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Less than twenty-four hours after Pakistan closed the border crossing at Torkham in response to a NATO helicopter attack that killed three Pakistani soldiers, insurgents set fire to 27 NATO fuel tankers that were waiting to enter Afghanistan at this strategic crossing. Rather than striking a conciliatory tone to tamp down growing unrest by Pakistan in response to ongoing US abuse, however, the Obama administration has chosen instead to venture into even more provocative behavior, planting suggestions in Friday’s Washington Post that the US would not be upset if there were a military coup in Pakistan.
Reuters describes the strategic importance of the NATO supply route that crosses into Afghanistan at Torkham:
About three-quarters of all cargo for NATO forces in Afghanistan travels through Pakistan, most of it via two main border crossings: Chaman north of Quetta in Baluchistan and Torkham at the Khyber Pass.
Another third flows into Afghanistan through the northern distribution network across Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Sensitive gear like ammunition, weapons and critical equipment is flown in.
The video from etribune (I could only get this video to play by setting resolution to 240) shows the burning tankers and describes a somewhat chaotic situation in the surrounding area as police have instituted a lockdown to conduct a search for the insurgents who attacked the tankers, setting them on fire with rocket launchers.
Given the fragile condition of US-Pakistan relations at the current time, which now has Pakistan quoted in the Reuters article warning of a "total snapping of relations" if the helicopter incursions continue, it is truly stunning that the Obama administration would respond by suddenly making very thinly veiled calls for a military coup through statements planted in Friday’s Washington Post:
U.S. officials pointed to recent signs that Pakistan’s powerful army and opposition parties are positioning themselves to install a new civilian government to replace President Asif Ali Zardari and his prime minister in the coming months. In a meeting with them Monday, army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kiyani "conveyed the concerns of the people" in no uncertain terms, according to a senior Pakistani security official.
/snip/
U.S. officials indicated that the administration has begun to contemplate the effects of a change, engineered through Zardari’s resignation as head of his political party, the dissolution of the current coalition government, or a call for new elections under the Pakistani constitution, rather than any overt action by the military. Some suggested that a new, constitutionally-approved government that was more competent and popular, and had strong military backing, might be better positioned to support U.S. policies.
And just to make sure that the Pakistan military knows that this message is intended for them, we get this gem:
"The best outcome here is that the instability will be taken advantage of by the military in ways that aren’t bad, getting rid of lots of cronies" who currently fill government positions, the administration official said.
Appearing on Russia Today, Ahmed Quraishi tells us that Pakistanis have had enough of the one-sided relationship with the US. He also provides perspective on the problems generated by excluding Pashtuns from the political dialogue in Afghanistan and Pakistan:
The Washington Post article also has a startling revelation from NATO, which has now changed its story regarding the helicopter incursion that killed three Pakistani soldiers. It now appears that the attack was "pre-emptive":
A NATO spokesman in Afghanistan said the helicopters were launched after ground troops in Afghanistan’s Paktiya province determined that a cross-border mortar attack by insurgents was imminent. "Operating in self-defense, the aircraft entered into Pakistani airspace, killing several armed individuals," Lt. Col. John Dorrian said.
Why are the US and NATO taking actions and making statements that appear to be deliberately provocative? What purpose is served by damaging relations with Pakistan?
See Scarecrow for more thoughts from him and Rachel Maddow on other aspects of US hypocrisy in dealing with Pakistan.
70 Comments
There is no need for a military coup. Pakistan is and always has been a brutal military/ISI dictatorship. The Mumbai attacks and and the Indian Embassy bombing and many other well documented terrorist attacks were proven to have been ISI. The “strategy of depth” means permanent state sponsored Pakistan terrorism. That includes financing the 9-11 attacks.
Of course Pakistan terrorism has been assisted by our “intelligence community” and the money from US taxpayers. That is because Pakistan maintains “Al Qaeda” which is necessary to maintain Obama’s wars and the bankster’s war profits.
The military dictator of the United States Gen. Betrayus supports and defends Pakistan Terrorism. He wants to help these murderers with more US money. Betrayus is a mass murderer himself.
