Jai Hind

So it looks like India has finally had enough of Pakistan's FA, and is having them FO the cost of having proxy Islamic terrorist groups attack India.

After Pakistan has been funding, sheltering, and using not-really-deniable terrorist groups as proxies, the Indians have finally had enough.

AP:  India-Pakistan Live: Islamabad vows retaliation after India's 'Operation Sindoor' strikes kill 26

Pakistan's latest supported terrorist group's terrorist attack in April was a step too far for India to tolerate.  Pakistan had been the supplier and base for the Mumbai attacks and countless others and they've gotten away without retaliation for doing so.

Until now.

India hit terrorist training sites in Pakistan in response to the latest attack. Part of this is due to India's new more friendly relationship with the United States and both nations troubles with Islamic terrorism.  The USA had long backed Pakistan over India as India was semi-involved/kinda sorta/it's complicated,  in the Soviet sphere of influence, but that support has worm thin, especially as Pakistan was supporting the Taliban against us in Afghanistan.

This does up the stakes, as Pakistan and India have had open warfare before and as each side has nuclear weapons things can get out of hand unless overall deterrence is reestablished.

However, a relationship where Pakistan can continue to send terrorists over the border to attack Indian civilians without any response is no longer tenable or acceptable, nor should it have been. 

Pakistan has long organized, trained, sheltered, funded, and then sent terrorist groups over to India and then  said "Who, Us?" each time after an attack, and continued a low-level conflict.

India is no longer permitting that, which is a good thing and may just re-establish an overall deterrence to have Pakistan stop the continued attacks when there is a cost imposed on Pakistan for these acts.  

It's a high-risk situation, but the current status quo of ignoring Pakistani responsibility for the myriad of terrorist attacks is not acceptable to India, nor should it be.

Not Sure If These Will Be Reported As Deaths Caused By The Coronavirus

The New York Post: Pilots in Pakistan airliner crash were reportedly distracted by coronavirus

The pilots ignored the sterile cockpit rule while landing, instead chatting about the Coronavirus, and ignored the multiple alarms that their gear wasn't down and went to land anyways.

They then managed to scrape both engines along the runway and then compounded the error by doing a go-round with two damaged and failing engines and then unsurprisingly crashed and killed all 97 people on board.

This is one of the reasons why flying with many foreign airlines is highly contraindicated. Violating the sterile cockpit rule is a major problem that tends to allow an opportunity for disasters to strike. Then sterile cockpit rule is amazingly simple - no non-essential activities or communication is permitted during critical stages of flying such as takeoffs and landings.

Add to the mix that it appears that perhaps 30%+ of Pakistan Airlines' pilots have fake credentials, which doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

Heck, I fly a tiny plane by comparison, and always instruct passengers not to talk during takeoff or landing, except to let me know if they see another plane is on a collision course.

This was a completely and easily avoidable accident that should never have happened.

Look Up In The Sky, It's A Bird, It's A Plane, No, It's A Drone And You're Another Dead Terrorist In Pakistan......

That droning sound followed by a blast means corporate advancement for the Pakistani Taliban as their number one got all blowed up.

The Detroit Free Press: Pakistani Taliban needs new leader after drone hit

The Pakistani Taliban's top council met Saturday to choose a new leader to replace the militant movement's chief, killed in a U.S. drone strike the day before, intelligence officials and commanders in the movement said.

The death of Hakimullah Mehsud, a ruthless leader known for attacking a CIA base in Afghanistan and a bloody campaign that killed thousands of Pakistani civilians and members of the security forces, is a heavy blow for the militant group.

One wonders how many potential candidates quickly yelled "Not it!" when it came time to picking a replacement.

And Another Al Qaeda #2 Bites the Dust.

John Ringo on Facebook commented that with the death of Al-Qaeda #2 Abu Yahya al-Libi, in Pakistan on Monday, he is the 29th Al Qaeda #2 that has met an early demise since taking on the job.

