Biting feeding hands

This blog sometimes sticks to its self imposed rule to avoid politics. It's time to break that rule once more. But first I urge you to read this excellent article describing the current emerging political crisis surrounding Pakistan.

I think the coming weeks may see dramatic changes in Pakistan and its relations with its neighbours and allies. The problem is this:  Pakistan historically pursued many of its political goals through proxies managed by the ISI. The proxies are not fully controllable and the ISI is apparently either incompetent or worse, now inseparable from the proxies.  Is it willing or able to tackle the jihadi terrorists operating in the country? If not, why continue to fund the nation that it works for?  The US has been funding Pakistan, or as the article above describes it "bribing" the Pakistan establishment and military in the hope that they will put their house in order. I sense a groundswell in Washington following recent events that they are now tired of funding Pakistan's apparent incompetence/obduracy and are threatening to pull the plug on them.  

Just to highlight the problem with one simple example.  This report here from the BBC quotes a defensive ISI official claiming that the Pakistani security forces had identified the Bin Laden compound of worthy of attention in 2003 and had raided it. However... on this page here you will see that the house didn't exist in 2004...  That's not going down well in Washington.

Pakistan is still the place where a very significant number of senior terrorists are found or remain. With Bin Laden being found in the military town of Abbottabad (a repeat, because KSM was found in the even more military town of Rawalpindi a few years ago), I sense the road is running out for the ISI and any Pakistan government that can't control the ISI and hence the proxies.

As the article reminds us, after 9/11 President Musharraf was given a choice - join the US efforts or be bombed into the Stone Age.  I think that threat is now being repeated but this time the US means it. To be clear the US won't bomb Pakistan (unless you count UAVs taking out terrorists). They will just turn off the funding and that will have the same effect as day after day of B-52 bombing.  And given Pakistan's precarious geo-politics and internal stresses, that's all they'll need to do. Then the US will shrug, because they have given Pakistan every opportunity but Pakistan bites the hands of those that feed it.  The only action they will need to take is to remove the matter of Pakistan's nuclear weapons, then they might stand back and fold their arms.  That's a pretty scary situation. I think Pakistan now have one chance and one chance only to avoid that. I don't have a huge amount of confidence that they will.