Quote Originally Posted by carl View Post
That is exactly the rhetorical argument the Pak Army/ISI uses and has been using for years. It is a line that is good for all times and will work for anything that can, will or has happened. All they have to do is suggest that anything we want to do that they don't like will start us down the road. What we need to do when they say that is to tell them to stuff it bub, do something and do it now.
And if they won't, or can't, "do something"?

Just because a point of argument is eternal doesn't mean it has no substance. The status quo in Pakistan sucks, for us. We have some capacity to disrupt that status quo. We have absolutely no way to assure that the consequences of such disruption will suck any less, for us.

The great complication in our relationship with Paksitan is our involvement in Afghanistan. Take that away, Pakistan's problems become a lot less important to us and many more options open for dealing with them.