Pakistan: The Problem, the Solution
The most significant fact to emerge from the killing of Osama Bin Laden is that Pakistan’s military intelligence service (ISI) had been sheltering him for years. This confirms what we have been warning for the best part of the past decade: that Pakistan is an irredeemably flawed entity, unable to turn itself into a stable polity or a benign global presence. It needs to be quarantined and its disintegration along its many ethnic-tribal fault lines actively encouraged.
It is indicative of a long-overdue onset of realism in Washington that the U.S. decided not to inform the government in Islamabad of the raid until after it happened. White House’s John Brennan openly admitted there had been concern that Pakistani forces would deploy to counter the US team conducting the operation. He also stated the obvious: that it was “inconceivable that Bin Laden did not have a support system” in Pakistan. Brennan could have added that on far too many occasions critical intelligence the U.S. shared with the Pakistani authorities has been passed on to those who should be the last to know, including a timely tip on the pending cruise missile attack on OBL’s camp in Afghanistan in 1998.
The ISI claim that OBL’s compound has been “off the radar screen” since being raided while it was under construction in 2003 is ridiculous. The old Urdu proverb, “The darkness is deepest under the lamp,” does not apply. The fortress-style villa worthy of Pablo Escobar, surrounded by 20ft walls, a hundred yards from the main entrance to Pakistan’s West Point, across the street from a police station – in the midst of what is effectively a police state! – evaded scrutiny because it was designated off limits by those in authority. (A retired Pakistani Brigadier General admitted that much in a BBC World Service interview on May 3.) General Ashfaq Pervez Kayani, chief of army staff, needs to be asked whose war he is fighting, and why should the U.S. continue to supply him with billions of dollars worth of hardware and direct aid. The questions are uncomfortable. “Everyone says nobody knew of Osama bin Laden’s presence in Abbottabad,” the Financial Times commentator notes, but this only raised fresh questions:
Bin Laden’s last whereabouts neatly encapsulate suspicions about a nation whose institutions have become steadily more religiously charged since its birth as a Muslim majority state out of British India in 1947. They reinforce the view articulated last year by David Cameron, UK prime minister, that Pakistan looks “two ways” over terror. But worse, they suggest that as in Afghanistan before 2001, militants are dangerously close to the institutions of power and reside in the heart of the country rather than just on its wild mountainous fringes.
The open question is no longer whether the ISI has been helping Al Qa’eda, but rather whether Al Qa’eda is in fact a wholly-owned subsidiary of the ISI, or a DBA – in other words, whether Pakistan is, literally, a terrorist state, using its intelligence agency to launch terror attacks around the world. It is the only country in which al-Qa’eda is on track to realize its key objective of provoking jihadist-led rebellions against regimes in Muslim countries supported by the West: “Pakistan is probably the only country in the world where Bin Laden’s death will be marked by angry mobs on the streets brandishing his portrait. These elements are not the majority of Pakistanis, of course, but they are far more numerous and present on Pakistan’s streets than they are in most other Muslim countries that Bin Laden had hoped to rally to his flag.”
The problem of Pakistan has been addressed three times in this column over the past five years, most recently in December 2008, when we concluded that the only lasting solution to the problem of Pakistan is the disappearance of Pakistan from the political map of the world: “A Pakistan-free world would be a better and safer world. It can be done and it should be done. Ceterum censeo Pakistanem esse delendam.” Sending arms and money to Baluch, Sindhi, and Northwestern tribal separatists – with India as a discrete conduit – could hasten this artificial and pernicious entity’s long-overdue disintegration. Commenting the resignation of Pakistan’s former president (Musharraf, Out of Tricks, August 20, 2008), we noted that the myth of Pakistan as an ally of the United States in the misnamed war on terrorism should be laid to rest, because that country remains the epicenter of global jihad, a breeding ground for the new echelons of “martyrs”:
Pakistan is an enormous Jihadi campus in which some ten thousand madrassas prepare over one million students for the Holy War… It can hardly be otherwise in a country founded on the pillars of Islamic orthodoxy. [It is] the worst violator of the ban on nuclear proliferation, thanks to the work of Abdul Qadeer Khan, the architect of Pakistan’s nuclear program. … He felt that giving nuclear technology to a Muslim country was not a crime. The sentiment is shared by Pakistan’s elite… as befits the first modern state to be established on openly Islamic principles.