A military coup by the very people that support the Taliban. Genius!
At least O is consistent in name calling & contempt for all his supporters, whether at home or abroad.
Kinda makes you think that Iran is really working in secret for the U.S., as they are in the same contempt category.
The United States has so thoroughly fucked up the South Asian subcontinent that one would expect it to tread lightly there. And yet it blunders again and again, generating a crisis with actions meant to manage the last crisis it produced or helped to produce.
Some day future historians will debate answers to this question:
Who was the biggest fuck up? Great Britain or the United States.
I’m starting to see a pattern here– the Vietnamese didn’t want our “help”, the Iraqis didn’t want our “help”, and now the Pakistanis don’t want us to “help” them. It’s starting to look like the rest of the world doesn’t understand that we Americans are just trying to “help” them.
On edit: I almost forgot about Latin America! We’ve been “helping” them for so long, and they don’t appreciate it either!
Well, I was thinking of the same thing myself. But I’m not sure how the Pak domestic forces line up. I think Frank33′s clumping the Pak military & ISI into the same basket is naive. I believe there are many tensions in Pak, not only between the ‘civilians’ and the military, but between the military & ISI & within each org, just like in every other country.
Having said that, the U.S. could not possibly know enough to execute a coup in Pak that would put actual supporters of O in place.
I think the jury’s in on that. The U.S. hasn’t just f’d up SE Asia, but has committed destabilizing operations all over the globe.
After the ’53 Iraq coup you would think we would learn something.
Has that cost anything since then?
This ability to govern without looking back must be a requirement for president, otherwise you would think they would know some history.
Boy that congressional Pakistan Declaration of War sure is a page turner isn’t it? /s
That they would even try is profoundly stupid, isn’t it?
Of course, just about as stupid as every other foreign policy of the U.S.
It’s known how the civilian forces line up in the frontier provinces. All the other tensions in the country suggest that in the not too distant future Pakistan will be on the brink of civil war and the prospect of another failed state looms large.
Every time someone mentions that, I feel obliged to make sure that everyone is aware of Kermit Roosevelt’s (the perp) memoir about it. He regarded it as a wonderful romp in the park, even though the book was published around the time of Khomeini’s takeover. I see, however, that the book has now become unaffordable. I borrowed the audio version from the library years ago, so perhaps that is the place to go.
Anyone care to comment about the perspective of Russia and China on all of this?
Agree. Some would already judge Pak to be a failed state, perhaps one with a F+, becuz it manages to carry on in many ways despite its dysfunctional govt & many other institutions. So you are right, it could get a lot worse. Which it’s why it’s so impt for the U.S. to keep provoking it. /s
At some point in time the “world” will come to the realization that the greatest threat to world peace and stability is the United States itself. Collective slap on the forehead.
It’s truly incredible that the United States government would even breathe a sigh about a possible coup d’etat. The ‘hint’ had to come from some frustrated general in the military or air force. It is inconceivable that the State Department would float it. The simple fact of the matter is that American leverage over Pakistan is extremely limited. The consequence of a successful military coup would make the United States even more dependent on Pakistan, because once it was carried out, the US would have no place to go, and would be hostage to the will of the new government. The only leverage the US is its foreign aid. The problem is that if America withdraws that aid, it loses what little support it has with the ordinary man in the street.
This is very close to checkmate for the whole operation in Afghanistan.
When I try to figure out things like that, my head begins to hurt right away. Once more than 2 countries are considered, it gets waay to complicated for me.
My naive take is imagining Putin, Medvedev, & Hu Jintao crossing their arms & grinning about the morass the U.S. is getting itself into. However, I know that’s wrong becuz who would want that morass in its own neighborhood, esp China, a purported Pak ally.
OT and I know I should have gotten used to it by now since Bushco…but its so damn depressing when we have to sift and read the statements of the administration like tea leaves as though we were Kremlinologists reading Pravda and Izvestia in the 70′s…Fuck Obama and the DLC for that as well.
They don’t call the U.S. the ‘essential’ country for nothing.