I daresay it's the Peter Principle for Al Qaeda: You rise to the level of your own drone strike.

Pull the other one, its got bells on....

Gates: 'No evidence' Pakistani leaders knew bin Laden was there

U.S. officials have “no evidence” that current Pakistani leaders knew Osama bin Laden had been holed up near their capital city for half a decade, but they suspect someone — perhaps a retired official — did know about the al Qaeda leader’s whereabouts....Amid passionate calls from Capitol Hill for the Obama administration to get tough with Pakistan after the revelation bin Laden had been hiding there for up to five years, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Wednesday he has seen “no evidence at all that the senior leadership knew.”

Gates told reporters during a Pentagon briefing that “I’ve seen some evidence to the contrary.”

In fact, Gates said, U.S. officials “have no evidence yet with respect to anybody else” knowing bin Laden was hiding in a compound about 30 miles from Islamabad.

Still, the former CIA director added, “My supposition is somebody knew.”

No kidding. Its rather unlikely that "senior leadership" had no idea Osama was operating from and hiding beside a major military base. His presence was a little bit too explosive so to speak for this to be the work of some low-level functionary. More than likely someone high up in the government leadership knew, and the ISI certainly knew and supported his living there.

Gates kind of covering for the Pakistanis is what happens when you rely upon unreliable "allies" like the Pakistanis and Saudis, both of whom are at least playing double games to undermine the US. However, as the US has put itself in a position of having to rely on these unreliable regimes expect more of this soft-shoe approach where a far sterner approach would bear better results.

An American Jihadi in Pakistan

Ok, there's not one but five of them, yet it seems reminiscent of the plot of An American Werewolf in London with carefree American travelling to foreign lands ... but this trip could have produced a higher body count than the one in the movie:

US official: Pakistan expected to deport US youths

senior State Department official said Friday the U.S. expects Pakistan to deport five young Americans detained after they allegedly sought to join up with terrorist groups and left behind a video saying fellow Muslims must be defended.

The State Department official said Friday that it is not yet clear whether the five men may have broken any Pakistani or U.S. laws during their stay in Pakistan. The five allegedly told local investigators they were trying to connect with al-Qaida-linked militant groups and intended to cross the border into Afghanistan and fight U.S. troops there.

Nice, grow up in the US so you can go fight Americans. Of course, unlike the star of An American Werewolf, these aren't your typical all-American youths just in town to have a good time:

Police have said those detained included three Pakistani Americans, two Ethiopian Americans and an Egyptian American named Ramy Zamzam who is a dental student at Howard University. The others were identified as Waqar Hussain Khan, Umer Farooq, Ahmad Abdul Minni and Aman Hassan Yamer. Pakistani officials have given various versions of their names and the spellings could not be confirmed.

Farooq's father, Khalid Farooq, also was detained. Pakistan police officials say the elder Farooq had a computer business in Virginia and shuttled between the U.S. and Pakistan.

Instead of innocently touring around and getting bit by a werewolf, they were trying to become werewolves and to get hooked up with their fellow jihadis:

Thursday the five men wanted to join militants in Pakistan's tribal areas before crossing into Afghanistan. He said they met representatives from the al-Qaida-linked Jaish-e-Mohammed militant group in the southeastern city of Hyderabad and from a related group, Jamaat-ud-Dawa, in Lahore, but were turned away because they were not trusted.

Sad, not even trusted enough to join the second-stringers.

While Pakistani officials have said the men admitted trying to connect with militant groups, an FBI note sent to American lawmakers said the bureau has "no information linking them to terrorist organizations."

This is hardly reassuring. Then again, given the pressure by organizations like CAIR to hamper the FBI from investigating radical Islamists in the US including in their radical mosques, its not surprising.

how many more like these five are out there (not to mention what will be done to keep track of them once they are deported from Pakistan) and what's the FBI doing to stop them bringing jihad to the USA?

How many made their jihadi pilgrimage uninterrupted, and will they be caught before they try and reenter the USA?