Warning the Bush administration against any 'loony' move to inject American troops in the militant-infested frontier areas of Pakistan, a former top United States official has said that Washington would have to find a way to 'motivate' Pakistan to deal with the extremists there.

"I think that a totally loony idea is to put US forces into the frontier areas of Pakistan," former under decretary of state for political affairs Thomas Pickering told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during a hearing on Afghanistan.

"If the Pakistanis themselves cannot do it, with their knowledge, with their capability to operate in those areas, at least now, how are Americans going to get over this particular difficult problem?" he questioned.

Pickering, who is also a former US Ambassador to India, said while he had no objections to the US helping Pakistan to deal with the growing militancy in its tribal areas, it was a 'a Pakistani problem in almost an exclusive sense'.

"We have to find a way, which we haven't been successful yet, in motivating the Pakistanis to do so," he said.

"It is not a simple problem either for president Pervez Musharraf [Images] or for the Pakistanis to deal with, but I see that's the only road and I totally agree on the looming dangers," Pickering said.