LAGORE: The Friday killing of 18 Pakistanis in a cross border missile strike fired inside the Waziristan region of Pakistan by Afghanistan-based US Predator, the first one after President Barrack Obama assumed his office, clearly indicates that the military option remains key to Obama’s strategy to deal with the ongoing insurgency in Pakistan and Afghanistan.
The latest strike seriously dents hopes of the Pakistan government that the new Obama administration will be prioritising a sudden slump in the cross border attacks that had killed 355 people and injured 248 others in 32 incidents of the missile strikes, predator and ground attacks carried out by the American forces inside Pakistan in 12 months of 2008, averaging 35 killings per month. During his presidential campaign, Obama repeatedly warned that his administration would take out ‘high-value terrorist targets’ if Pakistan did not act first. Presumably, although he did not make this clear, the area Obama had in mind was Federally Administred Tribal Areas (FATA) of Pakistan; however, he did emphasise the strikes would be against high-value, important or key figures of Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Three days into Obama’s presidency, Pakistan saw on Friday the first evidence of how his promise will translate into action.
How does the military facet of Obama’s policy towards Pakistan fit in with the diplomatic facet, which Obama has entrusted to the high-profile Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and the special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan Richard Holbrooke? Well informed diplomatic sources in Islamabad say Obama, soon after assuming the presidency, chaired the first meeting of National Security Council on Afghanistan and Pakistan and endorsed a decision to continue drone strikes inside the Pakistani territory. The decision made it obvious that Obama would like to continue the policies of his predecessor Bush for combating Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
According to diplomatic sources, an early assessment suggests the following: military action will continue in the Pakistan tribal areas while the US waits to see if Pakistan does more; aid to the Pakistan army will gradually be tied to concrete results against militants; development aid and other financial contributions will initially be stepped up, with further increases dangled as a ‘reward’ for genuine gains against militants; and behind-the-scenes diplomatic manoeuvring will occur to see what can be brought on the table for debate on improvement in Pak-India relations. What isn’t clear is how the Pakistani security establishment will react to all of this.
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