War with Pakistan in the immediate aftermath of 9/11

There were and there remain extremely powerful anti-American and pro-Taliban forces in Pakistan. What if the Pakistanis had refused to cooperate with America in the aftermath and/or Washington became convinced of ISI involvement.

The war that would follow be by far the most serious the US has engaged since WWII. How would it go down and what would be the ramifications?
 
There were and there remain extremely powerful anti-American and pro-Taliban forces in Pakistan. What if the Pakistanis had refused to cooperate with America in the aftermath and/or Washington became convinced of ISI involvement.

The war that would follow be by far the most serious the US has engaged since WWII. How would it go down and what would be the ramifications?

I'm granting your premise, though I think it's highly unlikely.

I'm assuming this is in addition to war with the Taliban in Afghanistan? Because if so, the United States is going to need serious allies. Otherwise, we don't have the resources to support and maintain an occupation and offensive operations in both countries. That means India, which is plausible on the Indian side, given the attacks on the Indian parliament. However, Indian involvement takes the war to a whole new level in Pakistan. Indian invasion and occupation will galvanize hugely any insurgency which springs up (as it is sure to), increase Muslim terrorism in India (and likely reciprocal Hindu terrorism as well) and in general screw things up. Which is why we didn't and still won't invade Pakistan. It has 180 million people, six times Afghanistan's 30 million.
 
We bring back the draft to get the needed numbers and take at least one of the gloves off, because if it convinces us to actually invade Pakistan it must be pretty bad, looks like we will have a bad decade, Pakistan will get wrecked and any other country will fear us

IMO the US deciding to glass Pakistan is more likely than actually invading (.1%-.02%), Pakistan is a nuclear power after all
 
Given the premise I don't see how war could possibly have been avoided no matter how difficult it was bound to be. Congress might actually declare war the old fashioned way.

Yes, the war with Taliban is still on the table. The war with Pakistan is occurring because they're protecting the Taliban and are believed to have supported the 9/11 attacks.

Pakistan had roughly 140-50 million in 2001.

The war would likely open with some kind of first strike on Pakistan's nuclear capabilities. I don't know whether that would have necessitated the use of nuclear weapons, probably not but it would likely be considered.

There would be a huge air campaign, one that would likely last for months.

Even using low end Rumsfeldian calculations the US would need at least 1.2 million men to actually invade Pakistan. (170k for Iraq, multiplied by 7)

A complete call up of the Reserve and the National Guard could mobilize an invasion force of perhaps 400,000 (complete guess on my part, feel free to set me straight) in six months. They land in the south while a million Indians come in from the east.
 

The invasion is likely to be simple, given the political will, just as the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan were. The US could, in 2001, win a conventional war with pretty much any country it set its mind to. But the problem is, as I said, this will under no circumstances be a conventional war. And a conventional war in Pakistan will be hell. Pakistan is largely urbanized. You'll get large numbers of urban guerrillas. Think about a Hue City every few months. You'll get traditional insurgents up in the mountains. You'll get terrorists in India. You'll get a massive mess. This would be mostly clear to any military planners in the US in 2001.
 
Yes it will be clear, but once again, given the premise, how is it avoidable? I just don't see it.

The only good aspect of this is that, as you said, the unconventional nature of the 2nd phase of this conflict will be recognized from the beginning and it will be planned for, unlike what happened in Iraq (which will be completely butterflied away).

One thing I'm incredibly interested in is how the US-Indian relationship would play out.
 
I don't think it's likely that India would get involved. By 2001 they've got far too much to lose. I suspect they most they'd agree to is participating in surgical strikes to try to take out Pakistan's nukes- Indian and American special forces operating out of Indian bases, striking into Pakistan. An outright invasion is out of the question. Pakistan may be a failed state but the military is the only thing in the country that works. It's not like invading Iraq or Afghanistan.

Also, I suspect that a condition of Indian assistance would probably be no first use of American nukes.The Indians aren't going to want nuclear explosions going off just over the border.
 
I don't think it's likely that India would get involved. By 2001 they've got far too much to lose. I suspect they most they'd agree to is participating in surgical strikes to try to take out Pakistan's nukes- Indian and American special forces operating out of Indian bases, striking into Pakistan. An outright invasion is out of the question. Pakistan may be a failed state but the military is the only thing in the country that works. It's not like invading Iraq or Afghanistan.

Also, I suspect that a condition of Indian assistance would probably be no first use of American nukes.The Indians aren't going to want nuclear explosions going off just over the border.

How does this butterfly away the attack on the Indian Parliament that jacked up tensions sky high in December, especially if the ISI is calling the shots?

The ISI is extremely paranoid about India, they won't believe that India won't get involved.
 
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