A Chinese-Pakistani axis is building up to face off against an American-Indian partnership, according to Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi in the American Spectator. Interestingly, Pakistan doesn't seem to have anything to say about defending its sovereignty against 11,000 Chinese troops already on its soil.

Although the leadership of the Pakistan Army is now firmly refusing to take any action against the Haqqani Network in the form of a military offensive in North Waziristan, Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik has vowed to attack and pursue Muslim Uighur militants who operate in China's western province of Xinjiang but take refuge and undergo training in Pakistan's border areas with Afghanistan (often in cooperation with al-Qa'ida and other Islamist militant groups that have firm footholds in Pakistan). As Malik himself put it, "We will strike very hard against them [the Uighur militants]. Anybody who is the enemy of China is the enemy of Pakistan."

Strengthening ties extend to the realm of arms deals, and now even entail the deployment of Chinese troops in Pakistani territory. For example, in May, China agreed to provide 50 new JF-17 Thunder multi-role fighter planes to the Pakistan Air Force (PAF) "immediately" (a deal had been signed earlier, but

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