(H/T – Allahpundit, who is officially freaking out)
The Daily Mail reports that, after being given control of Pakistan’s Swat district, the Taliban took over the neighboring Bruner district, putting them a mere 60 miles from the capital of Islamabad.
If that isn’t disturbing enough, Bill Roggio has even worse news – they’re also moving on the Haripur district, which neighbors not only Islamabad, but the military garrison city of Rawalpindi (headquarters of the Pakistani Army) and several nuclear facilities, including the facility where Pakistan’s nuclear weapons are reportedly stored. If memory serves, Pakistan has close to 100 nuclear weapons, already sized for ballistic-missile or tactical fighter delivery, and while they don’t possess any purely-military nuclear-capable assets that can hit American soil, they do have nuclear-capable assets that can easily hit Afghanistan.
For those hoping that an Anbar-style “awakening” would stem the tide against the Taliban, Roggio has some very bad news – the Taliban is steamrolling through whatever resistance the local tribal lashkars have put up. That piece also reinforces the lesson that the Taliban cannot be negotiated with – on April 9, they agreed to pull out of Bruner; on the 10th, they started consolidating control over Bruner.
It’s not often that I agree with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, but her reaction to this news (from the Mail) rings true – “I think the Pakistani government is basically abdicating to the Taliban and the extremists.” Considering that the Taliban is an ISI creation, and that up until yesterday, the government of Pakistan wasn’t exactly willing to fight for Bruner, one could say that the Taliban is coming home to roost.
However, that would be a “minor” understatement. There is the “minor” matter of the nuclear weapons program.
It’s hard to believe America has fallen to the point that we are going to let thugs like the Taliban gain control of nuclear weapons because we’re too gutless to do anything about it.
But we have.
I was proud to get my citizenship back in the 80s, but now I’m wondering if there was any point.
But wait, I thout if we give the offended of the world, that which they desire, they would be pacified and let us all live in peace! You mean it’s really, “give them and inch and they take mile, after mile, after mile, after mile…..”
“I’d like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony….”