Well, we did it: American forces invaded Pakistan with the whole world watching. Pakistani officials, for their part, weren't keen on having their country's sovereignty violated.

At least 20 people were killed in northwest Pakistan on Wednesday after U.S. and Afghan troops crossed from Afghanistan to pursue Taliban insurgents in an early morning attack that marked the first known instance in which U.S. forces conducted an operation on Pakistani soil since the U.S.-led war in Afghanistan began, according to witnesses and a Pakistani official.

The United States has conducted occasional air and artillery strikes against insurgents lodged across the border in Pakistani territory, and "hot pursuit" rules provide some room for U.S. troops to maneuver in the midst of battle. But the arrival of three U.S. helicopters in the village of Musa Nika, clearly inside the Pakistani border, drew a sharp response from Pakistani officials.

"We strongly object to the incursion of ISAF troops on Pakistani territory," said Maj. Gen. Athar Abbas, chief spokesman for the Pakistani military, referring to the International Security Assistance Force, the coalition of U.S. and other NATO troops that has been battling the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan since 2001.

Invading Pakistan in the midst of ongoing destabilization of the country ranks as bad military and diplomatic strategy. But to invade without - it seems - any well-formulated plan, on the same day that Pakistan's PM Yousuf Gilani survives an assassination attempt, is particularly bad timing. And if this behavior has already been going on (note the Post's careful wording about "the first known instance"), then getting caught strikes me as a sign of real recklessness. In any event, this reeks of poor planning - especially because civilian deaths may pour more gasoline on the flames of an insurgency that strikes like this are intended to stamp out. Oh, and we didn't even get the guys we were chasing.

What exactly is being communicated between Pakistan's government and ours is unclear. Rumors are flying about closed-door meetings between American officials and Pakistani leaders like presidential hopeful Ali Zardari (elections take place on September 6th, ramping up potential for chaos). What with US Ambassador to the UN Zalmay Khalilzad's unauthorized contacts with Zardari and resultant State Department outrage, and reports of a meeting between Admiral Mike Mullen of the Joint Chiefs and Pakistani military leader General Ashfaq Kayani, it's hard to tell what message (or messages) we might be sending - or what agreements may be close at hand.

U.S. and Pakistani officials have released few details about discussions at the high-level meeting, which was also attended by Gen. David D. McKiernan, NATO's top commander in Afghanistan. But a senior Pakistani military official with knowledge of the meeting said that talks between Mullen and Kayani focused in large part on the threat to coalition forces in Afghanistan emanating from insurgents operating inside Pakistan's borders. The Pakistani military official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said the meeting touched on a possible agreement to allow U.S. Special Forces to begin ground operations in Pakistan's tribal areas.

It sounds like those who want us to fight a three-front war may get their way. And I say three fronts because I don't think that expanding into Pakistan will involve fighting the same enemy on the same terms in the same way. Also, if Pakistani politics lose the fragile order they still possess, we could easily find ourselves in over our heads. I seriously doubt, given the way that the missions in Afghanistan and Iraq have played out, that we have the capacity to engage with the local population. Do we have the people who speak the right languages, the people who know something about the local culture, politics, and economy, the people who even know the physical geography? If not, I think we're going to see many more civilian deaths - and a corresponding backlash in Pakistan's tribal areas. How far will we expand the war before we admit that the strategy is rotten at its core?

One frightening thing is how weak the mechanisms of civilian control are in these cases. We just invaded a country, and there will be little public discussion of it, let alone participation in decision-making. I suppose one could argue that incidents like these garner more attention now than some of our Cold War adventures in Latin America and elsewhere attracted from the mass public, but that doesn't comfort me much. The nature of the War on Terror has always been to keep expanding - and in the case of Afghanistan/Pakistan, with vocal support from most prominent Democrats, including folks like Obama. Maybe I'm a fool and an expanded American military role in Pakistan would end the insurgency and bring freedom to South Asia. But at the very least we should have a greater public debate before - not after - we take the war to a new level.