foxbat
SENIOR MEMBER
- Joined
- Jan 31, 2010
- Messages
- 4,093
- Reaction score
- -7
- Country
- Location
try saying Pakistan 25 times in 10 seconds 
Anyway, let me list all the references to Pakistan from the debate ... Dont think that amounted to 10 seconds.. I know the references are not very flattering, and as a Pakistani you do not want to bring too much attention to them, but there they were. I think the only countries mentioned more than Pakistan were Iran & China (but mostly in good terms)
1. When it comes to going after Osama bin Laden, you said, well, any president would make that call. But when you were a candidate in 2008 — as I was — and I said, if I got bin Laden in our sights, I would take that shot, you said we shouldn't move heaven and earth to get one man, and you said we should ask Pakistan for permission.
And if we had asked Pakistan for permission, we would not have gotten it. And it was worth moving heaven and earth to get him.
2. I — I can tell you, at the same time, that — that we will make sure that we — we look at what's happening in Pakistan and recognize that what's happening in Pakistan is going to have a major impact on the success in Afghanistan. And — and I say that because I know a lot of people just feel like we should just brush our hands and walk away. And I don't mean you, Mr. President, but some people in the — in our nation feel that Pakistan (doesn't ?) — being nice to us and that we should just walk away from them.
3. But Pakistan is important to the region, to the world and to us, because Pakistan has 100 nuclear warheads, and they're rushing to build a lot more. They'll have more than Great Britain sometime in the — in the relatively near future. They also have the Haqqani network and — and the Taliban existent within their country. And so a — a Pakistan that falls apart, becomes a failed state would be of extraordinary danger to Afghanistan and us. And so we're going to have to remain helpful in encouraging Pakistan to move towards a — a more stable government and — and rebuild a relationship with us. And that means that — that — that our aid that we provide to Pakistan is going to have to be conditioned upon certain benchmarks being met.
4. So for me, I look at this as both a — a — a need to help move Pakistan in the right direction and also to get Afghanistan to be ready. And they will be ready by the end of 2014.
5. And so we decimated al-Qaida's core leadership in the border regions between Afghanistan and Pakistan. We then started to build up Afghan forces. And we're now in a position where we can transition out, because there's no reason why Americans should die when Afghans are perfectly capable of defending their own country.
6. All right. Let me go to Governor Romney because you talked about Pakistan and what needs to be done there. General Allen, our commander in Afghanistan, says that Americans continue to die at the hands of groups who are supported by Pakistan. We know that Pakistan has arrested the doctor who helped us catch Obama's — bin Laden. It still provides safe haven for terrorists, yet we continue to give Pakistan billions of dollars. Is it time for us to divorce Pakistan?
7. This is — this is an important part of the world for us. Pakistan is — is technically an ally, and they're not acting very much like an ally right now, but we have some work to do.
And I — I don't blame the administration for the fact that the relationship with Pakistan is strained. We had to go into Pakistan; we had to go in there to get Osama bin Laden. That was the right thing to do. And that upset them, but there was obviously a great deal of anger even before that. But we're going to have to work with the — with the people in Pakistan to try and help them move to a more responsible course than the one that they're on. And it's important for them, it's important for the nuclear weapons, it's important for the success of Afghanistan, because inside Pakistan you have a large group of Pashtuns that are — that are Taliban, that they're going to come rushing back into Afghanistan when we go. And that's one of the reasons the Afghan security forces have so much work to do to be able to fight against that. But it's important for us to recognize that we can't just walk away from Pakistan. But we do need to make sure that as we — as we send support for them, that this is tied to them making progress on — on matters that would lead them to becoming a civil society.
8. Well, keep in mind our strategy wasn't just going after bin Laden. We've created partnerships throughout the region to deal with extremism — in Somalia, in Yemen, in Pakistan. And what we've also done is engage these governments in the kind of reforms that are actually going to make a difference in people's lives day to day, to make sure that their government aren't corrupt, to make sure that they are treating women with the kind of respect and dignity that every nation that succeeds has shown, and to make sure that they've got a free market system that works.
they do not speak about ur country because they require ur money and market, they say very much about ur country off the media, just check their declassified documents 
