Wednesday, August 01, 2007

BARACK OBAMA

Obama's All-Upside, Ignore-The-Downside Plan on Pakistan

Why are people acting like Obama's vague pledges on Pakistan are big news? More specifically, why are people acting like this is a sign of significant hawkishness on the part of Obama?

"Let me make this clear," Obama said in a speech prepared for delivery at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. "There are terrorists holed up in those mountains who murdered 3,000 Americans. They are plotting to strike again. It was a terrible mistake to fail to act when we had a chance to take out an al-Qaida leadership meeting in 2005. If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf won't act, we will."

In case we've forgotten, let's look back at the objections to that mission in 2005: 

In early 2005, after learning about the Qaeda meeting, the military developed a plan for a small Navy Seals unit to parachute into Pakistan to carry out a quick operation, former officials said.

But as the operation moved up the military chain of command, officials said, various planners bulked up the force’s size to provide security for the Special Operations forces.

“The whole thing turned into the invasion of Pakistan,” said the former senior intelligence official involved in the planning. 

As the blogger Westhawk notes: 

The examples set by American “bare bones” operations are now obviously taken to heart by special operations planners: 

 

1) The 1980 operation to raid the American embassy in Iran collapsed when the bare minimum number of transport helicopters proved to be too bare.

2) The 1993 Delta/Ranger raid in Mogadishu seemed adequately large until thousands of angry militia members rose up in the densely populated city. The lack of AC-130 gunship and armored vehicle support resulted in a painful day for the Americans and a teaching point for staff planners.

So what would be the size of the security detail protecting Ayman al-Zawahiri and his lieutenants during an al Qaeda staff conference? The New York Times piece doesn’t say, but if the answer is “dozens”, “scores”, “several platoons”, “company-strength” one can then see why the American raiding force, when combining the assault teams, support elements, perimeter security, command and control, aviations elements, and quick reaction reserves would number in the hundreds, a battalion-sized force.

Look, I'd love to see Zawahiri's head on a pike. And the day may come when the potential benefits of a massive troop influx across the Pakistani border outweigh the risks. Heck, maybe that day comes tomorrow. But Obama acts like this is a simple call, and doesn’t mention the potential risk to Musharraf’s regime in Pakistan, once the proud, nationalistic Pakistani people learn that Americans have invaded their territory. Is it worth getting Zawahiri if Islamists topple Musharraf from power? Would they get their hands on nuclear weapons under that scenario? Isn’t that going from the frying pan into the fire? Some rival might even call Obama's failure to acknowledge the risks “irresponsible and naive.”

Remember, those who think we marched into Iraq willy-nilly and recklessly think that the Bush administration has somehow gotten excessively cautious and gun-shy in dealing with Pakistan. I think this just means that the Democrats will object to any course of action set forth by this administration. 

08/01 10:10 AMShare