Pakistan and bin Laden


The Sunday NY Times has an excerpt from a new book by Carlotta Gall that outlines the close working relationship and even sponsorship of al Qaeda by Pakistan. This included protecting bin Laden.

From the article:
The Pakistani government, under President Pervez Musharraf and his intelligence chief, Lt. Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, was maintaining and protecting the Taliban, both to control the many groups of militants now lodged in the country and to use them as a proxy force to gain leverage over and eventually dominate Afghanistan. The dynamic has played out in ways that can be hard to grasp from the outside, but the strategy that has evolved in Pakistan has been to make a show of cooperation with the American fight against terrorism while covertly abetting and even coordinating Taliban, Kashmiri and foreign Qaeda-linked militants. 

Link.

While I realize that a lot of this has been well known to people who paid attention, I do have one question: Why did it take the mainstream media so long to publish a story like this?

That's not a criticism of the reporter, but the media bosses above her.And, to some extent, of American "officials" as well. Pakistan's "cooperation" in the wake of 9/11 has been far overvalued - even when the country actually helped the U.S.

I understand the role of "realpolitik" in the world; I just wish we played "real" more strongly than we play "politik".

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