Predictable bad news on the Durand Line, the AfPak borderland, as threat and coutherthreat and ultimatum and apology and round up the usual suspects follow from the hot-pursuit shoot by ISAF/NATO against a frontier outpost that killed more than two dozen and wounded plenty. The Pakistani word for the shoot is "unprovoked." Full TV military funerals followed. Islamabad plays high cards by closing the freight routes overland to Afghanistan and by demanding the shutdown of the Shamsi Airbase within days. This threatens the drone ops. What is the big picture? Speaking Bill Roggio, Arif Rafiq, Rufus Phillips, Monday 28, re the damage. Pakistan has moved slowly into the Gulf camp and even more quickly into the PRC camp. South Asia in play. The Obama administration inherited a bad hand and played it to lose. The surprise irony of the 21st century is that when you get it wrong, you can't get out. Afghanistan will land on the new president's plate on Inauguration Day 2013. The puzzle today for POTUS Obama is that he has come to rely on the drones. The Bin Laden strike was a drone strike with boots to fill in the part that made it personal from Uncle Sam. POTUS resembles what the great master spy amateur Churchill came to represent, a man who cannot live or perform without access to the "jewels" of spycraft. The borderland is where Obama triumphed. The borderland is what Obama cannot solve, or when. Trapped by the drones.
Why is this any worse than Russian threats-" Russia threatened on Wednesday to deploy missiles to target the U.S. missile shield in Europe if Washington fails to assuage Moscow’s concerns about its plans, a harsh warning that reflects deep cracks in U.S.-Russian ties despite President Barack Obama’s efforts to “reset” relations with the Kremlin." (AP)or, Chinese threats, Iranian threats, #OWS threats, Egypt...on and on. We are living in huge tinderbox. I still see POTUS squeaking thru. The only bright spot that I noticed today from dailycaller was this new website http://thecollegeconservative.com/.
fOur mOre Years ---- This is how: (from pjmedia) For 2012, Be Wary of Obama’s Ties to Corrupt Project VoteThe ACORN affiliate has been repeatedly convicted of voter fraud.
It is astonishing that we have no established field level communications with our "allies". It needn't be a shared tactical radio net- just a single "red phone" line connecting the groups on both sides of the border so a "stop or we shoot" message could be exchanged before the hammer comes down. While I have no trouble believing that the Pakistani base was doing the firing, a warning would at least have dampened the posturings in Islamabad.
Obama is trapped by his narcissistic belief that he actually knows what he's doing.