The Pak-US Relationship

[muse]

Now lets hear from opinion in Pakistan, Is the Pakistan US relationship worth saving?? At what cost?? Can we cry over spilled milk and imagine things will change?



Beware of Americans — bearing gifts
By Shaukat Qadir
Published: May 12, 2011

The writer is a retired brigadier and a former president of the Islamabad Policy Research Institute

I am sure everyone knows this but merely to ensure we are on the same grid, a policy has one or more aims to be achieved in a specified period and spells out how the said aims will be achieved. While I have no intention of fleshing out a policy in this article, I will merely seek to emphasise the need for one and suggest what it should be aiming at. Pakistan has been without any policy since Ayub Khan’s decline in 1964!

Let us start by looking at what every ordinary citizen of any country, including Pakistan, wants. First and foremost is security: Not just security of life and limb or security from neighbouring enemies, but also food security, water security, job security, economic security, energy security etc. The list is long, and he/she wants to live in peace, so as to have the right to ‘pursue happiness’.

If this is all what we need, do we have any of these? Quite right, we have none! Why not? Because, apart from the rampant corruption at all levels of those in authority, we are engaged in a war that is sapping all our resources! Make no mistake, this is our war; the ‘enemy within’ poses an existential threat, greater than any external power does.

But why did this war begin? Why did the once loyal Mehsud, Afridi, and Mohmand turn against us?

If we hark back in time, in 2001, the Pakistani Pashtun and all Afghans were celebrating US intervention in Afghanistan. It would liberate them from Taliban oppression. Within a year, American arrogance, their suspicion of all Afghans, their utter disregard for local customs and culture, could result in only one thing: Another Afghan freedom struggle from an oppressive foreign force. The US called it a resurgence of the Taliban and al Qaeda! In time it did become that, because the US converted a legitimate struggle for freedom from an army of occupation into ‘Taliban linked to al Qaeda.’

To return to my question — as they did when Afghans sought their freedom from the Soviet occupation, the Pakistani Pashtuns bordering Afghanistan, girded their loins to assist their Afghan brethren. This time, Pakistan did not want them to. And in 2004, we decided to kill the most outspoken of those Pashtuns, a wazir called Nek Muhammad.

His murder was the watershed. We had a rebellion on our hands because we were preventing our tribal Pashtun from assisting their Afghan brethren in their freedom struggle against an army of occupation: The Americans, of course. So all Pakistan suddenly became American, kafirs, legitimate targets for religious fanatics to kill, and we are more vulnerable and accessible for them to target. So we are faced with an existentialist threat and we die. This was the first gift we got from the US.

Without tracing all the history, where do we stand today as far as the US is concerned? Anybody, who is anybody in the US, is baying for our blood. We are traitors to them and branded American-kafirs by our enemy within. Obama now tells us that when the Navy SEALs came to get Osama, they were “in sufficient numbers and prepared to retaliate to any response by the police or Pakistan’s security forces”.

They also gifted us Raymond Davis, hundreds of him. When we agreed to give him back, it was on the condition that all other Raymonds also leave. The CIA has not forgiven us and recent drone attacks are again killing more civilians than militants. If the Raymonds can no longer stoke unrest in Pakistan, the drones can!

As far as the promised financial aid is concerned, we receive a mere trickle, each time with another threat of severance if we fail to obey our Lords and Masters in DC. Even the Coalition Support Fund (CSF), intended to compensate a small portion of the expense incurred by the military in this war that has been forced on us by the US and Musharaf’s capitulation, is long overdue by well over a billion dollars.

The US has its own litany of complaints but we have ours. Isn’t it time to file for divorce?

But I also listed what our people want; how can we get there? To start with, if we divorce the US, we can no longer be clubbed with it and the raison d’etre for our internal strife ceases to exist and, if the US pulls out of Afghanistan, claiming victory after Osama’s execution, the entire cause disappears!

