Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Legally, under international law, you cannot block landlocked country's access to sea, and the supplies maybe going to NATO/US, but its still going to Afghanistan.
Agreed but does the supplies are going to Afghan government? One can found millions of reason to extend the ban if US ever activate such law.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
I think time has come for people of Pakistan to come out and ask for resignation of COAS & Air Chief. If we accomplish this task the power of security establishment as holy cow will be broken forever.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Legally, under international law, you cannot block landlocked country's access to sea, and the supplies maybe going to NATO/US, but its still going to Afghanistan.
The Americans are not totally dependent upon Pakistan now, more than half of their supplies are shipped through central Asian republics. They have an option of Iran available as well if they mend their relations with them. Anyways these supplies are bringing nothing other than destruction for us, so we should keep them blocked. That's another thing the government is waiting for a feeble apology and then the supplies will be opened and then the life as usual for the two Countries.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
you may not be following the news that time, it was all over the news, 2 NATO chopper came in, "arrested" (read protected) some "terrorists" (read their own TTP assets). also have not heard about NATO vacating their border posts letting terrorists flee to afghanistan when Army launched operation in FATA?
If that is true than our army shouldn't Complain now as its not easy for an army to come into a foreign country take people and then leave with the other army sleeping as usual. That could have been possible only with our support.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
What could be the reason behind such attack?
1) The jawans at the camp might have arrested some TTP terrorist dispatched from Afghanistan and ISAF was here on rescue mission
2) Talks in Kabul failed and this was show of POWER
3) Would divert attention from Memogate?
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
I think time has come for people of Pakistan to come out and ask for resignation of COAS & Air Chief. If we accomplish this task the power of security establishment as holy cow will be broken forever.
Trust me, in few days time, there will be some news "leaks" about how NATO+US forces are suffering from the shortage and they are at their knees and they are sorry and KIYANI and PASHA would be hero again
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
^ I don't know if they will become heroes or not. The reality is that the morale of the army and public is at all time low due to the different events that unfolded in 2011. The army which cannot defend themselves I don't think they can defend the nation. But the army top brass after all of this still can't decide what they should do to get themselves and the country out of the mess they have taken us into in the first place.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Legally, under international law, you cannot block landlocked country's access to sea, and the supplies maybe going to NATO/US, but its still going to Afghanistan.
i "think" that is for general supplies/ trade etc, not for Military hardware/ munition stuff... doesn't seem realistic if its for military purposes too. plus its not only Pakistan who's the enighbour of Afghanistan there are other countries too, Pakistan can continue to allow shipments for food, cloths, medicines for Afgnanis, not for the invaders.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
What could be the reason behind such attack?
1) The jawans at the camp might have arrested some TTP terrorist dispatched from Afghanistan and ISAF was here on rescue mission
2) Talks in Kabul failed and this was show of POWER
3) Would divert attention from Memogate?
firstly it was not a small camp post or something not very easily identifiable, it was complete building along with flag and proper structure.
and as for the reasons you mentioned i think it can be number 3 + a possible aircover for TTP to enter the area again after it was thrown out.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
We have got the apology, the army should open up the NATO routes…business as usual should resume now!
http://www.dawn.com/2011/11/27/pakistan-troop-deaths-tragic-unintended-nato-chief.html
Pakistan troop deaths ‘tragic, unintended’: Nato chief
**BRUSSELS: Nato chief Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Sunday he had written to Pakistan premier Yousuf Raza Gilani to express regret over the “tragic, unintended” deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers in an airstrike.
“I have written to the Prime Minister of Pakistan to make it clear that the deaths of Pakistani personnel are as unacceptable and deplorable as the deaths of Afghan and international personnel,” he said in a statement. “This was a tragic unintended incident.”
According to a report in the New York Times, A Nato spokesman, Brig. Gen. Carsten Jacobson, offered details suggesting that allied and Afghan troops operating near the border came under fire from unknown enemies and summoned coalition warplanes for help.
