Getting the job done

Monday, Sept. 15, 2008 | 2:07 a.m.

Ever since the battle for Tora Bora in December 2001, when retreating Taliban and al-Qaida forces in eastern Afghanistan made their way into Pakistan’s lawless tribal areas, U.S. forces have been at a deadly disadvantage in this true central front in the war on terrorism.

While the terrorists were free to regroup in the tribal areas and use them as a safe region from which to launch attacks into Afghanistan, U.S. ground forces were not free to cross the border and strike back.

Although Pakistan’s government has been a titular ally in the war on terrorism, its stance against cross-border missions by U.S. troops has been uncompromising.

In a country whose population harbors much anti-U.S. sentiment, then-President Pervez Musharraf feared being ousted if opposition political parties could say he yielded the country’s sovereignty to the Americans.

Although Pakistan’s current president, Asif Ali Zardari, has said he will work with Afghanistan’s leadership in the fight against terrorism, he has the same concern.

It may be right from a diplomat’s perspective to commiserate with those concerns. But justice calls for putting them aside if the precise location of Osama bin Laden or any of the Taliban or al-Qaida terrorists becomes known.

Although it has (presumably) authorized missile attacks in the tribal areas, the Bush administration should long ago have given our troops the right to act on intelligence and conduct surgical strikes across the border into the heart of those who perpetrated 9/11.

As reported last week by The New York Times, that authorization was secretly given by President Bush in July. Though late, the authorization is proper. Because the reach of the Pakistan government does not effectively extend to the tribal areas, terrorists who are a threat to the whole world have found safety there.

Barack Obama was criticized as naive by John McCain when early in the presidential campaign Obama said, “If we have actionable intelligence about high-value terrorist targets and President Musharraf will not act, we will.”

That is not being naive. It is being realistic about what a war on terrorism really means.