Mr. Hirsh wrote an article in Newsweek’s online edition. Mr. Hirsh’s unmitigated bigoted drivel is biased, it has serious errors in it and is typical of the anti-Pakistan tripe so pervasive these days. It is most disappointing how the IHT chose to reproduce such a rambling crypto-racist screed. Mr. Hirsh’s Teutonic bloviations are an admixture of discredited Neocon assertions, unsubstantiated, or outright Indian distortion, and pure unadulterated balderdash. His nauseating fixation upon and paranoid conspiratorial delusions about Pakistanis are a transparent attempt to justify the murderous rampage, carnage and barbarism faced by West Asia. The twaddle fails to illuminate the confusing deluge of eerily inept and counter-intuitive claptrap masquerading as fact in the clumsily stage-managed “global war on terror” environment. Mr. Hirsh’s selective amnesia fails to consider the fact that more than 1200 Pakistanis have died fighting the so called “war on terror”, and Pakistan has been a US ally since 1947. Pakistanis say “we don’t want your favors or your hate”. Leave Pakistan and Pakistanis alone.

• Comprehending the consequences of the “Do More” chorus
• Where’ the beef? Rhetoric from the USA but no US arms for Pakistani Forontier Corps

The West has used Pakistan and then discarded Pakistanis like used Kleenex tissues. To find profound philosophies in a business transaction between master and slave is repeat the “do more” mantra of the East India Company who wanted Indian Muslim to work harder for the empire and eventually get a piece of the action

As Lord Curzon found out these Pashtuns are patient and ferocious people and as the battle fatigued NATO is finding out, securing Kabul was easy, securing Zabul is not their cup of tea err hasish!!!. Pakistan was promised a pro-Pakistan Government in Afghanistan. The people riding the “Yellow cabs” came in shouting “Long Live Masoud, Down with Pakistan” and liberated the women of Afghanistan (yeah right!). Lacking MTV, Pakistanis do not suffer from Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD).

need to worry about the other tans!!! 

Pakistanis have long elephant memories. The entire world, or at least the thinking world knows that The Non-Pashtun Northern Alliance does not have grassroots support in Afghanistan and never will. The US  forces and the Mayor of Northwest Kabul are totally and absolutely dependent on Pakistan and the ISI on controlling the level of resistance there. The USA must realize that unless a pro-Pakistan government is installed in Afghanistan this will turn into another Vietnam, or could I say “Afghanistan”.

Even the State Department Web site calculated the cost of $10 Billion per year to Pakistan because of theThe problem with US policy makers is that they do not have the foresight to see the root ROOT CAUSE of the problem. As anonymous says in “Imperial Hubris“, is LOSING the war or terrorism BECAUSE, the USA does not HEAR what Laden is saying, “get out of of Muslim lands (Arabia, Afghanistan and Iraq). Anonymous says, “They don’t hate us because we have Girl scouts, or because we have freedom and a Senate or that we have MTV“…they hate us because the ROOT CAUSE OF THE MESSAGE is obfuscated by the likes of Wolfowitz and Frum “An end to all evil”. In Pakistan the root cause of the problem is: THE USA IS DEAF…and cannot hear the terrorists and CANNOT hear the Pakistanis  war in Afghanistan

I really don’t understand why this simple fact is so elusive to the liks of Mr Hirsh….forget Afghanistan, with the attack on Kabul theI give you a list of books that define the role of America. University of Columbia professor Dr. Rashid Khalidi describes it eloquently in “Resurrecting Empire“……. …amazingly we have selective amnesia and we forget that the taliban were created by the CIA-ISI and the Saudis/Emirates ….IF you need more information on the roots of terror please read “Sorrows of Empire” by Chalmer’s Johns and “Charlies War” (Congressman Charles Wilson of Texas) by George Crile who explains how the CIA ran the war in Afghanistan using Muslims from Pakistani madarsas all over the world to fight the Evil Empire-, the USSR. In “Unholy Wars“ by Cooley gives us an depth analysis and role of the CIA in creating a global network of terrorism using Muslim youth as cannon fodder..and 2 million Muslims were expended…do we have a memorial for these souls somewhere…..or Reagan destroyed the USSR with his bare hands…was it not….the Muslim who were being invited to the Governor’s House and the Whitehouse…now called the evil Taliban and everything is now blamed on Pakistan. 