I think they didn’t get that memo inside the Beltway.
Checkmate in Afghanistan. Isn’t that the name of an old classic movie?
No, these are administration officials making the suggestion, not the military. The WaPo article distinguishes between administration anonymous statements and military anonymous statements in the article.
Go back further……
“I’m starting to see a pattern here” How observant! I wonder if the US, GB and BP had not overthrown the elected government of Iran, in 1953, protecting western oil interests, Iran might not be “paranoid,” today? But then again if you where overthrown by a foreign government at the behest of a corporation, you might be justifiably angry. Maybe like some of the American citizens who suffer the consequences of a foreign corporation’s negligence, who we seem to have difficulty investigating for some strange reason? The pattern is as glaring as a “puss infected zit on a teenagers nose!” Lets “War” into another country? Too Life, not servitude!
Glad you mentioned the cost…why is it so pricey?
The Beltway is protected by an impenetrable force field that prevents any alternative reality from passing through. The energy that powers the force field is the burning of money.
It’s complicated, but one thing is certain. A country that slaughters its own citizens like BushCo did on 9/11 is receiving no sympathy from anyone for the dilemna it’s in.
The ripples to a coup wouldn’t just be inside Pakistan.
While India does not like the (hypothetical) idea of an increasingly powerful Pakistan, they would not be terribly happy with greater instability next door to them either. It likely would encourage the Indians to beef up their own military presence on the border, and thus encouraging more militarism in response from the Pakistani side, which would possibly lead to . . .
Not good.
To the west of Pakistan, the wingnutty folks in Iran would look at this and go absolutely batsh*t crazy. “We know all about US-sponsored coups, and it’s obvious they haven’t given up trying!” That message would resonate well with all the wrong people in the Middle East.
Very, very not good.
While US government folks at State, DOD, and elsewhere may be seeing signs of this in their research/intelligence gathering, to talk about it publicly like this is a very bad idea. Encouraging a coup may have short term benefits, but the long term cost is brutal.
Destabilizing a country with nuclear weapons…. good idea! Heckuva job Obama.
Short term benefits are the American way. Must be the result of the 24 hr. news cycle.
He’s a “keeper” isn’t he?
Words fail me at this point. So depressing, isn’t it? One giant clusterf*ck with no end in sight. Guess someone’s making lotsa $$$ out of this. Damn the “small people”… full speed ahead!
“While US government folks at State, DOD, and elsewhere may be seeing signs of this in their research/intelligence gathering, to talk about it publicly like this is a very bad idea. Encouraging a coup may have short term benefits, but the long term cost is brutal.”
Great point…….. this is exactly how we got Iran today!!! Want more Iran(s)? Just trample the sovereignty of a nation and its people. Like BP in the Gulf?
I think Russia and China will let us drown in our own stupidity.
There are thousands of government spokesliars paid for by taxpayers. There is a whole gaggle of generously paid Dee Cee “journalist” pretenders who likewise conceal, rather than reveal the best information available. With all this full spectrum dominace of information there surprisingly or maybe not surprising, are very few “official” spokes people who actually tell us anything true. This web of lies is necessary to maintain the phony war on terrorism.
Our “officials” tend to say things to these dictators that is not reported here also, such as the money and weapons given to Pakistan. Who knew that the problem with Pakistan was getting the trust of their dictators? Admiral Mullen has tried to get their trust with 18 trips to Pakistan.
Only if by “keeper” you mean only as long as is absolutely necessary. If he doesn’t get a challenge from the left, I’m writing my own name in.
He’s channeling Dick Nixon who ordered massing bombing raids on North Vietnam just before election time to get a more favorable outcome.
Toward the advantage of corporatist empire, war, failed states, destabilization and fear are good things. This kind of empire seems to need a high degree of initial crisis, chaos, violence, terror and poverty in order to achieve its goals. Either that or the folks who are calling the shots are terribly incompetent: almost every move seems to produce results contrary to their stated aims. Or maybe it’s that once violent adventures like AfPak/Iraq/GWOT get started, they almost immediately get out of hand, generating a momentum of their own on a downward spiral. I find it difficult to come to any other conclusions. Perhaps I don’t have my mind right.
