistan border. When
Pakistan was created in 1947, the Pashtun were split between that new
nation and Afghanistan.
Pakistan's Pashtun number 28-30 million, plus an additional 2.5 million
refugees from Afghanistan. Pashtuns, one of the British Indian Army's
famed "martial races," occupy many senior positions in Pakistan's
military, intelligence service and bureaucracy, and naturally have much
sympathy for their embattled tribal cousins in Afghanistan. The 15 million
Pashtun of Afghanistan form that nation's largest ethnic group and just
under half the population.
The tribal agency's Pashtun reluctantly joined newly-created Pakistan in
1947 under express constitutional guarantee of total autonomy and a ban on
Pakistani troops ever entering there.
But under intense US pressure, President Pervez Musharraf violated
Pakistan's constitution by sending 80,000 federal troops to fight the
region's tribes, killing 3,000 of them. In best British imperial
tradition, Washington pays Musharraf $100 million monthly to rent his
sepoys (native soldiers) to fight Pashtun tribesmen. As a result, Pakistan
is fast edging towards civil war, as the bloody siege of Islamabad's Red
Mosque and a current wave of bombings across the nation show.
The anti-Communist Taliban movement is part of the Pashtun people. Taliban
fighters move across the artificial Pakistan-Afghanistan border, to borrow
a Maoism, like fish through the sea. Osama bin Laden is a hero in the
region, and likely shelters there.
The US just increased its reward for bin Laden to $50 million and plans to
shower $750 million on the tribal region in an effort to buy loyalty.
Bush/Cheney & Co. do not understand that while they can rent President
Musharraf's government in Islamabad, many Pashtun value personal honor far
more than money, and cannot be bought. That is likely why bin Laden has
not yet been betrayed.
Any US attack on Pakistan would be a catastrophic mistake. First, air and
ground assaults will succeed only in widening the anti-US war and merging
it with Afghanistan's resistance to western occupation. US forces are
already too over-stretched to get involved in yet another little war.
Second, Pakistan's army officers who refuse to be bought may resist a US
attack on their homeland, and overthrow the man who allowed it, Gen.
Musharraf. A US attack would sharply raise the threat of anti-US
extremists seizing control of strategic Pakistan and marginalize those
seeking return to democratic government.
Third, a US attack on the tribal areas could re-ignite the old irredentist
movement to reunite Pashtun parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan into an
independent state, "Pashtunistan." That could begin unraveling fragile
Pakistan, leaving its nuclear arsenal up for grabs, and India tempted to
intervene.
The US military has grown used to attacking small, weak nations like
Grenada, Panama, and Iraq. Pakistan, with 163 million people, and a poorly
equipped but very tough 550,000-man army, will offer no easy victories.
Those Bush Administration officials who foolishly advocate attacking
Pakistan are playing with fire.
Eric Margolis, contributing foreign editor for Sun National Media Canada,
is the author of War at the Top of the World. Visit his website
http://www.ericmargolis.com/
http://www.countercurrents.org/margolis260707.htm
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