Cowboy Up

The U.S. is asking South Korea, Turkey and Pakistan to put up - we want 40,000 more cannon fodder... I mean, highly trained professional soldiers (AP Story). It's interesting that these three countries are being asked: all of them rely on or benefit immensely from U.S. support.

South Korea, of course, has American soldiers defending it, and U.S. nuclear weapons effectively guaranteeing its independence. Turkey is surrounded by countries who don't like it - Greece, Russia, Armenia, Iran, Iraq, Syria, etc. It's moved away from the Islamic world and embraced the West, and was a key U.S. ally throughout the Cold War. American support of Turkey's overtures to Europe is a big plus for them, as is our tolerance of their repression of Kurdish nationalists. They need us to guarantee that Iraqi Kurds don't get out of hand, and we're asking for some mercenaries in exchange. Sounds fair to me. Asking Pakistan for troops is just one more request on a running list that we established in October of 2001. After two years of Pervez Musharraf asking, "How high?", I'm beginning to wondering how much longer we can ask Pakistan to go on jumping. At some point, they're going to expect real support in their ongoing feud with India, and that's not something the United States can afford to give.