Pakistan - Know the Bad Guys and Understand the Threat (Haqqani)

Jalaluddin Haqqani (photo: reuters)

It can be difficult to understand what's going on Afghanistan these days. After a decade a of war, the fight has faded from the news to a large extent. And while we do receive updates from the morons in the main-stream media, it's not being covered in the coherent way that it needs to be for everyone to understand what's actually going on, why we haven't won yet, and also what's at stake.

Because people don't understand the dynamics, how it directly effects them, and what it all means, a significant portion of the population has lost interest and many don't pay any attention at all. There is also a growing list of know-nothings, crying ever louder for an end to the war.

We didn't start the war, we haven't vanquished the bad guy, so we can't "end" the war in victory. The fascist forces of Islamism are not going to stop coming after us. And there could be no worse time to lose interest, or to try to wrap up our efforts in Afghanistan for political reasons or simply from being war weary. I certainly think that it would be in our national interest to reassess our methodologies, define the actual enemy, and try something besides fighting an endless war against an ephemeral bad guy (terror).

However, it's complete suicide to stop fighting against the enemy that is waging war against us. Truthfully, I think the hard facts and conditions on the ground will preclude any end to the war in Afghanistan anytime soon, and will eventually lead to an expansion in the war.

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Pakistan has nukes. It's also the nation which most directly enabled Al-Qaeda, they harbored bin Laden, and parts of their government and military are waging a proxy war against us in Afghanistan (while we pour billions of dollars into the Pakistani government). There's a lot of trouble brewing over there, and all of it will have to be resolved some way.

In my last post, I said I was going to cover the various Islamist groups in Pakistan. Given their recent headline grabbing operations (against us), and their significance, I can think of no better network to start with than the Haqanni network.

Just yesterday Afghan officials revealed that a plot to assassinate Karzai had been discovered and averted. The conspiracy reached all the way to one of Karzai's own body guards. And the culprits behind the assassination attempt were none other than Haqqani operatives and recruits.

In the past, Haqqani have been the source and force behind many attacks against our people and the effort in Afghanistan. They are based in Pakistan, and serve as one of the primary enablers of Jihad in Afghanistan. They have direct ties to (and facilitate) Al-Qaeda and the Taliban, as well as the Pakistani ISI.

The videos glossed over this aspect of the Haqqani, but it deserves a little more focus. In the late 1970's and the 1980's, during the fight against the Soviets, the Haqqani network first established its power base and rose to prominence.

The Haqqani claim that during the soviet invasion of Afghanistan, in which the US (along with many other nations) backed and encouraged the Islamist resistance to our shared adversary (communism), a full 60% of everything going to the resistance in Afghanistan was funneled through the Haqqani network.

The Haqqani provided the means to wage war (much in the same way they do now), and capitalized on our efforts to fight communism. The well executed strategy of founder Jalaluddin Haqqani (calculated and shrewd), who trained in the ISI, resulted in what is now the one of most capable Jihadist networks. A network that touches the full spectrum of Jihad operations and has become one of the central enablers of the threat in that region.

Today, the Haqqanni network facilitates and directly operates on behalf of Jihadist organizations, acting as a central clearing-house of material support in the effort to wage Jihad from-and-in Pakistan and Afghanistan. They also function as the dirty hands for the Pakistani government on a fairly regular basis.

Whenever the Islamists in Pakistan want to kill our troops or otherwise attack our interests, they don't send their military after us. Obviously, it would be not be in their interest (even by irrational Muslim calculations) for them to try and spark a direct military conflict with America. In lieu of the the military confrontation, the Pakistani Islamists in the military and ISI attack via proxy Islamic militant groups, most of whom are affiliated or enabled by the Haqqani network.

The Haqqani really embody a substantial amount of the Jihad-power driving the militancy in the Afghanistan and Pakistan region. They are a direct threat in Afghanistan and they are under orders from the Islamist segments of the Pakistani government.

The fundamental reason Haqqani exists is to spread Islam and export Jihad. That is their reason for being. Exporting Islamism and waging Jihad takes a militant side and a recruitment side, so I asked a friend who lives in Pakistan about the Haqqani. He explained to me that the Haqqani target the minds of young kids and place Jihadi preachers in the Mosques.

Those are some of the exact tactics of the Muslim Brotherhood in America. They have the Muslim Student Association (MSA) and have managed to get their stealth-Jihadi preachers into many Mosques around the country. The MB and Haqqani share a core ideology (Sharia domination), have ties via the world-wide Jihad chain, and depend on similar tactics...

It's mind-boggling that we continue to work with the Pakistanis on the public side and continue to tax-payer fund the whole effort against us. Our foreign policy sounds like the result of a mental illness to me.

Fatwa On Islam