Pakistan Reaping the Whirlwind From Terrorists It Created

Seven Taliban terrorists, dressed as Pakistani Frontier Guards, attacked a primary school run by the Pakistani army in Peshawar, killing about 141 people, mostly schoolchildren and teachers, until they were finally liquidated over eight hours later. The school has 2,500 pupils aged 4 to 16. (Girls in school? UnIslamic!) As usual, the terrorists were well-armed with military-grade weapons, and included a suicide bomber. (Oh what joy, to blow oneself up and get to sleep with 76 virgins!)

The dead are said to include 132 children. Over 100 other people were wounded. [1]

To even get much attention in Western media, these terrorists have to commit more and more spectacular and grotesque atrocities. They've killed thousands of Pakistanis a year in their terrorist attacks.

The Pakistani Taliban, "Tehreek-e-Taliban," in claiming responsibility for the attack, said it was to avenge an army offensive against them. They complained of their women and children being killed by the army.  “We selected the army’s school for the attack because the government is targeting our families and females,” said Taliban spokesman Muhammad Umar Khorasani. “We want them to feel the pain.”

In retaliation, the Pak army is launching airstrikes within Pakistan. The army chief of staffed tweeted that “massive air strikes” had been carried out in the Khyber region even as the school was still being cleared. Perhaps he exaggerated the "had" already part. Clearly the intent is to bomb in retaliation for the retaliation. No doubt killing more women and children. For which the Taliban will retaliate. [2]

The Pakistani establishment is denouncing the terror attack. I guess that's progress for them.

This is a good time to review something the Pakistanis themselves won't do- how it has come to pass that a vicious, large scale and deeply entrenched terrorist army (actually several terrorist armies) exist inside the country with apparent free rein?

The answer, of course, is that the dominant institutions of Pakistan created these Frankenstein monsters themselves.

The genesis of this goes back at least to the anti-Soviet crusade in Afghanistan undertaken by Pakistan under the vicious military dictator Zia ul-Haq, Saudi Arabia, and of course most importantly the U.S., which provided the weaponry- especially Stinger shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles, and anti-tank infantry weapons- and billions of dollars to the "cause." [3]

Zia ul-Haq was one of Ronald Reagan's favorite dictators. (Another Reagan favorite was the "Christian" butcher of Guatemala, General Rios Montt, whom Reagan insisted was getting a "bum rap."

The three main members of the anti-Soviet alliance in Afghanistan had various reasons for wanting to keep Afghanistan mired in the 9th century. The U.S. was reflexively anti-Soviet, so the best interests of the Afghan people was of no consideration. (A pattern we see in every country where the U.S. imposes its imperialist will.) Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are both nations that strive to promote a medieval version of Islam. In addition, Pakistan regards Afghanistan as its backyard, and strove to create a client regime there, which it eventually did when the Afghan Taliban took over.

There were non-medieval resistance forces that the U.S. could have supported, such as those that later became the Northern Alliance against the Taliban tyranny, but the U.S. went along with its Paki and Saudi accomplices wishes and backed the fanatical fundamentalists, whose agenda included rolling back girls' education and all women's rights, which the "oppressive" Soviet-backed regime had instituted, among other hated impositions of modernity.

The secret police organ of the Pakistani military, the so-called "Inter Intelligence Service," or ISI, has over the years created a number of terrorist organizations, which it arms, trains, and directs, to commit atrocities in Indian Kashmir and in India proper, such as the numerous terrorist bombing and suicide attacks on Mumbai, India's financial center. (India has shown super-human forbearance by not retaliating. I can just imagine what would happen if Canada or Mexico sponsored a terrorist attack on Wall Street!) [4]

Another root cause of Islamofascist terrorism in Pakistan is the criminal negligence of the Pakistani elites. By not providing an educational system for the poor, they provide an opening for the religious fanatics to recruit children for their madrassas (funded all over the world by Saudi Arabia- them again!). These brainwashing centers masquerading as "religious schools" produce the raw material for suicide bombers and "holy warriors" (jihadists). Additionally, the government long ago ceded control of the so-called "tribal regions" to the local religious fundamentalists, in effect creating a Talibanistan inside Pakistan's nominal borders.

But even as its home-grown terrorists work to tear the country apart, Pakistan STILL won't stop sponsoring terrorism against India, in Indian Kashmir, and in Afghanistan.

Obviously the decent people in Pakistan don't deserve to live under this internal terrorist threat. For that matter, they don't deserve the corrupt civilian rulers and oppressive military apparatus that is imposed on them either.

The Pakistani media also plays a venal role, brainwashing the public instead of striving to enlighten it. The plutocratic owners of the media pursue their own selfish personal goals, using their media properties as their own toys. Additionally, journalists have to worry about terrorists killing them if they displease the terrorists with "negative" (that is, accurate) coverage. (An example of the tawdry nature of Pak media is their shabby treatment of hero teenage advocate of girls' education and Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, whom the Taliban tried to murder on her schoolbus a few years ago with a bullet in the brain. A young woman who should be a national heroine and source of pride is instead trashed.)

And with honest journalists subject to ISI beatings, torture, and murder, the prospect for responsible news and commentary taking root in the country labors under the additional handicap of state terrorism.

By now, the problem seems insoluble, except to let the Pashtuns of Afghanistan and Pakistan form their own nation. It would be a horrible, backward, oppressive country. Women will be treated barely better than animals, as is their "tradition" and "customs." At this point, unless the Pakistani army occupies the entire tribal areas and forcibly disarms every male, and then imposes some kind of normal civil society, continued violent conflict is unavoidable- notwithstanding the Paki army's chief vow today to exterminate "all" the "terrorists." Good luck with that.

And that leaves the problem of Afghanistan, where the Taliban are showing they are not at all defeated, and are stepping up their assaults and effectively taking control of more territory. Obama's plan to counter this is night raids by Special Forces assassination squads. That will hardly suffice to turn the tide. As with his various drone wars, it operates on the fallacious notion that killing "leaders" will destroy these entrenched religiously-based militant movements. (Maybe because neutralizing leaders of dissident movements works so well in U.S. domestic repression, they think it can work in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, and wherever.)

Relatives grieving for 15 year old Mohammed Ali Khan, murdered in school attack. There is an endless river of tears ahead in Pakistan.

1] Contradictory numbers have been reported on the number of attackers and victims. Some reports said there were nine attackers. A Pakistani party leader was reported in Dawn (Pakistan) saying 146 were killed, almost 140 being children.

2] See "Pakistan responds to Peshawar school massacre with strikes on Taliban," Guardian, 12/16/14.

The U.S. has also used air attacks on civilians within its own borders. Or rather local "authorities" have, as when the city government of Philadelphia dropped a plastic explosive bomb on the home of the MOVE group, burning down over 60 homes in a black neighborhood ion 1985. (The Mayor at the time was black, Wilson Goode, an ex-military policeman. Philadelphia has a long history of racist police repression, which Goode shamefully continued.) In 1921 whites used aircraft to burn down the black neighborhood of Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which was the wealthiest black neighborhood in the U.S. A total of 35 city blocks were burned to the ground. [See for example Tulsa race riot on Wikipedia, among other sources. This particular white pogrom is well-documented historically.]

3] I said "goes back at least to the Afghan war" because one could argue the root of the problem is traceable to the very establishment foundations of Pakistan itself by religious zealots with a hatred of Hindus.

4] See for instance "2008 Mumbai attacks," Wikipedia, "2011 Mumbai bombings," Wikipedia, "Mumbai Terror Attacks Fast Facts," CNN Library, November 19, 2014.