http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/15/world/asia/15policy.html?hp
I just give up. Just cut off all friggin aid and back India full-on on Kashmir and whatever else. We should have done this since 1947. Pakistan’s always had military dictatorships and Islamist movements running about while India has preserved something of democracy. Ideally India should never have been partitioned, its been the cause of all this grief.
The American government arrested the solider who leaked stuff to Wikileaks. Governments don’t like people who leak things, regardless of the goodness of their motives or the results.
When you say “fuck”, it makes Baby Jesus cry.
Yes, let’s purposefully annoy a nuclear theocracy with a high level of political instability and substantial numbers of hard-line Islamic death-cult fundamentalists.
That’ll end well.
I, too, am positively fuming when foreign countries act in ways not 100% in line with the interests of my own. Where do those nationalistic pricks get off pulling that shit ?!!
Thank goodness for that.
Did anyone else read the article in which the US cooperates with Pakistani authorities by saying “Hey, there’s a militant hideout over there!” Lo and behold, by the time the Pakistanis get there the militants have all fled! And yet the US continues to pander to Pakistan.
So what if Pakistan has nukes? I fucking dare them to light one off.
If they were a normal country they certainly wouldn’t fire them, but then if they were a normal country then examples like yours above wouldn’t happen in the first place.
They may well be on the brink of an Islamic revolution and full theocracy. The last thing we want to do is to give impetus to that. A nuclear Taliban? If that doesn’t give you pause for thought then it should.
As I am a very nice person, I will try to help you.
Pakistan has nukes primarily because of the long running tension with India, and as a pretty much direct result of the Indo-Pakistani war. Their most advanced delivery system, the Shaheen II, is a mid range missile with a range of around 3000km (i.e. the whole of India).
If they do “light one off”, then it will almost certainly be at India. India has a second strike capability, so they will almost certainly retaliate. You can then expect to see extremely high casualty levels in two countries with combined populations of 1.4 billion. That’s before you look at the likely collateral effects on Bangladesh (smack in the middle) and China.
Daring a chain of events like that as suggested response to Pakistan telling the CIA to go fuck themselves and shutting down anyone who fed info to them is a rather stupid thing to do. If you would like to appear less stupid, I would suggest you pass up on such helpful comments in the future.
I have no fear of Pakistani nukes because I am absolutely certain the number one wargame at USSOCOM is “How do we take the nukes away from Pakistan?” And anything commandos can’t accomplish can be finished off by bunker busters. Or vice versa. If we’re here arguing about it on a message board you can bet the US military has studied and planned for it down to the last detail. The Bin Laden raid proved that the US military can go right into the heart of Pakistan, kick whatever ass needs to be kicked and exfil back to friendly territory before Pakistan can blink. Like Bin Laden, the nukes aren’t moving around all the time. If the US knows where they are then the nukes are vulnerable.
The Pakistani nukes are a wild card but not one the government or Taliban can play. And if they do play them they automatically lose. What are they going to do, flip one at Afghanistan? Or India? They don’t have the capability to get one to Hawaii, much less the continental US. Meanwhile, the US can launch from B-52s, B2s, cruise missiles from ships or subs, cruise missiles launched from the air, ICBMs, tactical nukes on fighter-bombers, etc. So as Jules Winnfield would say, “I dare you… I double dare you muthafucka!” The Pakistani nuclear arsenal is not scary in any way in comparison to what the US could muster. Fuck 'em.
On preview: Gary, do you suppose the average citizen of the US cares if a bunch of people over there get killed in a nuclear war? Especially when Pakistan keeps up with behavior like this? :dubious: (Just to be clear, I don’t condone a nuclear holocaust. But take your average Joe Six-pack who thinks Mexican immigrants are ruining the US and ask him what he would think if a million brown folks halfway around the world were vaporized in a big explosion. I dare say there’s a good 30-50% of your countrymen who would be overjoyed if this happened.)
In any case, the nuclear stick that Pakistan wields is nowhere near the aggressive deterrent they would like it to be. And the consequences of them using a nuke are much worse for Pakistan than for anyone else. So again… fuck 'em.
What do you mean, “otherwise”? Are you claiming that the average US citizen does care if non-Americans die? On this board a lot of dopers, supposedly better educated than the average Joe Sixpack, routinely express their lack of concern for how people in the rest of the world are affected by their actions or lack of actions.
Sure, just like Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam etc. have been war-gamed. Any thoughts on how simple and straightforward they were. They all turned out well yes? Ah! I see. And in each of those cases the USA was not risking directly triggering a nuclear conflict if/when it went tits-up.
You are willing to put two angry cats in a sack and drop them off a bridge. Fuck 'em, it’ll be messy but they’ll be too far away to harm you and you are glad you won’t have to deal with them any more.
Be clear, the size and effectiveness of the Pakistani nuclear arsenal is irrelevant.
These are political weapons. Rather horrifically, the initial devastation they wreak is rather beside the point. The geo-political fallout will circle the globe in fairly short order and form a glowing heap in your back garden.
So if it was so easy and simple; why hasn’t it been done yet?
You are right. If we were a normal country we would be doing other things, like invading other countries on false pretenses.
To be fair, it takes some time to build up your skill level. I think this…
…Is level one, removing the nukes is level 8, there are at least two major end of level bosses and a motorcycle stage to get through yet.
Give him time, he only bought it yesterday.
What would the US do if citizens here had fed information to Saudi Intelligence agents that led to a clandestine Saudi incursion onto US soil in order to kill someone?
Whether or not we give money to Pakistan is dependent on the calculus of there being a net gain to the US for doing so, not whether each individual act by the Pakistanis is a gain for the US. If the argument can be made that there is a net loss, then cut off funds. But I would suggest the subject is more complex than the OP alleges.
What sorts of aid/funds are we giving Pakistan these days?
Why are you so damn eager to see millions of people killed? Are you some sort of fucking sociopath or something?
Here’s the sane alternative to all your moronic posturing: nukes are to be avoided at all costs. Never, ever, ever, EVER again. Period.