At the Nuke Gate

The Pakistan chapter of the Taliban, Tehrik-e-Taliban, is wreaking vengeance on its very creator — the Pakistan Army. Suicide missions carried out by Taliban fighters are now a routine affair. Only the other day did the Taliban eliminate a top Army officer, Brigadier Moinuddin Ahmed, former Director General of Military Operations who was serving with the UN peacekeeping mission in Sudan — the second Brigadier to be killed in a series of attacks carried out by the Taliban in the last fortnight, leaving about 190 people dead. The Taliban is baying for the blood of the Pakistan Army for its offensive in the Taliban stronghold of South Waziristan, where it controls half of the territory, with the rest in the grip of various tribal groups; nowhere in South Waziristan does Islamabad’s writ run, and almost all the recent terror attacks in Pakistan have had their origin in the anarchic Waziristan salient. And it is from this jihad hub that the Taliban is trying to get hold of Pakistan’s nuclear weaponry — the suicide attack on a security checkpost near the Pakistan Aeronautical Complex in Kamra, where aircraft carrying nuclear warheads are believed to be parked, is a pointer. Despite the assurance of the Obama administration that Pakistan’s nukes are safe and that the US is closely monitoring them, India has reasons to worry. The immediate choice of a nuclear-armed Taliban will obviously be India, which the medieval-age jihadi group wants to take on after taking over Pakistan. Given the gravity of the situation, it is now all the more incumbent on the US, unlike in the past when Pakistan’s nuclear assets were safe, to seriously intervene in that country and fortify its nuclear arsenal. It is no longer Pakistan’s internal affair. It is a global jihadi affair, and the Taliban-Al Qaeda combine has pledged to wipe out every ‘infidel’ settlement from the face of this planet. The world cannot let it happen. THE SENTINEL