The Pakistan Situation

Adam Blickstein looks at some confusing reports about the state of play in Pakistan. Reports, one assumes, are bound to be somewhat confusing as the new government is trying to jell and people are, presumably, at least somewhat inclined to lie to both the U.S. government and the Pakistani people about the extent of their cooperation with our government.

The very complexity of the situation is a reminder that when we talk about Iraq taking resources away from the Afghanistan-Pakistan situation, we're not just talking about X number of planes and Y number of soldiers. We're also talking about scarce resources like attention and expertise. It's a complicated, delicate, multi-faceted situation -- do we have our best diplomats working on it? Are agency heads and cabinet secretaries in DC spending enough time staying on top of events? Is the President paying attention? These aren't just questions for the Bush administration, they'll be questions for a Democratic administration as well. Reducing force levels in Iraq down to a "residual" point will solve some of the resource problems relating to inattention to Central Asia but not all of them by any means.

Comments

[Insert reference to Obama wanting to invade Pakistan]

Posted by Acme Troll-o-Matic | April 21, 2008 3:46 PM

We're also talking about scarce resources like attention and expertise.

Well they have certainly been scarce resources in THIS administration. Add intelligence, objectivity, and competency while you're at it.

Posted by LFC | April 21, 2008 4:16 PM

The question here: is Matt talking about "attention" in the sense of developing a rational foreign policy vis-a-vis Pakistan which takes into account a rational policy about terrorism - or is he just babbling again about some need to "deal with Al Qaeda in Pakistan" a la Obama?

The problem with virtually all discourse on Pakistan is the America-centric notion that "we have to do something about Pakistan". I haven't seen Matt say anything about Pakistan that doesn't fall into this error.

It's not clear that's the case at all if you start thinking about rational approaches to dealing with terrorism.

Posted by Richard Steven Hack | April 21, 2008 5:17 PM

We're also talking about scarce resources like attention and expertise.

It's possible that the diversion of inattention, stupidity, and incompetence to Iraq has actually helped the cause in Afghanistan.

Posted by John Emerson | April 21, 2008 7:07 PM

"It's a complicated, delicate, multi-faceted situation" Do you want the current President to pay attention ? I say he can contribute the most to the US and the world bicycling around Crawford.

Give the man a break, a vacation, some time off. We need it.

Posted by Robert Waldmann | April 21, 2008 7:42 PM

"It's a complicated, delicate, multi-faceted situation" Do you want the current President to pay attention ? I say he can contribute the most to the US and the world bicycling around Crawford.

Give the man a break, a vacation, some time off. We need it.

Posted by Robert Waldmann | April 21, 2008 7:55 PM

There are a lot of pretty backgrounds in that picture.

Posted by Neil the Ethical Werewolf | April 21, 2008 10:13 PM

Barack Obama is hot!

Posted by Paris Hilton | April 22, 2008 12:40 AM

The pakistan situation is about one thing only: pakistan's ONLY enemy: India. And it's ONLY reason to support, finance, train and deploy Jihad terror: asymmetric terrorism against India, which has killed more civilians in the past 30 years than all other world hotspots combined.

Any "analysis" of the pakistan situation without mention the entire reason for Pakistan existence and identity (warfare against India in Kashmir) is moot....

Posted by fooo | April 22, 2008 2:23 AM

The argument that all our diplomacy, as well as military is "distracted" away from Pakistan, therefore we must disengage to fixate on one nation is fallacious.
America has dropped the ball in ignoring regions we should have long before Iraq - Latin America, Asia, Africa ignored to "focus" on Cold War diplomacy or the ME intransigents.
The solution is to put the blame on Presidents, Congress, and State department - as well as the media which if anything has greater blame than the government in being unwilling or unable to focus on more than one "problem" at a time.

Clearly we need better systems so media and Congress do not force diplomats and Presidents to spend 50% of their diplomatic effort in the 80s and 90s baby-sitting intransigent Jewish zionists and the even more fucked up Palestinian "leaders" to "Peace efforts". Or the 2000s dominated by misfocus on globalization and wrecking the US economy in consequence, a small pack of Muslim terrorist bastards backed by hundreds of millions of radical Islamic shitheads, and the shitheads of Iraq to the detriment of other matters.
We have to learn, as FDR and Nixon demonstrated well - that it is possible to address a range of foreign and domestic issues - to walk and chew gum at the same time.
Arguing that we must abandon Iraq to focus on Pakistan because we can only have America put it's attention on only one country out of 181 at a time badly misses the point. We have to revamp our system so we can multitask domestic and international matters and demand media end their own one country-only fixation. We have to end special interest groups dominating America's foreign affairs priorities.

We need a larger State Dept, we need heavy recruitment of refugees, even making service to America if asked a price for allowing any in in the 1st place, to add to critical cultural and liguistic capacity the US needs in upgrading its ability to understand and handle foreign affairs and overseas military missions.
We need to get more money for State, but reshape that supremely Elitist American place so it is more like the Brits Colonial and Foreign Affairs organization where snooty preppies and academics were only a small part of the organization which relied far more on ambitious up from the lower UK classes type of people to do the nuts and bolts work and shape and work for their country as "experts" on each country. Those lower and middle class Brits were the true backbone - that knew the ins and outs of cultural, economic, military matters without the American preference that only those with advanced degrees and all too few of them - get the good jobs at State.

We sort of "flipped" the British way - where only those in the "right schools" with toney degrees or connections could do well at home while overseas service to the subjects of the British Empire was more open in opportunity, with an American system where ambituous people can succeed domestically but work overseas only rewards the "right placed, right-degreed" Elites...who then complain their exclusivity leaves them understaffed and unable to understand or do much in foreign countries except for maybe one at a time...

Posted by Chris Ford | April 22, 2008 3:02 AM