generalspeaking

All These Possibilities

Pakistan is crumbling, falling into pieces, threatening to disintegrate. The country has a complex balance between ethnic lines, Sunni and Shiite, further distinguished by the divide between the growing Islamist strength and the determination of its secularist population. But the weakest link is the civilian government, controlled by its military and secret service; the executive branch exercises its discretionary decisions only to be confounded by the coercive denials of its military.

President Asif Ali Zardari - his wife on her ascent to the presidency assassinated by the confident and growing threat of the Islamists - speaks of his country as "fighting a battle for its own survival". Against what begins to resemble an inevitable trajectory of fundamentalists growing from strength to strength to triumph. The country's ambassador to the United States claims a massive cash infusion would defeat al-Qaeda and secure the country from its growing Islamism.

The impoverished and embattled nation has been the recipient of generous American largess to ensure complicity in a combined struggle against terrorism. Yet there has been nothing of substance occur to encourage and impress upon the U.S. that the country is serious about rescuing itself from the clutches of the Taliban, the tribal Islamists and the al-Qaeda influence on its borders - growing in audacity and violence thanks to government appeasement.

India's Institute for Conflict Management reveals the reality that over 50% of the country's territory "has passed outside the realm of civil governance and is currently dominated essentially through military force." Not a pleasant picture for India, already embattled by encroaching Islamist extremists. Islamist terrorists have grown increasingly sophisticated and bold in their use of suicide bombers, car bombs, explosives, targeted assassinations and commando raids.

They have stretched their rule well beyond the lawless tribal lands of the northwest. International Crisis Group based in Belgium has revealed that radical Sunnis in the heartland of the Punjab have collaborated with Pakistani Taliban insurgents from the tribal areas in a determined push to destabilize the country. Pakistan Army convoys and checkpoints are continually being attacked, along with police stations.

Government schools are relentlessly attacked, along with local government officials. Hotels, restaurants and Shiite mosques have been bombed. "We're now reaching the point where, within one to six months, we could see the collapse of the Pakistani state", an Australian guerrilla warfare specialist claims.

"Pakistan is 173 million people, 100 nuclear weapons, an army bigger than the U.S. Army and al-Qaeda headquarters sitting right there in the two thirds of the country the government does not control" he warned. "The Pakistani military and police and intelligence service don't follow the civilian government; they're essentially a rogue state within a state.

"The collapse of Pakistan, al-Qaeda acquiring nuclear weapons, an extremist takeover - [all these possibilities] would dwarf everything we've seen in the war on terror today."

Labels: Political Realities, Religion, Troublespots, World Crises

posted by Pieface @ Sunday, April 12, 2009