Self destructive rules of Pakistan militias

NY Times:

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Some in Washington have pointed to the emergence of the lashkars as a hopeful parallel to the largely successful Sunni Awakening movement in Iraq, which drew on tribes’ frustration with militant jihadis to build an alliance with American troops that helped lessen violence in Iraq. But there are significant differences, a senior American government official acknowledged. In Anbar Province, he said, the Iraqi tribes “woke up to millions of dollars in government assistance, and the support of the Third Infantry Division.”

But the support by the Pakistani Army and civilian government for the tribal militias has been “episodic” and so far “unsustained,” the official said. In addition, tribal structures in Pakistan have been weakened in recent years by the Taliban, unlike the situation in Iraq.

The tribesmen, armed with antiquated weaponry from the 1980s Afghan war, are facing better equipped, highly motivated Taliban fighters who have intimidated and crushed some of the militia.

In the last two months, the Taliban have burned the homes of tribal leaders and assassinated others who have dared to participate in the resistance. They have pulled tribesmen suspected of backing the militia out of buses and cars and used suicide bombers against them as they did in Orakzai, the place where the wounded in the Peshawar hospital were attacked.

“We wanted to form a lashkar,” said Abdul Rehman, 50, a tribal leader of the Orakzai area, as he lay on his crumpled bed in the Lady Reading hospital. “We were pressured by the government to take action because they warned, ‘If you don’t take action you will be bombed.’ ”

The lack of consistent Pakistani Army and government support has left some tribesmen feeling betrayed. About 1,000 tribesmen were meeting on Oct. 10 and had just decided to form a lashkar, when the suicide bomber, armed with perfect intelligence for a pre-emptive strike, killed more than 100 tribesmen and wounded many more.

The next day, government forces struck back in Orakzai, but helicopter gunships hit more civilians than militants, forcing a large number of people to leave the area and providing space for the militants to occupy, residents of the area said.

The Pakistani military is counting on the tribal militias to work as localized forces and to pick up some of the burden of the heavy fighting that is now concentrated in the Bajaur part of the tribal belt. “We’re concentrating on the hard core; the lashkars are cleansing their areas, taking people out in their areas,” one general said.

But in the last four years the Taliban have deliberately singled out pro-government tribal elders, killing as many as 500 of them, and have attracted uneducated tribal youth with the lure of good money and stature.

Even in the best of times, there are basic unwritten rules about the tribal militia in Pakistan that limit their impact.

The Pakistani military, for example, can lend moral support but cannot initiate a tribal militia, the generals said. The lashkars come with their own weapons, food and ammunition. They have their own fixed area of responsibility, and they are not permanent.

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These rules may explain why the Pakistan army has also been reluctant to accept help from the US military. A special forces platoon could whip these guys into an effective fighting force to defeat the Taliban, but their cultural restrictions that impossible and make defeat by the Taliban likely. The Pakistan effort needs to be more than episodic. The off again on again approach gives the enemy time to rebuild and lick his wounds. To defeat the Taliban, they need a relentless approach