Regardless what Ms. Martha Radick and her ABC News blog has to say, the only people who have been caught flat-footed on this story have been the American people. The administration has been aware of this story, because the story actually broke on 1 SEP 2006 on the McClatchy Washington Bureau blog (link below). The story tells us,

“The Pakistani regime of Gen. Pervez Musharraf has been negotiating truces – with the Bush administration’s encouragement – with Islamic separatists in North Waziristan and South Waziristan, mountainous tribal areas along the Afghan border where U.S. officials think bin Laden may be hiding.

In return, Pakistani officials are promising to restrict the country’s troops in the area to major bases and towns and to pour huge amounts of aid – much of it from the United States and other nations – into the destitute region, according to American officials.

But as the truces take hold, separatists have been crossing into Afghanistan to fight alongside Taliban and al-Qaida fighters, according to Western and Afghan officials.”

In an earlier newspaper article, dated 16 AUG 2006, the same reporter tells us the administration has been helping to modify the Pakistani truce by letting the Pakistani army to move to its barracks along the border with India, and $150M will be pumped into Pakistan for other projects. Those projects include ‘training’ border guards using people from the tribal areas, set up an industrial area along the border, and possibly provide clinics and schools if the Pakistani militants put aside their agressive ways. Great idea but it will work as soon as monkeys fly.

I have been critical with the admininstration’s plan for a while – the political and military resources have been either misplaced or misused. I want the US Government to do a better job of placing the right force in the right place with the right amount of resources to do the job. These ‘whack-a-mole’ and ‘birth-pangs’ strategies are totally wrong. I am called as as a ‘cut and run’ groupie and an appeaser to aid the enemy because I criticize the strategies. Then this new strategy is unfolded to enable the administration to shift the focus from AQ (who has attacked the US a fair number of times since 1998) to Iran. The new strategy is WRONG – we are taking to much on our plate at one setting. We need to make sure we have enough resources to do the job correctly and we are spreading ourselves out even thinner. Heaven help us from this woe!

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/columnists/jonathan_s_landay/15419933.htm?source=rss&channel=krwashington_jonathan_s_landay

http://www.realcities.com/mld/krwashington/news/columnists/jonathan_s_landay/15289315.htm

Musharraf is heavily criticized for fighting alongside (to a degree at least) the US against Muslim extremists. This could be a solution that will result in a win-win situation: the US takes out Bin Laden, Musharraf remains in power of Pakistan.