International Security. Volume 32, Number 4, Spring 2008. No Sign until the Burst of Fire. Understanding the Pakistan-Afghanistan Frontier
Abstract
By 1932, British troops had been waging war of varying intensity with a group of intractable tribes along and beyond the northwestern frontier of India for nearly a century. That year, in summarizing a typical skirmish, one British veteran noted laconically, "Probably no sign till the burst of fire, and then the swift rush with knives, the stripping of the dead, and the unhurried mutilation of the infidels." It was a savage, cruel, and peculiar kind of mountain warfare, frequently driven by religious zealotry on the tribal side, and it was singularly unforgiving of tactical error, momentary inattention, or cultural ignorance. It still is. The Pakistan-Afghanistan border region has experienced turbulence for centuries. Today a portion of it constitutes a significant cant threat to U.S. national security interests. The unique underlying factors that create this threat are little understood by most policymakers in Washington. This region, which is almost certainly home to both Osama bin Laden and his lieutenant, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has once again become a locus for a regenerating al-Qaida network. The July 2007 National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on terrorist threats to the United States an intelligence product known to analysts as the mildest common denominator everyone can agree on corroborates this assessments. The NIE states that al-Qaida, with uninterrupted funding from radical Saudi Arabian Wahabist sources, not only has rebuilt its command structure in the border region, but has continued to recruit and train operatives to in infiltrate the United States and other Western countries. The border between Pakistan and Afghanistan is 1,640 miles long, much of it spanning terrain so remote and so mountainous that it is virtually inaccessible. For Pakistan, instability extends beyond both endpoints.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 2008
- Accession Number
- ADA485123
Entities
People
- M. C. Mason
- Thomas H. Johnson
Organizations
- Naval Postgraduate School