Fighting the Taliban

Over the weekend Pakistan sent 30,000 troops against the Taliban in that country.

A successful operation is vital to Pakistan's stability. Over the past two weeks militants have launched a series of audacious attacks across the country, including the suicide bombing of a United Nations office in Islamabad, three simultaneous attacks on police sites in Lahore and, most brazenly, a 22-hour siege of the army headquarters in Rawalpindi last weekend. Authorities said that most incidents were orchestrated by Waziristan-based commanders.

But President Obama is happy to have the Taliban as part of Afghanistan's government. His beef is only with al Qaeda.

The sharpened focus by Obama's team on fighting al-Qaida above all other goals, while downgrading the emphasis on the Taliban, comes in the midst of an intensely debated administration review of the increasingly unpopular war.

Obama's developing strategy on the Taliban will "not tolerate their return to power," the senior official said in an interview with The Associated Press. But the U.S. would fight only to keep the Taliban from retaking control of Afghanistan's central government – something it is now far from being capable of – and from giving renewed sanctuary in Afghanistan to al-Qaida, the official said.

At least somebody in power understands the threat of the Taliban. Too bad that "somebody" isn't in Washington.

What Obama plans on doing, exactly, in its efforts to "not tolerate" the likely event that the Taliban would try to take power is beyond me. And probably beyond Obama too.

What a wussy!