Haqqani: Military or political solution?
By Gareth Porter
WASHINGTON - Dissension over Admiral Mike Mullen's accusation that the Haqqani
network of Afghan insurgents is a "veritable arm" of Pakistan's intelligence
agency and the revelation that a United States official met with a Haqqani
official have provided new evidence of a long-simmering struggle within the
Barack Obama administration over how to deal with the most effective element of
the Afghan resistance to US-North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces.
One issue under debate is whether military force alone can settle the problem
of the Haqqani network or if a political settlement is necessary.
The other issue is whether the United States should continue to carry out a
drone war against the Haqqani network in Pakistan's North Waziristan tribal
area in defiance of Pakistan's demand for a
veto over the strikes, or reach an accommodation with Pakistan that would
narrow the focus of the strikes.
That policy debate pits top military leaders, Pentagon officials and the
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), who want to put priority on pressuring
Pakistan to attack the Haqqani forces, against those in the Obama
administration who doubt that the military effort can be decisive and support a
political approach to that key insurgent force.
The military, the Pentagon and the CIA have been pushing aggressively since
late 2010 to get the administration to force the Pakistani military leadership
to carry out a major offensive against the Haqqani leadership and forces,
despite an intelligence assessment that Islamabad would not change its policy
toward the Haqqani group.
Just days before his tenure of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff ended,
Mullen took advantage of the consternation of the entire Obama administration
over the 20-hour siege of the US Embassy and US-NATO headquarters in Kabul on
September 13 to raise the issue of Pakistani ties with the Haqqani group at a
higher level of intensity.
He sought to exploit what he called "credible evidence" that Pakistan's
Inter-Services Intelligence agency (ISI) was involved in the planning or
execution of the Kabul attacks.
It soon became evident, however, that Mullen was not speaking for a united
Obama administration. White House spokesman Jay Carney responded to a question
about Mullen's remarks on September 28 by saying it was "not language that I
would use".
A September 27 article in the Washington Post quoted an unnamed US official as
saying that Mullen's charge was "overstated" and that there was "scant
evidence" of ISI "direction or control" over the Haqqani group.
Then Washington Times Pentagon correspondent Bill Gertz suggested on September
28 that the criticism of Mullen was coming from officials in the intelligence
community and the State Department, which wanted to relax the pressure on
Pakistan over the Haqqani network rather than intensify it.
The critics were calling for cutting back sharply on drone strikes in northwest
Pakistan, according to the Pentagon official who leaked the disagreement to
Gertz. Their argument, according to Gertz's source, was that continuing the
strikes at the present level was unlikely to damage al-Qaeda any more than it
already had been.
That argument parallels those made by former Director of National Intelligence
Dennis Blair in an August 14 New York Times op-ed piece.
The vast majority of the drone strikes over the past two years, however, have
targeted the Haqqani network, not al-Qaeda or the Pakistani Taliban. The drone
war has therefore become the basis for an alliance between the leadership of
the CIA and the military in support of pressure on Pakistan's military over its
failure to attack the Haqqani network.
The military and the CIA have argued strongly against negotiating with the
Haqqani network. In June 2010, CIA director Leon Panetta declared publicly, "We
have seen no evidence that they are truly interested in reconciliation where
they would surrender their arms, where they would denounce al-Qaeda, where they
would really try to become part of that society."
That position also reflected the interests of the US military. Panetta's move
to the Defense Department and his replacement by General David Petraeus at the
CIA ensures that the same alignment of interests will continue.
But the Obama administration's December 2010 strategy review produced a
potential alternative to that military-CIA approach.
An intelligence assessment circulated just as the 50-page classified review of
progress in Afghanistan and Pakistan was being completed concluded that
Pakistan was not likely to agree to carry out a major military operation
against the Haqqani group, regardless of US pressures. It also suggested that,
without such a change in Pakistan's policy, the US military strategy in
Afghanistan couldn't succeed.
That strengthened the hand of those who had been skeptical about the military's
approach to the problem. The result, according to sources familiar with the
document, was that the strategy review suggested the need for a "political
approach" to the insurgency in general and the Haqqani network in particular.
The review, which is described as "diagnostic" rather than "prescriptive", did
not mandate such a political approach, nor did it define what it would entail,
according to the sources. The political approach "wasn't off the ground yet",
one source told Inter Press Service (IPS).
The implication, however, was that the Haqqani network would have to be
integrated into the broader US strategy of "dialogue" with the Taliban
insurgent leadership, even as military pressure on the insurgents continued. It
could not go further than that, because Obama had not made a decision to enter
into peace negotiations with the Taliban.
After the December review, Pakistan stepped up its effort to persuade the
United States to deal directly with the Haqqani network, telling the Obama
administration that it could bring the Haqqanis to the negotiating table.
Despite opposition from the military-Pentagon-CIA phalanx to a Haqqani role in
negotiations, those in the State Department and the White House who were
backing a broader strategy of negotiations for Afghanistan and hoping to ease
tensions with Pakistan supported separate talks with the Haqqani group.
In a hint of the direction US policy was tilting, Mullen, who was no fan of
direct contacts with the Haqqani network, declared in June that some members of
the network might be open to "reconciliation".
ABC News revealed on The Blotter on October 3 that a US official had met
with Ibrahim Haqqani, the son of the patriarch of the organization, Jalaludin
Haqqani, a few months before the September 13 Kabul attacks.
Sirajuddin Haqqani, who is now in day-to-day command of the network, told BBC
the same day that the US had raised the possibility of representation of the
network in the Afghan government.
Although no US official has confirmed that claim, it is consistent with past
efforts to divide the Haqqanis from Taliban leader Mullah Omar, to whom the
Haqqanis have pledged their loyalty. On May 5, 2004, Syed Saleem Shahzad
reported in Asia Times Online that Siraj Haqqani had confirmed a report Shahzad
had received from another source - presumably the ISI - that the United States
had offered through the ISI to make Jalaludin Haqqani prime minister. (See
Through the eyes of the Taliban.)
The elder Haqqani's response, according to his son, was, "After so much killing
of Afghans through 'daisy cutter bombs' and like, shall I sit in the government
under US command?"
While rejecting offers to end their resistance war in return for a position in
the government, the Haqqanis are ready to join broader negotiations whenever
Mullah Omar agrees to begin talks, as was confirmed by a Haqqani network source
to Reuters on September 17.
Last week, unnamed US officials were spreading the word to news media that
there was reason to believe the Haqqanis were to blame for the assassination of
Afghan High Peace Council Burnahuddin Rabbani, despite the apparent absence of
any real evidence the group was involved.
That was another indication that the debates over the two Haqqani-related
issues are far from being resolved.
Gareth Porter is an investigative historian and journalist specializing
in US national security policy. The paperback edition of his latest book,
Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, was
published in 2006.
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