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US says 200 troops on the ground in Pakistan
The U.S. military has 200 troops on the ground in Pakistan. That's about the double the previously-disclosed number of forces there. It's a whole lot more than the "no American troops in Pakistan" promised by special envoy Richard Holbrooke. And let's not even get into the number of U.S. intelligence operatives and security contractors on Pakistani soil.
The troop levels are one of a number of details that have emerged about the once-secret U.S. war in Pakistan since three American troops were killed yesterday by an improvised bomb. The New York Times reports that the soldiers were disguised in Pakistani clothing, and their vehicle was outfitted with radio-frequency jammers, meant to stop remotely-detonated bombs. "Still, the Taliban bomber was able to penetrate their cordon. In all 131 people were wounded, most of them girls who were students at a high school adjacent to the site of the suicide attack," the paper reports.
The military tells the Times that in addition to yesterday's deaths, "12 other service members had been killed in Pakistan since Sept. 11, 2001."