SPY EYES

The US Ambassador to Pakistan has worked tirelessly to put US-Pakistan relations on a positive track and both he and his wife have earned the respect of Pakistanis. He was expected to stay at least another year so there is much speculation on the reasons behind his early departure especially because the announcement comes soon after the US Secretary of State stated in India that the US believed that Ayman al Zawahiri was in Pakistan and that the US wanted Hafiz Saeed brought to justice. Ambassador Munter has been trying to find middle ground in the stand-off between the US and Pakistan and there is no doubt that he discerned the pragmatic opinion in Pakistan that wants the relationship revived and the drift into corners that overrules this pragmatism. The US talks to Pakistan from a position of strength as it is perhaps the only country that has the power to shape external environments in pursuit of its interests.  The US-India relationship gets a boost whenever high ranking US officials speak down to Pakistan from India and no doubt this goes down well with the Afghan government too. Pakistan understands the coercion and pressure especially when all US aid is tied to US determination of Pakistan’s cooperation on counter-terrorism operations and actions against the use of IED’s. The US has clearly spelt out that there will be no apology from the US over the Salala incident in which twenty four Pakistani soldiers were killed by US forces and no change in the policy on Drone strikes. The US has kicked the ball fully and squarely into the Pakistani court. The next call has to be by the government of Pakistan—an elected government that is trying desperately to balance civil-military relations and establish civilian supremacy over national security policy formulation.

The US has always stated that it wants political stability, sustainable democracy, a viable economy and civilian supremacy in Pakistan. The perception in Pakistan is that the US has no problem working with dictatorial military regimes but invariably creates pressures for elected governments. For the first time the military has stepped back of its own accord. After the Salala incident it pushed for the Defense Committee of the Cabinet to decide on the future course of action. The Parliamentary Committee for National Security formulated the framework for resetting the US-Pakistan relationship and after some delays the Parliament approved the framework. This was the time for the US to step back from its military driven policy in the war on terror and work with the government of Pakistan to find common ground rather than raising a brick wall that has encouraged the radical forces that oppose cooperation with the US and have none of the responsibilities and constraints of the incumbent government.

NATO’s Southern Distribution Network (SDN) could have been discussed in the context of non-lethal logistics, the modalities of the Drone strikes could have been jointly considered to give Pakistan a role in target selection and the apology issue made less confrontational by initiating a joint review of the investigations carried out by both sides into the Salala incident. The thrust should have been to strengthen civilian government not undermine it. To many in Pakistan it seems that any interest that the US has in Pakistan is only in the context of the war on terror and many even think the US is deliberately confronting Pakistan as a prelude to more active operations. The US strategy built around Drone strikes, covert operations and actionable intelligence can work best without the fig leaf of an allied relationship. Such a policy may work as a tactical expedient to get over a transient predicament but it could have tragic long term consequences for the region and beyond. After all the Northern Distribution Network (NDN) has not been targeted in Afghanistan though many anti-NATO forces could have disrupted it in the Afghan provinces of Baghlan and Kunduz. There are also perceptions that the Pakistan Army was deliberately drawn into FATA by sponsoring insurgents whose actions are being modulated in tandem with destabilization in other parts of Pakistan and that the recent beheadings of Pakistani soldiers is a tactic to get the military into North Waziristan. There are media reports of US thinking that the Al Qaeda footprint in Pakistan is much bigger than what it was considered to be earlier.

If reconciliation is now the preferred strategy in Afghanistan then this policy must extend to Pakistan too. Excluding Pakistan by a raft of strategic agreements with its eastern and western neighbors and following a policy of pressure and coercion cannot be a part of a reconciliation strategy.. Pakistan needs to be put in a situation where it finds it possible to reciprocate and cooperate. Pakistan has indicated that it wants the bilateral relationship with India to improve. This will only happen if the militaries and bureaucracies can look beyond the trivialities of managing a relationship to a broader change in the nature of the relationship. There is no doubt that Pakistan wants a robust relationship with the US. The path to this goal should be made easier and not more difficult than it already is. The US needs to encourage all bilateral relationships in the region especially the Pakistan-Afghanistan relationship. After all the specter of an ethnic conflict in Afghanistan is very real and the response to it has to be now—not after it erupts. Pakistan should be given time and the capacity to resolve internal conflicts and not degraded even as the demons within it are encouraged by expedient policies. Pakistan too must raise its sights and broaden its horizon by reaching out to other states like Malaysia, Indonesia and Turkey and not remain in the straitjacket of past policies. Pakistan has a place in the push by China for infrastructure that takes it to Turkey, Europe and Central Asia and it also has a place in the new Silk Road idea. Pakistan has to change and adapt and draw strength from the environment around it. Others will not come to Pakistan till it reaches out and goes to them.

Spearhead Research

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