**The NY Times report stated that: “In the early night hours of this morning, a force consisting of Afghan forces and coalition forces, in the eastern border area where the Durand Line is not always 100 per cent clear, got involved in a firefight,” General Jacobson said, according to a transcript of his statements on Nato TV that the alliance provided American officials on Saturday.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Hogwash and unacceptable. pathetic attempt to hide the crime they committed.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Tensions Flare Between U.S. and Pakistan After Strike**
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Pakistani officials said on Saturday that NATO aircraft had killed at least 25 soldiers in strikes against two military posts at the northwestern border with Afghanistan, and the country’s supreme army commander called them unprovoked acts of aggression in a new flash point between the United States and Pakistan.**
**The Pakistani government responded by ordering the Central Intelligence Agency to vacate the drone operations it runs from Shamsi Air Base, in western Pakistan, within 15 days. It also closed the two main NATO supply routes into Afghanistan, including the one at Torkham. NATO forces receive roughly 40 percent of their supplies through that crossing, which runs through the Khyber Pass, and Pakistan gave no estimate for how long the routes might be shut down.
A NATO spokesman said it was likely that allied airstrikes caused the Pakistani casualties, but said an investigation had been ordered to determine the cause.
**In Washington, American officials were scrambling to assess what had happened amid preliminary reports that allied forces in Afghanistan engaged in a firefight along the border and called in airstrikes. **Senior Obama administration officials were also weighing the implications on a relationship that took a sharp turn for the worse after a Navy Seal commando raid killed Osama bin Laden near Islamabad in May, and that has deteriorated since then.
“Senior U.S. civilian and military officials have been in touch with their Pakistani counterparts from Islamabad, Kabul and Washington to express our condolences, our desire to work together to determine what took place and our commitment to the U.S.-Pakistan partnership, which advances our shared interests, including fighting terrorism in the region,” said Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council.In a sign that the White House was trying to keep the situation from growing worse, President Obama was updated regularly throughout the day by Thomas E. Donilon, the national security adviser, Ms. Hayden said.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton; Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and Gen. John R. Allen, the commander of the NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, all talked to their Pakistani counterparts to offer condolences and to promise an investigation, administration officials said.
Mrs. Clinton and Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta issued a joint statement late Saturday endorsing the investigation and offering their “deepest condolences” to Pakistan.
General Allen, in a separate statement, said, “This incident has my highest personal attention and my commitment to thoroughly investigate it to determine the facts.”The strikes, which Pakistani officials said involved both helicopters and fighter jets, took place overnight at two military posts in Salala, a village in Pakistan’s Mohmand tribal region near the border with Kunar Province in Afghanistan. At least 40 soldiers were deployed at the posts, Pakistani military officials said, adding that NATO aircraft had penetrated roughly a mile and a half into Pakistan to make the strikes.
**
**What remained unclear on Saturday, and what will be a main focus of NATO’s inquiry, was what exactly prompted the airstrikes and whether they were unprovoked or resulted from a communications mishap. A NATO spokesman, Brig. Gen. Carsten Jacobson, offered details suggesting that allied and Afghan troops operating near the border came under fire from unknown enemies and summoned coalition warplanes for help.“In the early night hours of this morning, a force consisting of Afghan forces and coalition forces, in the eastern border area where the Durand Line is not always 100 percent clear, got involved in a firefight,” General Jacobson said, according to a transcript of his statements on NATO TV that the alliance provided American officials on Saturday. (The Durand Line is the colonial-era boundary between Pakistan and Afghanistan.)****“Air force was called in into this activity,” he said, “and we have to look into this situation of what actually happened on the ground.”
General Jacobson told BBC television that it was “highly likely” that the airstrikes caused the Pakistani casualties. Several American and allied military, diplomatic and intelligence officials contacted on Saturday said it was unclear what threat, real or perceived, led to the airstrikes or why the allied aircraft fired on the Pakistani troops.
Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, the Pakistan Army spokesman, told Pakistan’s Geo TV that the United States had been provided the grid locations of all Pakistani border outposts.
Such cross-border attacks have been at the heart of an increasingly hostile relationship between Pakistani and American officials. The United States has demanded that Pakistan do more to stop militants based in its territory, particularly from the feared Haqqani network and Al Qaeda, from crossing into Afghanistan to attack American forces. And United States forces in eastern Afghanistan say they have taken more mortar and rocket fire from positions at or near active Pakistani military posts in recent months, despite complaints to Pakistan about it.
Pakistani officials were enraged and embarrassed by the raid on Bin Laden’s compound and by repeated American drone strikes against militants in the northwestern tribal regions, which they consider breaches of the country’s sovereignty.
