The Myth That Contemporary Western Mass Media Help Understand the World: An Example on Pakistan

This article is published in PajamasMedia.

By Barry Rubin

People ask me why I write so much and I explain that I don’t want to do so but keep coming across such important events, missed stories, and outrageous nonsense that I feel compelled to say something. So it is in this case.

Here’s the problem: a remarkable amount of what's written on the Middle East in the mass media—and certainly the efforts to analyze it as opposed to reporting events—is nonsensical. It makes the region harder to understand. It misleads the reader.

An example is Anatol Lieven, “5 Myths about Pakistan,” Washington Post, June 5, 2011. Lieven is a professor at Kings College London and a senior fellow at the New America Foundation. He has just written a book on Pakistan.

One of the techniques often employed in the creation of the Fantasy Middle East is to misstate totally the issues at stake. Note the use of that technique in Lieven's article.

Alleged Myth One: Pakistan is a U.S. ally in the war on terrorism.”

Pakistan, he writes, just follows its own interests. Sometimes it’s helpful and sometimes it isn’t. Fair enough, that’s what allies generally do. But the policy question is: whether Pakistan is helpful often enough to merit being treated like an ally and given huge amounts of aid. The answer is”no.” Neither the question nor the answer is addressed.

Incidentally, it’s pretty outrageous that Lieven suggests that Pakistan supports the Taliban because India is inciting other groups in Afghanistan to seize power. Yet since Pakistan’s policy has been the same for 30 years--it has long supported radical Islamist forces in Afghanistan--how can India be to blame for relatively recent policies? To bash India for Pakistan's behavior in Afghanistan is absurd.

If a country supports to a major degree the two groups that attacked America on September 11—the Taliban and al-Qaida—plus is a major sponsor of terrorism against India, the answer to question 1 isn’t “Sometimes” but "Definitely not!"

Alleged Myth 2: ”Pakistan is an ally of the Taliban.”

Again, Lieven turns this into a “straw man” argument. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t, he says. But the real answer is "yes," if one is talking about the Afghan Taliban, which is what the United States is mainly concerned about! It is only an enemy of the [Pakistani] Taliban that tries to take over Pakistan. So, again, Pakistan IS an ally of the [Afghan] Taliban, the group--along with al-Qaida--that the United States gives it billions of dollars to fight against!

Alleged Myth 3: “Islamist revolution is coming to Pakistan.”

Why is this a myth? Because, says Lieven, less than one-fifth of Pakistanis view the Taliban favorably in a poll. As if, that’s the only Islamist group! He cites one Pew poll number but other polls and other questions show a remarkably high level of support for Islamism among Pakistanis. Putting such a spin on one item and leaving out others verges, to put it politely, on deliberate dishonesty.

Indeed, a recent Pew poll shows that Pakistanis support Islamism by a whopping 47 to 15 percent margin. Thus, this argument that Pakistanis don't want Islamism is a total myth. That's why Lieven misrepresents the issue to "prove" that Pakistanis don't want the Taliban's specific brand of Islamism.

I'm not saying that Pakistan will have a radical Islamist revolution. But it is certainly possible. If Turkey and Egypt can become Islamist, surely Pakistan could do so.

Alleged Myth 4 “Massive U.S. aid lets Washington dictate Pakistani policy.”

This one really made me angry. Nobody seriously argues such a thing. The real issue is whether the large amount of aid and support the United States gives Pakistan provides some American leverage to get Pakistan to do things that the United States wants and needs to be done. If this aid does no good at all then it shouldn’t be given in the first place.

The correct formulation is: Does giving Pakistan massive aid provide Washington with any ability at all to have the slightest effect on Pakistani policy.” If billions of dollars cannot even get them to help find Usama bin Laden what good are they?

Alleged Myth 5 “Pakistan, not Afghanistan, is the front in the war on terrorism.”

The front? I don’t know anyone who says this either. That's just a phony issue. The real question is: Does Pakistan provide really positive aid in fighting terrorism or not? But if one frames the question in that way the answer is not likely to be in the affirmative, which is presumably why this question isn't asked.

So what’s the bottom line? The author writes what he's been setting up for that entire misleading essay:

“None of this means that the United States should pursue more aggressive policies against Pakistan to win the war on terrorism….Any U.S. action that endangered the stability of the Pakistani government would be insane.”

In other words, U.S. policy is just fine and there's no need to change anything. Who cares if they support the Taliban, hide al-Qaida leaders, and launch terrorist attacks on India? Just keep sending them money and keep giving them support.

Precisely the same argument has and will be used to rationalize such things as:

U.S. aid and support to the Palestinian Authority (even if it refuses to negotiate or make peace and brings Hamas into the government);

Turkey (despite its regime's growing support for Iran,

Syria (the regime supposedly wants to reform itself and you can't expect it to abandon the alliance with Iran so who cares if they shoot down thousands of unarmed citizens and help terrorist groups along with opposing U.S. policies and interests);

Lebanon (even if Hizballah will be in the government and the country is dominated by Syria and Iran);

and no doubt soon Egypt (with a radical nationalist-Islamist regime that will be against the United States.

You can easily adjust the five "myths" to suit each circumstance. Indeed, if Iran's leaders didn't keep "stubbornly" refusing to make some phony deal on their nuclear program the Obama administration and many "experts" would no doubt be advocating the same ideas about Iran, too.

Why was that article written? Like so many, to turn something obvious through "sophistication" into a brain-dead conclusion. Let's state it briefly to make the point stand out:

High-ranking elements in Pakistan have just got caught hiding Usama bin Ladin, the world's number-one wanted terrorist who killed 3000 Americans on September 11and have repeatedly been caught helping bin Ladin's enablers, the Afghan Taliban, and terrorists murdering people in India. No apology, no investigation, no change of policy by Pakistan.

The expert recommendation? U.S. policy toward Pakistan shouldn't change at all.

This is the foolishness dressed up with deception and double-talk that so often substitutes for serious debate in America's mass media today.

I would call the kind of article I'm analyzing here not only “misinformation” but ”anti-information.” In other words, the person reading it would be worse informed afterward than they were beforehand!

