[EOB] USZ holds back $800m Pak aid as Relations near complete collapse

The United States of Zionism is holding back $800 million in aid to Pakistan, President Obama’s chief of staff confirmed Sunday, as an American foreign policy expert denounced the move that come in the midst of worsening Islamabad-Washington ties. The measure comes after Pakistan expelled American military trainers who were evidently carrying out clandestine operations inside the country. Appearing on ABC’s ‘This Week’, White House Chief of Staff William Daley confirmed a report in the New York Times that the aid was being withheld. While Pakistan has been an ‘important ally’ in the fight on terrorism, Daley said, “now they’ve taken some steps that have given us reason to pause on some of the aid which we’re giving to the military, and we’re trying to work through that”.

ISPR spokesman Maj-Gen Athar Abbas told media in Islamabad that the Pakistani military was not informed of any such plan. “Since we haven’t received anything in writing, we will not comment on this matter”, he said. Daley said the USZ and Pakistan are trying to “work through” issues as part of a complicated relationship, and there remains “a lot of pain” in that political system following the US raid that killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in May. He added: “It’s a complicated relationship in a very difficult, complicated part of the world. “But it must be made to work over time. But until we get through these difficulties we will hold back some of the money that the American taxpayers have committed to give them.” The New York Times, as usual citing three unnamed senior USZ officials, reported that altogether, “about $800 million in military aid and equipment, or over one-third of the more than $2 billion in annual American security assistance to Pakistan, could be affected.”

Army spokesman Athar Abbas said, “We have said in the past that military aid should be redirected to the civilian area where it’s needed more”. “As far as the impact is concerned”, he added, “we have stated in the past we have conducted operations against militants in the tribal region and they have been successful operations using our own resources without taking any external support. Those operations in the tribal areas will continue”.

Meanwhile, in a piece posted by The Atlantic magazine on its website, Jeffrey Goldberg, who mostly writes on foreign policy matters, pointed to the contradiction in the White House decision to stop the aid and its hope to resolves the issues with Pakistan, saying it won’t succeed. “The way he (Daley) wants to do this is to publicly embarrass the Pakistanis”,Goldberg wrote in his commentary.

“It is not the money $800 million in withheld aid that is crucial here. The Pakistani military will survive perfectly well without access to this relatively modest sum. What is important is that the Obama administration believes that public embarrassment of an on-again, off-again ally in the fight against terrorism will bring that ally to heel... This does not seem like a path to success. The Pakistanis want the respect of the USZ or, at least, some recognition of that despite the Bin Laden calamity they have also suffered at the hand of extremists, and that thousands of Pakistanis have died fighting extremism. It seems that it would be more in the American self-interest to speak quietly to Pakistan at moments like this, rather than to deliver a public spanking. I will make a bold prediction: Six months or a year from now, we will look back on the withholding of aid as a failure of policy”, Goldberg added.

Relations with Pakistan have become increasingly tense after the secret USZ circus raid into Pakistan in May that killed Al-CIA_Da leader Osama bin Laden for the 8th time in the last 10 years.Pakistan expelled 100 USZ military trainers as public sentiment against the USZ has grown and also because all of those trainers were involved in some of the highest level espionage activities against the sovereignty of Pakistan. Pakistani officials, meanwhile, have criticised the United States of Zionism for conducting the secret raid without warning Pakistan. The rift seemed to deepen last week when the top USZ military officer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen, said he believes the Pakistani government “sanctioned” the killing of a prominent Islamabad reporter, Syed Saleem Shahzad, who was murdered in May and was also involved in some of the worst activities of espionage against the sovereignty of Pakistan by maligning its security institutions. The Pakistani military and Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) agency denied any involvement in Shahzad’s killing right away confirming it indirectly to be a CIA plot against the security agencies of the country, which was testified by the heavy malicious campaign of the local Zionist media drones inside Pakistan.

The USZ-Pakistan relationship also was damaged last year after a CIA contractor in Lahore killed two Pakistanis. Some of the curtailed aid is equipment that the USZ wants to send but Pakistan now refuses to accept, like rifles, ammunition, body armour and bomb-disposal gear, the Zionist mouthpiece New York Times said. These deliveries were withdrawn or held up after Islamabad shut down a USZ program that had been training paramilitary forces, sending home more than 100 USZ trainers in recent weeks, and has threatened to close the base the CIA has been using for drone plane attacks on militant targets. Some of this equipment, such as night-vision goggles and helicopter spare parts, cannot be set up, certified or used for training because Pakistan has denied visas to the USZ personnel needed to operate it, the paper said.