If the US does not pull out of Afghanistan, which is more than likely, we can make the US increasingly irrelevant in Afghanistan. Those who read my explanation of why US Vice President Joe Biden rushed to Pakistan might recall the series of events listed by me which led to the (Burhannuddin) Rabbani Initiative, which also received a nod from our army chief, to find an Afghan solution to Afghanistan’s future.

All this will take time, but our war will be approaching a conclusion. It will no longer be open-ended. If Afghanistan can find its own solution and make peace within, our western borders are safe. If we mend fences with Iran and reopen negotiations with Tehran for the stalled oil pipeline, we will have cheap energy, which China is also offering. If we bring peace to Balochistan, China will immediately commence work on expanding the Karakoram Highway and the stalled rail link from Urumqi to Havelian. If that happens, commerce alone will suffice to infuse fresh life into our tottering economy.

It all starts if we divorce the US, now!

Our problem is that our political leaders have convinced themselves that before they are elected in Pakistan, they have to be selected in DC. May I suggest, if you must be selected somewhere, get yourself selected in Beijing instead. The only capital that has, while you were cowering in your palaces or gallivanting overseas, issued a warning (unsolicited by us) to the US: “Don’t dream of repeating May 1 in Pakistan again”.

So, do it now. Before the people rise up, as they are doing in Arab countries, and shout, “Enough — kaafi ho gaee”!

 

[TruthSeeker]

My heart says let's leave Afghanistan and Pakistan. They don't want us. We can put half as much resource into a "fortress America" defense instead of this power projection offense we have been pursuing for 10 years. But my head says that we should help Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan to develop, since we caused or abetted so much destruction in these three countries. If the American people were allowed to vote on a referendum: "Should the USA withdraw all military forces from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan?"; the answer would probably be 80%: YES, HELL, YES!!!!

 

[Ammyy]

My heart says let's leave Afghanistan and Pakistan. They don't want us. We can put half as much resource into a "fortress America" defense instead of this power projection offense we have been pursuing for 10 years. But my head says that we should help Pakistan, Iraq and Afghanistan to develop, since we caused or abetted so much destruction in these three countries. If the American people were allowed to vote on a referendum: "Should the USA withdraw all military forces from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan?"; the answer would probably be 80%: YES, HELL, YES!!!!

I dnt think local Afghan people want that America leave their country at this point cause they know devil Taliban waiting for this movement

 

[VCheng]

This editorial makes for some thought-provoking reading.


from: Banyan: The insanity clause | The Economist

Banyan

The insanity clause
You don’t have to be crazy to run counter-terrorism in Pakistan; but it helps to appear so

May 5th 2011 | from the print edition

UNDER your own nose is often the last place you look for something you have mislaid. But in this case the missing object was the target of perhaps the most expensive manhunt in history. It seems inconceivable that parts of the Pakistani establishment were unaware that Osama bin Laden was living in their midst. You might think it also seems unbelievable that Pakistan could be so breathtakingly duplicitous and take such a risk of antagonising America, its most important ally. In fact, you would be wrong: high-risk duplicity has long been the hallmark of Pakistani foreign policy.

You never know when the world’s most-wanted man might come in handy. Some members of the Inter-Services Intelligence or ISI, Pakistan’s spy agency, probably thought it a good idea to hang on to Mr bin Laden. The reasons lie in Pakistan’s tortured relations with America, with Islamist extremism and with India.

“Deadly Embrace”, a recent book on the America-Pakistan relationship, by Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer who chaired a review ordered by Barack Obama of policy to Afghanistan and Pakistan, shows that Pakistan has long seen the United States as a fickle friend. Viewed from Islamabad, the relationship is a history of betrayals. In the 1950s the two countries’ spooks got on famously. An American U-2 spy plane captured in the Soviet Union in 1960 had taken off from a secret airbase near Peshawar. Yet when Pakistan went to war with India in 1965, America stayed neutral. Nor, despite Pakistan’s role in arranging his opening to China, was Richard Nixon much help when East Pakistan seceded to become Bangladesh in 1971—though he managed to antagonise India by sending an aircraft-carrier into the Bay of Bengal.

