According to the New York Times, Pakistan is telling the CIA to butt out and basically stop killing people whenever it feels the need to pump up the body count. The breach between the CIA and its Pakistani counterpart, Inter Services Intelligence—as described by the Times, at least—is so massive and so embarrassing that, one imagines, the CIA will move heaven and earth, pretty much, to correct it or at least paper it over in some half-assed fashion that will get it, and the Administration, through the next election.
Because otherwise, why do we have a hundred thousand troops in Afghanistan? To chase down a handful of Al Qaeda terrorists who are now probably moving to Pakistan because it’s clear that our “ally” pretty much hates us? If the American people ever notice that we’re wasting hundreds of billions of dollars in Central Asia, not to mention thousands of lives—well, they might get upset, might even wonder why we need so many four-star generals and six-figure civilians, and we can’t have that. Expenditures of blood and treasure, after all, can be endured. But the loss of hundreds of bureaucrats’ jobs? Never!
