Land Of The Pure Primer

Well, not so much a primer as a reminder.


Of all the real and fakebelieve nation states created or recreated since the early Cold War days the - Land of the Pure is a study in discombobulation.

"...Anti-Americanism? (The Pew Foundation poll shows 64 percent of Pakistanis believe the U.S. is the enemy.) Yet the one thing they all want most of all is a U.S. visa. The anti-U.S. feelings all trace back to the way Washington left us high and dry after we had fought together against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s..."

"...The same week the CFR published its gloomy assessment of the Afghan war, one of Pakistan's most influential journalists, the editor of a major newspaper, made the "off-the-record" - which now means go ahead and use it but keep my name out of it - rounds in Washington to deliver a stunning indictment of all the players. Samples:

"...All four wars between India and Pakistan (1947, 1965, 1971 and 1999) were provoked by Pakistan.

"...There is no Indian threat to Pakistan, except for what is manufactured by the ISI (Inter-Service Intelligence agency).

"...Washington says Pakistan must do more to flesh out insurgent safe havens in FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas). As long as the Taliban were the illegitimate children of ISI, that was possible. But the Taliban are now the enemies of Pakistan, irrespective of whether they are Pakistani Taliban or Afghan Taliban. Assets have become liabilities. We've lost 3,000 Pakistani military killed in action. All the jihadi terrorist organizations were created by Pakistan - and they have turned against us.

"...Pakistan has a big stake in Afghanistan, and America's own exit strategy is entirely dependent on Pakistan. Our army has a chokehold on your supply lines through Pakistan. And Pakistan wants to be the U.S. proxy in Afghanistan. ISI wants to make sure Pakistan does not become a liability in Afghanistan.

"...There is no chance whatsoever for the U.S. and its NATO and other allies to prevail in Afghanistan. No big military successes are possible. All U.S. targets are unrealistic. You cannot prevail on the ground. ISI will not abandon the Taliban. And if the Taliban does not have a major stake in negotiations with the United States, these will be sabotaged by Pakistan.

"...Time is running out for Gen. Petraeus - for the United States and for us (Pakistan). Our system is falling apart. The sooner the U.S. and Pakistan are on the same page, the better it will be for both of us.

"...The Kerry-Lugar aid bill ($1.5 billion a year over five years) is too little, too late. Only half of U.S. pledges are actually coming in. A huge slice of this bill goes to administration and local bureaucracy; $25 million was earmarked for "Sesame Street" - for Pakistanis. U.S. aid is not achieving any of its objectives. Flood relief also caused havoc. Four hundred bridges were washed away.

"...The attacks against U.S.-NATO supply lines through Pakistan, which have included the torching of scores of tanker trucks, were not the work of Taliban guerrillas; they all were the work of the ISI made to look like Taliban. The objective was to demonstrate the extent to which the United States is dependent on Pakistani security.

"...Drone strikes? The Pakistani line about "huge provocations" and more civilians killed than the Taliban and their partners is pure army invention. Drones play a limited role and should continue.

"...One can't begin to understand the Pakistani crisis until one absorbs the terrifying fact that Pakistan's 180 million population includes 80 million children younger than 18 - almost half the population. And just 40 percent of Pakistani children are in school. (Reminder: Pakistan also is one of the world's eight nuclear powers, counting North Korea yet wields an amazingly underwhelming literacy rate of 49%).

"...India and Pakistan must bury the Kashmir feud. The reason it continues in an off-and-on mode is because that's what the Pakistani army wants. The army's corporate interests are at stake. If the crisis is resolved, the army loses its narrative for dominating the economy


"...Land of the Pure is a work in progress. The war against extremism is our war, too. The stakeholders are changing. Urban Pakistan is not interested in al Qaeda's global caliphate narrative.




Pic  - "The world is a ho beotch - and Great Satan is da pimp"