And the same goes for much—most? Almost all?—of the material of this nature in the mass media. Not only do we face this propaganda barrage but contrary opinions are generally  barred from mass media publication or broadcast altogether.

What I've done with this article and others can be done with many of the items on the Middle East that appear daily in prestigious publications. It's not just about getting details wrong, it's about total misdirection. A few minutes of serious analysis can totally demolish what they are saying while exposing their hidden (wrong) assumptions.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, and a featured columnist at PajamasMedia http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/ His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is http://www.gloria-center.org. His PajamaMedia columns are mirrored and other articles available at http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com/.

Bin Laden's Posthumous Fans

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By Barry Rubin

As so often happens, a peripheral issue has taken over the Western debate regarding the killing of Usama bin Laden. Whether or not the U.S. government releases a photo of the body isn't so important. If bin-Laden isn’t dead let him prove it by sending a video to al-Jazira. The issue is whether or not killing him was a good thing.

As for photos, those who believe that bin Laden isn't dead won't be convinced by photos. Ironically, many of them will simultaneously say that the United States didn't kill bin Laden but the fact that the United States killed bin Laden is a crime for which revenge should be taken.

We should have learned this from September 11, since many say that al-Qaeda wasn't responsible and it was done by the U.S. government and Israel while, at the same time, saying that it was an operation that made Muslims and Arabs feel proud and America deserved it.

Welcome to the Middle East!

Today--and for some years now--people in the Middle East haven't hated America because of its policies so much as defining whatever it does as hateful because America is already an enemy.  If you don't want revolutionary Islamists to take over countries, repress all freedom, suppress women, wipe Israel off the map, and expel all Western influence from the region then you are their enemy. You can be a weak, contemptible enemy or a strong bullying enemy but that's about the extent of your choice.

The reaction to the killing of UBL takes place in this context, Those Islamists and radical nationalists who saw bin Laden as a rival in life are finding him a useful martyr in death. Again, the issue is not whether bin Laden is dead but whether the United States was bad in killing him.

So far Hamas, the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, the highest Muslim cleric in Egypt, and Western favorite phony moderate Tariq Ramadan have all basically endorsed UBL as a great guy, a real martyr, and the victim of an evil United States.

The al-Aqsa Brigades of Fatah also apparently said so though it quickly withdrew the statement when it made the public relations’- conscious Palestinian Authority leadership uncomfortable. Yet the idea that this is just another American atrocity--one more reason to hate the United States--is a powerful force among Palestinians and also in public opinion in Egypt and Jordan.

And so the killing of UBL will enter the long list of U.S. policies for which America is disliked by many Muslims and Arabs in particular. There is a lesson here: whatever the United States does will be criticized because America as a great power, a civilization, a set of policies, and a presence internationally is hated by many, especially by revolutionary Islamists.

Consider the very “moderate” and sophisticated Mr. Ramadan, or perhaps I should say Professor Ramadan since he’s currently at Oxford University and Notre Dame wants to hire him. That’s pretty good for the grandson of a Nazi collaborator and the son of an agent working for a Nazi collaborator (Amin al-Husaini, the mufti of Jerusalem).

Not only did Ramadan criticize the killing of UBL but also called the burial at sea “against all the Islamic rituals.” Well, was bin Laden behind the September 11 attacks, Ramadan replies: "We don't know. Nobody knows—even the Americans." So much for moderation.

The killing poses a complex issue for Iran, Syria, and Hizballah. Iran is harboring scores of al-Qaeda leaders but the Tehran government—and also Hizballah—are Shia Muslims, a group that bin Laden despised. So no tears will be shed though perhaps some anti-Americanism can be stirred up in the Sunni Arab world by Iran.

Syria worked closely with al-Qaida in Iraqi terrorism but Damascus has also blamed al-Qaeda for internal attacks (ranging from possible regime hoaxes to democratic demonstrations) and so it isn’t well placed to cheer UBL now.

Regarding Pakistan, it has been an open secret—even published in the mass media—that the Pakistani government has sponsored terrorism and collaborated with al-Qaeda and the Taliban. Yet the U.S. government continued to pour money into the country.

Consider the murderous attack on Mumbai, India that took hundreds of hostages and killed so many people in cold blood. The group that conducted it operates from Pakistan with the knowledge of the authorities there. That government refused to cooperate with investigation or to extradite terrorists. We’re now supposed to be surprised that bin Laden was sheltering there?

In an official press release, the Pakistani army simultaneously claims credit for killing UBL and criticizes the United States for doing so. An official statement from the chief of staff of Pakistan’s army states:

“[We have] made it very clear that any similar action, violating the sovereignty of Pakistan, will warrant a review on the level of military / intelligence cooperation with the United States.

“The Corps Commanders were informed about the decision to reduce the strength of US military personnel in Pakistan to the minimum essential.

“As regards the possibility of similar hostile action against our strategic assets, the Forum reaffirmed that, unlike an undefended civilian compound, our strategic assets are well protected and an elaborate defensive mechanism is in place.”

So the U.S. killing of bin Laden is a cowardly attack on “an undefended civilian compound;” if the United States tries something like that again the Pakistani army will fight America; and the Americans are to be punished by expelling some of their personnel.

That’s quite a highly subsidized ally you have there!

Speaking of allies, a lot of the European media coverage revolved around whether the U.S. government broke international law by killing UBL. See previous paragraph.

And, once again, let me point out that al-Qaeda is a terrorist threat but not a strategic threat. The real problem is with revolutionary Islamists: Hamas, Hizballah, Iran, Syria, and the Muslim Brotherhood. If U.S. policy goes soft on these groups—even helping them at times—terrorism, anti-Americanism, and instability are going to get worse.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center, editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal, and a featured columnist for PajamasMedia at http://pajamasmedia.com/barryrubin/. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is http://www.gloria-center.org/. His PajamaMedia columns are mirrored and other articles available at http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com/.

An Article That Can (and Should) Change Western Understanding of the Middle East

By Robert E. Hughes exclusively for Rubin Reports

By Barry Rubin

Rarely has a mass media article shaken me up as this one does. It is a rare, intense, view of what the Middle East is really like nowadays, though it is about  Pakistan, on the eastern end of the region, in Pakistan. I wrote this before the events in Egypt but it certainly applies there as well.