In a statement on Saturday, the Pakistani military said its top commander, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, had “directed that all necessary steps be undertaken for an effective response to this irresponsible act.”
General Kayani was severely criticized by Pakistani legislators, citizens and even his fellow commanders for allowing the American raid against Bin Laden, and he is under pressure in the wake of Saturday’s attack to stand up to the United States, American officials said.
President Asif Ali Zardari also strongly condemned the airstrikes, and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani cut short a vacation, returning to the capital and calling a meeting of his cabinet’s defense committee.
A former Pakistani diplomat, Maleeha Lodhi, who has served twice as ambassador to the United States and has close ties to the Pakistani military, said in an e-mail message: “The relationship is on a much more slippery slope now. This is as close as you can get to a rupture.”
On Saturday night, the defense committee meeting culminated in the demand to vacate the drone operations at Shamsi and the announcements that both supply routes had been closed. The base, about 200 miles southwest of Quetta in Baluchistan Province, is home to a secondary C.I.A. drone staging area.
After the Bin Laden raid, Pakistan publicly insisted that the C.I.A. shut down its missions there, but the agency balked and Pakistan quietly relented to scaled-back operations. The end of operations there would restrict the agency’s flexibility in using airstrikes against militants.
Pakistan also canceled several scheduled meetings this weekend with visiting American officers, sessions aimed at quietly rekindling training and other cooperation between the two militaries that was shelved after the Bin Laden raid.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
They're covering it up now. This is unacceptable & Pakistanis should demand an end to this drama. If govt/army still wants to do tango with the US/NATO let them, but everyone else should come together to block NATO supplies route. This has to end & as long as US/NATO is in Afghanistan there would be no stability in Pakistan.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
http://security.blogs.cnn.com/2011/11/26/pakistani-american-relations-back-to-the-bottom/?hpt=hp_t1[FONT=arial, sans-serif]Pakistani-American relations back to the bottom
By **Adam Levine
Just days after a top American commander in Afghanistan said the situation on the border with Pakistan was improving, the U.S. once again finds itself back in the nadir of relations with the Pakistanis.
**The killing of 24 Pakistani soldiers at two military outposts, hit by NATO helicopters near the border area, has pulled the rug out from underneath American efforts to calm a relationship that had been rocked by Pakistani anger at America. (Read the latest on Saturday’s incident.
**After American special forces snuck into Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden, an American intelligence contractor killed two Pakistanis, and American officials accused the government of harboring and helping the Haqqani terror network, much work had been done to revive this critical counterterrorism effort though the two countries were barely on solid ground again before Saturday’s incident.
**A recent Pentagon report to Congress said the ability of insurgents to hide across the border in Pakistan is the greatest threat to success in Afghanistan. The report pointed directly at Pakistani authorities for aiding the strength of insurgents on that side of the border.
The 2012 presidential campaign has also brought forth much heated rhetoric by Republican candidates vying to be seen as standing up to the Pakistanis in a way the Obama administration has not. Former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and Texas Governor Rick Perry have called for a zeroing out of foreign aid to the country.
**“We were told, a perfectly natural Washington assumption that our killing bin Laden in Pakistan drove U.S.-Pakistan relations to a new low. To which my answer is, well, it should have because we should be furious,” said Gingrich at this week’s CNN national security debate. “you tell the Pakistanis, help us or get out of the way, but don’t complain if we kill people you’re not willing to go after on your territory where you have been protecting them.”
**
In the past few weeks, the U.S. was dragged into a Pakistani government scandal when it was reported that President Asif Ali Zardari asked the U.S. government in May to help him hold on to power because he feared a military coup. A Pakistani businessman claimed he’d been asked to pass the message on to U.S. Admiral Mike Mullen, then Washington’s top military official. In the end, the ambassador from Pakistan, Husain Haqqani, stepped down and a new ambassador was appointed just a few days ago. The new ambassador, Sherry Rehman, has yet to come to Washington.
But there were signs the two sides were mending fences.
The American commander of international forces was just in Pakistan to meet with Chief of Army Staff, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani. The two discussed "measures concerning coordination, communication and procedures between Pakistan Army, ISAF and Afghan Army, aimed at enhancing border control on both sides.