For as long as the country’s Islamic character is explicitly upheld, we warned, Pakistan cannot reform itself without undermining the religious rationale for its very existence.For that reason there should be “fewer illusions in Washington about the nature of Pakistan’s problems, and about the problem of Pakistan for the rest of the world.”
Two months earlier we focused on the role of the ISI in supporting Islamic insurgents in Afghanistan (Pakistan, The Taliban’s Indispensable Ally, News & Views, June 11), prompted by a major study by the RAND Corporation that accused “individuals within Pakistan’s government” of effectively crippling American attempts to stabilize the country:
Counterinsurgency in Afghanistan, funded by the Pentagon, merely confirms what Chronicles readers have known for years: that the regime in Islamabad is unwilling and unable to act in any manner inconsistent with its Islamic roots and ethos… If we look at the growing list of terrorist attacks and foiled plots in North America and Western Europe, it is evident that plots stemming from the Afghanistan-Pakistan border region are the single most important threat to Western security… The long list of Pakistan’s proven or suspected links with numerous terrorist attacks in recent years – and notably the 7/7 bombings in London in 2005 – illustrate the ambivalent role of Pakistan in the “War on Terrorism.” The ability of the establishment in Islamabad to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds has been an affront to all enemies of jihad for years.
On the occasion of Pakistan’s 60th anniversary we noted that the ISI is a key link in the global network of Islamic terrorism (Pakistan at 60: A Most Uncertain Ally, August 17, 2007):
Not only Taliban but most other Islamic extremist and terrorist movements all over the world were born out of ideas conceived in the battlefields of Afghanistan and subsequently matured and spread from Pakistan’s political, military, and religious establishment. These movements enjoyed the support of the Pakistani military-intelligence structures, and most notably its powerful Inter-Service Intelligence Agency (ISI), a leading promoter of state-sponsored terrorism. It grew rich and mighty, thanks to the U.S. role in helping Islamic fundamentalists fight the Soviets in the 1980s.
In the aftermath of Bin Laden’s killing the above diagnosis stands, and demands suitable therapy. The only lasting solution to the problem of Pakistan is the end of Pakistan. This goal is realistic, but it cannot be achieved by war because of Pakistan’s nuclear arsenal. It can be achieved, however, by exploiting Pakistan’s internal weaknesses. InBaluchistan, a huge region bordering Iran and Afghanistan, there is a strong independence movement resulting from what Le Monde Diplomatique’s Selig S. Harrison desribes as a “slow-motion genocide” of tribesmen:
Some 6 million Baluch were forcibly incorporated into Pakistan when it was created in 1947. This is the fourth insurgency they have fought to protest against economic and political discrimination. In the most bitter insurgency, from 1973 to 1977, some 80,000 Pakistani troops and 55,000 Baluch were involved in the fighting.
Most of Pakistan’s natural resources are in Baluchistan, including natural gas, uranium, copper and potentially rich oil reserves, yet Baluchistan remains the most impoverished area of the country. The natives are bitter. Steady and reliable foreign help would do wonders for the separatist movement.
In neighboring Sindh, nationalists who share Baluch opposition to the Punjabi-dominated military and political elite are reviving their long-dormant dream of a sovereign Sindhi state, or a Sindhi-Baluch union that would stretch along the Arabian Sea from Iran to the Indian border. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto – a native of Sindh – was widely blamed on the Punjabi establishment, with Sindhi nationalists complaining the Punjabi elites treat the province as occupied territory. Benazir Bhutto was not the first to die in Punjab: her father Ali was hanged by General Zia ul-Haq – a Punjabi – in 1979. Sindh has the potential to contribute to the prediction that Pakistan may splinter apart within ten years.
The Pashtuns, South and North Waziris and other restive groups in Pakistan’s permanently volatile Federally Administered Tribal Areas will be less willing to support Islamic militants if their nationalist grievances are recognized and supported. The model exists in Iraq’s Sunni “triangle,” where the marriage of convenience between Sunni Arab nationalists and Islamic extremists was broken when the U.S. accepted that no Shia police or military should lord over Sunni areas. A promise to the elders of each tribal group in Pakistan of complete self-rule – up to and including sovereign statehood – and the tangible means of achieving it and a few million in cash here and there, to sweeten the deal, would quickly end their association with the religious extremists and make one-fifth of Pakistan ungovernable to the Punjabi elite.