Wonder if they’re munching on the same kind of popcorn.
If one reads PNAC’s Rebuilding America’s Defenses one will find it spells out American current foreign policy quite well.
You might remember that William Kristol repeatedly chided the Shrub administration for not carrying it out fast enough.
This a response to:
karnak12 September 30th, 2010 at 11:03 am
78
In response to JamesJoyce @ 39 (show text)
“I hadn’t heard about Canadian soldiers killed in a botched bombing. Do you have a link for that?”
Yes I do!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarnak_Farm_incident
http://icasualties.org/OEF/Fatalities.aspx
4-18-2002 Canada Leger, Marc D. Sergeant 29 Hostile – friendly fire – bomb Kandahar Kandahar Ontario Lancaster, Ottawa 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry Battle Group
4-18-2002 Canada Dyer, Ainsworth Corporal 24 Hostile – friendly fire – bomb Kandahar Kandahar (near) Quebec Montreal 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry Battle Group
4-18-2002 Canada Smith, Nathan Private 26 Hostile – friendly fire – bomb Kandahar Kandahar (near) Nova Scotia Tatamagouche 3rd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry Battle Group
4-18-2002 Canada Green, Richard A. Private
I remember. R.I.P.
Ah yes, the US has such a great track record in the countries where there’s been encouragement for a coup
The title is misleading. “Suggests” does not mean “advocates” in this case. The key graph:
If there are advocates for a coup in this case, it is from Congressional hawks and the military officers who are lobbying them. I saw concern and a little confusion in the “administration official” response.
It doesn’t take encouragement from the US for factions of the Pakistani military to seek to overthrow Zadari, who was sort of thrust upon the military by elections after the murder of Benazir Bhutto.
As I read the article, the “senior administration officials” are acknowledging that there is political instability, that the US is aware of it, and that the US has not figured out yet what to do.
What was apparent from the article is that the US has no way to operationally coordinate with the Pakistani military even to know the coordinates of their border guards. And certainly no ability to directly communicate with Pakistani officers. And I wouldn’t be surprised if even with all of the great GPS technology the US does not know to sufficient accuracy the location of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. Which is likely loosely defined to begin with, given that relatives in the area have been crossing from one side to the other for generations.
Yes, for supposedly being a liberal Democratic administration, the WH appears to be following this Neocon blueprint pretty well.
A coup is definitely in the works. Former president Musharraf is forming a new political party – and the ex-general is no reformer. He’s coming back to jab the hornet’s nest with a stick…things will get very bad.
This is disgutsting and repulsive. But not a surprise from this corrupt crew in the White House.
Do they also support a military coup in the U.S.?
I remember when the term neocon was getting a lot of negative press Bill Kristol was asked about that and his response was they, the neocons, would just start referring to themselves as neoliberals because there was really no appreciable difference.
Spelling.
Supply & demand. *g*
Guessing its out of print and none of the used booksellers have any cheap copies.
Thank you, Jim, for keeping on top of the profoundly stupid.
Bluetoe2 @ 25 — the nuts in the nutshell — precisely.
DW
Apparent “packaging” …
DW
If one wanted to stage a false flag involving a nuke, attacking and destabilizing a muslim country with nukes would make for a very credible backdrop.
We learned that we could get a compliant government in Tehran for a generation and fodder for the MIC afterward, both beneficial for corporations and the empire . . . ?
Putting the ‘F’ Back In Freedom !
thanks Jim
I guess that you and I will have to disagree about the meaning of this from one of the anonymous cowards in the White House:
If that isn’t asking the military to step in, I don’t know what is.
A Blackwater (Xe)coup?
Yes, indeed!
Rogue elements of police are attempting to overthrow the democratically elected social democracy government in Ecuador. The Ecuadorian government is embroiled in litigation against Chevron for a catastrophic oil spill in Ecuador’s amazonian wilderness and it has aligned itself with the two prominent left wing leaders in South America, Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and Evo Morales in Bolivia. Although I haven’t read anything that suggests CIA involvement in instigating and financing the attempted coup, I’d be surprised to discover that it isn’t involved.