Close co-operation in the 1980s in arming and training mujahideen fighting the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan soon turned into sanctions over Pakistan’s nuclear programme. So on September 11th 2001, Pakistan’s then dictator, Pervez Musharraf, according to his memoirs, thought hard before succumbing to America’s threats and offering help in the looming war in Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s role in that war has been ambiguous. It has provided vital access. It has sacrificed hundreds of soldiers’ lives fighting terrorists. It has tolerated hugely unpopular drone attacks on Taliban and al-Qaeda targets in its territory. It has let hundreds of CIA agents roam about. When one of them shot two people dead in a Lahore street in January, it even, eventually, let him go. It has also captured and handed over al-Qaeda fighters—670 of them by 2006 according to Mr Musharraf, including in 2003 Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, alleged mastermind of the 9/11 attacks.

Yet Pakistan has also done much to help the Afghan Taliban rebuild itself after crushing defeat in 2001. It is even harder now to believe Pakistan’s denials that the group’s leader, Mullah Omar, lives in its territory. The army has been selective in the extremists it has attacked. The Haqqani network, which reserves its firepower for targets in Afghanistan, has been immune. So, the world now knows, was the biggest terrorist prize of all.

It may even be that his protectors had sympathy for Mr bin Laden and his views. Hamid Gul, a former head of the ISI, has promoted conspiracy theories about 9/11. He also believes—less controversially in Pakistan—that “the Taliban is the future” for Afghanistan. You can choose your friends, but not your neighbours. Americans come and go, but India will be there forever, and deeply ingrained in the Pakistani security establishment are the beliefs first, that India is the real enemy, and second, that to remain safe from it, Pakistan needs the “strategic depth” of a friendly Afghan neighbour. The Taliban, moreover, are predominantly ethnic Pushtuns, like many Pakistanis.

The strategy of using Islamist militants to topple a big power worked well in Afghanistan and was tried again against India in Kashmir. The links built up during the two insurgencies between the ISI, the army and the militants go deep. It seems highly unlikely that the Pakistani terrorists who attacked Mumbai in November 2008, for example, did so without some official connivance. The aim would be to raise tension with India, justifying Pakistan’s army in concentrating its forces on its eastern frontier. Since India and Pakistan both have nuclear weapons, this may be the highest-risk strategy of all. At home, the extremists now seem out of control, threatening the very survival of a moderate Pakistan. Yet the government still seems ambivalent about them.

Denying in the Washington Post this week any Pakistani knowledge of Mr bin Laden’s whereabouts these past ten years, Pakistan’s president, Asif Ali Zardari, resorted to a familiar defence. Pakistan is “perhaps the world’s greatest victim of terrorism”, which has taken the lives of 30,000 Pakistani civilians. It makes no sense, he implied, to be collaborating with terrorists.

For fear of finding something worse

Mr Zardari is right: it is a policy of almost lunatic recklessness. It assumes America is too dependent on Pakistan’s help to ditch it again. It assumes India will withstand almost any provocation. And it assumes the rise of extremism in Pakistan itself can still be contained. It is that final assumption that has looked shakiest this year. Two moderate politicians have been assassinated for advocating reform of the unjust blasphemy law. Few have dared condemn, and many have praised, their murderers.

If it were located anywhere else, Pakistan—which also has the world’s worst record on nuclear proliferation—might be treated as a rogue state. But it is too important. The fear of its lurching into fundamentalist hands is in turn part of what restrains America and India. That would be a catastrophe for the war in Afghanistan, for India’s hopes of a prosperous future in a calmer region and, most of all, for the vast majority of Pakistanis, who show little sign of hankering for harsh clerical rule.

 

[somebozo]

If it were located anywhere else, Pakistan—which also has the world’s worst record on nuclear proliferation

Excuse me but who has the world worst record?
Pakistan which went on international shopping spree of nuclear materials or the suppliers who were willing to deal in selling equipments illicitly??
What warrants that if they have sold to Pakistan, they would not sell to other dubious regimes?

 

[VCheng]

from: Sulks and self-delusion | Opinion | DAWN.COM

Sulks and self-delusion
Irfan Husain

LOST in the strident blame game between Islamabad and Washington in the aftermath of the raid that killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad is any clarity about the basis of their relationship.