The New ‘Forgotten War’
For Obama and McCain, the debate is all about Iraq and Afghanistan. But the bigger problem is Pakistan.Michael Hirsh Newsweek Web Exclusive Updated: 7:23 AM ET Jul 25, 2008
There’s nothing like a presidential race for getting the big issues wrong. While John McCain and Barack Obama engage in a pseudodebate about Iraq-where things are going relatively well, and both candidates will probably end up pursuing similar courses-the real emerging crisis is in Pakistan. And that is where no coherent U.S. policy exists, nor is there even a debate occurring. The problem: while President Pervez Musharraf, the old soldier, is fading slowly away, new Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Kayani is said to be quietly cutting deal after deal with Al Qaeda-linked militants, whose safe haven is growing beyond the tribal regions. And the still-green civilian government of Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani is all but powerless to interfere. The result is that militant and terrorist groups, feeling almost cozy in their newly secured territory, are mounting a fresh military and propaganda campaign and establishing a breathing space from which to plot future acts of terror.

Bush administration officials are growing steadily more alarmed by Pakistan’s instability, and they are at a loss about what to do. More bombing only seems to create more jihadis. At a meeting in the city of Rawalpindi in early June, radical groups including Jaish-e-Mohammed and Lashkar-e-Tayyaba-which have been surreptitiously supported by the Pakistani military as proxies in its longtime border struggle with India-agreed that the joining the fight with their Taliban brethren against NATO in Afghanistan was now more of a priority than the disputed province of Kashmir, The Associated Press reported. A month later, nine U.S. soldiers died in the most costly ambush of U.S. forces since 2002. The Taliban’s propaganda capabilities have grown much more sophisticated as well, a new report by the International Crisis Group says. The number of propaganda videos coming out of the Pakistani tribal region has jumped from just six in 2002 to 97 videos last year, according to figures compiled by Bruce Riedel, a former CIA analyst and National Security Council official.

South Asia expert Chris Fair of the Rand Corp. says that what’s developing in Pakistan is “a proliferating archipelago of radical micro-emirates ratified by peace deals.” She says “it’s no longer just the FATA [federally administered tribal areas] that are safe havens; the area has most definitely grown.” Since 2004 in Waziristan, she says, there have been at least seven major pacts of non-aggression signed with Pakistani tribal groups. “What all of them seem to have in common is that the military is legitimizing the Taliban as a negotiating entity. They [the militants] are being compensated for losses both material and human, allowed to keep weapons, in return for promising not to harbor foreign fighters. But the military doesn’t leave itself any enforcement mechanism.”

The policy of appeasement began under Musharraf, but Kayani has stepped it up because he wants to focus on rebuilding the Pakistani Army’s stature after eight years of military rule, says Fair and other analysts. “First and foremost, Kayani has to protect the institution of the Army,” says Fair. “So he’s putting counterinsurgency aside. The civilians have no control, it’s not their portfolio.” In some cases, says Robert Pempler of the International Crisis Group, Gilani’s government is trying to negotiate deals that will wean some “reconcilable” tribes away from the militants, “but in some ways these are being undercut by the military,” which just wants to withdraw its troops. “It reflects a longstanding failure by the Pakistani military to tackle issues in this area.” And politically, he adds, Pakistan is “still an incredibly delicate situation. It has not completed the transition from military to civilian rule” despite Gilani’s planned visit to Washington next week as head of state. The administration’s currying of favor with Kayani by upgrading his F-16s-as reported by The New York Times-is no answer.

Afghanistan was once known as “the forgotten war,” but that’s no longer true. Now everybody’s paying attention; even McCain has joined Obama in calling for the deployment of more U.S. troops there. But no matter how many forces are sent to Afghanistan, that war will remain unwinnable while the bad guys have a safe haven across the border. And that problem is not being addressed. When Obama, in a speech last summer, suggested that he would send in the U.S. military unilaterally if Pakistan’s government did not act against Al Qaeda (he repeated the threat during a visit to Afghanistan last Sunday), he was pilloried by almost everybody-including his fellow Democrats-for allegedly offending an ally. Unilateral action is still not a good solution, since it would only further damage America’s already tenuous ties with Pakistan’s government. But no one in Washington has offered a better answer yet.
URL: http://www.newsweek.com/id/148721