Pakistan's fight against the Taliban has a limited chance of success because of the army's inexperience and its refusal to accept help from the west, according to a counter-insurgency expert.

As Pakistan continued its offensive against the Taliban in the Swat valley to the north-west of Islamabad, David Kilcullen, widely hailed as a key strategist behind the successful US surge in Iraq, warned that the outlook for the operation was "pretty bleak." Mr Kilcullen has been a leading adviser to General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command, in his Iraq strategy.