03-02-2007, 11:20 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Al-Qaedaâs last laugh?</b>
Najam Sethi's
FT E d i t o r i a lÂ
For many months the American administration, backed by the American media and think tanks, has been demanding that Pakistan should âdo moreâ to eliminate the Taliban-Al Qaeda threat to Kabul. Now the demand is also echoing in the select committees of Congress. Indeed, a bill is afloat in Congress which, if passed, would link further American economic and military assistance to Pakistan to a yearly certification by the American president that Pakistan was actively engaged in helping the US fight the war against the Taliban-Al Qaeda. Potentially, if Pakistan doesnât play ball, this could have the same negative impact on it as the Pressler amendment did in the 1990s when all American aid was cut off following a refusal by Pakistan to freeze, cap and roll back its nuclear programme. In the last five years since 9/11, as a reward for waging the war against terror, Pakistan has received nearly US$10 billion from the US, and another US$1 billion is earmarked for the current year.
Mr Dick Cheney, the US vice president, was the latest in a line of international bigwigs to descend on Islamabad last week and press the same demand. In the last two months, the CIA chief, Robert Gates, and the US Secretary of State, Condi Rice, came to Islamabad with the same message. As if to confirm Americaâs worst fears, the Taliban left their latest calling card â a suicide bomber â at the gate of the mighty US air force base at Bagram near Kabul shortly after Mr Cheney arrived. Over 20 people were killed, including an American and two foreigners.
Understandably, President Bush is a deeply worried man. His Iraq strategy is in tatters and Afghanistan is unraveling the same way. Britain and his other NATO partners have got cold feet. And the American people want him to âbring the boys home, asapâ. Therefore everyone knows that the Bush administrationâs bluster of sending more troops into the two theatres of war is running on empty, that it is only a matter of time. Under the circumstances, all the old and new players are already conscious of making adjustments to protect their national interests. And these include Pakistan. Some critical questions arise.
Why has the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated to such an extent? Who is to blame and in what measure? What can be done by each of the players to salvage it now?
Following the rout of the Taliban in Afghanistan by American forces in 2002, and the courageous steps taken by President Musharraf to uproot Al-Qaeda from the urban areas of Pakistan from 2002-03, the situation was ripe for both players to press the advantage home. But America and its NATO allies shirked from injecting the pledged financial resources for nation-building in Afghanistan. Worse, they made opportunist payoffs to the warlords instead of disarming them and building a multi-ethnic Afghan national army. The straw that broke Pakistanâs back was US dependence for state building in Kabul on Tajik and Uzbek elements of the Northern Alliance (NA) that had been in bed with India throughout the 1990s. Tensions between Kabul and Islamabad exacerbated in 2005 when Islamabad began to suspect that India and Afghan intelligence might be involved in fueling the insurgency in Balochistan. That is the time when Pakistanâs military establishment began to have second thoughts about how to deal with Kabul. That is when the strategy of confronting and eliminating rebellious Pakhtun-Taliban elements in FATA was changed into one of trying to making peace âdealsâ with them and limiting Pakistani casualties. Unfortunately, this âreprieveâ has enabled the Taliban to regroup and stage a comeback, and in the process threaten both Kabul and Islamabad. If Washington and Kabul had been more sensitive to long-held Pakistani geo-strategic concerns relating to India and the Pakhtuns, this situation could have been avoided. So where do we go from here?
First, we need to address the question that if America, Europe and India can be legitimate long distance players in Kabul, why not Pakistan which is directly in the firing line of the blowback from Afghanistan? This will require greater Pakistani input into how to cobble a new Afghan political system and state that is adequately represented ethnically and is friendly to Pakistan without being a Talibanised state. Second, America and NATO will have to expend resources in nation-building and on creating stake holders not just in Afghanistan but also in the tribal areas of Pakistan to woo people away from radicalism and extremism. Third, America and the international community will have to actively support the revival of democracy and mainstream politics in Pakistan urgently so that a greater national consensus can be developed on integrating it with the global economy and stopping it from sliding into widespread anti-Americanism, religious extremism and consequent isolation.