The possibilities are enormous, I concluded two and a half years ago and reiterate now. They should be explored and exploited creatively. India should be helped to provide to Baluch, Sindhi, and assorted tribal separatists the same kind of support that Islamabad has been giving to Kashmiri militants for decades. President Mohammad Karzai should do the same from Afghanistan, and he might be happy to comply. After all, irreversible removal of the Pakistani state so stubbornly supportive of his Taliban foes may be a precondition of his own survival. On balance, the removal of Bin Laden should prompt Washington to become a lot less indulgent of this nuclear-armed state so used to running with hares and hunting with hounds.
If Pakistan is carefully degraded from within, the nuclear arsenal bequeathed by Dr. Khan becomes irrelevant. It should be taken out, of course, but in any event when Pakistan starts imploding its generals will not be tempted to use the bomb any more than Soviet generals were tempted to do so in 1990-1991. They will withdraw into their Punjabi redoubt instead, where they will have only their own people to terrorize and exploit… until they are killed by the insurgent mob or forced into Saudi exile. A pleasing prospect.
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Unlike most Chronicles articles, I believe Dr,Trifkovic's prescription is likely to become official US government policy. All it would take is one terrorist attack, that can be traced back to Pakistan. The Baluchs, Sindhi and Pashtuns want out from the Punjabi boot and India can easily become the tail of the Amercian kite. It would also undermine the Chinese-Punjabi axis, with its pipelines and Gwadar naval base.
What if the Chinese, Saudis and Russians strongly back up a Punjabi dominated Pakistan in no uncertain terms?
Dr. Trifkovic correctly points out that Pakistan has had a double-policy for the last several years vis-a-vis the USA and the regional jihadi groups. However, the USA (and most other players of note) have similar double policies.
The US has been feeding Pakistan with one hand while attacking it with the other. On the one hand, the US has been pursuing a policy of destabilizing Pakistan by backing India and anti-Pakistani Afghan elements for the last several years. At the same time, this policy has been accompanied by significant military aid to Islamabad. Why? Because the Pakistani military brass has convincingly argued to Washington that they are an indispensable part of any accommodation with Afghan jihadi groups that would be acceptable to the USA, and that the USA would still need Pakistani troops as the gendarme-of-last-resort to suppress pro-Iranian uprisings in the Arabian Peninsula.
#2,
Mr. Nicoletti,
If the Russo-Pakistani reconciliation continues apace such that Moscow fully sides with Beijing in defense of Pakistan, then New Delhi would have a lot to think about...
Yes, India is likely to maintain a non-aligned stance. India purchased Russian T-92 tanks and will buy either British Typhoons or French Rafales, not Boeing made F-18s.
The issueS (plural) with Pakistan started during the politically healthiest times of the post colonial India. After Pakistan enforced a separation as it should have the separated Bangla Desh didn't quite fit the Muslim indoctrination and conflicts started with the Punjabis (living in bordering Indian northern provinces). For my money Pakistan will continue to present a Rubik's cube of an enigma in the coming years and decades. I keep wondering what criteria "we Americans" and our political leaders use to locate friends that we have to dispose of, within the next few years (Noriega, Hussein, even OBL, etc. etc.). Penny wise and pound foolish. Pakistan has absolutely no long term political value to the U.S.
Pakistan outed the CIA station chief and is talking about making General Pataudi the new ISI chief. Pataudi has famous relatives in India, a cricket star and film stars. Shrewd.
"...its disintegration along its many ethnic-tribal fault lines actively encouraged". And which of the disorderly disintegrated ethnic tribes would you suggest takes possession of the nuclear weapons, Dr. Trifkovic?
Question that no one ever seems to take into account when it comes to the rearrangement of Muslim countries: what would become of Pakistan's 2.8 million Christians?
#9,
NGPM,
Some would flee to India, some would flee to Iran, maybe some even to China over the Karakorum highway, and others would be less fortunate...
"President Mohammad Karzai should do the same from Afghanistan, and he might be happy to comply. After all, irreversible removal of the Pakistani state so stubbornly supportive of his Taliban foes may be a precondition of his own survival."
Hamid Karzai, though rightly derided as the Mayor of Kabul, is no fool and is highly unlikely to embark on such a mad scheme because he would not survive the destruction of Pakistan. That is because he is a Pashtun aristocrat maneuvered into the Presidency by the US for two principal reasons:
1. To weaken the Russian and Iranian-backed Tajik, Uzbek and Hazara warlords.
2. To provide a connection to the Pashtun rebels if and when the time for negotiations come. Karzai, after all, was a onetime supporter of Mullah Omar's Taliban.