While conspiracy theories and accusations are being hurled back and forth, nobody`s asking: what next? This confusion is more pronounced in Pakistan where a humiliated high command is issuing angry statements to little purpose. One example of its fury emerged when Maj-Gen John Campbell, US commander of forces in eastern Afghanistan, said that for two days, he could get no response at all from his Pakistani counterpart.

This sulky behaviour exposes a military leadership unaccustomed to public scrutiny and criticism. Lashing out at their American critics, Prime Minister Gilani has said that “full force” could be used against any further violations of our sovereignty.

But these words ring as hollow as the ones contained in a declaration issued by the Pakistan Ex-Servicemen`s Association (Pesa):

“Whereas Pesa agrees that Pakistan is becoming isolated in the region and the world because of our weak nationhood, no common direction, and consequent impoverishment; thus becoming vulnerable to forces hostile to us; it is now essential that a minimum national consensus be created across party lines on the national identity, purpose and vital national interests, for a secure people and a secure Pakistan.”

This ringing declaration with its laudable aims would have had more credibility had any of its authors resigned during our many bouts of military law that did the exact opposite of what Pesa now demands. Sadly, too many of our retired generals become democrats and express their concern for democracy only after they hang up their uniforms. As long as they are on the military gravy train, they are perfectly happy with the power they wield, and the perks that come with it.

Another voice from Pakistan`s large population of retired but vocal military officers comes from Brig Farooq Hameed Khan, blogging on a public Internet forum:

“Where is the proof or evidence that it was the real OBL and not his decoy, look-alike or dummy who was killed in the Abbottabad raid by US Special Forces? … The Americans are masters in the art of strategic deception. Was this operation staged to tell the world that OBL was killed in the operation while hiding in a city not far from Islamabad? Was this operation engineered to be Pakistan`s 9/11 to embarrass the Pakistan Army/ISI? ….”

Of course one doesn`t have to be a retired brigadier to spout such conspiracy theories: the Internet is humming with them from all manner of people. However, the fact that the blogger refuses to accept the word of Bin Laden`s wives and daughter suggests a degree of unreality that, coming from a once senior army officer, should be a matter of concern to Pakistanis who paid for his training.

But for me, this confusion emanating from the highest levels of the country`s security establishment reflects a lack of clarity about the basis of our relationship with America. This is something the army high command shares with a large number of civilian hawks to be found in TV studios and editorial offices of newspapers across Pakistan. To remind us about the beginning of the US-Pakistan relationship, here is Lawrence Wright writing in a recent issue of The New Yorker :

“It`s the end of the Second World War, and the United States is deciding what to do about two immense, poor, densely populated countries in Asia. American chooses one of the countries, becoming its benefactor. Over the decades, it pours billions of dollars into that country`s economy, training and equipping its military and its intelligence services. The stated goal is to create a reliable ally with strong institutions and a modern, vigorous economy…

“… The benefits that Pakistan accrued from this relationship were quickly apparent: in the 1960s, its economy was an exemplar. India, by contrast, was a byword for a basket case. Fifty years then went by. What was the result of this social experiment?

“India has become the state we tried to create in Pakistan. It is a rising economic star, militarily powerful and democratic, and it shares American interests. Pakistan, however, is one of the most anti-American countries in the world, and a covert sponsor of terrorism. Politically and economically, it verges on being a failed state…”


This makes painful reading for any Pakistani, but we really need to understand why much of the world sees us in this depressing light. We have been in denial for far too long, and of late, our ruling elites have sunk into self-delusion and outright paranoia. Rather than admit their many failings, they have convinced themselves that there is some dark conspiracy to `get Pakistan`. In this, they have the support of an increasingly hysterical and irrational media that has thrown objectivity and reason out of the window in a race for advertising and viewers.

As our generals and their acolytes in the media ratchet up their shrill condemnation of the United States, they should remember that Pakistan is not exactly the flavour of the month in America these days. There are voices being raised in Washington to cut off aid to Pakistan in the wake of suspicions that our military was deliberately harbouring Bin Laden.