This is to take nothing away from the brave demonstrators in Egypt, and especially the moderates and truly pro-democracy people among them. In fact, the odds they face and the relatively low numbers of people who want such an outcome makes them all the braver and more admirable.

But let's remember that both the lawyers' and doctors' associations in Egypt are dominated by the Muslim Brotherhood.

The title of the article is, "A governor's assassination has delivered Pakistan to the extremists," by Pamela Constable in the Washington Post.

The background is the assassination of a government official because he suggested easing the country's blasphemy law, which has often been used against Christians or for personal vendettas. Constable notes that the law, "Makes any purported slur against the prophet Muhammad--even a misinterpreted remark or a discarded Koran--grounds for execution."

She describes how, "At a fashionable plaza in this serene Pakistani capital, a few dozen people gather in the evenings at the spot where provincial governor Salman Taseer was gunned down on Jan. 4."

But meanwhile, fifteen miles away "in a working-class alley of Rawalpindi, thousands of people flock each day to the home of Mumtaz Qadri, the elite police guard who killed Taseer. Qadri is in jail now, but the site has become a shrine to what many Pakistanis see as his heroic act against a blasphemer who insulted their prophet. Someone has even put up posters of Qadri riding a white horse to heaven."

In short, the masses are with the extremists. There are dozens for moderation and democracy; thousands for revolutionary Islamism. She continues:

"In the days since Taseer's death, Pakistan has become a different country. The veneer of Western democracy has been ripped away, the liberal elite has been cowed into silence, and the civilian government has beaten a hasty retreat from morality, authority and law. Islamic extremist groups, once dismissed as unable to win more than a few seats in Parliament, are filling the streets, with bearded acolytes waving flags and chanting like giddy crowds at a post-game victory rally."

I think it was always like that, more or less, under the veneer so often screened out of sight by the cosmopolitan types that journalists usually hang out with. Now it is just coming more to the surface, and to the attention of Western reporters. When I was last in Pakistan, my host took me to the upscale Sin Club where he was most disappointed when I didn't want to drink the expensive scotch he ordered.

A very admirable American diplomat, the only one I know who predicted the Iranian revolution, explained to me that it was easier to have one cup of tea with a cabinet minister than 50 cups of tea with workers, peasants, and small merchants. Constable continues:

"Suddenly, a crucial U.S. ally in the fight against terrorism seems incapable of stopping a tide of intolerant and violent Islam at home [that's Pakistan today and not, perhaps, Egypt in a couple of years--BR]--raising doubts about Pakistan's ability to play a constructive role in the war against the Taliban or to help the United States extricate its forces from Afghanistan, Pakistan's northern neighbor."

Well, plenty of other things have raised doubts, like the high levels of cooperation with the terrorists and Pakistani intelligence's involvement in helping them. but again, the tide and the doubts can no longer be ignored.

But this should not just be a story about Pakistan but a story of what's happening all the way to Morocco in the west and Indonesia far to the southeast. While Westerners obsess about Israeli-Palestinian issues as the center of the universe and think that flattery and kind words will make the radicals go away, there is a volcano seething out there. The lava is also flowing down onto Gaza and Lebanon, Egypt and Iraq, and elsewhere.

Now, contrast these two paragraphs. First, Constable:

"Qadri, who happily confessed to murdering the politician he was assigned to protect, has little chance of being convicted. Instead of suffering ostracism, he was greeted with handshakes and garlands by courthouse lawyers, who offered to defend him [for free]. The provincial court system, notorious for freeing radical Islamic leaders, is unlikely to condemn a national religious hero."

Now, the New York Times:

"Cheering crowds have gathered in recent days to support the assassin who riddled the governor of Punjab with 26 bullets and to praise his attack — carried out in the name of the Prophet Muhammad — as an act of heroism. To the surprise of many, chief among them have been Pakistan’s young lawyers, once seen as a force for democracy."

Why should anyone be surprised? The "many observers" are certainly not Pakistanis, who know better, but Western observers who assume that lawyers must be moderate, modernizing people. But in Egypt and Jordan, for example, the lawyer's associations are controlled by the Muslim Brotherhood. While in the West law is pretty secular, in Muslim-majority countries it is closely (to varying extents) linked to Islamic law.

Remember President Obama's terrorism advisor who explained that Hizballah couldn't be terrorist because it had so many lawyers in its ranks? (That's not a joke. He did say it.) Well, this may come as a shock to you all but even lawyers can be terrorists, and their bills are paid in blood.

In the West, doctors are modernist, relatively moderate people generally, with a very high proportion of atheists while in Muslim-majority countries many--though by no means all--are radical Islamists. Consider the al-Qaida leader al-Zawahiri, the Palestinian terrorist Dr. Wadi Haddad and many others. Even some Muslim doctors living in the West who have been involved in terrorist attacks.

So both much of the masses and much of the elite in many places want an Islamist revolution. They don't want democracy. The rules by which Westerners think about their own politics and societies do not apply to these societies.

Remember Obama's speech in Cairo? As usual, William Shakespeare said it best, "There are more things in heaven and earth...Than are dreamt of in your philosophy."

Here's the reality after billions of dollars in U.S. aid to Pakistan:

"In Friday sermons and at many levels of Pakistani society, one hears warnings about creeping Westernization, secular culture and forceful aggression against Islam by America and its allies. When Pope Benedict XVI called for a repeal of Pakistan's blasphemy law this month, some Muslim clerics decried it as part of the foreign conspiracy and said the pope was inviting attacks on minority Christians in Pakistan."

Is this all so new? Check out my analysis of the shocking Pew poll results, especially for Egypt and Jordan. (I didn't analyze the Pakistan and Nigeria results but they are also extremely radical.) 

In Pakistan, no one wants to challenge the public wrath (in pre-PC days we'd be using the word "fanatical").

But there's much, much more. I think about the Syrian woman television producer who, though an Alawite, cheered on the radical Islamists who'd fire her from her job, confine her to her home at best, and maybe execute her as an Alawite heretic.  I think of the crazed hatred against Israel and the West of the Islamists and now even mainstream clerics. How when the West views itself as being generous and repentant, the other sees this behavior as showing weakness.