Consequently, Karzai owes his position of power to the fact that he can straddle both the Pashtun Taliban (backed by Pakistan) and the non-Pashtun northerners (backed by Russia, Iran and India). To move too closely to one side or the other would be fatal for him.
In recent years, Karzai has become the scapegoat for all that has gone wrong in Afghanistan. He finds himself in a position similar to that of Diem in South Vietnam or of his countryman Hafizullah Amin some 3-4 decades ago. Of course, the US does not wish to send special forces to storm the Presidential Palace because, given the precarious US military posture in the country, such a move would destabilize the collaborationist Afghan state apparatus too much. However, that has not stopped the US from trying to unseat Karzai politically via new proxies such as the former foreign minister Abdullah Abdullah. Faced with an occupier that wants to replace him, this is hardly the time for Karzai to abandon Pakistan.
Yes, Nicoletti is right. He refers to the family of Nawab Pataudi, one of the old time aristocrats spread across both sides of the border, although the current generation here in India has changed last names to hide the fact.
I do wonder, however, that since Pakistan's government contains so many of the old colonial era aristocratic families, and since those families were cosmopolitan enough to have relatives spread across Britain, India, and the rest of the world...
it only seems less likely that they would appease and compromise with the ne'er-do-wells and scallywags among those militant tribals. Why side with anti-Western enemies, when such people have relatives living all across the West?
PS: In fact, many of these upper crust Pakistanis have been nominal Muslims only and Mohammed Ali Jinnah never stepped a foot inside a mosque in his life. Indeed, he married a non-Muslim, and some of his descendants married Hindus in India. Queer, their association with Islamists.
Aymeric Chauprade has provided an excellent overview of the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in Pakistan.
http://www.realpolitik.tv/2010/09/geopolitique-de-lafghanistan-volet-3/
ps. Nothing un-Islamic about a Muslim man marrying a non-Muslim woman.
The article is far too logical and factual to ignore. The problem is with our foreign policy "experts" and politicians who have extreme difficulty admitting that they were wrong in their belief that Pakistan will always behave as a true ally. It's time to cut the purse strings.
Some would flee to India, some would flee to Iran, maybe some even to China over the Karakorum highway, and others would be less fortunate…
Great. So now we just resign ourselves to leaving the rest of the world into the dark night of ignorance, superstition and lies, as we huddle together in a dwindling Camp of the Saints from Saint John's Apocalypse, besieged by and gradually succumbing to the unbelieving hordes so that when the Son of Man returns at last, He will find no Faith on this Earth?
Oh boy, another Camp of Saints reference, made with respect to a topic on South Asia.
Of course, among most of the devout religious masses in the region (which is most of the people), it has been considered a sin to ever go to a foreign country, and there have been painful purification rites for re-entry once one goes back to one's village. It goes as much for many local Muslim sects as for the rest. These rites occur even when one returns from a long distance away in the domestic region. Many people consult sages to pray for their job being shifted back to their home town. That's because they feel a great wrong in living away from parents and grandparents.
True story. When my brother went to an eastern part of the country, he had to wait outside his guest's home for a whole day, and then had to be soaked with water outside afterwards before being allowed, and had to wear the clothes given. The supersitious folk didn't want him bringing an evil foreign influence.
The very idea that most of them would dare live away from home is absurd. The kind who do are either among the very tiny cosmopolitan minority or, yes, Christians like Dinesh D'Souza. And I am not even mentioning the fact that their culinary tastes are so specific, many of the people here barely live on anything more than cucumber sandwiches when they go abroad. It's not easy for them to cook food with a million spices outside the country.
That's why this idea of brown Asian hordes arriving to Western Europe and forcing away the dwindling locals is beyond absurd.
NGPM
#15,
Just to be clear, I think that I have stated elsewhere on this website that the Shanghai Cooperation Organization countries would be best placed to restrain the India-Pakistan antagonism and thereby contain the jihadi menace in the region. The SCO countries would stay away from any mad schemes of promoting ever-greater chaos and hoping that something better comes out the other side.
#16,
"That’s why this idea of brown Asian hordes arriving to Western Europe and forcing away the dwindling locals is beyond absurd."
Mr. Sanjay,
It is absurd if one thinks of the process as a deliberate Asian invasion of Europe.
It is not at all absurd if one thinks of it as the consequence of economic policies embarked upon by Western elites and their comprador allies in many Asian countries. There are two primary reasons masses of Third World immigrants cram themselves aboard dingy little boats to cross to Europe:
1. They have been economically uprooted in their home countries. often by policies imposed by Western financial institutions.