<b>If this democratization isnât accomplished in Pakistan while the moderate and mainstream parties still have roots in the masses, extremist religious groups will fill the vacuum of opposition politics. Should that happen, Pakistan will degenerate like much of the Muslim world, ruled by military-monarchial oligarchies in which the fundamentalists are constantly trying to break down the gates of the failing state. In the event, Al-Qaeda will have the last laugh. </b>
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Najam Sethi's
FT E d i t o r i a lÂ
For many months the American administration, backed by the American media and think tanks, has been demanding that Pakistan should âdo moreâ to eliminate the Taliban-Al Qaeda threat to Kabul. Now the demand is also echoing in the select committees of Congress. Indeed, a bill is afloat in Congress which, if passed, would link further American economic and military assistance to Pakistan to a yearly certification by the American president that Pakistan was actively engaged in helping the US fight the war against the Taliban-Al Qaeda. Potentially, if Pakistan doesnât play ball, this could have the same negative impact on it as the Pressler amendment did in the 1990s when all American aid was cut off following a refusal by Pakistan to freeze, cap and roll back its nuclear programme. In the last five years since 9/11, as a reward for waging the war against terror, Pakistan has received nearly US$10 billion from the US, and another US$1 billion is earmarked for the current year.
Mr Dick Cheney, the US vice president, was the latest in a line of international bigwigs to descend on Islamabad last week and press the same demand. In the last two months, the CIA chief, Robert Gates, and the US Secretary of State, Condi Rice, came to Islamabad with the same message. As if to confirm Americaâs worst fears, the Taliban left their latest calling card â a suicide bomber â at the gate of the mighty US air force base at Bagram near Kabul shortly after Mr Cheney arrived. Over 20 people were killed, including an American and two foreigners.
Understandably, President Bush is a deeply worried man. His Iraq strategy is in tatters and Afghanistan is unraveling the same way. Britain and his other NATO partners have got cold feet. And the American people want him to âbring the boys home, asapâ. Therefore everyone knows that the Bush administrationâs bluster of sending more troops into the two theatres of war is running on empty, that it is only a matter of time. Under the circumstances, all the old and new players are already conscious of making adjustments to protect their national interests. And these include Pakistan. Some critical questions arise.
Why has the situation in Afghanistan deteriorated to such an extent? Who is to blame and in what measure? What can be done by each of the players to salvage it now?
Following the rout of the Taliban in Afghanistan by American forces in 2002, and the courageous steps taken by President Musharraf to uproot Al-Qaeda from the urban areas of Pakistan from 2002-03, the situation was ripe for both players to press the advantage home. But America and its NATO allies shirked from injecting the pledged financial resources for nation-building in Afghanistan. Worse, they made opportunist payoffs to the warlords instead of disarming them and building a multi-ethnic Afghan national army. The straw that broke Pakistanâs back was US dependence for state building in Kabul on Tajik and Uzbek elements of the Northern Alliance (NA) that had been in bed with India throughout the 1990s. Tensions between Kabul and Islamabad exacerbated in 2005 when Islamabad began to suspect that India and Afghan intelligence might be involved in fueling the insurgency in Balochistan. That is the time when Pakistanâs military establishment began to have second thoughts about how to deal with Kabul. That is when the strategy of confronting and eliminating rebellious Pakhtun-Taliban elements in FATA was changed into one of trying to making peace âdealsâ with them and limiting Pakistani casualties. Unfortunately, this âreprieveâ has enabled the Taliban to regroup and stage a comeback, and in the process threaten both Kabul and Islamabad. If Washington and Kabul had been more sensitive to long-held Pakistani geo-strategic concerns relating to India and the Pakhtuns, this situation could have been avoided. So where do we go from here?
First, we need to address the question that if America, Europe and India can be legitimate long distance players in Kabul, why not Pakistan which is directly in the firing line of the blowback from Afghanistan? This will require greater Pakistani input into how to cobble a new Afghan political system and state that is adequately represented ethnically and is friendly to Pakistan without being a Talibanised state. Second, America and NATO will have to expend resources in nation-building and on creating stake holders not just in Afghanistan but also in the tribal areas of Pakistan to woo people away from radicalism and extremism. Third, America and the international community will have to actively support the revival of democracy and mainstream politics in Pakistan urgently so that a greater national consensus can be developed on integrating it with the global economy and stopping it from sliding into widespread anti-Americanism, religious extremism and consequent isolation.
<b>If this democratization isnât accomplished in Pakistan while the moderate and mainstream parties still have roots in the masses, extremist religious groups will fill the vacuum of opposition politics. Should that happen, Pakistan will degenerate like much of the Muslim world, ruled by military-monarchial oligarchies in which the fundamentalists are constantly trying to break down the gates of the failing state. In the event, Al-Qaeda will have the last laugh. </b>
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