News story (corrected) by Jack Lee
Pakistani military officials on Monday angrily (aka falsely) dismissed Afghan government claims that a NATO (not NATO- U.S.) air strike that killed 24 Pakistani soldiers was a retaliatory measure against fire from the soldiers’ two border posts. ( Okay, so it was retaliation – this is what happens when you shoot at US soldiers. )
The dispute further deepened a new rift in U.S.-Pakistan relations (What relations?) that could jeopardize efforts toward a negotiated resolution to the war in Afghanistan. (If you mean a sellout to the Taliban, who cares about that resolution? )
Coalition forces (again, it was not NATO, it was U.S. soldiers with a few Afghan interpreters) called in air support only after coming under fire from the Pakistani side of the frontier, Afghan and Western officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the investigation into the attack. But several officials said it remained unclear whether the fire came from insurgents (Al Qeada/Taliban) sheltering near the Pakistani posts or from the posts themselves. (Not unclear to us, we knew.)
The airstrikes, which Pakistan says involved NATO gunships (again, it was all U.S. aircraft) and occurred early Saturday, marked the (best shooting) deadliest toll of Pakistani soldiers slain by NATO troops (not NATO!!! – U.S. forces) since the Afghan conflict began 10 years ago.
Pakistani military officials insisted that the air strike was unprovoked. They said the two posts that were attacked were situated on a mountaintop about 300 yards from the Afghan border and were clearly marked as Pakistani military installations, with the nation’s flags and with bold lettering. Soldiers who were not on guard duty at the time were asleep when the attack occurred, officials said. (Flags make great targets for artillery)
“Why should they be firing … toward the Afghan side with small-arms fire?” said a Pakistan official. (Why indeed, unless they were pro-Taliban/Al Qeada and shooting at us. The better question the media never asked is, why would the U.S. hit that base for no reason at all? Well, we know why, that is pretty obvious. We knew where that enemy fire was coming from, heck there were Pakistani flags all over the place. There was no question, because we had it locked in by hi-tech satellite coordinance and we surgically took them out.)
“The checkposts are very well known to the Afghan army and to NATO forces. … No one can miss them or mistake them to be anything other than Pakistani army checkposts.” (My point exactly – and when there is hostile fire coming from them shooting directly at U.S. forces then there is no question who is doing it! And this is what we should have said!)
Speaking to a private Pakistani television channel, Pakistan’s army spokesman Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas said the Pakistani military tried to alert coalition forces that their gunships were firing on Pakistani army posts, but the attack continued. (You bet, and we kept firing until the last SOB that was shooting at us was not shooting!)
“Now they’re coming up with excuses to wriggle out of the situation, [saying] they fired in retaliation,” Abbas said. “We don’t accept that.” (The American people don’t accept that either – we want you to know we did it and you had it coming. No excuses. No diplomatic speak, just plain blunt talk…you got what you deserved and if you do it again we kill the next bunch too.)
U.S. commanders in the past have said that Pakistani troops, either out of sympathy for the insurgents or reluctance to engage them, ignore militants’ presence on territory surrounding Pakistani bases and the militants’ use of the area as staging grounds for cross-border attacks.