Swat: Can the deal work? It seems like we're finally getting a glimpse into Zardari's thought process -- it's a little strange, but I guess that's to be expected.

Anti-Americanism in Pakistan and the Taliban Menace the author says: "To the Americans, Pakistan is an instrument to be used for their strategic ends." His flawed argument, typical of recent Pakistani liberal scare tactics, is that the threat of impending Talibanization trumps all other threats including the threat of US manipulation or occupation. Forget that Talibanization of the whole country is MUCH more unlikely than Pakistan becoming another Afghanistan or Iraq if we give the US carte blanche to do whatever it wants as the author seems to be suggesting.

The reason why there was so much outrage over the death of the FC soldiers was because it was such an ominous signal of things to come -- see also in yesterday's Dawn, remarks by Admiral Mike Mullen: "“I’m comfortable, as the military leader, that I have all the authorities I need,” said Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, when asked if he had the authority to target key terrorist leaders hiding in Fata."

Muslims in America Re: # 177 by Majumdar
The part about Paul Bremer disbanding the police in the article you posted reminded me of the recently released official history of the Iraq war. I heard an NPR report on it a few days ago: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92086362&ft=1&f=5
The actual report is 720 pages or long or something, so too long to read, but it sounds very interesting because it is especially critical of Bremer and Tommy Franks.

Sort of tangential, but also interesting is this article in US armed forces journal: http://www.afji.com/2008/06/3468975 about how, since the Korean War and the firing of MacArthur by Truman, all the subsequent political leadership of the US has refrained from firing military leadership for incompetence.

Muslims in America Re: # 110
"In my opinion, unfortunately for the Muslim world, the destruction of the Ottoman Empire created these Arab nation states. Now these Arab nation states totally disregard the prevailing international behavior of a 21st century society."

You're also ignoring the role of the European powers between the world wars in shaping many of the problems of the modern Middle east. Unless you think that the mandate system was also another glowing example of the kindness of the Western powers towards the Islamic world which the backward Arabs failed to sufficiently take advantage of.

Local Liberal Dribble Re: # 60
HP says: "Okay that’s fine. If you two insist, can you spell out what the thought at the other end of Islamic spectrum is and why that qualifies as logical?"
and in #56 HP says: "[...]The best course is to fight what mullah preaches with the facts right out of this world and not from some imaginary make believe world."

HP the main thing I was objecting to in your post #56 was that you claim that the worldview of the Mullahs is "imaginary" and "make believe" and thus not worth arguing against. Don't you think, even if you don't agree with it, that it's better to study the content and origins of the philosophy that you are opposed to rather than just dismissing it as crazy? What made me think about this recently was reading about Dr. Fadl's criticisms of Al-Zawahiri.

Local Liberal Dribble Re: # 56
I don't know HP. It's pretty much an intellectual dead-end to dismiss the other end of the Islamic spectrum as populated by a bunch of lunatics with unresolved Freudian sexual issues. Even if you oppose them on every single issue, where is this approach going to get you? That's probably why the self-termed civil society of Pakistan is always left on the sidelines: because it never bothers to participate in Islamic tradition and has isolated itself from it to the point where it's almost indistinguishable from disengaged Westerners.

The reason why the "liberal dribble" as Mr. Paracha terms is so ineffectual is not because it's useless to argue with extremists because they're crazy but because most of what passes as liberal criticism of extremism is usually not presented from within Islamic tradition, it's just a hotch-potch derived from Martin Lings' biography of Muhammad or Karen Armstrong's latest or something like that. It's intellectually lightweight stuff. I guess a pretty good metaphor for the whole thing is all the students who get their Islamic learning from studying for the Cambridge O-Level Islamiat exam. The Brits must really be laughing at what we've become.

Nawaz Sharif’s Moment of Truth Re: # 80 by zeemax
Another questionable aspect of the decision is that according to the schedule for the by-elections posted on the ECP website, the last date for filing appeals against the accepting/rejection of nomination papers was 24/5/08. So how could the second appeal by the independent candidate Noor Elahi have been allowed to have been filed, let alone decided? This article (http://thenews.com.pk/top_story_detail.asp?Id=15561) makes it pretty clear that Elahi filed a totally different second appeal after his original one resulted in a split decision on May 31 and was rejected by the Election Commission.

Nawaz Sharif’s Moment of Truth Re: # 1 by rf786
An obvious problem with your argument is that the LHC in its current state can hardly be called independent and it's likely that the decision against Sharif was affected by pro-Musharraf elements within it. So rather than being an example of judicial independence which you say is hypocritical to criticize, the LHC's decision is an example of the danger of the judiciary being in the President's pocket.

Aitzaz’s Monumental Blunder Re: # 298
akcheema, the Romans could enslave the Carthagians and plow their fields with salt but there was only one Carthage, as there is only one Japan. So the situtions are not analogous. There are a lot of muslims, and an action like nuking a part of FATA would mobilize a lot more terrorists than it would kill. It would just be a larger version of what happens every time there is an unmanned missile strike in FATA. Maybe it would cripple a particular agency as a centre of the insurgency but other centres would spring up in no time, fueled by the anger against what had happened.

Do you think that Fazlullah and Mehsud would have been in the position they are in today if there hadn't been an Operation Enduring Freedom? The only people who advocate nukes as a solution are the ones who refuse to consider the consequences of the war on terror in radicalizing the population of Pakistan. Someone asked if there are any honest Pakistanis -- I wonder if there are any honest neo-cons who are willing to consider the consequences of their actions rather than preaching morality.

Attack in Mohmand Agha Amin, you are spot on in pointing out that this attack does not appear to be a random incident. It doesn't seem to be a coincidence that the Rand report by Seth Jones was published just this week. If anyone has the time to read it it is here (177 pages though):
http://www.rand.org/pubs/monographs/MG595/

The interesting thing I noticed about the US media coverage of this report was that while much of the report was concerned about the Afghan army and the counterinsurgency effort in Afghanistan and only a pretty small section focused on the Pakistan army, most of the big newspaper headlines were similar to this one: "Pakistan intelligence abetting Taliban militants: US think-tank"

Now it looks like the US has released a video of the attack supposedly to clear their involvement. It looks more like a propaganda war against the Pakistan military. It looks like Pakistan is being pushed into a corner very quickly.

The Emerging Threat Re: # 80
"If an individual is too ignorant or too unskilled or too helpless to create or build anything, he can at least establish his significance in an anonymous universe by committing an act of massive destruction"

The daily times column you're quoting is pretty awful: http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2008%5C06%5C07%5Cstory_7-6-2008_pg 3_2

The author belongs to the school of "thought" that finds it easier to dismiss terrorism in Pakistan as pointless vanity acts despite the fact that the movement is currently wreaking havoc on the NWFP govt and the army. I guess it's sort of natural that the sight of Musharraf screwing up so badly is so blinding that the tendency is to underestimate how well people like Fazlullah have played the situation to their advantage but seriously, how long will Pakistanis go on ignoring what is happening in NWFP.

(sorry for the double post. I didn't know chowk ate up html tags)

The Emerging Threat Re: # 80
"If an individual is too ignorant or too unskilled or too helpless to create or build anything, he can at least establish his significance in an anonymous universe by committing an act of massive destruction"

The