We wouldn't want to leave them disappointed... lol It sounds like they want the US to invade.
Pakistan elite talk up imminent US invasion
Salman Masood
September 29, 2011
Angry ... Prime Minister Yusuf Gilani. Photo: Reuters
ISLAMABAD: The United States might still be weighing its options about how to deal with Pakistan, but many politicians, retired army generals and television personalities here have already made up their minds that America is on the warpath with their country.
Such is the media frenzy and warmongering that popular talk show hosts have begun discussing possible scenarios of how Pakistan should react if the US attacks the country. One television news channel has even aired a war anthem.
The Prime Minister, Yusuf Raza Gilani, has called on a conference of opposition political parties and government allies today to discuss the crisis. The government is also enlisting foreign allies. There has been a flurry of diplomatic activity in the capital Islamabad, with the visits of Chinese and Saudi officials.
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The US ambassador, Cameron Munter, has met with the President, Asif Ali Zardari, along with the Foreign Secretary, Salman Bashir.
After meeting with the Vice-Premier of China, Meng Jianzhu, on Tuesday, Mr Gilani said that ''China categorically supports Pakistan's efforts to uphold its sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity,'' an oblique reference aimed at the US .
Earlier in an interview with Reuters, Mr Gilani warned against any cross-border raids by US forces in Afghanistan. ''We are a sovereign country,'' Mr Gilani was quoted as saying. ''How can they come and raid in our country?''
Pakistan's powerful army and intelligence chiefs have conveyed their message through their posturing. The army chief, General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, cancelled his Monday visit to Britain, stoking a sense of crisis.
On Sunday, General Kayani led a meeting with his military commanders. No statement was issued, but leaks to local media outlets warned of a ''stern response'' to any attack on Pakistan by US forces from Afghanistan. A military official, privy to the meeting, said ''certain decisions were taken, primarily of some defensive nature, in the event of a possible US attack''.
The head of the Pakistan spy agency ISI, Lieutenant-General Ahmed Shuja Pasha, also flew on Monday to meet officials from close Pakistan ally Saudi Arabia.
Senator Javed Ashraf Qazi, a retired lieutenant general and former head of the ISI, said on Tuesday that the US was ''pressurising Pakistan to hide its own failures in Afghanistan'', a widely held view in Pakistan.
He added that ''US officials often lie for their own interests''.
Criticism of the US has increased in the past few days, since the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, made a statement describing the Haqqani network, a militant group based in Pakistan's tribal areas, as a veritable arm of the ISI.
He also said that the ISI had supported an attack this month by Haqqani militants on the US embassy in Afghanistan.
''Why cannot we snap diplomatic relations?'' asked a retired colonel, Shuja Khanzada, during a live talk show Tuesday on Dunya TV, a private television news network.
On Monday, Hamid Mir, the host of Capital Talk, a talk show on the popular news network Geo, started the show asking, ''Is United States going to attack on the ground in Pakistan?''
Another retired lieutenant general who appeared on the show, Abdul Qayum, said that a US attack was a possibility.
A further participant on the TV news show, Farukh Saleem, a columnist and widely quoted analyst, criticised the local media by saying they had ''put more fuel on the fire''.
This prompted Mr Qayum to interject and he said Admiral Mullen's statement was an insult to the whole nation.
''You cannot trust them,'' Mr Qayum said of the Americans. ''There is a history of betrayal.''
The New York Times
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/world/pakistan-elite-talk-up-imminent-us-invasion-20110928-1kxck.html#ixzz1ZGP3Cg6O
