Pakistan Is Obama's Big Test, Says Wall Street Journal

A senior American official was asked a few days ago whether there were places where the global economic mess could aggravate security problems. He answered without hesitation: "Pakistan."

That is the concern to keep in mind as President-elect Obama's transition to power unfolds in coming weeks. The new president's advisers worry that if there's an unpleasant foreign-policy surprise that will divert their attention from enormous economic challenges, it could well come in Pakistan.

It's a well-founded fear. Pakistan was a tense and worrisome place for America before the world-wide financial mess arrived. The country is, after all, a nuclear-armed Islamic giant run by an unproven new government, beset by internal political rifts, conducting a fitful struggle with Taliban and al Qaeda insurgents along its border with Afghanistan, and threatened by Islamic radicals angry over American military strikes along that same Afghan border. That's plenty to keep a new president awake at night.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[bascombe]

murdock's pet rag has an opinion!

so what...

[Liberoservative]

Tell us something that we already didn't know WSJ.....

Good grief.... every single thinking person in world politics and international affairs knows that Pakistan is a powderkeg......

Maybe you are doing a good job to bring that fact to the mouth breathers out there that still think that we are America of the past......

[GeorgeP922]

I suggest everyone read up on WSJ.

The paper is a right wing mud machine, and is literaly falling apart.

I suggest you find a November 5 edition and read the cover.

According to WSJ when they went to press they couldnt call it for Obama.

Your telling me now they went to press at 9:30 pm.

Although I hate to see newspapers hurting, I cant wait to see the WSJ fall.

[honeydiva]

right wingers don't get a say as to what his big test is...murdoch s.h.u.t. up.

[PSM42]

Noam Chomsky advises us that the Financial Times and the Wall Street Journal are the most accurate sources of information, because those running businesses have to have a fairly accurate view of the world. Unlike the view of those who rely on the MSM. Also, he says, the FT does that without the ridiculous editorials of the WSJ, so the FT is just 100% accurate reporting.

This of course, would be a WSJ editorial opinion. Therefore worthless.

[functor]

Pakistan Zindabad!

[arvay]

The Pakistani army seems to be engaged in a military effort similar to what the Russians did in Chechnya. Like the Syrian government's elimination of the Muslim Brotherhood, they may very well succeed. The results will be horrible, like the Roman army wiping out north European resistance to Roman rule.

From the Pakistani government point of view, an aggressive, independent Taliban state within their own country is unacceptable, so I think they will proceed despite the cost in human life.

Possibly our best option is to strike back occasionally against Taliban attacks in Afghanistan and provide whatever material help we can to the Pakistani government. At best, the Afghan state seems to be failing. It's unclear whether reinforcements from the US and its allies will help much.

It's possible that a negotiated settlement with some power-sharing by Taliban elements may defuse the situation and we can withdraw the troops which are, in the final analysis, the magnet that draws militants to the area.