And I think of the naive, well-intentioned Western elites who explain that it is all "our" fault, how there is no real difference between religions (not just in theory but as presently practiced), and how any critical analysis of Third World societies is some form of evil, or how concessions will please and appease the problems away.

This is not about Israel or the boundaries of Jerusalem. It is about revolution and the fate of one billion people.

Ladies and gentleman, the unstoppable force is about to crash into the supposedly immovable barrier. And the barrier doesn't even know it; while those who should be manning it are busy dismantling it.

The above paragraph was written before the events in Egypt.

America's Biggest International Problem: Global Political Warming as Neglect Fuels Aggression

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The following article appears in PajamasMedia and is reproduced here for your convenience, with some improvements.

By Barry Rubin

One of the main features of this sick, sad era in international relations is that hugely important developments are ignored, having no effect on Western policy. Here’s one such case: Indian investigators have confirmed that Pakistani intelligence was deeply involved in the massive, bloody Mumbai terror attack in 2008, killing 166 people.

The story should be on the front page of every Western newspaper.

This Pakistani involvement has long been suspected but now there is strong evidence on the record. Just think of it: Pakistan is a huge U.S. aid recipient. It suffers no consequence of being a sponsor of terrorism, not only in this case against India but also repeatedly in previous attacks and in helping terrorist groups in Afghanistan.

Yet there is something in the strategy of ignoring this problem that fits into the broader strategy of the Obama Administration: buy short-term quiet and apparent popularity at the price of strategic decline and future crises. Let’s go through the Mumbai story and then look at the bigger picture.

The group carrying out the Mumbai attack was Lashkar-e-Taiba, an organization completely dependent on Pakistani financing, training, arming, and safe haven.

Now, U.S. officials have new and dramatic evidence of this because the source for the information is an American in U.S. custody. His name is David Headley, who has pleaded guilty in a federal court of involvement in the attack and is cooperating with the government. He has detailed how officers from the Inter-Services Intelligence Agency, Pakistan’s notorious intelligence force, helped carry out the raid.

According to Headley, as recorded in a report on the interrogation, the Pakistanis directed and funded the group. In Headley’s case, he was trained as a spy, paid, and sent to India where he took photos and videos of potential places for attack. The material was turned over to the group’s intelligence liaison who then suggested where and how to kill lots of people, including American citizens staying in hotels and the office of the Jewish Chabad group.

This should lead to a major crisis in U.S.-Pakistan relations. Regardless of the fact that Pakistan is “helping” the United States against al-Qaida and the Taliban. But wait! How much is it helping? U.S. officials have also reported that Pakistani intelligence is assisting the Taliban in killing Americans in Pakistan and not working all that hard to find Usama bin Ladin and his friends.

Now let’s be clear. There is a genuine policy dilemma for the United States, the need to balance Pakistani help against Pakistani sabotage of U.S. policy and terrorism. The point is that the Mumbai information should be the last straw, showing the need for some confrontation.

Yes, the popularity of the United States might decline a few percentage points in Pakistan. There might even be—shudder!—tension. Yet it is time for the U.S. government to demand full cooperation, a change in Pakistani behavior, turning over all the wanted terrorists and their handlers to India, or else the United States will take serious action.

Or does the Obama Administration want to be an ally of those who murdered 166 people in Mumbai, the equivalent of backing those who carried out the September 11, Lockerbie, Spanish train, and British underground bombings?

Oh, wait! The U.S. government is now advocating and helping the Afghan government negotiate with the Taliban, the partner in the September 11 attacks. How can this be justified: Easily, by claiming that there are forces in the Taliban that can be moderated. Of course, the problem this isn’t true.

Combined with naiveté and ignorance, what are the other factors in this move? Well, if the Taliban makes some kind of truce or reduces its fighting, the Obama Administration can withdraw U.S. troops from Afghanistan and claim victory, or at least stability, has been attained. This, however, would just set the scene for a strengthened Taliban and far more fighting soon after U.S. combat troops leave.

Yet this isn’t the first time such a strategy has been used by the Obama Administration. It ended efforts to subvert the Hamas regime in the Gaza Strip and also continues engagement with Syria despite that country’s continued anti-American extremism. While the governments in Venezuela and Turkey trounce U.S. interests, this is also ignored.

Other examples can be cited of this approach toward such disparate countries as Russia, North Korea, and others, as well as benign neglect of problems like the fact that Iraq is suffering from a huge political crisis of having no government at all. In the UN Human Rights Committee, despite the domination of radical states and no change from past misdeeds, the administration justifies its decision to join by pretending there are no problems at all.

The worst problem the United States is going to face may be a political global warming, as neglected crises heat up, while tolerated radical forces set the world aflame with increased violence and aggression in the next few years.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). The website of the GLORIA Center is at http://www.gloria-center.org and of his blog, Rubin Reports, http://www.rubinreports.blogspot.com.

Clinton: It's OK If Pakistan Lets Anti-American Terror Attacks Be Planned There As Long as NY Street Vendors Stop Them

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By Barry Rubin

After ascertaining that the Times Square bomber had connections with the Pakistani Taliban, secretary of State Hillary Clinton was asked about her view of Pakistan's cooperation. She responded:

"This is a threat that we share. We have a common enemy. There is no time to waste going after that common enemy." She would not criticize Pakistan and in fact said, “I have to stand up for the effort that the Pakistani government is taking....We’ve gotten more cooperation and it’s been a real sea change" in their efforts.

But the tip-offs are the phrases about how effective the Pakistani government is being against terrorists "in their own country" and about a "threat that we share." In other words, as I've previously pointed out, the Pakistani government fights against terrorists that want to overthrow it (Pakistani Taliban) but not against those who merely want to kill Indians (several Pakistani-backed groups) or Americans (al-Qaida, Afghan Taliban).


Let me underline this point. The Pakistani government may act regarding threats that "we share," but does not regard al-Qaida and the Afghan Taliban--in contrast to the Pakistani Taliban--as threats to itself.

