State of Pakistan

Admiral Mike Mullen (first from left), the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff, Pakistani Army Chief Gen. Pervez Kayani (third from left) and next to him,

the ISI Chief Ahmed Shuja Pasha (then Major Gen. and Director General Military Operations) aboard the U.S. naval carrier Abraham Lincoln in Indian Ocean;

in a secret meeting on August 26, 2008.  Pasha was promoted to the rank of Lt. Gen. and appointed as the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence on Sept. 29, 2008.

[Source: New Yorker]

President Zardari and Pakistan’s top political leaders like Nawaz Sharif and Shahbaz (of the main opposition group) own luxury properties abroad besides other interests and MQM’s Altaf Hussain (the leader of the third largest party) has long been beholden to the British for providing him a sanctuary and also their residency since the 1990s. But let us not delude ourselves to believe that the Army leadership’s record is any different when it comes to serving the western interests and dancing to the tunes of the puppeteers in Washington and London. Zia and Musharraf were American puppets. Zia and his ISI Chief left fortunes for their families. Musharraf has been leading a comfortable life in London - the same Musharraf who mocked Benazir and Nawaz for living luxurious lives abroad.

One of Pakistan’s main causes of failure is similar to those experienced by many developing countries in the past; the nexus between corrupt local leaders and the West to serve their mutual interests at the cost of the poor and impoverished masses and their future. Pakistanis will have to break this unholy alliance between the elites and the West if they want their country to be a self-respecting sovereign state that works to promote the interests of its people and not of its Army or its corrupt and selfish elites. There are two Pakistans, the real one is of the people which has been high jacked by imposters and the elites.

Another reason for failure has been the inability of the so-called mainstream parties to provide honest and credible leadership. In many other countries, for example, in Latin America, the unholy alliance between the local military, rightwing forces and Americans undermined democracy but the nationalist and democratic forces eventually triumphed because they had capable and credible leadership. The prolonged involvement of the Army in politics, its manipulation of elections and political governments through corrupt means and corrupt politicians has led to the demonization of politics to a degree that save for incompetent and corrupt individuals like Zardari or Nawaz Sharif, or creations of the establishment like neo-fascist Altaf Hussain or pro-Saudi Maulana Fazlur Rehman (infamous for his double dealings), few wish to navigate the treacherous and murderous waters of stormy Pakistani politics. It is a tribute to the political maturity and patience of the people of Pakistan that despite huge disappointments they have voted mainstream parties into power in every election and rejected the religious or extremist groups.

The most critical mistake committed by our establishment and “moderately educated and enlightened” English-speaking chattering classes has been their refusal to see that military aggression by the U.S. has been a major contributor to the radicalization of public opinion in the Muslim countries, destruction of Iraq and Afghanistan, and the destabilization of Pakistan that could lead to its Balkanization. It can be argued that is not a “mistake” on their part, but a deliberate policy for the purpose of serving their own interests. Anyone who points that out is labeled as a Taliban sympathizer or encountered with thoughtless and shallow refrains such as “this is our war.” This is a myopic, unrealistic, self-serving but ultimately self-defeating mantra.

There is no alternative to a political solution as I have maintained since the second half of 2006 when I started writing for the newspapers and appeared on TV. Non-violent political solution means not only Pak Army should not use militants as a policy tool but also the U.S. stops playing the “Great Game” in Afghanistan simply because it can no longer afford to, as it belatedly seems to be realizing. President Obama addressed the American people Aug. 31 and admitted, “One of the lessons of our effort in Iraq is that American influence around the world is not a function of military force alone. We must use all elements of our power -including our diplomacy, our economic strength, and the power of America’s example -to secure our interests and stand by our allies.”

Obama left little doubt about his plans for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Afghanistan declaring, “We cannot do for Afghans what they must ultimately do for themselves. That’s why we are training Afghan Security Forces and supporting a political resolution to Afghanistan’s problems. And, next July, we will begin a transition to Afghan responsibility.” He may face serious obstacles including from the Pentagon and the C.I.A.

