Deteriorating U.S - Pakistan Relations

Pakistan's generals meet as relations with US hit new low
Pakistani military join scramble to tackle crisis as tensions with US escalate, raising likelihood of more drone strikes

Declan Walsh, Guardian, September 25, 2011

Pakistan's army chief has gathered his generals to discuss the escalating war of words with the US over the Haqqani insurgent network amid a deep sense of foreboding across the country.

The military refused to comment on the meeting chaired by General Ashfaq Kayani other than to say it was to discuss the "prevailing security situation". Media reports said the generals considered retaliatory action in the event of US military strikes in the northwestern tribal belt.

Meanwhile the prime minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, recalled his foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar, who has strongly defended the military, from the United Nations in New York.

The political and military scrambling reflected the gravity of a crisis triggered by a 20-hour Haqqani assault on the US embassy in Kabul on 13 September, and subsequent US allegations that Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence agency was behind the attack.

Last week the outgoing US military chief, Admiral Mike Mullen, described the Haqqani network as a "veritable arm" of the ISI that were being used to fight a "proxy war" in Afghanistan.

The bare-knuckles criticism of Pakistan's military, unprecedented since 2001, has plunged already troubled relations to a new low and triggered a deep sense of foreboding in Pakistan about what is coming next.

US actions will also be driven by domestic political pressure. In a taste of rising impatience with Pakistan, one senior Republican said the US was "going to have to put all options on the table, including defending our troops".

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