Not Our War, Time for Deal Making

Former chief of Pak's military intelligence and ISI, Lt. Gen (retd.) Asad Durrani, says why are we dying for the Americans - fighting tribals in NWFP is not our war and it's time to make a deal.

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My own assessment is that anyone we do not like in our tribal areas, we call them Taliban. Those opposed to negotiations would come up with [reasons] like Al-Qaeda being present. This is the old habit of refusing to do certain things and the pretext is anything you can find — in this case it is Al-Qaeda. The old English saying, give the dog a bad name before you kill it, that fits in so very well here. But let me assume there are Al Qaeda elements and we don’t want them. We again will have to come to an arrangement with the locals who may be providing them sanctuary.[...war being fought in the frontiers is not our war - The Hindu]

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If there is any way ISI and LoP's army can get al-Qaeda away from NWFP, they'll go back to their old ways of the good old '90s - send back Taliban to take back Afghan for the still needed strategic space and continue with J&K terror (and the thousand cut policy). al-Qaeda spoiled all that with its terror in the west and all the unwanted western attention to LoP. Ultimately, for LoP's elite, that's the only solution - as soon as the American and NATO forces leave Afghanistan. And it's not about cleansing the terror forces from amongst them and creating a democracy. The losers will be Afghan on the west and Bharat on the east.