And then there’s the U.S. support for a ruthless crackdown by the military in Honduras against dissenters.
Yet again, the United States is up to its old tricks interfering with and destabilizing social democracies in Central and South America. With over 30,000 dead and the Mexican government barely holding its own in a deadly war against the drug cartels, initiated at the insistence of the U.S. government and drones already patrolling the U.S. Mexican border, I cannot help but wonder how soon we’re going to read about over-the-border raids by U.S. troops into Mexico just like what is about to happen in Pakistan.
U.S. foreign and military policy is sheer madness.
Good stuff, Jim! As always, thanks for being on it.
I just linked to it at Hullaballoo, where something like this piece showing us just how far around the BushCo bend Barack Obama has gone would not see the light of day, even if someone were holding Digby hostage, to try to force her to post a thread on it.
I put it up right in the middle of another one of her herring-drags about the evils of the tea partiers. I expect to hear from the loyalists about my perniciously “going off topic”, any moment.
Rebuilding America’s Defenses
“Does the United States have the resolve to shape a
new century favorable to American principles and interests?”
http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/45445/robert-w-tucker-and-david-c-hendrickson/thomas-jefferson-and-american-foreign-policy
“For Jefferson, as for subsequent American statesmen, the desire to change the world was at war with the desire not to be corrupted by the world… The combination of universalism and parochialism is the result of a self-consciousness over role that forms a constant in the nation’s history”. Yet “the conventional contrast of the roles of exemplar and crusader has often obscured the affinity that may always exist between them”, as between thought and action.”
Look, we set a great example as we crusade to shape a new century favorable to American interests and principles. Questions are 1) Who really determines those interests and principles? 2)Do other nations and people want those same “mutual interests,” and principles? 3)Which “interests” do you give the keys to, to drive the Tank?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACoMcO8pHYE&feature=related
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/neilyoung/cortezthekiller.html
“I still can’t remember when, Or how I lost my way.” I think we have lost our way and minds………
Reply to: ottogrendel@43
“Yes, for supposedly being a liberal Democratic administration, the WH appears to be following this Neocon blueprint pretty well.”
No wonder why we have to just keep looking, forward :) >>>>>>>>>>>>>, and never , backwards<<<<<<<<<<<<<<< :) ! In that case, lets keep on keeping on into Laos and Cambodia. Correction, Pakistan! War with Pakistan. In Iran they called it SAVAK. In Pakistan they will call it PAVAK!!!
Good job of reading those tea leaves, Jim. You could have been a Kremlinolgist in another lifetime. (What did Izvestia say on page 5?)
Meanwhile, it’s time to change the actors and put in a new crop of paid assets. Only maybe the Pakistani people (themselves hugely split between different nationalities, ethnic groups, urban/rural, British-Raj urbane and Islamic warlord-led (and much in-between) — Pakistan is after all only an acronym (“P for the Punjabis, A for the Afghans, K for the Kashmiris, S for Sind, and the “tan,” they say, for Baluchistan”) — don’t like playing this game over and over. Whether they can do anything about that is another question, as their own leaderships are highly corrupt, and the left has (big surprise) been persecuted by the U.S. supported various coups and faux-democratic governments.
Americans, for their part, are impervious to events, finding it near impossible to learn any lessons. If you tell them it’s about “democracy” you can pick their pockets clean, or bomb a country, or overthrow a foreign leader. No need to look at those messy death squads and torture chambers, or the scattering of cluster bomblets made in the U.S. of A. Americans are superior to everyone in their own minds. And the higher up on the political chain you go, the more their belief in that superiority. Such dreams of hubris always end badly.
Memo from Obama to Pakistan’s military:
“Will another Squadron of F-16′s and $5 billion in other war toys be enough to trigger the coup? I mean, we’re spread kind of thin, just now. If you want to counter and raise the rent-a-coup price, it’ll have to go on the cuff, if that’s OK.”
