November 18,2008:
Pakistan is asking the UN for more help in supporting Afghan refugees on
its side of the Afghan-Pakistan border. As Pakistan sees it, Pakistan has
suffered the most from the Taliban violence in Afghanistan. Pakistan has spent
over $150 billion over the last three decades, supporting these refugees. That
doesn't count the cost of the 110,000 troops it now has on the border fighting
the Taliban.
But as the
Afghans see it, Pakistan created the problem they now complain about. In the
1990s, Islamic radicals in the Pakistani military created the Taliban, by
arming Afghan students in Wahhabi religious schools in Pakistan, providing some
training and technical support, and sending the lads off to end the civil war
raging in Afghanistan. But when the Taliban gained control of Afghanistan, the
Pakistanis began to have second thoughts. In fact, by then, the Pakistani
generals and politicians had abandoned Islamic conservatism, for it had proved
no solution to Pakistans problems. Too late. When September 11, 2001 came
along, and American troops engineered the overthrow of the Taliban government
two months later, the Pakistanis found Islamic terrorism had become entrenched
among their Pushtun tribes, and was spreading to some urban areas. After al
Qaeda was chased out of Afghanistan, the terrorist group declared war on the
Pakistani government, for siding with the Americans. That war continues, with
al Qaeda losing, but not yet destroyed.
Be careful
what you wish for, or create, as it may come back to haunt you.