Word: islamabad
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...accounts put military casualties at more than 200 dead); 11 suspected militants and 26 tribesmen were also killed. Now, with little to show for the campaign, the U.S. is being forced to rethink its Afghanistan strategy?and Pakistan's decision to pull back is leaving others to question again Islamabad's commitment to the war on terror...
...Pakistani forces suffered constant harassment. According to one Islamabad-based Western diplomat, "the Pakistanis would come along the road with 200 trucks lined up, and within minutes, every al-Qaeda and Taliban knew they were here." Other tribes joined the Wazir in raids against government troops, raising fears that a prolonged campaign could escalate into a full-blown tribal uprising all along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. There was never a sign of bin Laden, nor was there a sighting of his No. 2, Egyptian Ayman al-Zawahiri, rumored, wrongly as it turned out, to be in Waziristan...
...Privately, Pakistanis grumble that the U.S. and its coalition partners are pushing too hard and as a result the Pakistani army rushed headlong into Waziristan unprepared for the resistance it faced. "Yes, we're impatient," conceded one Western diplomat in Islamabad. "But we're operating against the unknown deadline of a major terrorist attack in the U.S. That's what drives us." Another Islamabad-based diplomat claimed that lately Western intelligence was picking up "lots of chatter" from its electronic eavesdropping and informants that "something very nasty was being planned out of Pakistan...
...deadlines for registration have come and gone, the latest on May 7, and no one has come forward. Americans say the scheme is useless. "We certainly don't expect to see Osama bin Laden walking in to put down his name," joked one Western diplomat in Islamabad...
...that the Pakistani army has stirred the hornet's nest, it is unlikely militants can be caught unawares and captured in their tribal-area hideaways in the foreseeable future. Bin Laden's fighters, says Islamabad-based columnist and retired General Talat Masood, "have almost certainly melted away into the hills." Mohammed, meanwhile, is now a local hero. Mobs of cheering tribesmen gather when his six-vehicle convoy, each auto mounted with machine guns, roars past. "I believe in the concept of jihad," Mohammed told reporters in his village of Shakai after the truce was signed, adding that he still considers...