US Commando Strike in Waziristan

"This is a direct assault on the sovereignty of Pakistan and the people of Pakistan expect that the armed forces of Pakistan would rise to defend the sovereignty of the country and give a befitting reply."

I see Pakistani Augusta class sub-marine in manhattan harbor already...for this "befitting reply". Please tell Owais Ghani to use his mouth the part he uses to chew his food next time rather than use his other mouth where he stores beef jerkys.

bulleya #30 "iraqis were not known for fighting....afghanis are legendary in this area."

the Genius of Kakul speaks!! the sad part is, I have heard this kind of standard gibberish from other graduates of Kakul University too.

Afghans may scare the wits out of you Conquerors of Your Own Civilian Governments. But they are flesh and blood, not supermen. Nor, despite tall claims, have ever been more than a middling military presence outside their barren mountains that no one wants to waste time trying to make a seat of power.

Re: # 30

captain cluless,

...... "the usa is extremely weak in such planning....despite spending $4000 billion or so in iraq, it has been defeated....."

..... where did you hear that ? ...... by all accounts we have won the war in iraq - now it is just a mopping up operation ..... us casulaties are way down, baghdad has more hours of electricity than islamabad, the mahdi army has disappeared from the scene, anbar province was just handed over to the iraqis and by the end of next year us forces will be confined to a couple of large bases ......

..... we have to maintain our presence in iraq for the next ten fifteen years to make sure the bedouins don't go back to their bad ways and as a staging area for a clean up operation in iran ...... the mullahs of iran have to be ousted and the people liberated - that nonsense has gone on long enough! ...... other bases in pakistan and afghanistan will make things easier ......

Sriram Allah #33: You cannot be All-Knowing if you believe what Musharraf says.

bulleya 32.

"pakistan needs to tell the usa to pack its bags and leave pakistan, and fight its own wars....regardless of what the usa's reactions happen to be...."

Really?? I guess you havn't read "In the Line of Fire".

"On September 12, 2001, then-U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell telephoned the Pakistani leader with the ultimatum: "You are either with us or against us," Musharraf recalled.

The next day, Powell's then deputy, Richard Armitage, tele-phoned the chief of Pakistan's top spy agency, the directorate of Inter Services Intelligence (ISI), with an even sterner warning.

"In what has to be the most undiplomatic statement ever made, Armitage ... told the (ISI) director general not only that we had to decide whether we were with America or with the terrorists, but that if we chose the terrorists, then we should be prepared to be bombed back to the Stone Age," Musharraf recounted."

#30 by bulleya

....despite spending $4000 billion or so in iraq, it has been defeated.....

Captain Clueless as usual speaking from his a$$. Someone please call Arjun to knock some sense into him. The man has already concluded that the US has lost in Iraq

$400 not $4000...

...any strategic military operation carried out by the usa is going to be a disaster....the usa is extremely weak in such planning....despite spending $4000 billion or so in iraq, it has been defeated.....

hence afghanistan is going to be a bigger disaster than iraq...iraqis were not known for fighting....afghanis are legendary in this area....the usa's defeat there is going to be even bigger than in iraq...

...if the democrats commit more troops there, it will only result in more american troops dying...

...so pakistan has two choices...either become a part of this disaster....or distance itself from it, and let the afghanis and americans fight it out on their own...

...if pakistan becomes a part of this disaster, then, eventually, the usa is going to pack its bags, in defeat, like it is doing in iraq, and will leave....pakistan will be stuck with all the blowback....

...this is what happened in the first afghan war, when pakistan became a frontline state.....klashnikovs, drugs, taliban, etc. are all a product of joining that war...

....the second war is going to result in suicide bombings, constant warfare in nwfp, the pakistani taliban etc....

pakistan needs to tell the usa to pack its bags and leave pakistan, and fight its own wars....regardless of what the usa's reactions happen to be....

after that it should let the americans and taliban fight it out....be it in the tribal areas or in afghanistan....i think the taliban and tribals are strong enough to look after themselves....

in this war, smart money is on the usa losing and taliban winning....

if pakistan joins in, then it loses on both sides....hence it should not take sides and stay away....

i cannot think of any other country supporting the usa, if, as a result, it had 160+ suicide bombings, within its borders....spain had one explosion in spain, and it left the iraq war....france has recently lost ten soldiers, and its govt. is having difficulty convincing the french that afghanistan is their war...ditto on canada and holland...

the usa cannot win wars in this region....hence it is not a good idea to became a party to its wars.....they will leave from afghanistan....and will leave it a bigger mess than they left iraq.....

..... thank god for america! ..... this is a great opportunity to wipe out the taliban and their sympathisers in pakistan once and for all ..... as part of this campaign, pakistan should shut down all madrasas, round up jihadi sympathisers, send mullahs to re-education camps, throw out the hudood law, dismantle the sharia court, spay the girls of jamia hafsa and go back to using khuda hafiz instead of allah hafiz ......

8. What would be the immediate tasks that the new PM and president should focus on?

Reconciliation and less emphasis on the power of the army to bring about a military solution.More emphasis on Soft Power , better intelligence gathering.

9. The protests that we are seeing are mainly confine to the lawyers, lawmakers and journalists, which are considered the elite groups in the country. Some were said to be paid to carry out these protests against Musharraf and there were those who enjoyed the limelight from the media. Besides, the number of protesters are small, around 100 or so. The common people are no where to be seen. In fact, I have a feeling that Musharraf is widely popular among the common people. What is your take on this? Are these protests genuine? Do you think the media has been biased?

The common people are apathetic . They are more worried if they will have something to eat the next day.But remember the Bolsheviks with just a hard core of 10,000 captured power in Russia.

Re: # 24

Harish

Public discourse is monopolized by anti-Americanism, remnants of the Jihadi network, military establishment followed by throngs of poorly informed people.

These are not excuses but facts, what Pakistan needs to do and cannot do is dismantle this Jihadi network in the form of Madaris, religious charities and their offshoots.

Things look bleak, situation is getting from bad to worse.

True Arif bhai. The US has gone into other countries on the flimsiest of pretexts, but with Pakistan it has been extraordinarily patient. It has poured in billions of dollars, provided the technology and equipment all in the hope that it will clean up the mess. But Pakistan doesn't want to do anything; so the US is left with no choice but to do it on its own.

I have been saying this for a very longtime now, either Pakistan solves the problem or the problem will be solved for them. Had we taken responsibility then the outcome would have been in our control, now that we abdicated our responsibilities, we have also conceded control to others.

Why is it that when the Taliban/Al Qaeda blow up their targets and in the process scores of civilians get killed, no one raises a peep (except perhaps for Masadi and a couple of others) but when US missile/fighter strikes kill civilians, people invariably focus on the civilian casualties alone?

re: #22 nazarhayatkhan

...I guess not everyone thinks like that atleast in NWFP... you are probably represnting the Pakhtun of the plains (Peshawar valley).... go ask the tribal Pakhtun!!

Havn't read the article.

Terrorists (religious fanatics) are crazy nuts. They only understand the brute force.

Pakistan Army is already attacking them. If the Americans chip in, so be it. It only serves our cause.

Rest all is BS about sovereignity Blah Blah Blah.

Better to live in peace like the rest of the world instead of being a victim of these Nuts' recommended life style.

regards

NHK