U.S. policy and Pak Army’s “wonderland” view of the strategic depth constitute the core of the problem and not extremism per se, which is a consequence or a by¬product of the core problem. Both the U.S. and Pakistani establishments have been in this game together. The concept of strategic depth is flawed as the proud and fiercely independent-minded Afghans will not accept it. It is an extension of the establishment’s nationalism of the imperial variety which is the core of the mindset of the militaries of the subcontinent.

ISI, under the military command, acts as an extension of the C.I.A. at a very high level in the Great Game, notwithstanding disagreements and turf battles. In view of the long history of close ties and cooperation between the Pentagon and Pakistan Army, particularly since 1980, The ISI-C.I.A. conflict appears to be largely a charade for the world to justify the expanded military presence in the region otherwise why would the U.S. Congress earmark one billion dollars for “new and larger” U.S. Embassy facilities in Islamabad. Does anyone can really believe, with a clear head, that a weak country like Pakistan (that is so heavily dependent on the U.S. Aid and the IMF) can carry on this double game for nearly a decade until and unless it also is part of the bigger game of the Americans. Such a belief would be a silly assumption in realpolitik.

The U.S. officials were saying not too long ago that there was no difference between al Qaeda and the Taliban. Now they seem to be eager to reach out to the Taliban for a political settlement. If that was the objective, what was the fuss about al Qaeda being the biggest threat to the global security? Or was it not really but an excuse to build a military presence in Central Asia and Pakistan? Baitullah Mahsud of TTP was guided by Mullah Omar as there was no difference between Afghan and Pakistani Talibans, claimed many U.S. and Pakistani officials. But was it ever a secret that Omar was part of the Quetta Shura protected by the ISI. Who has been trying to fool whom? Many Pakistani and Western analysts - many fed disinformation by the officials - can’t seem to think straight and see through the huge contradictions in the official positions of the U.S. and Pakistan.

How come Kayani (ISI Chief from 2004 to 2007) who presided over the resurgence of the Talibans on both sides of the Durand line during 2004 to 2007 and the worst violence during 2008 - 2010 during his tenure as Army Chief is so close to and favored by the Pentagon and not just that; the top U.S. officials also supported the extension in his tenure. This is nothing new or a conspiracy theory. Kayani has been favored by the U.S. for a long time.

The Startfor, an influential U.S. global intelligence company, reported on October 2, 2007 that “with President Gen. Pervez Musharraf due to step down as army chief by Nov. 15, Kayani will emerge as his successor, and given Kayani’s strong leadership credentials, Musharraf as a civilian president will be forced to share power with him.”

The New York Times ran a story “U.S. is Looking past Musharraf in Case He Falls” on November 15, 2007 concluding that “at the top of that cadre is Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, General Musharraf’s designated successor as army chief. General Kayani is a moderate, pro-American infantry commander who is widely seen as commanding respect within the army and, within Western circles, as a potential alternative to General Musharraf.” 

Sir Simon Jenkins wrote in the Guardian (Jan. 10, 2008), “Backing Musharraf has always seemed “a good idea at the time”. The next person to be cursed with Washington’s favor appears to be Musharraf’s successor as army chief, General Ashfaq Kiyani. However, by opting for the realpolitik of dictatorship the west has not just repressed democracy but aided insurgency and terror.”

Given that Kayani’s rise had been well anticipated and he was the ISI Chief and Vice Chief of Army Staff during 2004-2007 before he became the Army Chief, it is difficult and almost incredible to believe that he had no hand in Zardari’s rise to power. Kayani must therefore share part if not the whole blame for thrusting upon Pakistan someone like Zardari who is nothing but an embarrassment to the country. If he did it under American pressure, that is even worse. 

