WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. military and intelligence officials are so frustrated with Pakistan's failure to stop local militant groups from attacking Americans in neighboring Afghanistan that they have considered launching secret joint U.S.-Afghan commando raids into Pakistan to hunt them down, officials told The Associated Press.
But the idea, which U.S. officials say comes up every couple of months, has been consistently rejected because the White House believes the chance of successfully rooting out the deadly Haqqani network would not be worth the intense diplomatic blowback from Pakistan that inevitably would ensue.
Pakistan has done little in response to repeated U.S. requests for a crackdown on the Haqqanis, and Defense Secretary Leon Panetta surprisingly voiced that frustration in a visit to Kabul this month.
He said the U.S. was "reaching the limits" of its patience with Pakistan's failure to tackle the tribe's safe havens. He added that the U.S. was "extraordinarily dissatisfied with the effect that Pakistan has had on the Haqqanis." He also made fun of Pakistan's ignorance over the bin Laden raid at a speech in India, Pakistan's archrival.
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