Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Michael Scheuer: Pakistan must get a free pass on Shahzad

Despite Hillary Clinton’s rhetoric, Scheuer argues that we cannot levy any consequences on Pakistan, even if Shahzad trained there, because we need Pakistan more than they need us. He contends that they are fighting this war on our behalf and until we are ready to kill the enemies ourselves and quit apologizing for casualties, we can’t touch them.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

This just in:

http://www.thelocal.se/26590/20100511/

And in a related story, Moehammy is still a pedophile and murderous scum sucking pile of stinky shit and Muslims are emotionally underdeveloped scum sucking stinky piles of shit.

Epaminondas said...

He is cynically correct.

This is a criticism of america.

He is saying PUT UP or SHUT UP to the political class, and reminding americans what they voted for

Pastorius said...

Thanks, MLAR.

I posted the story.

:)

Pastorius said...

Epa,
I agree with you. However, I think we have to point out that Bush was playing the same game with Pakistan.

In fact, Obama is doing more about Pakistan than Bush ever did.

revereridesagain said...

I don't think it's even that he's being cynical at this point, I think he's just fed up. He knows we will do nothing until we are hit with a wave of successful attacks, and it had better be big ones or we'll ignore those too. That's not an idle comment about the Japanese. We probably wouldn't have considered dropping an A-bomb on anyone in November 1941. And even by 1945 there had been very few American civilian casualties -- but 400,000 military dead and over 3 years of all-out war changed our perspective. Will it take the equivalent to do it again?

mah29001 said...

Wait a second...isn't this fella a fan of Ron Paul...? Along with also being involved in his 2008 campaign along with also being engaged in Antiwar.com writing anti-Israel columns?

This is the fella that says we need to defend Pakistan? Which has done nothing or very little to squash the terrorists whom trained Shahzad?

Pastorius said...

mah29001,
Yes, you're right. This is THAT guy.

He's a nut, but he's also right sometimes.

Actually, the problem isn't quite the vacuum he portrays it to be.

The problem is not simply that Pakistan would fall. The problem is that Pakistan WITH IT'S NUKES, would fall into the hands of the Taliban.

That's why we can't do anything unless we are willing to do EVERYTHING.

I should have spelled that out.

cjk said...

So just wondering here, does anybody know if Pakistan's 'free passes' have reached 4 figures yet?

Pastorius said...

I think the operative question here is, what would we expect to happen in Pakistan were the current government to topple?

Dag said...

The man is an anti-Semite fool.

cjk said...

Lots of variables there. It would be interesting to hear from people who have some sense of the public mood there.
If the government of Pakistan did fall it would most likely be taken over by the military as has historically happened, but of course nothings certain.
In any case we would most likely be able to count on the support of India as a balance.
The reality there is that paramount on the Pakistanis mind is Kashmir.
Personally I'm seriously worried about Iran.

cjk said...

A prolonged civil war would be just beautiful and couldn't happen to a better country.
If we were smart we would keep the government just supplied enough like we did for the Iraqis from 1980 to 1989.

Epaminondas said...

He BELIEVES that we have no business overseas because we DO NOT act responsibly when we DO THINGS overseas. Like recognize when we are in a war.

I agree with that.

Unfortunately for him that is a UTOPIAN ideal.

We cannot restrict Americans' activities to HERE, and is is THAT which drives the bus.

We will ALWAYS be engaged overseas and thus always dirty in someone's eyes somewhere. No doubt he feels that FDR's embargoes and unilateral harsh sanctions against Japan in the 1930's were responsible for the attack we suffered as well, but that FDR acted correctly later on.

If Pakistan did not have nukes we should fuck them good because there is NO WAY the ISI is not Taliban and playing to stay alive and out from under Reapers. PERIOD. But the off chance that their ~60-100 nukes go awry gives pause. If we decide to act against Pakistan we had BETTER be ready to RAID THEIR NUKES and be prepared for what comes next.

Scheurer has done a lot for this nation. But he has done it while being totally wrong about how to act in this world philosophically.

I am grateful for his tactical actions, and his existence, but his ideas are dangerous and functionally racist in result.

Obama, IMHO, agrees with THAT side of his argument.

Pastorius said...

I agree with Epa.

Thanks for articulating that, Epa.

Anonymous said...

So why is not Pakistan declared the enemy and war imposed upon it? And how come ex-CIA officials have become apologist for the Pakistanis? The rot is within us, not the Pakistanis, and unless we refocus on the true enemy and hold them accountable, prepare for more Faizals amidst us.

Unknown said...

Vow, with analysts like Mike, we can rest assured that finding "Osammy" is next to zero !!!

Pakistanis -- only understand one language -- Deadly Force !!

If the Ombaba Adm or next US Govt, grew some "cojones" and were to DROP some daisy flowers on Rawalpindi or Islam-is-bad using B-52s or B-1s, the problem of "Taliban" would disappear rather quickly, instead of spending 10 years of Tax Dollars !!

Pray What is "Moderate Taliban" or Good Taliban ---

It is time that the Pentagon wises/wakes up and sends/plants a few daisies --- !!!

Epaminondas said...

People, he is clanging US not the Pak's.

Anon - Scheurer's entire point is that since we are INCAPABLE (Clinton/Bush/Obama) of acting responsibly if we are going to be overseas actors, we therefore are incapable of doing anything but needing the Paks more than they need us. So we should STFU and get used to being but effed fools.

FARSHTAY EVERYONE?