The Killing Of Jalaluddin Haqqani, One Of The Taliban's Most Important Leaders

Jalaluddin Haqqani

Change We Can Believe In: Pakistan Raids -- Threatswatch

From my friend Eli Lake at The New York Sun:

While American special forces and military contractors have conducted raids in Pakistan, such actions were rare and required Cabinet-level approval. In July, the leadership of Central Command, which oversees the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, was given the sole authority to approve ground assaults in Pakistan. Late last month, the American military began launching ground attacks in the country on a near daily basis, depending on local conditions and intelligence, according to a military official who requested anonymity.

The escalation in Pakistan is due in part to the incoming leader of Central Command, General David Petraeus, who has been credited with changing the course of the Iraq war and is said to have the full trust of President Bush. Before formally taking the reins at Central Command, General Petraeus began meeting in June with Pakistani political leaders to develop an effective strategy for combating Al Qaeda in the border provinces.

Most important for the Bush administration, however, has been the political implosion in Islamabad since the resignation of America’s longtime ally, President Musharraf.

“With Musharraf gone, the policy of self-deterrence is now gone,” a former senior counterterrorism official for both the Clinton and Bush national security councils, Roger Cressey, said. “We would deter ourselves from doing anything for fear that any action would destabilize Musharraf.”
“The other point here is the brazenness and frequency of Taliban-led raids really required U.S. forces to be aggressive,” he said. “I think this is less about getting bin Laden than it is about responding to the Taliban.”

It is far preferable for the Pakistani military - the Army, not the Frontier Corps - to execute precision operations against the Taliban-al-Qaeda undertaking an insurgency within their own country. But that’s just not going to happen. So the buck falls to… you guessed it.

Read more ....

My Comment: This post "The Failing Campaign to Kill Jalaluddin Haqqani" was posted in 2002. It puts forward an excellent case on why this man is dangerous, and why he must be eliminated. His death is a good day for everyone in Afghanistan.