Story and photo found here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45442885/ns/world_news-south_and_central_asia/#.TtF7QFZdDz5
Update: Boinky posts this excerpt from a Strategy Page post on this story:
Since the border guards and paramilitary police in the tribal territory are recruited from the tribes, the Taliban can also recruit, bribe or coerce these troops to fire on NATO and Afghan forces. Border patrol bases are often used for this, and NATO air strikes and artillery will be used to support the NATO and Afghan ground troops that are under attack. Since Pakistan officially denies that their paramilitary forces often work for the Taliban, they declare that the casualties from NATO forces defending themselves are "unprovoked attacks on Pakistan." That fiction works for a while in the Pakistani media, but most Pakistanis know better.
The link: http://fkclinic.blogspot.com/
3 comments:
So much is stolen from the convoys that the US has been switching to bringing in supplies from the north (via the transSiberian RR etc).
And StrategyPage says these border posts are run by local tribesmen, not regular Pakistanis, and that often they are infiltrated by the Taliban so shoot at US or Afghan troops who are chasing the Taliban (who are running back to safe havens in Pakistan to hide).
In this case, it was the Afghans who called in the airstrikes.
The Pakistanis riot because they believe their press (and the Paki army kills any journalist who dares write the truth). But I'm not sure what is the excuse for the US press to assume that NATO is wrong (yes, they'll probably print a retraction on page 32 in a week or so).
Boinky,
There is no doubt that we are much more likely to get accuracy and truth from reading Strategy Page and other blogs than from the mainstream media. Yes, we should look on page 32 for the "clarification" in a few weeks.
Can't we just liposuck the middle east out of our lives?
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