US helicopters apparently came under fire from Pakistani troops today as they made yet another incursion into Afghanistan’s neighbour country.
We all thought that that the parting present to the world from outgoing president George Bush and VP Dick Cheney was likely to be war with Iran (which is trying to acquire nuclear weapons, they think). Now it looks as though it might be conflict with Pakistan, which most certainly does have nuclear weapons.
Not only that but it has a newly-elected and weak government and a very powerful military and intelligence set-up which includes numerous sympathisers with the Taliban in Afghanistan. You’d think the right policy would be to try to win friends and influence people, the good old Reader’s Digest approach to diplomacy.
But that’s not George and Dick’s way.
In recent weeks America has all but ignored Pakistan’s sovereignty as it chases the bad hats in the black turbans over the border and, maybe, makes a last effort to kill or capture Osama bin Laden.
At the very least this will undermine the Pakistani government and leave the way open for a more fundamentalist successor (with access to that store of very big bangs). At worst it will result in a shooting border war between Pakistan and the US forces in Afghanistan, with heaven knows what consequences (including very big bangs).
One just hopes that British foreign secretary David Miliband is prepared to take the same firm line with the US as he tried to do with the Russians over Georgia. The stakes are infinitely higher and the least he can do is point out that America is on its own if it carries on this way.
But, as a good Blairite supporter of everything American, he won’t.