Pakistan has never really leveraged the refugees -- but now it will send them back -- and well the misery this will inflict without firing a single bullet will be significant -- it may kill the patient.
Ghani sab understands he has to placate an illiterate population and thus tremendous liberty with the truth.
A country like China which is an economic powerhouse -- an unequal in execution is linking Eastern China to a Pakistani port through insurgency wracked Pakistan but Ghani sab can at the wave of a wand uncouple Afghanistan from Karachi.
-- if if it was possible [and it simply is not] this would take 10-20 years of concerted efforts.
Note that even during the PDPA times -- when Pakistan would close the route it would wreak economic havoc in Afghanistan that was linked by a subsidized route to the USSR --
-- but it is not the Pakistanis Ghani sab is fooling -- like many politicians it is Afghans
It's like asking a patient in intensive care to eat broccoli and exercise -- they need help to keep living now.
Is Ghani sab stupid -- unlikely -- he knows grand standing sells well in Afghanistan and even educated Afghans seem to believe this (as evidenced by their blog posts).
That's like saying eat more broccoli
The ground truth is that the crooked Afghan Parliament has dismissed 7 of Ghani's ministers -- which took two years to put together
An aside: the foreign minster is Salahuddin Rabbani (who makes Pakistani ministers look like Oxbridge grads)
Anyhow -- the Jurnails at least have ring side seats -- popcorn anyone?
From using them as foot soldiers in various GHQ sponsored exercises outside of Pakistan, to using them as pain point point on occasions when necessary, to using them in international forums .... to using them as a pretext of oh so many Afghans here we can differentiate between Talis and the ordinary refugees.... the list goes on and on.
