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Pakistan
and the US: The odd couple
By Ehsan Ahrari
Ambivalence may be the phrase that best describes United States-Pakistan ties.
At one time in the distant past - the early 1950s - Pakistan's vain hope was to
become the Israel of South Asia for the United States, and get enormous
financial, political, and military support from Washington, notwithstanding the
dynamics of its own policies in its immediate neighborhood. On the US side,
Pakistan - unlike Israel - never became important enough a country to be given
that status.
Indeed, it can be argued that the entire subcontinent was of little importance
to the United States during the Cold War, save from the late 1970s until 1989,
when the United States came to South Asia for the specific purpose of defeating
the Soviet Union in Afghanistan.
Before the terrorist attacks of September 2001on its own territory, the United
States perception of Pakistan was that, despite becoming a nuclear power, it
was a near-failed state with a highly politicized and corrupt military and
which had a low regard, if not outright contempt, for democracy. Thus, it was
to be kept at arm's length, even when the administration of then president Bill
Clinton renewed its interest in South Asia and decided to develop a strategic
partnership with Pakistan's archrival, India.
Washington's lackadaisical attitude toward Pakistan was especially evident in
the 1990s, when the US left the region after the Soviet Union was forced out of
Afghanistan. At that time, Washington was too busy with the heady issues of
dealing with Russia and its immediate environ of Central Europe to be bothered
with comparatively "insignificant" South Asia. In the duration, Pakistan not
only became a major playing field for Islamist forces, but an active supporter
of those groups in disputed Kashmir, thereby making South Asia a region ripe
for war.
Toward the end of the 1990s, both South Asian nations had shocking news for
Washington. They had become nuclear states. Even then, it took a couple more
years for the US to engage India in dialogue for a strategic partnership, while
excluding Pakistan largely because its military had once again showed its
contempt for democracy by ousting the highly corrupt - though democratically
elected - government of Nawaz Sharif. The time from 2000 to September 2001 was
marked by strong ambivalence and considerable ill will in Islamabad and
Washington toward each other. Pakistan was resentful of the United States for
its manifest preference for a special relationship with India. The United
States was irate with Pakistan for ousting democracy and supporting the Taliban
regime. Clinton's visit to South Asia in 2000 dramatized how remarkably
divergent the US perspectives had become toward the two South Asian states by
then.
As Islamic radicalism emerged as a powerful anti-US force in the 1990s, any
country where Islamist forces had a high profile became automatic recipients of
America's scorn, scrutiny, and antagonism. Saudi Arabia was a rare exception to
that rule until the September 11 terrorist attacks. But Pakistan was one of the
main recipients of the aforementioned American behavior. From the US side, the
contrast between it and Pakistan could not have been starker. One was a secular
Western democracy, with an explicit global agenda for the promotion of those
traits. Pakistan, on the contrary, was a military dictatorship permeated by
Islamists even in the highest echelons of government, and a dedicated supporter
of the Taliban regime, which was overtly linked with Osama bin Laden and his
al-Qaeda terrorist organization.
The post-September 11 environment created a new era of engagement between
Washington and Islamabad. Pakistan made a major about-face by abandoning the
Taliban regime and by becoming a frontline state in America's "war on
terrorism". But that pesky and unrelenting feeling of ambivalence refuses to go
away. It is correct to argue that this ambivalence is the direct outcome of the
stark contrast between the political systems of the two countries. Thus, it
might go away only if Pakistan becomes a democracy. As radical as this
proposition sounds, it might be the only way to create any real basis for a
long-term rapprochement between the United States and Pakistan.
Another point of engagement, some say controversy, between the US and Pakistan
is the latter's role in post-Taliban Afghanistan. There has been plenty of
speculation about whether Pakistan has really stopped supporting the Taliban.
The controversial aspect of this issue is related to the fact that the Taliban,
after being ousted from Afghanistan, have been gathering strength in the
Northwestern Frontier Province and Balochistan. Then there is that "mysterious"
Pakistani Inter Service Intelligence (ISI) service - which is given more power
in Western analyses than it really has - and its role in cooperating with US
law enforcement officials. Undoubtedly, there is support for the Taliban within
the ISI, but any suggestion that the ISI still operates as a "government within
the government" is an exercise in sheer speculation or wishful thinking.
From the US side, there is no clearcut evidence of official support for the
Taliban in Pakistan. The only point of contention is whether Musharraf's regime
is doing enough to track down the al-Qaeda elements. Washington is fully
cognizant of the fact that it is hard to establish a clear-cut distinction
between the Pakistani Islamists and the Taliban. But the Arab elements of
al-Qaeda are easy for the Pakistani authorities to identify, track, and
capture. One school of thought in Washington is that Islamabad is doing quite a
bit in this regard, but could do more. President George W Bush falls into this
category. The other school is more ambivalent on the issue.
From the Pakistani side, the issue of developing a sustainable friendship
toward the US may be a myth at best, or even a fiction, under the present
environment of anti-Americanism, which is so heavily couched in religious
phraseology. Persuading the uneducated part of its population - which might
only be between 6 to10 percent of the entire population but which formulates
the hardcore support for the jihadi culture - that the United States is not an
anti-Islamic force would be akin to performing a miracle. Short of a miracle,
the only feasible way of lowering the intensity of anti-Americanism is through
a two-pronged strategy of programs of massive economic assistance and the
radical refurbishing of Pakistan's religious educational institutions.
Meanwhile, the process of nurturing young jihadis must stop immediately if
Pakistan is to have a future as a stable and modern Muslim state. The question
posed in a classic children's story, "Who will bell the cat?" becomes relevant
here with a slight modification. It is not only important to ask who'll bell
the cat, but also, "What will the process of belling the cat entail?"
The United States knows the intricacy, obduracy, and durability of the process
involved in the creation of a moderate democracy in Pakistan. But in order to
accomplish a task of this nature, Bush's global "war on terror" must be
radically altered with a view to assigning primacy to economic assistance and
nation-building everywhere, especially in Pakistan and Afghanistan. While the
United States has offered economic assistance to Pakistan, no other elaborate
measures related to nation-building have been taken yet.
The foremost measure related to nation-building in Pakistan is radical reform
of its religious educational institutions. A country where a sector of the
population envisions women as livestock - largely useful for procreation and
carrying out household chores - can claim to be neither Islamic nor having any
craving for modernity, since modernity involves the entire population, not just
the male part of it. That frame of mind - which is essentially a part of the
Taliban culture - has to be eradicated through radical reforms of the entire
political and cultural milieu of Pakistan. No US government has the patience to
do it, considering that it largely responds to crises. Even then, its response
is driven by a preference for simple and quick-fix solutions, which, more often
than not, are neither on target nor ameliorative. But as a country that has
assigned itself the lead role of winning the global "war on terror", the United
States does not have much of a choice other than stamping out obscurantism,
which has been one of the major sources of promotion of terrorism in Muslim
countries.
Even though measures of this nature are not likely to do away with the
seemingly enduring ambivalence between Washington and Islamabad, they do
promise to be a step in the right direction.
(Copyright 2003 Asia Times Online Co, Ltd. All rights reserved. Please contact
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