U.S. Helps Pakistan Blunt Terrorism

U.S. military advisers are helping the Pakistanis double the size of their elite commando force in an ongoing effort to blunt the rising threat of terrorist groups and anti-government militants operating in the country's unruly tribal areas, a senior Pentagon official said Wednesday.

The American military presence is fewer than 100 personnel, said Mike Vickers, assistant secretary of defense for special operations and low-intensity conflict, and is focused on what he called "targeted training." That includes assisting Pakistan's Special Service Group and teaching specialized fighting techniques, such as helicopter assaults.

"It's been ongoing for a while," Vickers said during a meeting with reporters. "They're expanding their capability substantially - they're essentially doubling their force. So we're helping them with that expansion, and trying to improve their capabilities at the same time. There's also some aviation training. It's been ongoing for several years."

However, CBS News' Farhan Bokhari, writing in the Financial Times, reports that Pakistan has refused the U.S. request to conduct joint military operations in its lawless northern tribal regions.

The number of U.S. forces in Pakistan is a sensitive issue. Many Pakistanis openly support or sympathize with al Qaeda, the Taliban or militant groups and would view a sizable American presence in their country as an unwelcome intrusion.

That means the United States won't conduct military strikes on its own inside Pakistan unless President Pervez Musharraf's government requests such direct support.

"We have to be careful conducting operations in a sovereign country, particularly one that's a friend of ours and one that has given us a lot of support," Dell Dailey, the State Department's counterterrorism chief, said last month. "The blowback would be pretty serious."

U.S. intelligence believes al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden is in the tribal area, a large swath of rugged land that runs along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan.

Defense officials told Congress on Wednesday that al Qaeda is operating in safe havens in "under-governed regions" of Pakistan - posing a direct threat to Europe, the United States and the Pakistan government itself. Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, predicted in written testimony that the next attack on the U.S. would likely be launched by terrorists in that region.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates said he believes that Pakistan understands the threat al Qaeda poses to its government, but is sensitive to an American military presence. Gates has said the U.S. remains ready, willing and able to provide military support and conduct joint operations with the Pakistanis.

Until Pakistan "sort of gets on top of the whole situation and what their needs are, I think we're kind of in a standby mode at this point," he said.

The top American commander in the region, Navy Adm. William J. Fallon, was in Pakistan in January meeting with senior Pakistani officials, including the new army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Kayani. Following the meeting, Fallon told reporters that Pakistani officials were more willing to seek U.S. assistance.

Mullen is scheduled to travel to Pakistan later this week, Vickers said.