The text there is a bit convoluted, but that seems to identify the official better and give what was closer to the full statement.
And this is separate, identified not as “administration officials” but “U.S. officials”, most likely career military, State, intelligence — who knows.
So their hope is that Zadari resigns, the military kicks out cronies who have been sidelining US aid, the military provides stability, and there is a new popular election that clears the political air. It is the reporter who uses the word “engineers”. This is a contingency scenario of the best case, not a plan. What is likely to happen in fact will be beyond the control of the US and liable to be messier. The Pakistani military has enough factions to create its own instability without US help.
If it turns out that the US, with Obama’s knowledge and approval, did indeed engineer something as stupid as the removal of Ngo Dinh Diem, I will apologize to you. For now, I’m quite willing to agree to disagree.
And look who suddenly pops up again in the news. What a coincidence! From Reuters:
I was wondering if or when Musharraf would show up.
Does that mean he will stand for election? And who exactly is the base of his political party?
And just how close is he to the Clintons? He seems to have taken over shortly after the attack on the US embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam.
pretending to believe the official 9/11 story ~
Good Germans of 1945 did not know anything
Yes, only a question of time and the “right” incentive …
DW
So much for wanting to be bipartisan or for trying to be cool, calm and collected!
“Good Germans of 1945 did not know anything”
After the Nuremberg War Crimes Trial the world knew.
“Events at Gleiwitz”
Much of what is known about the Gleiwitz incident comes from the sworn affidavit of Alfred Naujocks at the Nuremberg Trials. In his testimony, he states that he organized the incident under orders from Reinhard Heydrich and Heinrich Müller, the chief of the Gestapo.[1]
On the night of 31 August 1939, a small group of German operatives, dressed in Polish uniforms and led by Naujocks[2] seized the Gleiwitz station and broadcast a short anti-German message in Polish (sources vary on the content of the message). The Germans’ goal was to make the attack and the broadcast look like the work of anti-German Polish saboteurs.[2][3]
To make the attack seem more convincing, the Germans brought in Franciszek Honiok, a German Silesian known for sympathizing with the Poles, who had been arrested the previous day by the Gestapo. Honiok was dressed to look like a saboteur; then killed by lethal injection, given gunshot wounds, and left dead at the scene, so that he appeared to have been killed while attacking the station. His corpse was subsequently presented as proof of the attack to the police and press.[4]
In addition to Honiok, several other convicts from the Dachau concentration camp[2] were kept available for this purpose.[3] The Germans referred to them by the code phrase “Konserve” (“canned goods”). For this reason, some sources incorrectly refer to the incident as “Operation Canned Goods.”[5]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gleiwitz_incident
Based on this fabricated attack on the Homeland, Nazi Germany invade Poland!
“The day after the Gleiwitz incident, German forces invaded Poland from the north, south, and west. As the Germans advanced, Polish forces withdrew from their forward bases of operation close to the Polish-German border to more established lines of defence to the east. After the mid-September Polish defeat in the Battle of the Bzura, the Germans gained an undisputed advantage.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Poland
History! But lets keep on looking forward!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This is real CIA crap. They love this shit.
If I didn’t know better, I’d say the US is begging to be attacked.
Funny how Osama’s been taken out of his box this week.
Everything they say is a lie meant to scare us and spread chaos for endless wars.
Hate to disagree, but the article didn’t say military coup, and Ashraf Kayani has already said he wasn’t interested in one. The article said the U.S.’s best outcome would be military installation of new civilian rulers. Kayani had called for a civilian purge, not a military purge of civilians, either. The problem is there are no civilians poised to purge anyone except some same old same olds who will be just as rotten within a month or two. Real new blood will only come with elections, everybody knows it, and the system favors oligarchs. It’s kind of well known in Pakistan that Kayani doesn’t want the job. Musharraf is trying to launch a political party from London, demanding a military coup. That’s as close as a military coup has of succeeding right now, and people want his ass in a court room with a judge pronouncing a hanging verdict.