How not to win in Pakistan
Dawn of Pakistan, which is essential reading nowadays, reports that in a firefight in Swat, the Taliban captured and then set free about 30 members of Pakistani security forces “after securing written promise from them that they would quit their government jobs.” Amnesty — it’s not just for the Americans to give out anymore! The ...
Dawn of Pakistan, which is essential reading nowadays, reports that in a firefight in Swat, the Taliban captured and then set free about 30 members of Pakistani security forces “after securing written promise from them that they would quit their government jobs.” Amnesty — it’s not just for the Americans to give out anymore!
The propaganda benefits don’t stop there. A grateful constable Kiramat Shah told a reporter that, “Taliban have given us a new life. We had been under the siege for about 36 hours and pleaded for reinforcements, but nobody came to our help.”
And there’s even more: The Pakistani army responded by firing off a bunch of artillery shells, killing four civilians, the newspaper reports.
Why is the Taliban so much better at this stuff than the Pakistani military? Taliban TTP (tactics, techniques and procedures) strikes me as pretty good.
To paraphrase John McCreary, this is today’s bad news.
Thomas E. Ricks is a former contributing editor to Foreign Policy. Twitter: @tomricks1
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