U.S., Pakistan clash over crackdown on militants

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - With Islamabad resisting U.S. pressure to crack down on militants, Washington is in a quandary as it seeks to balance military goals in the region without causing trouble for Pakistan's pro-American president.

Pakistan's efforts to oust the Afghan Taliban in its northwestern border areas are critical to U.S. attempts to roll back the Taliban campaign in neighboring Afghanistan where Washington is sending in 30,000 additional troops.

But in recent meetings with U.S. officials, diplomats say Pakistan's military and political leaders have pushed back against U.S. pressure, saying they cannot move too fast without provoking a backlash against President Asif Ali Zardari.

"Pakistan is willing to work with the United States but there is a need to understand and to not press Pakistan to a level where it could destabilize the region further due to lack of popular support," said Imran Gardezi, the press minister at Pakistan's embassy in Washington.

"This can't be done in a hurry. There is no quick fix or short-term solution," Gardezi added.

Underlining tensions with Islamabad over the pace of its military actions, Vice President Joe Biden said this week Pakistan had a "long way to go," particularly when it came to dismantling a militant network led by veteran militant commander Jalaluddin Haqqani.

"Are they doing enough? No," Biden told MSNBC in an interview on Tuesday, adding that Washington wanted Pakistan to "move on our mutual interest, which includes the Haqqani network and includes the Taliban in Pakistan. But this is a hell of a process."

In a letter delivered by his national security adviser last month to Zardari, President Barack Obama made clear Washington had other options if Pakistan did not cooperate in fighting Afghan Taliban factions seeking refuge in the border areas.

DISCONNECT

These options include increased pilotless drone attacks, which are very unpopular with the Pakistani public, as well as so-called hot pursuit exercises in which U.S. forces could track extremists who crossed over into Pakistan.

Zardari responded to Obama's letter, promising Pakistan's help but also making clear his country's own security concerns must be met and Washington must offer more military assistance and equipment, said one source with knowledge of the response.

"There is a disconnect on where American and Pakistani authorities are right now," said former CIA analyst Bruce Riedel, now with the Brookings Institution, a Washington thinktank.

Riedel said the administration was aware its options could affect Zardari and was also weighing Pakistan's logistical importance as Washington increases its troops in Afghanistan.

"I think what (military officials) Petraeus and Mullen are trying to do is just keep pushing the Pakistanis in the right direction without overplaying their hand. But it is tricky," added Riedel, who led a review in March of the Obama administration's strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Admiral Mike Mullen, chairman of the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, was in Pakistan on Wednesday, following a trip earlier in the week by General David Petraeus, the head of U.S. forces in the region, who reiterated Obama's call for more action.

In public, most U.S. officials are cautious about criticizing Pakistan, and Special Representative Richard Holbrooke tiptoed around the issue when asked whether Islamabad was doing enough to tackle Afghan Taliban factions.

"Is it enough? Well, obviously we want them to do as much as they will do, but I am not going to sit here and demand of a sovereign country what they have to do," said Holbrooke. "They know what they should do in terms of their own interest and ours," he told the Council on Foreign Relations.

Holbrooke said he understood Pakistan's concerns that additional U.S. troops being sent to Afghanistan would likely push over more militants into the southwestern region of Pakistan, as it did in the U.S. campaign in 2001 and 2002.

"While it is far from perfect -- it's very complicated because there's so many moving parts -- we have really moved the ball forward here in terms of close coordination (with Pakistan)," said Holbrooke.