Word: quetta
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...British troops in Helmand are fighting with both hands tied behind their backs. They cannot go after the leadership of the Taliban - still led by the reclusive Mullah Omar - which operates openly in the Pakistani city of Quetta, just across the border. They also can't go after the drug trade that funds the insurgency, in part because some of the proceeds are also skimmed by the friends, officials and perhaps family members of the stupendously corrupt government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Helmand province is mostly desert, but it produces half the world's opium supply along a narrow...
...fragile new government of President Asif Ali Zardari may be more cooperative. Still, the Pakistani intelligence service helped create the Taliban and other Islamic extremist groups - including the terrorists who attacked Mumbai - as a way of keeping India at bay, and Pakistan continues to protect the Afghan Taliban in Quetta. In his initial statements, Obama has seemed more sophisticated about Afghanistan than Bush. In an interview with me in late October, Obama said Afghanistan should be seen as part of a regional problem, and he suggested that he might dispatch a special envoy, perhaps Bill Clinton, to work...
...British troops in Helmand are fighting with both hands tied behind their backs. They cannot go after the leadership of the Taliban - still led by the reclusive Mullah Omar - which operates openly in the Pakistani city of Quetta, just across the border. They also can't go after the drug trade that funds the insurgency, in part because some of the proceeds are also skimmed by the friends, officials and perhaps family members of the stupendously corrupt government of Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Helmand province is mostly desert, but it produces half the world's opium supply along a narrow...
...fragile new government of President Asif Ali Zardari may be more cooperative. Still, the Pakistani intelligence service helped create the Taliban and other Islamic extremist groups - including the terrorists who attacked Mumbai - as a way of keeping India at bay, and Pakistan continues to protect the Afghan Taliban in Quetta. In his initial statements, Obama has seemed more sophisticated about Afghanistan than Bush. In an interview with me in late October, Obama said Afghanistan should be seen as part of a regional problem, and he suggested that he might dispatch a special envoy, perhaps Bill Clinton, to work...
...interests in Afghanistan are at stake. "So what's new?" asks G. Parthasarathy, a former diplomat and foreign-affairs analyst. "The Americans have all along known about the ISI's collaboration with the Taliban. They knew the political leadership of the Taliban, including Mullah Omar, were in Quetta; they knew when [Jalaluddin] Haqqani was in Pakistan. Earlier it didn't suit their interest to admit this, but now that the fellows trained to fight in Kashmir are fighting in Afghanistan and killing American soldiers, they're feeling the heat." Vikram Sood, former chief of India's external intelligence service...