The crux of the matter is that Pakistanis must disengage themselves from fighting America’s proxy wars and battles in the region, which, since 1980, have cost them more than the all the aid that they received. Pakistan suffered huge losses to the extent of over U.S.$ 43 billion ($10 billion in direct and $33 billion in indirect costs) between 2005 and 2010 according to the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2010, published by the ministry of finance. In sharp contrast, the net financial assistance from the United States, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS), was just $4.9 billion during 2005-10, excluding $7.9 billion as reimbursements of war-related expenses incurred by Pakistan.

But Pakistan has paid a greater cost than can be estimated in money terms. Pakistan’s support to the so-called Afghan jihad has proven to be the starting point when the seeds of its own destruction were sown. In the first phase (1980-1989), ‘Kalashnikov and drugs culture’ spread in Pakistan and contributed to a gradual break down of the law and order and criminalization of society and politics at large. In the second phase (1989-2001), once the Afghan war ended and the Americans left, the militants - under the patronage of the State of Pakistan and its intelligence agencies - organized  themselves and formed what came to be known as the Talibans. We have seen the rise of the Talibans since then and the havoc it has wrought.

But there is a big lesson. Pakistan’s foreign and domestic policies have been inextricably linked and are intertwined. Fighting proxy wars for some aid seemed liked a good deal to Pakistan’s ruling elites. That ‘good deal’ has become Pakistan’s worst nightmare and the threat of the implosion of Pakistani state is now a global security concern. But do Pakistan’s ruling elites (particularly the GHQ) understand this and that the way out of this quagmire would require a change in both foreign and domestic policies?  Current and past indications are not encouraging.

I have tried to provide a framework for a basic and fundamental shift in our strategic and defense priorities in articles written for DAWN since 2006. Pakistan needs a national debate on a fundamental shift in its intertwined domestic and foreign policies. This shift will have to start from the foreign policy. This can’t happen overnight but a beginning has to be made. Pakistan is in Asia and the future belongs to Asia.

To defuse tensions and improve relations with India and Afghanistan, Pakistan should:

(a) not let the Kashmir dispute hold the process of normalization of relations with India. Pakistan must attach the highest importance to the resolution of water disputes with India, given the long-term decline in its water resources and their significance for its agrarian economy. All forms of communication particularly travel, telephone, internet, radio and television must be opened between Pakistan and India to help develop better understanding between the two peoples; and

(b) Pakistan must restrict her involvement in Afghanistan only and strictly to the extent it is necessary to maintain peace on the borders and in the north-western Pakistan because it is in its best interests to focus on domestic stability and economic development. Also, the U.S. must end its military and covert operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

With respect to Pakistan’s relations with Iran, she must not allow any covert activity from its territory against Iran and should seek to improve bilateral ties by focusing on the grievances of Iran, particularly with respect to her relationship with Talibans and the United States.

Pakistan must seek greater ties in trade, industry, and technology with countries like Japan, Korea and Taiwan and look more towards the East. It should diversify its sources of oil imports away from Saudi Arabia and explore prospects in Central Asia, Africa, and even Latin America and also develop its own natural resources. Pakistan’s excessive dependence on Saudi oil has been a major reason for the growth of extremist groups in Pakistan who enjoyed Saudi support.

The case for a fundamental and strategic shift in the foreign policy is not based on any emotional notion of national pride or anti-West feeling.

The Financial Times said in an editorial (Aug. 27, 2010):“Great power shifts are usually accompanied by changes in the international reserve currency. So it is telling that China is taking steps to broaden the use of the renminbi among international investors. Dominance of the global economy, Beijing believes, goes hand-in-and with dominance of the global monetary system.”

 I had written in DAWN on October 28, 2008:

“ The biggest casualty of the western financial meltdown might be the U.S. dominance of the global financial system, the linchpin of its global power. And that it is China, with over $1.8tr in foreign exchange reserves- growing at a pace of $40bn a month, which holds the key to the financing of the astronomical budget deficit that the U.S. will have to run to finance the bailout of its financial institutions. The reports of the death of American capitalism may be exaggerated but there is little question that the financial meltdown means the end of its sole super power status in what was described as a unipolar world.”