It is hardly surprising that Pakistan would struggle against those who want to bring down its own government, line up its leaders against the wall, and shoot them. But how much help is U.S. aid buying against those who aren't targeting Pakistan or are even cooperating with the regime there? Not much.

Then Clinton made one of the type of "tough" statements with huge loopholes she is fond of uttering:

“If an attack like this which we can trace back to Pakistan had been successful there would be very severe consequences.”

So since the attack failed, the U.S. government apparently sees no need to change its policy toward Pakistan.

I don't want to be unfair. Presumably there is a lot of chatter going on behind the scenes. Yet the massive flows of money from the United States to Pakistan simply hasn't brought results in terms of an all-out effort to wipe out al-Qaida and Afghan Taliban forces along the border or even to round up the top leadership of al-Qaida.

Of course it isn't easy to get Usama bin Ladin but when the history of this issue is written Pakistan's permissiveness and even aid to these terrorists will be clear. The story has already begun to come out, as when a reporter saw first-hand the warm cooperation between the terrorists and the Pakistan authorities.

But then Clinton apparently forgot her annoyance at Pakistan before the Times Square attack. As the Pakistani government does a worse job the criticism disappears. It should be the other way around. Moreover, all these American efforts (and spending) has had no effect within Pakistan, where people view the United States and India--not al-Qaida and the Taliban--as the enemy.

What should U.S. policy be? Simple, the basic type of policy that should be used everwhere. American aid and support has to be conditioned on real effort and real results. If these things don't happen, there should be criticism, pressure, and reduced support. There seems no hint of this in U.S.-Pakistan relations and the implication is that Pakistan is doing the U.S. government a favor by not collapsing and taking American money.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). His new edited books include Lebanon: Liberation, Conflict and Crisis; Guide to Islamist Movements; Conflict and Insurgency in the Middle East; The West and the Middle East (four volumes); and The Muslim Brotherhood. To read and subscribe to MERIA, GLORIA articles, or to order books. To see or subscribe to his blog, Rubin Reports.

Hillary Clinton: Pakistan Isn't Helping Against al-Qaida

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By Barry Rubin

Every week or so, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reminds us that the wrong Democrat was elected president in 2008. In these cases, she gets off-script, showing her skepticism about engagement with Iran before it became obvious even in the White House, or expressing the novel idea that U.S. policy should view Israel as a valuable ally.

Now she's addressed legitimate frustration with Pakistan, a country which has received billions in U.S. aid yet barely lifts a finger to help U.S. policy. The Pakistani government pretends to fight terrorism but only the terrorists who directly challenge the regime. There is ample reason to believe that Pakistani intelligence helps the Taliban in Afghanistan, sponsors terrorists who attack India, and does little to help against al-Qaida forces operating within Pakistan and along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.

Remember the bloody attack by Pakistan-based and sponsored terrorists in Mumbai, India? What has the Pakistani regime done to round up those responsible, punish them, and provide information on the terrorists to India that would help prevent another such attack? Nothing.

People with access to intelligence information say that Chinese flights carrying military equipment--including things that can be used for weapons' of mass destruction--to Iran pass through Pakistan, too.

And take a look at my article HERE on Pakistani public opinion to see just how "allied" this country is with the United States.

So here's what Clinton just explained:

"I'm not saying that they're at the highest levels but I believe that somewhere in this government are people who know where Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda is, where Mullah Omar and the leadership of the Afghan Taliban is and we expect more cooperation to help us bring to justice, capture or kill, those who attacked us on 9/11."

Yes, a country to which the United States is giving full support and billions of dollars is doing little or nothing against those responsible for the September 11 attacks and killing about 3,000 Americans. But this administration doesn't believe in getting tough or putting on pressure against those countries actually giving America trouble. Ah, maybe the Obama administration does understand. After all, if they really regarded Pakistan as an ally, instead of a hostile state, they wouldn't be treating it so well!

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). His new edited books include Lebanon: Liberation, Conflict and Crisis; Guide to Islamist Movements; Conflict and Insurgency in the Middle East; and The Muslim Brotherhood. To read and subscribe to MERIA, GLORIA articles, or to order books. To see or subscribe to his blog, Rubin Reports.

Afghanistan: The Obama Administration's Trust in Pakistan is Going to Get Americans KIlled

By Barry Rubin

Prediction: One day some enterprising author or former intelligence officer is going to write a best-selling book about the hunt for Usama bin Ladin. Readers will be horrified to find how the Pakistani government and military sabotaged the effort to catch or kill the al-Qaida leadership.

Meanwhile, reading Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s December 10 interview with al-Jazira, it's striking how much she speaks in a totally American psychological and political context. Perhaps it is always like that with U.S. governments. But an administration claiming to be multi-cultural, open to the world, seeing the other side’s viewpoint, and criticizing its predecessors for insensitivity, still sounds like a bunch of naive Americans who don’t quite seem to grasp what other parts of the world are like.

What better example than Afghanistan and Pakistan, countries as different from the United States as you’re going to get. She states:

“We’ve admired the way Pakistan has pulled together to go after those elements of the Taliban that are directly threatening them. And I think that the people of Pakistan are so unified now in support of this military action”

Consider this bizarrely self-subverting first sentence. Isn’t it great, she says, that Pakistan is fighting those Taliban types who are trying to take over the country and kill them. Well, of course they are! Is it hard to understand that they don't want to be murdered and overthrown?

[A digression: What's truly amazing is that other people don't seem to notice stuff like this nowadays. The media keeps missing the essential points, whether it be in Clinton's reaction to Israel's construction freeze which set out a new U.S. policy or in her statement during the Spanish foreign minister's visit when she signalled the start of the sanctions' campaign.]

But the problem, of course, is that Pakistan isn’t going after those elements of the Taliban that are not "directly threatening" them. In fact, as most recently attested by a freed New York Times reporter who the Taliban had been holding hostage, Pakistani intelligence is helping the Taliban and other terrorists who want to kill Americans or Indians!

