Fallon orders plan for US troops in Pakistan

AP:

The commander of U.S. forces in Central Asia has launched planning for more extensive use of U.S. troops to train Pakistani armed forces, a senior defense official said Wednesday.

Adm. William J. Fallon, commander of U.S. Central Command, issued a planning order, an internal instruction to lower-level commanders, to propose ideas for a long-term approach to helping Pakistan combat what has become an expanding, homegrown insurgency that threatens the stability of the government.

Fallon's intent is to develop new approaches to help Pakistan, with a time horizon stretching to 2015, the official said. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the order has not been made public.

A central assumption in the planning is that no such U.S. training contribution would be made without the Pakistani government's prior approval, the official said.

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In an interview last week during a conference with Middle Eastern defense chiefs in Florida, Fallon said Pakistan is taking a more welcoming view of U.S. suggestions for using American troops to train and advise its own forces in the fight against anti-government extremists.

Fallon said he believes increased violence inside Pakistan in recent months has led Pakistani leaders to conclude that they must focus more intensively on extremist al-Qaida hideouts near the border with Afghanistan.

"They see they've got real problems internally," Fallon said. "My sense is there is an increased willingness to address these problems, and we're going to try to help them." He said U.S. assistance would be "more robust," but he offered few details. "There is more willingness to do that now" on Pakistan's part, he said.

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The US does not expect a Spring offensive in Afghanistan in 2008 but does think that Al Qaeda and the Taliban will try to secure their rear in Pakistan. That makes the training of the Pak forces all the more important. It is certainly about time Pakistan started taking the threat to its forces and government seriously. It is also about time it started taking American assistance seriously too.