The new U.S. strategy of unilateral attack against suspected militants inside Pakistani territory is threatening to send moderate Pakistani tribesmen to go fight alongside extremists against coalition forces in neighbouring Afghanistan.
The move piles more pressure on the fragile new democratic government in Islamabad, which is struggling to defend Pakistan's role in the war on terror against a hostile public that sees U.S. aggression as being as much of a danger as the Islamic militants.
Over the weekend, tribal chiefs in North Waziristan, the part of Pakistan's tribal borderland that was struck by the most recent civilian-killing U.S. missile attack, vowed to take the fight to Afghanistan if the United States does not halt attacks into Pakistan. These community leaders, representing the majority of people in North Waziristan, had not previously supported the extremists, but they are fiercely independent, armed and willing to fight anyone who trespasses on their land. Their anger could easily spread to other six other "agencies" that make up the tribal belt, several of which have also been subject to U.S. attacks.
There has been an intensified bombardment of the tribal territory with U.S. missile strikes against suspected Taliban and al-Qaeda training camps and hideouts, compounded by the first U.S. ground raid into the area earlier this month, apparently in exasperation at Pakistan's inaction.
Reacting to the missile attack Friday in North Waziristan, tribal chiefs from the area, representing around half a million people, called an emergency jirga - or tribal meeting - on Saturday.
"If America doesn't stop attacks in tribal areas, we will prepare a lashkar [tribal army] to attack U.S. forces in Afghanistan," tribal chief Malik Nasrullah announced. "We will also seek support from the tribal elders in Afghanistan to fight jointly against America."
During the past month, there have been seven U.S. missile strikes in the tribal area, about the same number as the whole of last year, representing a huge escalation in American intervention in Pakistan. The ground assault, which took place in South Waziristan, provoked a sharp rebuke from the Pakistan army, which is otherwise an ally in the "war on terror." Washington believes that Taliban and al-Qaeda militants fighting the U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan use Pakistan's tribal area as a safe haven.
"If the Americans are coming to sort it out with force, they would create more enemies," said Ayaz Wazir, a retired Pakistani diplomat who is a tribal chief from South Waziristan. "The Americans might have supersonic jets and we might have to fight with stones in our hands, but we will stand up."
Analysts believe that U.S. intervention could set the tribal area on fire and reverse a series of recent setbacks for the militants. Some of the Pakistani tribes have risen up against the Taliban, in border areas of Dir and Bajaur, forming lashkars to fight them. The Pakistani military has finally taken on the extremists, in battles in Bajaur and Swat, a valley in the north west, while the democratic government has, for the first time, been trying to make the case to the public that the struggle against the militants is Pakistan's war, not America's.
Pakistan's new President, Asif Ali Zardari, has arrived in Britain, on a private visit but he is expected to meet British Prime Minister Gordon Brown tomorrow, to discuss the situation along the Pakistan-Afghan border. Mr. Brown is likely to press for greater Pakistani action against militants in the tribal area and may go along with U.S. calls for integrating the tribal territory into the conflict in Afghanistan as one theatre of war - an idea that will be resisted by Pakistan.
Mr. Zardari and Pakistan's Prime Minister, Yousaf Raza Gilani, said in a joint statement during the weekend that: "The sovereignty and territorial integrity of the country should be respected at all cost."
An editorial published yesterday in The News, a Pakistani daily, said: "The Islamabad government is aware the U.S. strikes are badly undermining its authority, weakening the standing of the Pakistani army and, as such, aiding the militants in their task of whipping up greater internal support."