U.S. Commanders Seeking to Widen Pakistan Attacks

U.S. Commanders Seeking to Widen Pakistan Attacks

www.nytimes.com

American commanders in Afghanistan have in recent months urged a widening of the war that could include American attacks on indigenous Pakistani militants in the tribal areas inside Pakistan, according to United States officials.

The requests have been rebuffed for now, the officials said, after deliberations in Washington among senior Bush administration officials who fear that attacking Pakistani radicals may anger Pakistan’s new government, which is negotiating with the militants, and destabilize an already fragile security situation.

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Do they pussyfoot around Pakistan because there's no OIL or POPPIES?
Guarding the poppy fields in Afghanistan must be a real pain in the butt if
Pakistan is harboring all of the terrorists.

American intelligence officials say that the threat emanating from Pakistan’s tribal areas is growing, and that Pakistani networks there have taken on an increasingly important role as an ally of Al Qaeda in plotting attacks against American and other allied troops in Afghanistan, and in helping foreign operatives plan attacks on targets in the West.

So if the threat is growing, and...

Military and intelligence officials say Al Qaeda and its affiliates now have a haven to plan attacks, just as they used camps in Afghanistan before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Gen. Michael V. Hayden, the C.I.A. director, said last month that the security situation along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border “presents clear and present danger to Afghanistan, to Pakistan and to the West in general, and to the United States in particular.”

Does that mean Pakistan is the next Afghanistan?
And will they wait to take action before or after the next 9-11?

www.nytimes.com
(visit the link for the full news article)