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State Dept Pakistan Chief: Ask Me Later About Bhutto
There's no statement as yet on Bhutto's assassination from Richard Boucher. That's notable, considering Boucher is the assistant secretary of state for South Asia. A spokeswoman for Boucher referred me to the general State press office before saying that she was telling reporters to watch for a statement from President Bush.
As the assassination of Benazir Bhutto throws U.S.-Pakistani relations into turmoil, it's worth pointing out how the staffing of the U.S.'s Pakistan team indicates that Pakistan isn't exactly a priority for the Bush administration. Boucher is a career foreign service officer, but he has no prior South Asia experience, and his highest-profile portfolios were his two turns as departmental spokesman. The current U.S. ambassador, Anne W. Patterson, used to run State's anti-narcotics efforts -- a none-too-subtle signal that combatting Afghan heroin exportation gets more attention from the administration than figuring out what to do with a nuclear-armed dictatorship that's home to Osama bin Laden and a rising tide of Islamic extremism. Patterson, too, doesn't have experience in the region. The previous, well-regarded ambassador to Pakistan? He's a little busy right now somewhere else.
Matthew Yglesias recently noted how we've got the C-Listers on Pakistan, and suggested Dick Cheney was exploiting the dearth of expertise to control our Pakistan policies. All of which, it should be noted in fairness, are looking super-awesome right now.
Comments (6)
acuppajo wrote on December 27, 2007 12:30 PM:New Delhi news service is providing very good CNN like live feed coverage at ndtv.com.
One interesting tidbit that keeps coming up on their ticker is that two men with AK-47's fired on Bhutto's car.
theswan wrote on December 27, 2007 12:36 PM:Sound to me like the administration is plumb out out of personel. The delay in making a statement about this news brings back memories of Katrina (that other troublesome woman). What do we do now? Someone call brownie.
I'm Muldoon, HE'S Toody wrote on December 27, 2007 1:20 PM:'Tis The Season...
The Bush Family: The Gift That Keeps On Giving.
Buddy Lee wrote on December 27, 2007 11:50 PM:Once again, competence -- or the lack thereof -- puts us at risk, while the punditocracy parses the words of the presidential candidates and the Bush administration languishes in incoherent foreign policy. Here's what David Ignatius reported in WaPo last July 21:
"So again, what should the United States do? The lesson of Sept. 11 is that it's necessary to act decisively. But the lesson of Iraq is that unwise actions can make the terrorism problem worse. Which course is right?"
moondancer wrote on December 28, 2007 10:11 AM:"The best answer I've heard comes from Henry Crumpton, a former CIA officer who was one of the heroes of the agency's campaign to destroy al-Qaeda's haven in Afghanistan in late 2001. After retiring from the CIA in 2005, he served as the State Department's coordinator for counterterrorism. He resigned from State in February and is now a fellow at the EastWest Institute and a private consultant."
"Crumpton argues that the United States must take preventive action but that it should do so carefully, through proxies wherever possible. The right model for a Waziristan campaign is the CIA-led operation in Afghanistan, not the U.S. military invasion of Iraq. Teams of CIA officers and Special Forces soldiers are best suited to work with tribal leaders, providing them weapons and money to fight an al-Qaeda network that has implanted itself brutally in Waziristan through the assassination of more than 100 tribal leaders during the past six years. It would be better to conduct such operations jointly with Pakistan, but if the government of Gen. Pervez Musharraf can't or won't cooperate, the United States should be prepared to go it alone, Crumpton argues."
"'The United States has an obligation to defend itself and its citizens,' says Crumpton. 'We either do it now, or we do it after the next attack.'"
Crumpton proposed a detailed plan last year for rolling up these sanctuaries, which he called the Regional Strategic Initiative. It would combine economic assistance and paramilitary operations in a broad counterinsurgency campaign. In Waziristan, U.S. and Pakistani operatives would give tribal warlords guns and money, to be sure, but they would coordinate this covert action with economic aid to help tribal leaders operate their local stone quarries more efficiently, say, or install windmills and solar panels to generate electricity for their remote mountain villages.
Intervening in another Muslim country is risky, to put it mildly. That's why a successful counterinsurgency program would need Pakistani support and why its economic and social development components would be critical. The concept should be President John F. Kennedy's 'Alliance for Progress' to counter radicalism in Latin America, rather than 'Operation Iraqi Freedom.'
The United States can begin to take action now against al-Qaeda's new haven. Or we can wait, and hope that we don't get hit again. The biggest danger in waiting is that if retaliation proves necessary later, it could be ill-planned and heavy-handed -- precisely what got us in trouble in Iraq.
Looks like bushco is at a historic crossroads. Unfortunately, its bushco. Instead of have flexible, muscular options bushco is looking like a tyro surfing a tsunami. Look for him to circle the wagons in some fort in the middle of nowhere Iraq, while Pakistan, Afghanistan,and others catch fire.
Jake wrote on December 28, 2007 12:23 PM:I'm not sure Pakistan is going to wait for a new administration to bail it out of the pending conflagration.
Where is L. Paul Bremer when you need him? He of the brown nosing Washington mandarin clan - what goes in Washington is all that matters.