Hot Pursuit

Has someone in the military gotten the message that if you see the bad guys you're not going to stop at the border? Apparently, US forces pursuing al Qaeda and Taliban in Afghanistan have not bothered to stop at the Pakistani border and are instead following them into Pakistan in order to eliminate the ongoing threat:

They said the Taliban threat is greater now than it was a year ago, and they agreed that the Pakistan government can and must do more to get at the large, ungoverned sectors along the remote Pakistan border that are safe havens for Taliban insurgents.

"We have all the authorities we need to pursue, either with (artillery) fire or on the ground, across the border," said Lt. Gen. Douglas Lute told the Senate Armed Services Committee. Lute, who is chief operations officer for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said soldiers can respond if there is an imminent threat. But he said they would have to seek the Pakistan government's permission to go after a munitions factory further inside the Pakistani border.

The discussion came just days after Vice President Dick Cheney met with Pakistan President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, in an effort to urge a more aggressive Pakistani effort to hunt al-Qaida and Taliban fighters who are expected to increase attacks into Afghanistan this spring.

The Pakistani military has been more aggressive in going after al-Qaida than the Taliban, who are more protected by tribal leaders in some of the border regions.

Musharraf has insisted that his forces have done all they can against the extremists, but senators said it's simply not enough. And they quizzed Lute and undersecretary of defense for policy, Eric S. Edelman, about what more the U.S. can do if Pakistan won't or cannot do more.

The primary reason that the Taliban and al Qaeda are threatening now is that they've been able to reconstitute inside the safe haven of Pakistan. The Pakistanis had made deals with the border tribes to stop going after al Qaeda and Taliban, which essentially provided a safe haven for the terrorists.

In response, the US has turned the screws on Musharaf and have worked out an arrangement where the US forces are able to go after al Qaeda and Taliban in hot pursuit if they've crossed the border into Afghanistan in hit and run attacks.

There are limitations as to what the US can do in these circumstances since Pakistan is a sovereign nation, but since the Pakistani government appears to have consented to this action, the US actions to go after the Taliban and al Qaeda if they engage in hostile acts or demonstrate hostile intent. That's a pretty wide brush and left up to the commander on the scene. However, targets deeper inside Pakistan may still be off limits and there is a need to share information.

Bill Roggio has more on the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan.