Karzai: A Roaring Mouse

Karzai: A Roaring Mouse; Pak Politicians & Their Base In Diplomatic Enclave

Does Hamid Karzai want to start the Third World War? If the Pakistan Army was to respond, a clash between them and NATO forces could bring the world to the thermonuclear threshold. He shouldn’t forget that, U.S. help notwithstanding, it was we who did what Napoleon and Hitler couldn’t – defeat the Russian Empire and liberate Afghanistan. Karzai was ‘Pakistan’s Karzai’ when he lived on our largesse for two decades, protected by our own ISI. This poor hapless rodent is required to kill all the cats that belong to the fierce breeds known as ‘Taliban’ and ‘Al Qaeda’. If he is lucky enough to avoid the fate of his predecessor Najibullah, he can return to live in Pakistan again to end his days in comfort, telling his grandchildren stories of the ‘glory’ that was once his as the Lord Mayor of Kabul who couldn’t kill cats.

By Humayun Gauhar

Sunday, 22 June 2008.

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—Have you ever heard a mouse roar? If you haven’t, you should have heard Hamid Karzai the other day. He called the Taliban leader “Pakistan’s Mullah Omar”, forgetting that the description “Pakistan’s Karzai” fitted him better once – the ingrate lived on our munificence for two decades under the protection of our ISI.

Now the latest occupiers of his country have ineffectively made him Lord Mayor of Kabul rejoicing under the title ‘President of Afghanistan’.

Dick Wittington returned to London when he imagined the bells tolling “Turn again Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London” and became a scullery boy again in the house of Mr. Fitzwarren. He found that his cat that he had sent on his master’s ship to be sold had earned him a fortune because it had killed all the mice in the King of Barbary’s palace. Sadly, Dick Whittington’s cat missed one mouse. Wonder of wonders, America adopted that mouse after occupying his country and has appointed him twice Lord Mayor of Kabul so far. It expects him to kill cats – a pipedream to beat all pipedreams!

The cats the poor hapless rodent is required to kill belong to the fierce breeds known as ‘Taliban’ and ‘Al Qaeda’.

Pakistan adrift without leader

Pakistan remains in a leaderless drift four months after elections, Western diplomats and military officials have said, and Pakistani politicians and Afghan officials are increasingly worried that no one is really in charge.

The leadership vacuum is most stark in dealing with militants, Pakistani politicians and foreign diplomats have said, adding that the Pakistani government and military officials were sending mixed signals about policy in the tribal areas that have become home to the Taliban and to Al Qaeda.

That confusion, military officials and diplomats warn, is allowing the militants to consolidate their sanctuaries while spreading their tentacles all along the border area. It has also complicated policy for the administration of George W. Bush, which leaned heavily on one man, President Pervez Musharraf, to streamline its anti-terrorism efforts in Paksitan.

If anyone is in charge, Pakistani politicians and Western diplomats say, it remains the military and the country’s premier intelligence agency, the Inter-Services Intelligence, or ISI, which operate with little real oversight.

While the recently elected civilian government has been criticized for dealing with militants, the military is brokering cease-fires and prisoner exchanges with minimum consultation with the government, politicians from the government coalition, diplomats and analysts said. Meanwhile, politicians in both the provincial and central government complain that they are excluded from the negotiations and did not even know of a secret deal struck in February, before the elections, let alone the details of the accord.