The world's first uncontested superpower doesn't have to account for its actions to anyone, even its own people.
In the words of the first President Bush after his government shot down an Iranian civilian airliner in 1988, killing all 290 persons on board, "I'll never apologize for the United States of America. Ever, I don't care what the facts are."
During last year's presidential campaign and most notably during the debates of the general election, Barrack Obama repeatedly vowed that "If we have actionable intelligence about high-level al Qaeda targets in Pakistan's border region, we must act if Pakistan will not or cannot."
Rarely (never before to this writer's recollection) has a candidate for the post of US president with a serious chance of winning, and a standing Senator moreover, so brazenly proclaimed the intent of launching deadly military attacks inside a nation that the US was not at war with, that is in fact a major half-century-long American ally and military client. And rarely has a campaign pledge been delivered on so promptly and resolutely.
Again leaving aside the origins of al-Qaeda in US-assisted training camps in Pakistan in the 1980s, the best that one could say about the above-quoted statement is a desideratum written at the time by an American political journalist: One hopes it was only another false campaign promise.
It wasn't. Between the election of November 4 and the changing of the guard on January 23 of this year the incumbent Bush government acted on Obama's words and launched a series of missile attacks on and suspected commando raids in Pakistan's tribal regions with the outgoing president perhaps wishing to steal some of the incoming's thunder.
On his very first day in office Obama delivered on his promise and five missiles were launched into North and South Waziristan, killing 14 people, suspected armed militia and possibly others.
The attacks have continued uninterruptedly with over 30 killed in missile strikes in South Waziristan on February 14; 30 in the Kurram Agency on February 16; seven more on March 1 in South Waziristan; 24 on March 12 in the Kurram Agency; and most recently at least five killed on March 16 in the North-West Frontier Province.
The US's preceding post-Cold War wars - Operation Desert Storm in 1991, Operation Allied Force in 1999, Operation Enduring Freedom in 2001, Operation Iraqi Freedom in 2003 - were waged against basically defenseless nations with populations under 30 million.
Pakistan has 173,000,000 citizens, nuclear weapons and the bombers and missiles to deliver them.
In the give and take of US foreign policy, the Democratic Party handed the Korean and Vietnam wars over to the Republicans and the Republicans have now returned the favor by bequeathing the Iraq and Afghanistan wars to the Democrats.
Republican President Dwight Eisenhower ended the US military campaign on the Korean peninsula (though bases and troops remain there fifty six years later).
His vice-president Richard Nixon while later president himself inherited the Vietnam war from Democrat Lyndon Johnson and escalated the bombing of North Vietnam and expanded the war into Cambodia.
The current Obama administration may commence partial military disengagement from Iraq but has already continued, as detailed above, to extend the war into neighboring Pakistan.
The New York Times of two days ago wrote of plans by Obama and his national security advisers to further deepen military attacks inside Pakistan, reaching beyond the tribal belt to the environs of the capital of Baluchistan, Quetta.
Pakistani Baluchistan borders with Baluch-inhabited southeastern Iran and missile attacks and commando raids on the Pakistani side could spill over to and drag in Iran. Perhaps that's Washington's intention.
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