2. They have had their heads filled with bogus Baywatch-type images of life in the West.
As I just said, the supersitions here are very much against anything foreign. How can people of one of the most xenophobic regions in the world actually want to enact a Camp of Saints situation? Even economic incentives and TV wouldn't push them. As it is, most people here don't watch TV, myself included.
While my family isn't even Hindu or one bit religious, my grandparents share similar prejudices, and my grandmother was upset about a frozen squid we kept in the refrigerator. It made her angry that something foreign was kept in our homes (and also that an innocent animal could be chopped into pieces, sent across oceans, kept in a freezer, and slowly eaten bit by bit across several days, instead of being a given a dignified quick consumption).
Then where do all the South Asians labouring in scorching heat in Dubai come from?
It is not a matter of economic "incentives" so much as one of economic survival. When timeless custom does not fill one's belly it quickly loses its timelessness.
You are right, I concede there.
I think I should highlight it more as what may be a limiting factor, one that would make a Camp of Saints situation unlikely, although not impossible.
Mr. Sanjay, though I used the same imagery as did Jean Raspail I wasn't referring to the novel's apocalyptic prediction of the "end of the white race" so much as the Christian Apocalyptic prediction of a mass apostasy and crisis in the Church. That was Saint John the Evangelist/Apostle, not Jean Raspail. Imagine all the Christians in the Middle East and the Subcontinent pushed entirely out. This already happened in Turkey; day by day it looks increasingly likely in Iraq and Egypt. Israel/Palestine, Syria and Pakistan may very well be next. And then, God forbid, Lebanon, Albania, Bosnia? Don't think it can't happen, because when it does, the U.S., Britain and possibly France will be complicit. Putting aside the refugee issue, their removal would be a monumental tragedy for the world, for they can no longer act as levain in a dark region. The more astute local [nominal] Muslims recognize and grieve this fact. Just look at the outrage expressed by Mehmet Ali Birand:
[in 1955] the Greek families in our neighborhood started to move to other places or go to Greece. After 1963 none of them were left. They left Istanbul.
They took with them an important culture, a color and a different lifestyle.
They left us alone in Istanbul to live our colorless lives.
Later on we were full of regret, but by then it was too late.
Read the whole article; it's truly chilling.
As for the refugee scenario, Mr. Sanjay, I imagine you are correct in that the bulk of the people wish to remain "among their own kind," though there are always exceptions. (In the West one finds a few people who want to go and live in Mexico, China, Japan or sub-Saharan Africa, even though these are not the majority.) Yet as Jonathan points out, economic and political hardships often drive them to look elsewhere. I can tell you from an eyewitness standpoint they arrive *here* by the truckload, and furthermore that over here they do tend to congregate together on turf where the locals become personae non grata, where they can continue their culture and lifestyle.
Jonathan, one can only hope the SCO will prove better apt at protecting those Christians than had NATO or any other operation involving the U.S.
Aaaaaaah, I see, thanks.
I know what you mean - there is a distinct possibility of an almost completely Christian-free Middle East and Central Asia within our own lifetimes.
The Arab Spring might be the first step towards it...
I can't believe that ST is advocating more war, though I see his reasoning. Would there be a serious jihadi problem for the West if the West were not occupying and killing Muslims? That said, I'm all for restricting Muslim immigration to the West.
I disagree with Dr. Trifkovic: The solution for us in Pakistan is for us to get the hell out of the neighborhood. How are we supposed to supply our troops and contractors in Afganistan if we fund a clandestine war in Pakistan? Such wars have been fools gold to many American administations. Iran, Nicaragua, Cuba, Afganistan itself in the 70's and 80's etc. Pakistan has a huge military supplied by us and the Chinese. It also has a huge possible ally in China. Now is the time to leave this neighborhood. We need Pakistan to extricate our troops and bring them home. Once that has happened we can leave Pakistan and it's peoples to their own devices. Let the tribes and regions of Pakistan settle their own differences, with us not being involved. Let these countries be the problem of their neighbors. I of course believe in the complete cut off of all foreign aid to every entity as soon as possible. Our foreign aid only props up tyrants and kleptocrats.
Just found this out from Der Spiegel.
There are "resocializaion" or "deradicalization" centers in Pakistan, run by some people in Swat Valley.
