How Swat was my valley

Today’s Wall Street Journal carries a sobering page-one report on the Taliban foothold in Pakistan’s Swat Valley. According to reporters Zahid Hussain and Matthew Rosenberg, thousands of Taliban terrorists are pouring into Pakistan’s Swat Valley and setting up training camps there, quickly making it one of the main bases for Taliban fighters. Hussain and Rosenberg report that Pakistan President Zardari signed a bill that imposes Islamic law in Swat yesterday.

My guess is that Hussain contributed the on-the-spot reporting from Swat, where the article finds (in somewhat mangled syntax) “mounting evidence that the deal already is strengthening the militants as a base for war.” I am curious what President Obama has to say about the reported developments in Pah-kee-stan? The article only cites the worried comment of an unnamed “U.S official in Washington.”

UPDATE: Matthew Rosenberg has graciously responded to my inquiry on who provided the reporting from Swat: “Thanks for writing and for the kind words about the story. Yeah, Zahid did the reporting on the ground in places where Westerners simply can’t go. Swat has become a very scary place.”

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