It is remarkable that the secretary of state can put the issue in such a backwards manner. Tens of thousands of American soldiers are about to be risked in Afghanistan, depending on Pakistan to guard the back door and stop terrorists who want to kill them. But in fact Pakistan will do the minimum possible, thus placing those troops and their mission at risk. Meanwhile, the administration sending them there is pretending the problem doesn’t even exist.

With all due respect, the idea of Pakistanis as “unified” and ready to be “pulled together” sounds like a rather out-of-touch way to describe an incredibly divided nation full of anti-Americanism, packed with many thousand radical Islamists, mired in corruption, hovering on the verge of anarchy, and where armed factions shoot at each other daily.

It is a country whose government just one year ago sponsored a massive terrorist attack on Mumbai and got away with it at no cost whatsoever, not even any international criticism!

As for Afghanistan, all the atmospherics make people miss the point that the administration sounds strikingly like that of the Bush presidency. After all, they both claim to be able to take another country, create a democratic system there, help build a responsible government, and ensure there's a strong military that will be able to defeat the terrorist forces.

The irony is that Bush had by far the better situation. First, Iraq is far more promising raw material than Afghanistan.. Second, Bush was willing to tough it out when things looked bad; Obama has already announced a short-term time limit publicly.* Third, Bush could depend on his main local allies--Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Turkey--to oppose the enemy while Obama can't rely on Pakistan for anything in that regard.

If George W. Bush erred in seeing parts of the world as being ready for democracy when they definitely were not, Barack Obama, and the administration for which he sets the tone, seems to think of itself as a community organizer pulling together those who really do want to play nice. Even at the Copenhagen summit such tactics led to the diplomatic equivalent of a barroom brawl.

In public at least--and whatever differently they think in private doesn't manifest itself in their policy--this administration seems to believe in a fantasy Pakistan packaged like some slightly exotic version of a Hollywood film set or some idealized American image of everyone pitching in to raise money in order to save the farm.

This is the kind of thing people make fun of today when they describe how innocent Americans once thought about a country named Vietnam.

Barry Rubin is director of the Global Research in International Affairs (GLORIA) Center and editor of the Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) Journal. His latest books are The Israel-Arab Reader (seventh edition), The Long War for Freedom: The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East (Wiley), and The Truth About Syria (Palgrave-Macmillan). To read and subscribe to MERIA, GLORIA articles, or to order books  To see or subscribe to his blog, Rubin Reports.

*Yes, I know that he also said he would take into account conditions at the time of the deadline but he also implied he will pull out regardless and Obama doesn't seem like the type to fight a war against tough odds and domestic criticism, does he?

Freed Reporter Smashes U.S. Policy Myths About Afghanistan, Pakistan, Taliban

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By Barry Rubin

When reality breaks into the mainstream media it can be of earthquake intensity. Such is the New York Times article by David Rohde, a journalist held prisoner by the Taliban for over seven months and finally released.

Rohde's conclusions aren't of much comfort for the Obama Administration, or for those who are naive about radical Islamists, or indeed for his fellow journalists. But his honest thinking out loud should affect their writings and policies.

During his captivity, Rohde writes:

"I came to a simple realization. After seven years of reporting in the region, I did not fully understand how extreme many of the Taliban had become. Before the kidnapping, I viewed the
organization as a form of `Al Qaeda lite,' a religiously motivated movement primarily focused on controlling Afghanistan."

But he came to understand from close observation as a prisoner:

"I learned that the goal of the hard-line Taliban was far more ambitious....They wanted to create a fundamentalist Islamic emirate with Al-Qaeda that spanned the Muslim world.

With some important differences--and minus the al-Qaida (my preferred spelling) link, the same points apply to Hamas, Hizballah, the Iraqi insurgents, and Iran's regime. These are not moderate forces and won't be persuaded to change. And with another step downward in intensity--they use tactics other than violence, for example--he is also describing the anti-Iran Muslim Brotherhood groups, the Turkish regime (Islamism in one country), and a lot of the Islamists operating in Europe and America under "moderate" cover.

Then there's Rohde's second point:

"I had written about the ties between Pakistan’s intelligence services and the Taliban while covering the region for The New York Times. I knew Pakistan turned a blind eye to many of their activities. But I was astonished by what I encountered firsthand: a Taliban mini-state
that flourished openly and with impunity."

Or, in other words (and as Indian analysts keep trying to explain to the West), large elements of the Pakistani regime, military, and intelligence are the Taliban's best allies, as well as the sponsors of a variety of Islamist terrorist groups targeting India.

Yet it is that very country, Pakistan, that U.S. policy wants to depend on to fight the Taliban and al-Qaida. Washington ignores Pakistan's sponsorship of terrorism, deep involvement in the dreadful Mumbai attack and other operations into India, and laziness in battling the Taliban and al-Qaida. I'm not saying that Pakistan never fights the Taliban but that it does so only when its own interests are at stake, which means preventing the group from taking too much territory within Pakistan itself.

This doesn't mean that the Obama Administration should escalate or keep fighting directly in Afghanistan--I think that's a bad idea--but has to wake up and deal with the realities of that area.

After all, when Rohde speaks of his illusions about the Taliban, he is describing the policy line being pursued by high-ranking U.S. officials who have spoken of a moderate Taliban (like Hizballah's or Hamas's fabled and mythical "political wings") or even how the Taliban as a whole can be courted in order to fight better against al-Qaida.

Rohde is no longer a prisoner of the Taliban, but Washington is still the prisoner of terrible ideas about foreign policy.

Why U.S. Help Doesn't Bring Love

By Barry Rubin

I was attacked on a Pakistani blog for my article about how a recent poll shows only a 1 percent rise in the popularity of the United States since President Barack Obama took office along with other results showing how deep extremism and anti-Americanism is in that country.

My writing about this relates to a larger discussion about how the idea that Obama is wildly popular almost everywhere in the world and this has valuable policy implications is simply wrong on both counts.

What’s important is not the blog, which is obscure, or the criticism, which is tendentious. But the main three arguments, which are so often heard, are worth refuting briefly.

One is that the United States should not receive any positive response for its huge aid to Pakistan because it is merely hiring the Pakistani military for certain specific services.

