Word: talibans
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...among sympathizers in Waziristan's villages. Hussain showed up for the cease-fire ceremony unarmed, as agreed. But if the Pakistani officer expected his adversaries to reciprocate by laying down their weapons, he was disappointed. Accompanied by some 7,000 defiant tribesmen, some waving guns, rebel leaders, including former Taliban commander Nek Mohammed, appeared wearing their sidearms. Eyewitnesses say that all the general got from a slyly grinning Mohammed was a rusty sword. "We never war-gamed this," says a chagrined colonel in Islamabad of the military's failure to pacify Waziristan...
...moral pomposity is almost always a camouflage for baser fears and desires. Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and the neoconservatives share a primal belief in the use of military power to intimidate enemies. If the U.S. didn't strike back "big time," it would be perceived as weak. (Crushing the peripheral Taliban and staying focused on rooting out al-Qaeda cells wasn't "big" enough.) The President may have had some personal motives-doing to Saddam Hussein what his father didn't; filling out Karl Rove's prescription of a strong leader; making the world safe for his friends in the energy...
...mountain trails around Spera, where thick pine forests provide cover from U.S. aircraft, have become a major infiltration point for Taliban and al-Qaeda operatives. The watchful locals, members of the Zadran tribe, sympathize with the jihadists. It's ambush country, and some time around 7:30 p.m. Tillman's patrol was attacked. In the 12 to 15 minutes of shooting that followed, two Americans were wounded. An Afghan militia man was killed. So was Tillman...
...Pakistani army spokesman said operations were halted because it had succeeded in "smashing" terrorist bases. But no senior al-Qaeda or Taliban member was caught. A Pakistani official who brokered the truce says the deal included a guarantee from tribal leaders that "non-Pakistanis"--Arabs, Chechens and Uzbeks--would no longer cross from Waziristan to ambush U.S. troops in Afghanistan. But local officials in Waziristan say that promise is not enforceable. What's more, the truce raises doubts about the resolve of the Pakistanis to root out al-Qaeda fugitives from the tribal areas. Said a U.S. military spokesman...
...truce, however, could be a severe setback for the Bush Administration, which has been leaning on Pakistan to carry out a clean sweep of al-Qaeda and the Taliban from the tribal territory. Mohammed is a former Taliban commander who still swears loyalty to fugitive leader Mullah Omar and was earlier accused by the Pakistani government of giving shelter to al-Qaeda fighters, possibly including Osama bin Laden. In this area Pakistani troops last month mistakenly thought they had cornered bin Laden's deputy, Ayman al-Zawahiri...