Re: Musharraf to West: 'We have our own brains'
Oh, I wanna know your thoughts about Waziristan
Personally, after a lot of thought, I am beginning to appreciate the view point espoused by many (including Imran Khan) that, quite unnecessarily (though probably unavoidably) Pakistan has taken a problem which was a US (western world problem) and made it our own. People in Waziristan, including the so-called "foreigners" and "jihadi" had nothing but appreciation and love for Pakistan. Post 9/11, under tremendous US pressure (and thus perhaps unavoidably), Pakistan government turned these same mujahideen into its our own biggest foe. Was it necessary? I don't know. It could be that the pressure applied by the US was just unbearable. May be there was a way for Pakistan to support US aggression against Al-Qaida (alleged masterminds of 9/11 attacks) and still balance its own territorial sovereignity and best interests. Unfortnately we didn't.
Government of Pakistan in a sudden about-face declared all of these groups as unwelcome and terrorists, and thus these groups had a new foe - Pakistan. For them it was easy to attack inside Paksitan (as they are right there) and our security apparatus is no where close to the same standard as most other Western countries. Thus, Pakistan is a very easy target.
Lets make no mistake. These groups always had a militaristic agenda of Islamic domination. We may disagree with their vision and their policies but clearly their target was not Pakistan (prior to 9/11). As a result of Pakistan government's change in policies post 9/11, now we are enemy.
So that is why in my mind its a chicken and egg scenario. Question is are these terrorists targetting Pakistan right now because of our government's about-face to mark them as enemy; or is our government targetting them because they are terrorists?
This is just historic what-could-have-been discussion, though.
Unfortunately there is no way to turn back the clock, and there are no easy answers. Situation is a mess, and I don't see anyone from either side with any solutions. Personally, in my view, while military action may be one part of a multi-pronged approach to solution, but it really can't be the only action we take. Its just goint to make it worse.
Pakistan never had suicide attacks. Never had them at such high scale (50+ in one year). Some thing has changed. And what a lot of people say is that the problem is Musharraf and his policies of blindly towing US line and making US enemies as our enemies. Could Musharraf have done something different? May be. Unfortunately,we'll never know.