This is something often heard . Aid either shores up a regime which the critic doesn’t like or it is merely serving U.S. purposes. But the money going to Pakistan is to fight revolutionary Islamists who also subvert Pakistani society and cause significant bloodshed. So in fact, the aid directly does benefit Pakistan and its interests.

Indirectly, of course, by strengthening the Pakistani military with money and equipment, the United States also creates a situation in which Pakistan could more easily attack India or brazenly sponsor terrorism against its neighbor and then defy its pressures to stop doing so. Similarly, U.S. aid to the Palestinian Authority in terms of military equipment and training might some day be used to fight Israel.

At least, donors should be aware if and when the provision of lavish aid (not to mention diplomatic support and other beneficial behavior) will bring no return of popularity or willingness to cooperate with itself.

The second argument is the old one that Pakistanis cannot hate America when they are eager to get a green card to work there or to buy its products.

Why, however, are people in countries like Pakistan or Arabic-speaking countries so quick to argue that America hates them, which is precisely what the poll on Pakistan shows? One equivalent argument would be to say that if American tourists would like to go to a country or eat at an ethnic restaurant representing its cuisine this proves they really love that country. China, you’re in great shape!

The third argument is that U.S. policy has always been totally pro-Indian. (Indians have their own idea on that point.) It is easy to show that the United States has often side with Pakistan even at times when this was unpopular to do so (as in the Bangladesh crisis, or ignoring Pakistan’s close involvement in bloody massacres in India).

A key point here is that U.S. attempts to show how sympathetic it is to Islam or to a given country; no matter how hard it tries to distance itself from that country’s enemies—as with Obama Administration efforts in the current Middle East—will not bring much return.

Consider that for 16 years, the PLO, Fatah, and the Palestinian Authority has been a U.S. client. There is no pro-American aspect of their policies, however, or sense of gratitude. America is still the enemy and they—along with other Arabs—will tell you how America completely backs Israel and does nothing for the Palestinians.

Attitudes are simply fixed in place to a large extent, bubbling up from an anti-democratic political culture, manipulated by governments, or even set by historic experiences. That was, after all, the point of the article.

For a fuller discussion of these issues and of anti-Americanism in general see here and look at our book, Hating America: A History.

Pakistan Still Hates America and What That Teaches Us

By Barry Rubin

The August 13 Pew poll in Pakistan shows just how much effect the popularity of President Barack Obama has on this critical country. Since he became president positive attitudes toward the United States as caring about Pakistan have gone up! Yes, they are up from 21 percent in 2007 to 22 percent today. That’s 1 percentage point. So, in effect, there’s been no effect.

But this is really far worse than even that statistic would make it appear. First, it shows that Obama’s leaning over double-backwards, as in his Cairo speech, has had no impact whatsoever. If he hasn’t changed anything yet, he’s unlikely to do so in future.

Second, Pakistan has been the recipient of incredible financial generosity from the Obama administration. And third, it is an absolutely pivotal country in his strategy, which emphasizes the war in Afghanistan.

There’s even a fourth factor which is that the country has suffered more from one of the few groups which the Obama administration still says is at war with America, the Taliban. High-ranking administration officials have stated that there are also moderate Taliban. So they don’t hope to defeat that group--despite the fact that it was al-Qaida's protector and helped make the September 11 attacks happen--but to split it.

It’s true, as the poll shows, that the negative view of the Taliban held by Pakistanis has climbed steeply from 33 percent in 2008 to 70 percent today. That’s quite dramatic. Indeed, 69 percent of Pakistanis fear that “extremists” could seize power.

But which ones? The Taliban is an Afghan group, after all, and whatever the Pakistan security forces have done to foster it over the years—a lot—it has invaded Pakistan. It is an alien invader. Pakistan, however, has lots of home-grown extremist groups which are more popular and stronger.

Here's the most devastating finding of all: 64 percent of Pakistanis regard the United States as an enemy. Just 9 percent say it’s a friend.

Why is this? Well, America is not Muslim, is culturally different, and they are being taught for decades--by clerics and others if not by their political rulers--that America is bad. That also goes for the years when George W. Bush wasn't president!

In part, for the United States it also goes with the territory, so to speak. Since to do something in Afghanistan and to block the Taliban and to stabilize Pakistan and just to "do things" for Pakistan so that Pakistanis will supposedly like America the Obama Administration has to...back the country's rulers. And that is going to make Pakistanis who don't like their own leaders also not like America and its policies, right? Who said it's easy to be a great power, problems which don't go away when U.S. leaders try to renounce being a great power.

Who else is an enemy for Pakistanis? It isn’t surprising that India is high on the list (69 percent) but what is worth noticing how much higher it is than the Taliban (57 percent) or al-Qaida (41 percent), groups engaged in killing Pakistanis.

And it also isn’t surprising that the United States is perceived to favor India over Pakistan, but again the margin is amazingly large despite the fact that the Obama administration and many of its predecessors have really done more for Pakistan than India. The actual numbers are shocking: 54 percent see America as pro-India; only 4 percent as pro-Pakistan.

Finally, there are some important clues about these gaps in Pakistani religious attitudes toward social and political issues: 78 percent believe that anyone who converts to another religion from Islam should be killed, 80 percent that thieves should have their hands amputated, 83 percent that adulterers should be stoned.

So we aren't talking about a small percentage of extremists who hijacked Islam (Bush's phrase) or don't represent the true Islam (Obama's phrase) but rather about the interpretation of Islam that is mainstream among these people.

As interesting as these figures are, the interpretation is even more significant, not only for U.S. policy toward South Asia but for understanding where Western perceptions of the world have gone wrong.

Here it is in a single sentence: The problems are not just ones of misunderstanding and of Western aggression or mistakes. Thinking that George W. Bush was a meanie and Barack H. Obama is charming and empathetic only gets you so far, and not far at all.

Conflicts are based on real collisions of interest, deeply differing ways of thinking about the world, widely distinct societies and histories. They are not easily bridged and perhaps cannot be bridged at all.

The United States could stand on its head, dole out billions of dollars, talk until its green in the face about how much it respects Islam, and it won’t make much of a difference. And then, it is clear that the United States requires all the traditional implements of diplomacy: power, force, deterrence, credibility, steadfastness, as well as support from reliable allies--that is, allies who actually really help and don't just say how much they like Obama--to deal with problems.

