President Karzai of Afghanistan threatened to attack if Pakistan does not clean up there act in regards to cross border terrorism and not just tolerance of Jihadis, but in some quarters outright support. You can read it at the Daily Times:
KABUL: Afghan President Hamid Karzai threatened on Sunday to send Afghan troops across the border to fight militants in Pakistan.
He told a news conference that Afghanistan had the right to self-defence, and because militants crossover from Pakistan “to come and kill Afghans and kill coalition troops, it exactly gives us the right to do the same”. “Therefore, Baitullah Mehsud should know that we will go after him now and hit him in his house,” he added.
“And the other fellow, (Taliban leader) Mullah Omar of Pakistan should know the same,” Karzai continued. “This is a two-way road in this case, and Afghans are good at the two-way road journey. We will complete the journey and we will get them and we will defeat them. We will avenge all that they have done to Afghanistan for the past so many years.”
Update: Bill Roggio has more on the latest predator strike inside Pakistan Saturday that might have been targetting Baitullah. Also note that Pakistan has alluded to a combined arms capability of using unarmed drone guided missles remotely fired from their Helicopter gunships and that some predators do take off from Peshawar.
UPDATE II: Another Shia mosque has been attacked by TTP or AQ forces, this time in Dera Ishmael Khan. The Takfirists are trying to further the work of inciting the 4th Fitna that they started much earlier in Iraq, and Parachinar. I think people everywhere are wising up to their ways, and we will not see a world-wide Islamic civil war as they desire. This along with the recent kidnapping of 16 Iranian border guards is a shift in strategy, they hope to regain the popularity they are losing by shifting the front to one more popular.
I don’t wish to be dismissive of Karzai’s bravado, but could this mean some serious gains on intel have been made in the NWFP
Is Karzai forgetting the Pakistan has nukes???
I don’t think he’s forgotten the nukes. This seems to me to be a bit of saber rattling to set up “hot pursuit” scenarios like the ones we allow Turkey to run against the PKK in Iraq. I don’t doubt that Afghanistan will go cross border in a hot pursuit scenario, they already have in a couple of situations. They aren’t going to stay long or wage extensive campaigns however, the terrain and the realities don’t allow it.
Pakistan has nukes, but if they use them while Nato forces are everywhere in Afghanistan it would be the largest mistake they’ve ever made, and they have made many. Several of the Nato force countries have nukes, and Pakistan knows that.
They also know that the Waziristans are their own little countries right now, they aren’t “semi-autonomous tribal regions” since Baitullah united the Pakistan Taliban into Tehreek Taliban Pakistan. (TTP)
He’s setting up as a regional Warlord in the Waziristans, as has happened many times in the past in that region. (E.G. the most recent Mehsud or Masud uprising was against the British post WW I they came in a series about 1912- 1930 if I recall right, the Brits brought in the Ghurkas to put that down.)
Here’s a link on the region and border:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/slideshow/page/0,,2021829,00.html
Note in the epigraph at the end they say something not quite true: Alexander the Great did subdue the region. However he did it by taking the leaders along with him in his conquests of Punjab and India.
The other tribes in the other tribal areas of Pakistan are sympathetic but not stupid, witness the ass-kicking the Taliban got when they tried to take the Khyber pass recently.
Noam, I’m seeing signs that you are right, there’s also a lot of disaffection over the rise of the Taliban in Pakistan. It was ok as long as their depredations were extra-territorial, but now it’s come home to roost.
From what I’ve read, Pakistan does not put their regular army
on the border anyway. They use frontier or border patrols who
apparently look the other way when the Taliban crosses
through, then act as rear guard when they scurry back into
Pakistan. A few good incursions by Afghan forces may be all
that’s needed to get Pakistan to quit allowing the Taliban the
safe haven and help eliminate them like the Iraqi forces are
starting to do along with the help of Sunni and Shia militias…
That’s correct, it’s mostly Frontier Corps on the borders, I updated my post on the US strike the killed 11, they were all FC troops. They don’t always look the other way, sometimes they even lay down covering fire for the Taliban as the gun camera tapes show.