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One week after The New York Times went front page with the news that Al Qaeda had regrouped and was thriving in a tribal region of Pakistan, the Bush administration has launched a diplomatic offensive to convince Pakistani President Gen. Pervez Musharraf to crack down.
But talk hasn't gotten them very far. And since the administration is extremely wary of alienating what they see as a key ally, their secret weapon is... the Democratic Congress. From The New York Times:
Vice President Dick Cheney made an unannounced trip to Pakistan on Monday to deliver what officials in Washington described as an unusually tough message to Gen. Pervez Musharraf of Pakistan, warning him that the newly Democratic Congress could cut aid to his country unless his forces become far more aggressive in hunting down operatives with Al Qaeda....Pakistan is now the fifth-largest recipient of American aid. Mr. Bush has proposed $785 million in aid to Pakistan in his new budget, including $300 million in military aid to help Pakistan combat Islamic radicalism in the country.
The rumblings from Congress give Mr. Bush and his top advisers a way of conveying the seriousness of the problem, officials said, without appearing to issue a direct threat to the proud Pakistani leader themselves.
âWe think the Pakistani aid is at risk in Congress,â said [the senior administration official], who declined to speak on the record because the subject involved intelligence matters.
The official adds that the message they're sending to Musharraf now "is that the only thing that matters is results.â Sounds like a message worth sending. And it would seem that this game of "Good Cop, Bad Cop" in general goes much better when Congress is the bad cop for a change.
Josh
Zachary
This is the Franken Strategy (Good Cop-Bad Cop), as proposed by Al Franken numerous times on his radio show. It's about time the Administration starts to actually address one of the real sources of terrorism in the world. Now, on the Saudi Arabia! (Yeah, right!)
February 26, 2007 9:59 AM | Reply | Permalink
Ken,
I had exactly the same thought about the Democratic candidate for Senator from Minnesota and his belated radio show.
Good work!
February 26, 2007 12:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
so basically for the last five years or so, our deal with Pakistan has been, "go through the motions of going after al-Qaeda, throw us a bone every so often, help us with a pre-election terror scare now and then, and we'll keep the money flowing."
Little wonder that Osama bin Forgotten.
February 26, 2007 1:34 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is what I call Cheney's "Doctor Evil Tour."
There are now factions much more hardcore than Osama's troops, courtesy of the Iraq invasion. Details available in the new MoJo.
February 26, 2007 1:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
each time I glance at that photo of Musharraf, I keep seeing Cheney instead!
I think Cheney envies Musharraf. No inconvenient Constitution in Pakistan. No inconvenient civil rights, habeas corpus (oh right, we got rid of that), or negotiating with opposition parties. Just pure military martial law.
February 26, 2007 3:57 PM | Reply | Permalink
Cheney bullying Musharraf yesterday was really ironic. I saw it as passing the buck. Cheney and Bush have all but ignored the resurgence of the Taliban, despite all the warnings over the last year, and now he's hassling Pakistan to do what we should have done four years ago which was follow through and find these guys and dragging them out. But as we know, Saddam suddenly became the target.
As far as Musharraf playing both sides, we better hope that he stays just where he is. If he goes, the next leader of Pakistan stands a good chance of simply telling us to f--k off, we have nukes, we have the Taliban, we have tons fo dirt on the US, and we don't need your stinking dollars anymore. It's the same old game that the US always plays, he's a bad guy but he's our bad guy. I think we are stuck, but that's our own doing.
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