US faces the F-16s it supplied Pakistan

[Demeter]

Source: India Times


WASHINGTON: The United States is suddenly faced with the uncomfortable scenario of confronting the very same weapons and military hardware, including F-16 fighter jets, it has armed Pakistan with for decades.
...The turnaround of Pakistan from an ally to a potential enemy has alarmed lawmakers, some of whom are now questioning the continued supply of arms to Islamabad. On Tuesday, a Democrat-controlled House Foreign Relations panel has scheduled a hearing whose snarky title -- ''Defeating al-Qaida's Air Force: Pakistan's F-16 Program in the Fight Against Terrorism'' == betrays the unease over the Bush Administration’s relentless arming of Pakistan. Al-Qaida has no known air force.

In July, the Bush administration sought to shift $226.5 million in US counterterrorism aid for the F-16 upgrades... In addition, because Congress has previously provided Pakistan with significant amounts of Foreign Military Financing (FMF) for counterterrorism and law enforcement activities against al-Qaida and the Taliban, the subcommittee will seek testimony on how these planes contribute to Pakistan’s efforts in the fight against terrorism and extremism, and how the use of additional FMF to pay for mid-life updates to Pakistan’s existing F-16 fleet enhances those efforts. The subcommittee is also expected to examine what counterterrorism equipment or programs were foregone as a result of the July 16, 2008, reprogramming request.

Fearful of a Congressional squeeze on further F-16 supplies and upgrades, an unnamed senior Pakistani official in Washington briefed US and Pakistani journalists on Friday on the central role the jets were playing in the war on terror. Pakistan, he said, has flown nearly 100 missions during three weeks in August that produced some 500-550 Taliban casualties. But the PAF needed night-flying capability because the militants were regrouping in the night...There is a great deal of skepticism about Pakistan using F-16s against militants, and the body count it keeps producing. Several accounts from the region describe friendly, fraternal ties between the Pakistani military and Taliban fighters.

On Sunday, the Pakistani media reported tribal sources as saying a PAF jets were seen patrolling the skies on the country’s western borders with Afghanistan in the afternoon, soon after a US predator was seen flying in the area. ''Neither the CIA-operated Predator nor the Pakistani jet fighter took any offensive action as the two planes didn’t encounter each other,'' a report in the Pakistani newspaper The News, said.






Read more: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/US_faces_the_F-16s_it_supplied_Pakistan/articleshow/3482718.cms

[yurbud]

1. maybe it's time to stop selling weapons to thug regimes...