US vague on strikes inside Pakistan

WASHINGTON - Obama administration officials have keeping themselves vague about whether U.S. forces should directly engage terrorists operating in northwestern Pakistan in the wake of the announcement of a new Afghan strategy, analysts noted.
Richard Holbrooke, US special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, declined Friday to say whether the United States would fight inside Pakistan to target Osama bin Laden and other terrorist leaders known to be based there, the Washington publication The Hill reported.
It would be "deeply injurious to our national interest to speculate" on that, Holbrooke said.
His comments came an hour after U.S. President Barack Obama told reporters that the United States was reserving the option of attacking terrorists within Pakistan, saying, "We will insist that action be taken -- one way or another -- when we have intelligence about high-level terrorist targets."
When asked if that meant the U.S. troops would hit targets in Pakistan, presidential spokesman Robert Gibbs asserted, "I think it would be wise for us not to lay out for the world that plan of attack," adding that Americans could be "assured that the president is taking the steps necessary to address the threat and protect the American people," The Hill reported.
Meanwhile, a top US official said that the administration fully supports the elected leadership of Pakistan and work closely with a view to ensure that the American assistance under the new strategy is used toward socio-economic uplift of the people as part of efforts to deal with extremism.
Bruce Riedel, chairman and leader author of the panel that crafted the policy for President Obama's administration's way forward in Pakistan-Afghanistan region, called for proceeding cautiously on the notion of putting any overly legislative or other restrictions on utility of the aid.
"We support the elected leadership of Pakistan ----As the President indicated in his speech, we're going to make sure that there is rigorous oversight by an Inspector General's office.
"And we're going to work very, very intensively with our Pakistani partners, the democratically elected civilian leadership in Pakistan , to see that we're moving in the right direction, in the same direction that we want to go."
He was making comments in the backdrop of the lack of accountability in the use of U.S. assistance given to Pakistan in the last several years.
Riedel premised that any moves towards strict restrictions should not push Washington into a corner as has been the case in the past.
"The United States has a long history of legislative-required sanctions on Pakistan. I think one of the things that we have learned from that history is that we need to be very careful in how we do this, and that we need to work with the Pakistanis and not box ourselves in or box them in.
"So it's going to be a complex process. We will work very closely with the Hill on the legislation. But we're going to try on this area, as in every other area, to maintain the adaptability of our strategy, so that we can avoid finding ourselves boxed into a corner."