Various Taliban people are being given computer courses, being taught how to build an electric circuit, given clay or rocks to cut and carve - basically anything to occupy their time and prevent them from the kind of boredom that leads to nihilism and extremist bent. As long as they waste their time there, they will have less time available to come to jihad training camps.
Do you guys think it will work?
#26,
Resocialization programs for defeated enemies usually work. But there are two primary structural problems impeding resocialization as the decisive response to out-of-control jihadi groups in Pakistan:
1. The Afghan border: As much as Pakistan can be described as a haven for elements destabilizing Afghanistan, Afghanistan can similarly be described as a haven for elements destabilizing Pakistan. Consequently, the jihadi problem will not be brought under control without a regional solution.
2. Regional geopolitics: The Jihadi groups have become an indispensable part of regional geopolitics. Since large-scale conventional warfare between India and Pakistan is largely off the table on account of their nuclear arsenals, the proxy war waged by intelligence agencies via shadowy paramilitary groups assumes even greater importance. On the Pakistani side, that means military support for jihadi groups (under ISI influence of course) will continue.
At the same time, these jihadi groups have become significant enough such that the ISI could not simply order them to disband. A key reason why many jihadis have gone rogue and turned on the Pakistani military is precisely because Islamabad, under US pressure, closed down many jihadi training camps in Azad Kashmir. The Pakistani generals are thus in a catch-22. If they do not continue to support these jihadi groups to some extent, these groups will go rogue AND THEN OTHER INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES WILL BE ABLE TO RECUPERATE THEM FOR THEIR OWN PURPOSES. According to many seasoned observers, this has already happened.
I'm going to have to respectfully disagree with Dr. Trifkovic on his solution to the Pakistan quagmire, which to me sounds familiar to the kind of thinking which permeated through Defense Department of the Bush II Administration. Indeed Pakistan is a problem for all the reasons you mention in this article and in past articles on Pakistan as well. But wishing it goes away will not make it so nor will funding rebel or secesionist groups. A much as there is a Pakistan problem, even India, Iran or Afghanistan would not want a destabilized Pakistan with nuclear weapons on their borders which would lead to a massive refugee crisis, further violence and bloodshed, a potential for extremist takeover in Islamabad in order to keep the country together which could easily lead to a Taliban takeover in Afghanistan which would put Shia Iran and Hindu India right next to a radical Sunni region, in otherwords a far worse situation than exists right now. The kind of weaponry a Baluchi rebel group would need to take on Pakistan's army requires a little more than AK-47s and ensnare the U.S. so deep into the region it would be impossible to get out.
Get is exactly what the U.S. needs to do. Free ourselves from the madness that you exactly describe Pakistan as being and just come home. If Pakistan fails it fails because of its inherit contradictions, not because thee U.S. made it fail on purpose.
I agree with Mr. Marino @25 and Mr. Scallon @28. Dr. Trifkovic's proposed solution seems to contradict the approach he proposed in his book, Defeating Jihad. (I'll have to take another look.) I believe that encouraging India to support the dissidents may lead to a beneficial outcome, but direct U.S. support will lead us down a slippery slope.
The true root of Pakistan's illness can be traced back to Saudi Arabia. Back in the 1970's, the Saudi's paid for a water project in Pakistan upon the condition that Pakistan accept and impose Sharia Law on its people, just as it did in the Sudan. Saudi Arabia paid for Pakistan's atomic bomb program, much like it did Saddam Hussien's nuclear weapons program. Pakistan has a cargo plan on standby at an airbase, with two nuclear bombs in it, that it can fly to Saudi Arabia at a moment's notice. King Abdullah is and was a very anti-western person who wanted the US out of Saudi Arabia. One of his sons wishes to conclude an alliance with Iran to push the West altogether out of the Middle East. Need I point out the the Saudi's pay for the madrassas in Pakistan, Turkey, Egypt, Indonesia, the UK and the USA? Wahabi-ism is the chief cancerous tumor and its HQ is in Saudi Arabia.
#29,
India's centrifugal forces are as severe, if not more so, than those of Pakistan. It would be very dangerous for New Delhi to uppe the ante in the "back the neighbour's rebels and separatists" game.
India is an economic success in some regions and the other regions are optimistic, ie the booting of the ruling Communists from West Bengal. We should not support the Pashtun Taliban against Islamabad and the Punjabis.
I was thinking of the Assamese rebellions in the northeast, the Kashmiri Muslim rebellion in the northwest, and the Naxalite rebellion that affects a major swath of central India.