**Also this week, the commander for U.S. and NATO troops in eastern Afghanistan, Major Gen. Daniel Allyn, told reporters at the Pentagon that the Pakistanis had been cooperating in trying to stem Haqqani attacks that emanated from the Pakistani side of the border and were aimed at U.S., NATO and Afghan troops. Allyn described it as a “positive step forward” and said the Pakistanis had even been adjusting positions at the request of the NATO forces. The result was attacks “tapered somewhat in the past several weeks” to just “three to four cross-border firing incidents a week.”
“Now, whether or not there’s more to the explanation than that’s where the enemy is choosing to shoot from, I can’t answer that. I do know the positive sign from our perspective is the responsiveness with which the [the Pakistani military] border force have coordinated actions against the firing,” Allyn said. **U.S., NATO, Afghan and Pakistani troops had been conducting communications excercises, said Allyn, to help coordinate border security. Another was scheduled for November.
Clearly, this incident has jeopardized that good will. Pakistan quickly and angrily, in messages from multiple officials, have condemned the killings, calling it “unprovoked.” The country shut down two critical border crossings used to bring supplies to NATO troops. Pakistan is also ordering U.S. military personel out of Shamsi Airbase within two weeks. Shamsi had at one point been used to launch CIA drone strikes within Pakistan although that was stopped in the wake of the Raymond Davis incident but there are still American military based there..
Promises of investigations were quickly proffered by Gen. Allen and the U.S. ambassador in Pakistan, Cameron Munter.** But Washington was quiet with little to say on-the-record or even on background, as the U.S. looks to figure out how what happened and how to placate the Pakistanis.**
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
the only thing which can change this is political parties bringing their workers on the road and demanding Military + Govt heads to resign, and block the supplies themselves, not only block NATO supplies, but block Kiyani + zardari supplies. At least Imran should do it. i dont expect anything from sharifs who are not so sharif
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
why is there so much fuss now??
the ‘sovereignity’ has been violated hundreds of times… thousands of Pakistani lives have been lost…
why is it that when the military people die..only then there is so much fuss?? are their lives more important that thousands of civilians killed by drones??
selective patriotism people have here…
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
^ agreed, this was bound to happen down the road!
this is the history of pakistan’s sovereignty…
http://www.longwarjournal.org/pakistan-strikes.phpA country asks foreigners to leave a base but they refuse, thats sovereignty.
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
. . . and hence we got use to all the screwing and lived happily ever after with our pimp Uncle Sam . . .
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
Pakistan retaliation leaves Nato drivers in limbo](http://URL=“http://URL=“http://www.dawn.com/2011/11/27/pakistan-retaliation-leaves-nato-drivers-in-limbo.html””)
Re: 25 Pak Soldiers killed by NATO shelling
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/nov/26/pakistan-secretly-helps-publicly-hits-us-interests/Pakistan secretly helps, publicly hits U.S. interests
**Pakistan has cooperated secretly with the U.S. on several war-fighting missions in an odd-couple alliance that also sees factions in Islamabad backing the fiercest American enemy.
**
The uneasy relationship is being put to the test again, as Pakistan accused NATO on Saturday of unleashing a helicopter strike on a Pakistan army border outpost and said 24 soldiers were killed.
**
U.S. military personnel who have served in the region tell The Washington Times that Pakistan does far more in secret than either side acknowledges. It wants money from Washington to keep flowing, yet fears a democratic Afghanistan could one day align itself with archenemyIndia, analysts say.
**
Pakistan’s dual objectives help create this odd alliance.**Last summer, as then-Joint Chiefs Chairman Mike Mullen was castigating Pakistan in public for aiding the al Qaeda-linked Haqqani Network, the CIA was launching Predator drone strikes from Pakistani air bases on suspected militants.
**The U.S. military has deemed Haqqani its greatest threat, ranking it above the Taliban and al Qaeda.
Pakistani security personnel stop trucks carrying supplies for NATO forces in neighboring Afghanistan at Takhtabeg check post in Pakistani tribal area of Khyber, Pakistan, on their way to Torkham border post on Saturday, Nov 26, 2011. Pakistan on Saturday accused NATO helicopters of firing on two army checkpoints in the northwest and killing 25 soldiers, then retaliated by closing a key border crossing used by the coalition to supply its troops in neighboring Afghanistan.
