You have commented 339 times on Rantburg.

Your Name
Your e-mail (optional)
Website (optional)
My Original Nic        Pic-a-Nic        Sorry. Comments have been closed on this article.
Bold Italic Underline Strike Bullet Blockquote Small Big Link Squish Foto Photo
Submit your comments on this article
India-Pakistan
A monster roaming the world
2011-09-04
Long piece (3144 words) In the Sydney Morning Herald pulling together many of the stories we've seen here at Rantburg, and adding further details. The author's conclusion: despair, agony, probable doom. The problem is, the alternative to fighting the jihadis is surrender... It will be interesting to see how General Petraeus' move to the CIA and the new man in his spot in the DoD change things -- a CIA quietly concentrating on finding and killing bad guys coupled with a beefed-up JSOC quietly concentrating on hunting down and killing bad guys, while the regular forces shape the battlefield, clear and hold, and get the headlines.
The West has spent billions trying to buy Pakistan's friendship but the jihadists are stronger than ever, writes Paul McGeough.

Search for a firm footing in Pakistan and there is none - all is quicksand ... strategically, politically, morally.

Here in south Asia, strategically sandwiched between failing Afghanistan and the China and India powerhouses, is a country in which journalists are abducted in the night by agents of the state and murdered; in which the only advance after a decade in which Washington has tried to buy friendship with cheques for more than $20 billion, is the expansion of Pakistan's nuclear arsenal - which is on the verge of surpassing Britain's as the fifth biggest in the world.
Posted by:

#21  
Posted by: OldSpook   2011-09-04 22:15  

#20  Let's hope that it's finally time for the wheel to turn.

It's been 80 years, that's what it usually takes. But I'm not looking forward to 2020.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2011-09-04 20:19  

#19  Goodbye, asshole.

Stormfront.org could use another one of you. We won't have you.
Posted by: hotspur666   2011-09-04 20:15  

#18  The internal inconsistencies of the Koran are readily apparent to the literate.

Them as have eyes to see. Unfortunately, jihad (and especially Sudden Jihadi Syndrome) seems to resonate with Western-educated muslims.
Posted by: Free Radical   2011-09-04 15:22  

#17  "Economic depression has a miraculous way of restoring bourgeois values"

Hopefully this time. Last time it led to the rise of FDR etc. Let's hope that it's finally time for the wheel to turn.
Posted by: My two cents   2011-09-04 14:14  

#16  Nothing that a asteroid didn't cure dinosaurs of.
Posted by: Water Modem   2011-09-04 13:19  

#15  Economic depression has a miraculous way of restoring bourgeois values. A shame it seems to require so much pain.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2011-09-04 12:37  

#14  "the culture must die"

Agreed. It is however impossible to beat something with nothing. First we need to reestablish our western tradition. Only once we get our mojo back can we even presume to change, let alone banish, another culture.

Posted by: My two cents   2011-09-04 10:34  

#13  You overestimate the capability of nukes and underestimate the capability of cell phones.

In a few years, anyone with a cell phone can home school in their native language everything taught in high school and most from college.

The internal inconsistencies of the Koran are readily apparent to the literate. Literacy is the doom that the Paks should fear, not nukes.
Posted by: rammer   2011-09-04 10:31  

#12  If Pak is nuked, it will be for one of three reasons.

The first is that they pitched a nuke at India, trying some lame excuse that terrorists captured it and fired the missile, and India responds forcefully.

The second is that there is a protocol, which I have long suspected, that the US has told both nations that whichever one uses nuclear weapons first will receive full retaliation from the US. Of course this is solely directed a Pak, because India would never initiate fires, as its conventional army could once again whump the Pak army.

Three is "scenario X", which could mean that yet another player gets involved.
Posted by: Anonymoose   2011-09-04 09:45  

#11  #8 Excalibur, there's not one city entirely composed of blue baddies.

Perhaps not entirely. But visit San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, DC, or Detroit. And they're all on the water.
Posted by: Nimble Spemble   2011-09-04 09:43  

#10  I think we've seen how to do it with minimal collateral damage. The imams show stark fear of satellite dishes because it reveals the outside world. We have the technology and the means to saturate even their primitive environment with this weapon that can ultimately undermine their own universe.
Posted by: Procopius2k   2011-09-04 09:42  

#9  i wont sign off on a genocide, but the culture must die along with the ideology that feeds it.

Uh huh, you say that now, but events may change your mind later. My opinion is already formed.

As for the second part, that can only be realized by punishing the Umma collectively, brutally and without mercy. We will need to be, the strong horse.
Posted by: Secret Asian Man   2011-09-04 09:04  

#8  Excalibur, there's not one city entirely composed of blue baddies.
Posted by: twobyfour   2011-09-04 08:46  

#7  Not a bug, a feature. The jihadis aren't going to nuke a red state city.
Posted by: Excalibur   2011-09-04 05:30  

#6  The demise of jihadis and their culture won't happen absent a nuke or similar destroying a major American city, followed by overwhelming retaliation in kind. Otherwise our civilization slowly bleeds away as passive jihadis flood in and gain power with the help of obtuse domestic enablers.

Pretty depressing when the most hopeful outcome involves your enemy wreaking unprecedented carnage on your fellow citizens and visiting slaughter orders of magnitude greater on them.
Posted by: kcs   2011-09-04 04:59  

#5  i wont sign off on a genocide, but the culture must die along with the ideology that feeds it.
Posted by: abu do you love   2011-09-04 03:59  

#4  The answer involves the "G" word. Reduce, concentrate and quarantine.
Posted by: Secret Asian Man   2011-09-04 03:51  

#3  to kill them, and take the land and women. Like old times

YOU take the women...I sure don't want them! Well, except for that Lebanese....
Posted by: Glenmore   2011-09-04 01:49  

#2  The alternative to fighting the jihadis as is done currently is to kill them, and take the land and women. Like old times.
Posted by: Eohippus Phater7165   2011-09-04 01:13  

#1  Pretty well sums it up. Please add in some behind the scenes Iranian and Russian action as well. The usual suspects of course.
Posted by: Besoeker   2011-09-04 00:13  

00:00