The Economist noted in an editorial Aug. 26, 2010: “An America that is bleeding economically at home, with unemployment stuck at nearly 10% and debts as tall as the eye can see, is losing confidence in its ability, and perhaps in its need, to shape events in far-flung regions such as Central Asia and the Middle East.”

The long term shift in the balance of economic power from West to the East and Pakistan’s geographical and strategic position makes it an imperative for the country to reduce its heavy dependency on the West in recognition of the reality that this is no longer a unipolar but a multipolar world and China is the second largest economy and financially the strongest country in the world as well as the largest and most powerful Asian country.

Pakistani state is too weak to afford to pursue policies that cause tensions with all of its immediate neighbors – India, Afghanistan, and Iran – and are viewed with skepticism and unease by the Chinese. They support Pakistan and put up with its “too close for comfort” relationship with Washington because they also need Pakistan, but they never liked its support for the Islamic militants nor its very close ties with Washington. Hence, while they gave Pakistan a token amount during the financial crunch in 2008 as it came to a default, they in effect told Pakistani leaders to get the money from the West (U.S./IMF) because that’s how Pakistan is perceived in Beijing; an old friend who is sleeping with a global adversary – America.  

A recent report (China’s caution on Afghanistan-Pakistan, July 1, 2010) by an influential American think-tank, the Council on Foreign Relations, has this to say regarding the Chinese concerns about U.S.- Pakistan relations:

“China’s geopolitical perceptions are also substantially different from those of the United States. The U.S. role in the region is seen by Beijing as a problem both in its own right, because of the strategic threat that China perceives a U.S. presence to represent, and as a source of destabilization in recent years. Many in China believe that the United States is not purely motivated by counterterrorism concerns if at all but has instead a geopolitical objective: to exert control over the region’s energy routes and strategic chokepoints and ‘‘encircle’’ China. It is a precise echo of Beijing’s concerns about the Soviet invasion in the 1980s, a period which still deeply permeates Chinese thinking about Afghanistan.

China also treats the U.S. presence in Pakistan with suspicion. It sees a commercial threat, believing that its companies may lose the privileged access they have enjoyed, and a strategic one, suspecting that the United States (along with India) intends to weaken China’s position, whether by destabilizing its Baluchi foothold on the Indian Ocean or by seizing the Pakistani nuclear arsenal that it played a vital role in developing. The Chinese ambassador has publicly raised concerns about the expansion of the U.S. embassy, which is indelibly associated with many rumors swirling in the Pakistani press about a growing presence of U.S. marines and private military companies in the country.”

In the past five years, a small country like Sri Lanka has received more aid from China than Pakistan. Since 2006, Beijing has provided Sri Lanka with $3.1 billion in financial assistance for various projects. Its aid to Sri Lanka, which was a few million dollars in 2005, jumped to $1.2 billion in 2009, over half the total aid the island has been offered by various countries. China is Sri Lanka’s largest aid donor today - ahead of Japan or the Asian Development Bank.

The flood aid announced by China to Pakistan – under $10 million – was notably and strikingly small compared to hundreds of millions of dollars donated and mobilized by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia, the two top foreign donors to the flood aid. While Prime Minister Gilani can gloat about this, it should be a cause of concern that the Pakistani government is too ready and willing to beg aid (this time it is likely to be more debt than aid), practically blackmailing the world, and either Pakistan does not have friends in the region or its relations are visibly cool with them.

President Zardari has apparently gone out of his way to promote relations with China and remove their doubts about him but has had limited success partly due to his own low credibility and cozy relations with Washington, but largely due to the fact that Pakistani establishment still looks towards Washington as the primary source of diplomatic, financial, and military aid because it has and continues to play the Great Game to serve the Western agenda, despite the fact China has been the largest supplier of arms to Pakistan through some most difficult times and has played the most critical role in helping her acquire the nuclear weapons technology and capability.

