Specifically, bad news in Afghanistan and Pakistan where, out of the harsh glare of our national debate on Iraq, we are slowing losing the first front in Bush’s “War on Terror” (via The New York Times):
(Cont.)
PESHAWAR, Pakistan — Islamic militants are using a recent peace deal with the government to consolidate their hold in northern Pakistan, vastly expanding their training of suicide bombers and other recruits and fortifying alliances with Al Qaeda and foreign fighters, diplomats and intelligence officials from several nations say. The result, they say, is virtually a Taliban mini-state.
The militants, the officials say, are openly flouting the terms of the September accord in North Waziristan, under which they agreed to end cross-border help for the Taliban insurgency that revived in Afghanistan with new force this year.
The area is becoming a magnet for an influx of foreign fighters, who not only challenge government authority in the area, but are even wresting control from local tribes and spreading their influence to neighboring areas, according to several American and NATO officials and Pakistani and Afghan intelligence officials.
Once upon a time, a cowardly putz brave little president warned every nation on earth that any nation which sheltered terrorists within its borders would suffer the same fate as the terrorists. Seems like such a long time ago, doesn’t it?
Tonight we are a country awakened to danger and called to defend freedom. Our grief has turned to anger, and anger to resolution. Whether we bring our enemies to justice, or bring justice to our enemies, justice will be done.
Well, that was then, and this is now:
Since retreating from Afghanistan in 2002 under American military attacks, the Taliban and foreign fighters have again been using the tribal areas to organize themselves — now training their sights on the 40,000 American and NATO troops in Afghanistan. […]
This year suicide attacks have become a regular feature of the Afghan war and have also appeared for the first time in Pakistan, including two in this frontier province in recent weeks, indicating a growing threat to Pakistan’s security.
In recent weeks, Afghan officials say they have uncovered alarming signs of large-scale indoctrination and preparation of suicide bombers in the tribal areas, and the Pakistani minister of the interior, Aftab Khan Sherpao, publicly acknowledged for the first time that training of suicide bombers was occurring in the tribal areas. […]
So numerous are the recruits that a tribal leader in southern Afghanistan, who did not want to be named because of the threat of suicide bombers, relayed an account of how one would-be suicide bomber was sent home and told to wait his turn because there were many in line ahead of him.
This is the true cost of the fiasco in Iraq. The Taliban has come back with a vengeance. Al Qaeda has not only survived, it has thrived. Suicide bombers are literally standing in line waiting their turn because there are too many applicants. All while our military weakens, and our influence in the region diminishes, with each day that passes.
In short, Osama bin Ladin is winning. The Taliban is winning. And we, the US of A, are losing: our tax dollars, our international reputation, our status as a superpower, our nation’s future security and (last but not least) the lives of our soldiers. I wonder who George Bush will find to blame for that?
