Nothing written by you of which Holbrooke et al aren't aware. You've seemingly reconciled yourself nicely to proxy wars on two fronts. Comfortably even.
Must be a remarkable savings in uniforms.
Your comments make clear the following-
1.) We absolutely, despite additional routes, need your supply corridors. If not, given that it's almost certainly clear to the President on down that you're double dealing, we'd likely do all we could to isolate you.
Ahmad Pasha's cryptic defense of free speech for the boys in Quetta to Der Spiegel now seems patently clear in retrospect. So too the rumors of Hekmatyar and Haqqani.
They, if your assertions are correct (and I absolutely believe them to be true), are the actions of an enemy to the UN's Afghanistan mission in virtually every respect. Which brings me to-
Quit dissembling and distorting S-2. My comments indicate nothing of the sort - your comments here are are the expression of your desire to shift US/NATO failures onto Pakistan that continuously results in these fantastic conspiracy theories of 'ISI in cahoots with Taliban' that you guys have taken to heart.
And then you get after the Pakistanis for 'believing in conspiracies'.
The US/NATO on the other hand, using your logic, have clearly indicated that they are an enemy to Pakistan's mission against terrorism by doing close to nothing to stop the poppy crop and the drug and weapons trade, that is now responsible for supplying the militants murdering Pakistani women. children and men, civilians and soldiers, with weapons and resources.
It is ludicrous to thin that given the ISI DG made those comments, the higher level US military and civilian leadership is not aware of the restricted arrangements with the 'Quetta Shura' - your guys know this and have a tacit arrangement with Pakistan on this count. It works becasue, as I pointed out elsewhere, the Shura, if prevented from actively training and recruiting, have very little tangible benefit they can provide the insurgency, which remains localized in the hands of local Tribal commanders, in Afghanistan and FATA, and funded by the Drug trade.
As such the Quetta Shura has an insignificant impact on the insurgency, which is why the US has not been chomping at the bit to get them taken out, so far. Whether this tacit arrangement with Pakistan changes under the Obama adminsitration we shall have to see.
On the 'two proxy wars bit' - a sheer lie there. The proxy war in Afghanistan ended with the US invasion, and the active proxy war in Kashmir ended after 2002 - there is a reason why the LoC has been largely silent, the ceasefire has held, and cross border infiltration is negligible. We are giving the Indians every chance to arrive at a peaceful resolution of the dispute by tamping down on the militancy, and Musharraf came out with proposals on the issue that were a radical enough departure from Pakistan's traditional stance on Kashmir for him to be called a 'sell out and traitor'.
As with my advice to Zhero, save some of your pretentious indignation for the real criminals and 'abrogators of Kashmiri rights', the Indians. Throw some of your pretentious lectures on 'respect for the UNSC resolutions, agreements and human freedom and rights' there war as well, unless you have no shame in continuing to act as hypocrites.
2.) Drugs are a distractor which you've conveniently played to score points here at def.pk. Nothing more. How could it be when opium is so critical to the sustenance of your "good" taliban? Likely, the ISI is knee-deep here as well which nicely segues to-
If the attitude at the higher level civilian and military leadership is the same as what you have expressed here, no wonder you are failing in Afghanistan and blaming Pakistan. You cannot kill every insurgent, and at the same time if you do nothing to stop the weapons and money supplies, funded by the drug trade, you are doing absolutely nothing.
Your disingenuous dismissal of the drug trade only points to the fact that you seek to remove any responsibility for the current deteriorating situation from the shoulders of the US. The poppy is grown in Afghanistan, not Pakistan, so the argument of the 'ISI being neck deep' (without any evidence again) is nothing but a canard and 'distraction'. Pakistan or the ISI do not control that crop, the US/NATO does, and the responsibility for that crop supplying the Taliban with resources is yours.
I am just looking for a good customer, he said. It isnt important to us who it is. Most of the Taleban are good customers, but we also take these guns further into Pakistan, to the Landi Kotal market, where we sell them to international arms smugglers.
From Landi Kotal located high in the Khyber Pass the weapons make their way to radical groups all over the world, Mir Alam said, explaining, Landi Kotal is one of the largest arms markets in the region. The mujaheddin and al-Qaeda purchase weapons for Palestine, Kashmir and other battle fronts.
Turning Afghan Heroin Into Kalashnikovs
And the list of analysis such as this pointing to the Northern Afghan drug and weapons trade corridor is expansive - deal with it instead of creating ISI bogeymen.
3.) Your army is in charge, no if's, and's, or but's. Your civilian government is a facade designed to reassure the U.S. that you're on the "path" to democracy and thus worthy of aid.
I'll give it to your military leadership. Their cajones are world-class. Nobody double-downs on a pair of deuces like you guys.
Gonna lose your house if you play this hand wrong.
The Military's relationship with the 'good Taliban' is limited to what I described - we are not actively supporting them - no weapons, no intel no facilitation in cross border crossings - nothing. We maintain contacts, and the Shura lives in Quetta, likely with full US knowledge - The Taliban leaders talking to the Saudis and Afghan Government leaders did not fly out to Saudi Arabia from a cave in Kandahar you know.
Success in Afghanistan and FATA against the Taliban will likely reduce the utility of these individuals, and possibly make them more amenable to dialog and power sharing. If they remain obstructionists in that scenario, then they will be cast out.