Although it is common to blame the Pakistani military establishment, Pakistan’s pro-Western policies date back to even before its birth in 1947. Various declassified papers of the British government (e.g. Transfer of Power in India, 1942-47 by Nicholas Mansergh), indicate that the British strategists distrusted Gandhi and were concerned that India, led by the “leftist” Nehru, might fall under Soviet influence. The British found the idea of Pakistan as an independent, pro-Western state quite attractive. Pakistan’s founders sought special relationship with the West, particularly the United States.

Pakistan’s every ruler, save Z.A. Bhutto, followed a completely pro-Western agenda hoping that it would serve as a counter weight to India’s threat. However, the world has changed and more so since the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1989, and the emergence of China and India as global economic powers in the last two decades, particularly since 2001. Pakistan has continued to follow the old set of policies overlooking the fact in its quest for containing Chinese influence in Asia and Central Asia; the West’s long term favorite will now be India.

Pakistan’s military is strategically useful and relevant to the U.S. and NATO as long as it can serve their objectives in central and west Asia because the U.S. or the West (for that matter even Iran or Saudi Arabia) do not share Pakistan or Pakistan Army’s view of India as a threat to the regional security and peace. However,  in the long run neither India nor Pakistan would like to be politically dominated or economically exploited by the West.

On the other hand, since one of the main strategic objectives of the U.S. is the containment of Chinese, Russian, and Iranian influence in the region, a strategic and military alliance with the U.S. puts Pakistan in a natural conflict with the interests of China, Russia, and Iran.The continuance of the present set of policies implies that Pakistan may be in a perpetual state of military and strategic tension on both its eastern and western borders. This is an untenable and unsustainable position from all angles; economic, geo-strategic, or political. This fundamental contradiction must be resolved if Pakistan wants to transform itself from a dysfunctional national security state to an Asian country with a promise and start a new era of foreign policy that looks toward East.

To this end, it must remove irritants and possible reasons for mistrust in her relationship with China and give top priority to the safety of the Chinese citizens working or living in Pakistan. It did not help Pak-China relations that some militants, allegedly connected with Pakistan’s intelligence agencies, were guilty of serious crimes, including murder and abduction, committed against Chinese citizens on Pakistani soil. It is important here to recount some of the past incidents that caused tensions between Pakistan and China and created misunderstandings.

One source of tension between Beijing and Islamabad in the past was the issue of Chinese Uighur separatists receiving sanctuary and training on Pakistani territory. It is part of a covert C.I.A. strategy to let selected Islamic militant groups operate against China and Russia. Tensions surfaced in Pak-China relations in the summer of 2007 when, according to a former CIA analyst Lisa Curtis, vigilantes kidnapped several Chinese citizens whom they accused of running a brothel in Islamabad. “China was incensed by this incident, and its complaints to Pakistani authorities likely contributed to Pakistan’s decision to finally launch a military operation at the Red Mosque in Islamabad.” It should be noted that a key character involved in the Red Mosque saga was an ex-ISI officer Khalid Khawaja who had known connections with both the ISI and the C.I.A.

Around the same timeframe as the Red Mosque episode, three Chinese officials were killed in Peshawar in July 2007. Several days later, a suicide bomber attacked a group of Chinese engineers in Baluchistan. In August 2008, Islamist extremists abducted Chinese engineer, Long Ziaowei, in Pakistan’s Swat Valley. The Chinese protested vehemently to the Pakistani government and Ziaowei was released unharmed in February 2009.

Following the Mumbai attacks in November 2008, Beijing dropped its resistance to banning the Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD–a front organization for the Lashkar-e-Tayyiba) in the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) in December 2008. China had previously vetoed UNSC resolutions seeking to ban the JuD over the last several years.

