Pakistan: Inter Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) - a collection

[Entropy]

Ok, look, nukes are a sideshow to this discussion. When it comes to nukes we're worried about Pakistan falling apart followed by the nukes getting "lost." We're not really worried about Pakistan nuking us and it's not their nukes that are keeping us from doing more about Pakistan's support to the Taliban. After all, we haven't even cut off aid yet. Pakistan is still technically an ally.

And nukes didn't keep us from flying in and killing UBL, nor has it stopped us from drone strikes in Pakistan (those have the sanction of the Pakistanis, of course). If Pakistan didn't have nukes we'd have the same problems with them we're having now. We need Pakistan because they are the key to Afghanistan for all the obvious reasons - reasons which policymakers and our senior military leadership give lip service to. We've opted to tolerate Pakistan's support of the Taliban not because of nukes, but because we have to have their assistance if we want to "win" in Afghanistan, however one chooses to define that. As bad as Pakistan's support is WRT the Taliban, it could be a lot worse. Pakistan is using that leverage - not the threat of nukes - and are laughing themselves to the bank at our expense.

[omarali50]

Lets say Pakistan had no nukes and the US "engaged" with Pakistan for all the reasons you give. And then, in 2003 or thereabout, finds out that its not exactly cooperating wholeheartedly. My thought is that the nukes take some options off the table..e.g. the option cutting off aid and applying direct pressure...maybe nobody would have done that anyway, but even if someone thinks of doing it, don't the nukes inhibit that though immediately?..not because Pakistan could use one, but because the sanctions and pressures might work too well, leading to either collapse or open Jihadist takeover. To avoid either contingency 98.7% of analysts would opt for "more engagement" and while GHQ may not know many things, they do know this fact and use it.
Again, I could say (like Robert sahib) "good for them. they should protect their interests", except that i dont think that the interests defined in the Pakistani military-inspired national narrative are really in the interest of most Pakistanis.
And, as a US citizen and taxpayer, I do feel we shouldnt be paying for such shenanigans. I understand wasting trillions is our thing and Ron Paul is not going to win the election, but the thought still pinches...

[Entropy]

And then, in 2003 or thereabout, finds out that its not exactly cooperating wholeheartedly. My thought is that the nukes take some options off the table..e.g. the option cutting off aid and applying direct pressure...maybe nobody would have done that anyway, but even if someone thinks of doing it, don't the nukes inhibit that though immediately?

I don't think nukes take cutting aid off the table at all. After all, we've cut off aid before when they had nukes. The aid only started back up because of Afghanistan and once that is over I bet they will get cut off again. The idea that Pakistan is somehow using its nukes to extort aid from us just seems ludicrous to me.

That's not to say the nukes mean nothing. Yes, Pakistani stability is more important - yes nukes mean we aren't going to do a lot of things like attack them, but those are things we weren't going to do anyway.

Nukes simply aren't a central consideration to what we do about Afghanistan. Our position wouldn't be any better if Pakistan wasn't a nuclear power.

[omarali50]

And all this time i thought there must SOME rhyme and reason to this silly business. If its not even the nukes, then I must say it looks even more ridiculous..

[davidbfpo]

For once a measured, careful commentary on this "leak" and the fuss afterwards by a British think tank author, who was a special adviser to the former Labour government:http://www.ippr.org/articles/56/8609...er-afghanistan

A "taster" from his last two paragraphs:

This suggests a total inability to see the conflict from the insurgency’s point of view. At the same time as Western leaders, looking to their domestic constituencies, are talking about accelerating the process of ‘transition’ to Afghan control, today’s report tells us that ‘the Taliban are deliberately hastening NATO’s withdrawal by reducing their attacks in some areas and then initiating a comprehensive hearts-and-minds campaign’. We shouldn’t ascribe too much strategic sophistication, and in particular too much strategic co-ordination, to what is undeniably a fragmented insurgency under a degree of pressure; but the trends identified in the report are plausible components of a deliberate strategic shift by the insurgency, in response to NATO’s own strategic shift towards ‘transition’. Dismissing them as ‘desperation’ is itself rather desperate.

Leaks are always damaging, but however difficult this is to handle in the short term, we must hope that UK officials and others use it as an opportunity to move towards a more honest and realistic debate about the Afghan campaign and its prospects of success, in public as well as private. Clearly, they are under no obligation to talk up our enemies, but complacency can be just as damaging as defeatism.