A recent US raid into Pakistan from Afghanistan using Special Forces
on the ground is apparently part of the Bush administration's new "get
tough" policy on the Taliban and al-Qaeda sanctuary in the tribal areas
of Pakistan. For many years, Osama bin Laden and the al-Qaeda leadership
have been thought by US intelligence to be hiding in these wild and
remote areas.
Well, at last, the administration, in its waning days, has directed its
policy toward the right country. After 9/11 and bin Laden's escape from
Afghanistan into Pakistan, the administration became sidetracked with
nation-building projects in Afghanistan and then Iraq. These
counterproductive episodes of military social work have increased the
number of terrorism incidents worldwide and diverted administration
attention, intelligence assets, and Special Forces units from the main
goal of capturing or killing bin Laden and the other al-Qaeda leaders.
Notice the absence of the word "Taliban" from the last sentence. Even
Barack Obama and the Democrats declare that "we cannot lose
Afghanistan." The main reason for the stepped up US incursions on the
ground, and the concomitant increase in strikes by Predator Unmanned
Aerial Vehicles into Pakistan, is to hit the Taliban's safe havens to
impede the group's cross-border attacks on Afghanistan. Yet the United
States has to worry about the Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan and
Pakistan only because its non-Muslim occupation of a Muslim land is
causing it. The US government and the American public have lost sight of
the fact that the Taliban did not attack the United States on 9/11, bin
Laden and al-Qaeda did.
A more aggressive policy by the US in Pakistan, when combined with the
continued occupation of Afghanistan, is likely to make the Taliban even
more wildly popular in both places. Rising Islamic radicalism in
Pakistan is very dangerous, because the country possesses nuclear
weapons. The US originally helped create al-Qaeda; let's not create any
more threats.
To deflate the Taliban ascendancy in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the vast
majority of US and allied forces should be withdrawn from Afghanistan,
leaving only a small contingent of clandestine Special Forces and
Predators to take advantage of any window of opportunity, should bin
Laden or any other leadership targets be located. However, most of the
US effort should be reoriented to the same policy that has reduced
violence in Iraq: paying off your enemies not to fight you.
Removing the non-Muslim occupation from Muslim soil would likely take
the fire out of the Taliban resurgence in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and
the United States could simply pay any Taliban remnants not to fight.
Even more important, keeping its "eyes on the prize," the US should
offer whatever the Taliban in Pakistan wants to turn over bin Laden and
the al-Qaeda leadership. In that part of the world, allegiances often
shift with the flow of cash. In late 2001 after 9/11, when bin Laden was
on the run from US forces, he apparently paid Afghans to let him escape.
So why can't the US just pay whatever it takes to bring him in? Tell the
Taliban to name their price. Some say that no matter how high the
reward, the Taliban is too dedicated in its radical Islamic beliefs to
turn over bin Laden, but the group regularly violates its principles to
profitably consort with Afghanistan's drug lords.
But the amount will no doubt be much more than the measly $50 million
sum the US government currently has on bin Laden's head. Such a sum
seems like a lot, but is chump change for countries and political
movements, such as the Taliban.
I guess it would be too much to expect the Bush administration – which
has incompetently distracted itself with every other task in the "War on
Terror" except what should have been its main objective: capturing or
killing the perpetrator of one of the most heinous acts of terror in
human history – to get it right at this late date. But because a new
administration is just around the corner, hope springs eternal.
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