Pakistan needs to realize or should be made to do so that it can no longer afford to fancy that it has a role to play in the “Great Game” or that it needs to control Afghanistan to protect her strategic interests from Indian designs. The reality is Pakistan cannot fight a war for even a short while - few weeks at best - because it will go bankrupt and would have to accept humiliating cease-fire conditions dictated by Delhi and Washington. Kargil provided a miniature sample of this scenario.

Many of the arguments advanced by Pakistani establishment or those of pro-establishment analysts are based on ill-informed and short-sighted considerations and half-baked notions about security threats or delusions about Pakistan’s strength as a nuclear power. But more importantly, they sadly reflect a lack of vision for Pakistan’s future and its role in the region and the world. Musharraf’s adventure as Army chief that led to the Kargil debacle was a manifestation of such short-sightedness and lack of vision.

Indian hawks –inside or outside the government- may talk tough sometimes but there is no question, whatsoever, of a full scale military aggression from India because she is a rising global economic power and would never jeopardize its economic growth and billions of dollars in investment flows to have a fight with Pakistan – which is seen as a small but troublesome neighbor. 

As far as Pakistani military strategists’ theory of bleeding India through militant activities is concerned, this looks more like a pipedream given the precarious state of Pakistan’s economy and domestic conditions and the emergence of India as the fourth largest economy in the world in purchasing power parity terms and among the top ten ranked by foreign exchange reserves. Given the periodic episodes of Pakistan-linked terrorist attacks in India, it does play games in Afghanistan - with apparently the full U.S. support - and along the border but their significance is overplayed by Pakistani establishment to justify wasteful spending on F-16s.

In any event, F-16s or nuclear bombs do not provide security but economic development, together with investment in human resources, in a peaceful environment does and that Pakistan must learn from China. Pak Army must re-evaluate the balance between Pakistan’s relations with the U.S. and China. For starters, its leadership should try to have as close a relationship with the top Chinese leaders as it has developed with Admiral Mullen.

Pakistan can learn a lot from the East Asian experience, particularly from China’s policy to focus on economic development and put conflicts in cold storage. Pakistan must put its house in order now and make economic development its most important domestic and foreign policy objective. This process must start with a gradual disengagement from the external conflicts and redefining ‘security’ to include energy, water and food security as being more important, and reallocation of resources through a restructuring of the armed forces with more emphasis on brains than brawn. The peace dividend, in the form of higher and more stable economic growth, alone would more than offset the illusory benefits of ‘foreign aid’.

Today the gravest threat to Pakistan is not external. Nor is it the Talibans who have no popular support. It is Balkanization. Why? Pakistan is controlled by a military and civil complex, largely drawn from northern and central areas of its largest province -Punjab, which governs it by striking deals and arrangements with disparate power centers and groups in the minority provinces and areas. A critical limb of state, the civil services, has collapsed. This has made the governance more dependent on the army making the country largely and practically ungovernable. Pakistan Army’s narrow power base in the central and northern Punjab – has virtually alienated the rest of the country fueling anger and secessionist sentiments. In the past four decades, Army has been used to suppress opposition or insurgencies in every province except Punjab.

Pakistan must therefore find a way to transform itself from a dysfunctional client national-security state to a modern democracy with a sustainable economic development model which is appropriate for a country with one of the world’s largest, fastest growing, and youngest populations. It cannot hope to move towards that goal unless it disengages itself from overt and covert conflicts; external and internal, realigns its foreign and economic policy focus from the West to the East, and empowers its people through genuine and not ‘manipulated or rigged or highjacked’ democracy.

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For those readers who may wish to read further in the above context, there are six articles that I wrote for DAWN during the last four years:

Commentary by Laurence Kotlikoff

Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) — Let’s get real. The U.S. is bankrupt. Neither spending more nor taxing less will help the country pay its bills.