Tough Context for US Pakistan Meeting

Islamabad Marriott, September 20, Photograph by BK Bangash/Associated Press

The new President of Pakistan and the outgoing President of the United States will meet on Tuesday in New York. Preparations for the meeting included the visit last week to Islamabad by Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen.

The Presidents' meeting has also been preceded by increasing US attacks on terrorist targets inside Pakistan. On September 17 - during Admiral Mullen's visit - missiles from a US drone hit a suspected terrorist hideout. This came on the heels of the first - reported - ground attack by US forces inside Pakistan on September 3. According to media reports, President Bush has authorized US operations inside Pakistan without Pakistani pre-approval. Whether or not the recent US attacks received Pakistani approval, they have created a political furor. (Overview from Time Magazine.)

Since their 2001 ouster in Afghanistan both the Taliban and al Qaeda have established safe havens inside Pakistan, especially in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). These safe havens are used to supply and train for attacks inside Afghanistan and elsewhere. In the last two weeks German police have made a series of arrests involving terrorist suspects who received training in Pakistan in 2006 and 2007.

In a videotape released on September 8 the Taliban and al Qaeda promised, "more major, large-scale attacks like the Kandahar prison operation, the Nuristan raid, the Sarobi ambush and Khost airport operation in which approximately 50 Americans and 100 apostates were killed and four helicopters were hit and destroyed." Over the last three months, insurgents have inflicted the highest casualty tolls on western forces since the Afghan war began nearly seven years ago. (See related story.)

US Defense Secretary, Robert Gates, has defended cross-border operations into Pakistan as a military necessity. The United States has pressed Pakistan for more aggressive action against the terrorist hideouts along the mountainous Afghan-Pakistan border. Saturday the Pakistan military claimed progress in a month-long offensive in the Bajaur area of the FATA.

But many are skeptical. On Saturday Nasim Zehra wrote in the Khaleej Times (Dubai, UAE), "The Taliban and the al Qaeda are now relatively more effective because they have strong intelligence, the locals have virtually minimal protection by the State, the Pakistan Army has not been successful in blocking the expansion and the power of these groups... What is now being achieved through the Pakistan Army operations in Bajaur? Reportedly minimal. Will the Pakistan Army win against the militants? It appears that the army operations have not succeeded to substantively weaken the Taliban and the al Qaeda."

Saturday morning a suicide bomber struck a Pakistani army convoy in North Waziristan killing at least ten soldiers. According to some reports there have been at least 900 Pakistani army casualties in counterterrorism operations since 2006.

On Saturday afternoon Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari gave a wide-ranging speech to Parliament insisting, "We will not tolerate the violation of our sovereignty and territorial integrity by any power in the name of combating terrorism."

But President Zardari gave much more attention to the internal challenge of terrorism. "We must root out terrorism and extremism wherever and whenever they may rear their ugly heads. Reforming the tribal areas and bringing them into the mainstream of national life can no longer be delayed. They must be treated at par with the rest of their Pakistani brethren... Pakistan is at a critical security juncture today. In order to meet the challenge posed by the extremist and terrorist elements in the Tribal Areas and the adjoining regions, the Government has devised a comprehensive three-pronged strategy. First, to make peace with those who are willing to keep the peace and renounce violence; Second, to invest in the development and social uplift of the local people and Third, to use force only as a last resort against those who refuse to surrender their arms, take the law into their hands, challenge the writ of the Government and attack security forces."

Will this strategy be enough? For President Bush? For reducing terrorist operations in Afghanistan? For curtailing terrorist training targeted at Europe, the US, and elsewhere? For Zardari's survival? For Pakistan's survival?

Only a few hours after President Zardari's speech the Pakistani capital was shaken by the explosion of a massive vehicle bomb at the Marriott Hotel. (Published 1300 US Eastern, Saturday, September 20)

Follow-on coverage: Over 50 Killed, Pakistan's 9/11, Al Qaeda Suspected, Warning to US-PAK Coop, Zardari vows to Fight, Pakistani President Departs for New York.