Amidst all the babble about countries and peoples possessing their own perceptions of the world in a “multicultural” globe glorified by differences, it is forgotten that there is a rather serious price to pay for all that, which includes conflict, war, hatred, persecution, and powerful forces maintaining social stagnation and economic failure.

Ultimately, it is not America or globalization, not India or Israel, or George Bush who is responsible for the dislike emanating from places like Pakistan; and the material enmity coming from places like Pakistan; and the instability, terror attacks, or suffering arising within places like Pakistan. No, it is what people think, do, and how the society works, and what the goals are in places like Pakistan.

Death of a Leading Taliban Commander in Pakistan: Killing Baitullah Mehsud & and What It Means

This is a guest column by a colleague who is an expert on Pakistan-Afghanistan


By Isaac Kfir

At around 01:00 on Wednesday (19 GMT Tuesday) a CIA drone attack allegedly killed one of Pakistan’s most feared Taliban commanders, the 35-year-old Baitullah Mehsud. Baitullah has been responsible for the death of countless of people and taking jihad from the tribal belt to the cities.

In September 2009, he orchestrated the Marriot Hotel bombings which killed 50 people. He was also behind the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in December 2007. This explains why Time Magazine rated him among the top 100 most influential people in the world, with the Taliban commander coming above Tony Blair, Rupert Murdoch, and many more.

According to Kafayat Ullah, a reported aid to Mehsud, the attack took place when Mehsud was at his father-in-law’s house in the Zangarha area.

Mehsud began his career as a talib (student) in a radical madrassa in Miranshah, North Waziristan, though he did not become a religious scholar. He received his military training from the legendary Pashtun commander Jalaluddin Haqqani, who had spent more than a decade fighting the Soviets. He later joined the Taliban effort against the Northern Alliance. This is possibly when Mehsud left the Haqqani Network and joined Mullah Omar, Haqqani’s bitter rival.

In 2006, in a special ceremony attended by a number of important Taliban commanders, Mehsud was appointed Mullah Omar’s governor of the Mehsud tribe, sealing the special relationship between the two men. Mehsud had spent the following years ensuring the Talibanization of South Waziristan, closing down barber and music shops as well as schools for girls and imposing Shari’a law.

Mehsud comes from a relatively small Broomikhel clan, an offshoot of the Shabikhel sub-tribe, which is a part of the larger Mehsud tribe. But due to his skills and close ties to Mullah Omar has been able to unify the various Taliban groups under one umbrella organization known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan (Taliban Movement of Pakistan) which operates in the Waziristan area. In reality the group’s operation is mainly in the Federally Administered Tribal Area (FATA) and specifically in the Bajour Agency. There are seven agencies in the FATA and it appears that TTP controls a number of them, making it very difficult for the Pakistani military to engage these fighters who know the terrain and the people.

This may also explain why the government has for the past several years being keen to sign peace and ceasefire agreements with these tribal leaders. Looking back one can see two ways in which the Pakistanis have dealt with their own version of the Taliban: either killing them (often with a missile attack managed by the United States) or signing ceasefire and peace agreements with them.

There are three prospective successors to Baitullah: Hakimullah Mehsud, Wali-ur-Rehman and Maulana Azmatullah of which not much is known. Hakimullah Mehsud, a 29-year old Mehsud tribal leader also known as Zulfiqar Mehsud, has a 10 million rupee ($120,000) bounty on his head, as he is seen as the person responsible for launching attacks against U.S. and NATO supply convoys. Hakimullah allegedly has around 8,000 men under his direct command.

The other two men are relatively unknown, though Rehman is supposed to be a cousin of Baitullah Mehsud and was one of his closest advisers.

Reportedly, Baitullah has said that he wanted Rehman to succeed him, but history has shown that such requests are not always followed, as there is tremendous amount of internal politics. As seen for example in the relationship that Baitullah Mehsud had with Qari Zainuddin, a fellow Mehsud but from the Shaman Khel sub-clan of the Mehsud. The two men were at great odds, with Zainuddin refusing to accept the Baitullah’s leadership. Zainuddin was killed by his bodyguard of six year, Gulbadin Mehsud, a man whom he had considered a close friend (Gulbadin had previously served as Baitullah Mehud’s bodyguard).

The key issue now is whether the Pakistani Taliban would cease to be the threat that it was when Baitullah Mehsud was leading it, or whether his successor would seek to avenge Baitullah’s death as well as strive to impose his own print on the group. The killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in a U.S. airstrike on June 7 2006, brought a change in the tactics of al-Qa’ida in Iraq and with it a reduction in attacks against civilians.

Thus, due to the unknown quantity of Baitullah’s successors it is quite possible that South Waziristan, Pakistan, and Afghanistan will experience a lull in suicide attacks, which makes it even more important for the international community to enter the region and undertake substantive confidence-building measures as well as invest in the reconstruction of the region.

Isaac Kfir is the Schusterman Visiting Fellow at Syracuse University, Maxwell School of Public Administration / Institute for Counter-Terrorism (INSCT).

U.S. Policy Notes: Pakistan and on Special Envoys

Pakistan: It's not clear what is happening in Pakistan. So far it seems like a small-scale advance by the Taliban. Pakistan is a country with a huge extremely diverse population which includes a lot of friction and competing groups. There are Sunni and Shia, different ethnic communities, and regions where politics are pretty local. I doubt the Taliban is about to take over.

Obama's special envoys: So far they haven't achieved anything. An envoy is only good, it seems to me, to conduct an existing negotiation which has a chance of success, thus to deal with diplomats over details and very intensely.

This system seems pretty unwieldy and I wonder if it will last into next year.

I assume Mitchell is just filling in for a few more months on Arab-Israeli issues and will resign before next year.

Dennis Ross, on Iran, seems to be functioning more like a State Department official than as an independent envoy so it seems he is coordinating closely with Secretary of State Clinton.

It isn't quite clear whether Richard Holbrooke is getting anything done in Afghanistan-Pakistan. If the crisis blows up I assume Clinton and the White House will have to step in fast