Ironically, the United States is paying a price for its own errors. Contrary to popular belief and hoary statements from the White House, Pakistan's cooperation in the "war on terror" has always been fitful. During General Pervez Musharraf's tenure as president, he proved to be extraordinarily deft in dealing with the United States. He handed over a few key Al Qaeda operatives--he turned over the Tanzanian Ahmed Khalfan Ghailani in August 2004 and Abu Faraj al-Libi, a senior member of Osama bin Laden's circle, in May 2005--but the arrests were suspiciously well timed. They tended to occur alongside either important U.S. political events or U.S. criticism of Pakistan for its apparent failure to make much progress on the counterterrorism front.
Though this sleight of hand was obvious to close observers, the administration continued to rely almost exclusively on Musharraf and the Pakistani military. Little or no effort was expended to nudge Musharraf away from military rule. Not surprisingly, he and his military acolytes came to see themselves as indispensable to the United Sates. Thanks to this American indulgence, Musharraf's 2002 election brought an Islamist coalition into power and, under its watch, the Taliban reconstituted itself in Pakistan's western borderlands while other Islamist terror networks flourished inside Pakistan.
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4:17 AM
Moderate Islamist here
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