Our Best Frenemy

Pakistan. Their intelligence service whacked one reporter, beat the stuffing out of another (both for writing stories that made the Paki spooks uncomfortable) and supplies guns, money and training to our enemies.

Pakistan is playing a dual game and everybody who has been paying any attention knows it. It is somewhat understandable; Bush was ready to bomb the shit out of Pakistan in 2001, but the Pakistanis also know that the war in Afghanistan will end some day. The Great Game of Central Asia still goes on, the contested turf is the same, but this time the players are India and Pakistan, not the British and Russian Empires.

This is why of all of the military aid we give them to "fight terror", the vast majority goes to preparing to lose another war against India-- Pakistan arguably has initiated at least four wars with India, both large and small, and lost every one. With a record such as that, it is kind of hard to understand the esteem that the Pakistanis supposedly have for their army.

We're kind of stuck with them, as long as we need to get supplies and troops in and out of Afghanistan. Which is a strong argument for ending the conflict.