**In April, as the Obama administration was keeping Islamabad in the dark on the Osama bin Laden raid for fear of a leak, the U.S. Navy routinely flew aircraft from carriers over the country’s airspace, along designated “highways,” to hit targets in Afghanistan.
**
James Russell, an instructor at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif., said Pakistan needs U.S. cash to maintain a large army and to deter India.“The Pakistani military has a longstanding relationship with the United States,” he said. “We have been a principal provider of military equipment, training and money for many years.“Pakistan has needed our help to maintain its army, which defends the country from its principal adversary — India.
Like many of the countries in the region, the military is the most important, national-level institution that helps hold the country together.”
U.S. aid not only forces Pakistan to help in the war but also acts as an investment to protect the country from radical Islam, a development that would be worse for Washington than a balky Islamabad.“We fear that that country will fall apart without a strong military, creating another haven for Islamic extremist terrorists in a country that has nuclear weapons,” Mr. Russell said.
Pakistan has helped in other ways.**In 2009 and early 2010, as Pakistani intelligence officials were harassing U.S. embassy personnel, according to a State Department cable released by the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks, the government’s guards were convoying critical supplies for NATO troops.
It was from Pakistani soil and airspace that the U.S. launched the initial attack on Taliban-held Afghanistan in the fall of 2001, according to participants.****The cover story was that commandos struck from a carrier in the Arabian Sea. In fact, they staged in bases inside Pakistan, joining anti-Taliban Afghans — such as the future president, Hamid Karzai — then swooping across the border via helicopters.
**
**A former intelligence officer who served in Afghanistan said Pakistanhas allowed the U.S. to create CIA/Joint Special Operations Command safe houses inside the country to hunt down militants. The CIA/JSOC fusion has led to the capture and deaths of scores of al Qaeda militants, including bin Laden.
**
**“We based drones at several of their air bases that have resulted in a lot of al Qaeda deaths],” the former officer said. “They have allowed transit of equipment via rail and via air through Pakistan en route to Afghanistan.”
**
**This source said Pakistan views al Qaeda has a gang of Arab outsiders who threaten the regime, whereas the Haqqani Network has tribal ties to officials inside the armed forces and government.
**
“Basing rights and the establishment of logistics routes into Afghanistanhave been the two most important aspects of our partnership since 9/11,” said an Army Special Forces officer. “It could be argued that those things are the only reasons we pretend there is a partnership at all.”
**Intelligence sharing, however, remains spotty, since the CIA believes information passed to Islamabad on certain targets ends up as a tip-off to militants to change locations.
**
**“They have assisted in the apprehension of terrorists, but I believe they were very selective on if or when to help in such operations,” the Armyofficer said.
**
The Obama administration has embarked on a $7.5 billion economic aid program over five years to build schools, improve electricity and spur economic growth in Pakistan.
But the Government Accountability Office reported this year that only a small portion had been spent over fears that Pakistani government corruption was diverting the money.
In July, the New York Times reported the administration was withholding hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid in protest over Pakistan’s failure to launch promised counterterror operations and its refusal to allow new U.S trainers into the country.
The Congressional Research Service reports that Congress has appropriated more than $22 billion in economic and security-related aid to Pakistan since 2002.
**James Phillips, a Middle East analyst at the Heritage Foundation, said Pakistan aids militants such as the Haqqani Network because it fears a Pashtun-dominated Afghanistan will one day form an alliance with India.
**
**“To preclude such an alliance, the Pakistani military historically has encouraged Islamist radicals inside Afghanistan because it knows that they will be willing allies against India and will be less likely to foment a Pashtun nationalist rebellion inside Pakistan,” Mr. Phillips said.
**
He said Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), which helped bring the Taliban to power, is eyeing President Obama’s 2014 troop exit date from Afghanistan as a time to re-exert power across the border.
“The ISI, which controls Islamabad’s Afghanistan policy, works covertly with the Taliban, Haqqani Network and other insurgent groups to gain a hammerlock on Afghan politics after the U.S. withdraws,” Mr. Phillipssaid. “Regrettably, by emphasizing the exit timetable arbitrarily imposed on the U.S. troop surge, the Obama administration has encouraged ISI’s belief that Washington is only concerned with rushing for the exit and that it can continue its duplicitous policy with little consequence for the bilateral relationship.”