A school of thought in Pakistan is confident that America needs Pakistan too much to walk away. Indeed, much of our military`s approach in dealing with the US appears to be based on this calculation. But we need to remember that President Obama has announced his intention to reduce US troops in Afghanistan from this year. After Bin Laden`s death, the pressure to pull out will only grow.

Once the US departs, there will be little incentive to continue to pump military and economic aid into a country that hates it so much. Many of our TV chat show anchors and guests insist that we can do without US aid. But when the tap is turned off, and the price of the dollar goes through the roof, raising the price of borrowing and imports overnight, I wonder if they`ll sing the same tune.

They might find that the price of ` ghairat `, or national honour, can be very high indeed.

 

[Geronimo2011]

Hard to believe that this was just 1 year back

 

[arthurborges]

I've been reading up on this thread with only a vague wish to sign up but finally did so.

I signed up because I was just thinking that contributors here might benefit from adding the following to their personal libraries:

Confessions of an Economic Hitman by John Perkins
The Shock Doctrine by Naomi Klein
+ occasional visits to the websites of Thierry Meyssan and Webster Tarpley.

There was also some US website with a military theme, but I forget which one, where some member defined diplomacy as "The art of saying 'Nice Doggie' until your sniper gets into position."

 

[NmHqh2JbVo]

Anybody can be a diplomat if you don't have frontal lobe problem, or better, don't even have it. Look at Chinese foreign minister, do you see his frontal lobe? Do you see Zardari's frontal lobe?
By this thinking, it's time for Rusiaans to replace their foreign minister.

 

[monitor]

Should (Could) America and Pakistan’s Bond Be Broken?
June 5, 2011
By MARK MAZZETTI

WASHINGTON — America’s tormented relationship with Pakistan has long had the subtlety of a professional wrestling match. So when frayed relations turned openly hostile in recent weeks, it was hardly a surprise to see Pakistani officials flirt publicly with China, America’s biggest rival in Asia.

Within days of the American raid deep inside Pakistan that killed Osama bin Laden, Pakistani officials travelled to Beijing and asked their “Chinese brothers” to operate a strategic port on the Arabian Sea. They also said the two countries were planning oil pipelines, railroads and even military bases in Pakistan for the Chinese Navy.

The Pakistani officials had already advised their neighbors in Afghanistan — where Americans have committed billions of dollars and lost more than 1,500 lives since 2001 — that Afghanistan would be better off placing long-term bets on an ascendant China, rather than a declining United States.

With the tortured marriage clearly in trouble, Islamabad has sent signals that it is ready to start seeing other people. Can Washington afford to do the same? And just how far could Pakistan get by playing the field?

With Bin Laden dead and the White House determined to get the bulk of American troops out of Afghanistan as quickly as possible, some in Washington make the case that the ties that bind the United States to Pakistan are no longer so strong, and that the allegiances that have entangled them over the past decade could be rearranged.

There are new dynamics now at play, noticed by analysts who liken this era to the years immediately after the cold war. For decades, fears of Soviet expansion had brought the United States and Pakistan into a tight embrace, but those ties weakened and ultimately broke once that threat had passed. Similarly, an American withdrawal from Afghanistan could put greater distance between the two nations and allow ties between Washington and New Delhi to grow.

“As we begin to rely on Pakistan less to get supplies into Afghanistan, America’s axis with India will continue to strengthen,” said Bruce O. Riedel, a former C.I.A. official now at the Brookings Institution. If this happened, he said, it would only be natural for Islamabad to try to grow even closer to China and Saudi Arabia, two longtime allies and trading partners.

But even then, there would be limits on how much America might suffer. Some experts say that a network of new regional relationships with Pakistan actually might help America pursue its deepest interests in the region.

Don’t expect an open break tomorrow, of course. For the moment, the United States and Pakistan remain bound to each other. As long as war rages in Afghanistan, the United States will rely on routes in Pakistan to ferry in military supplies, and to keep pressure on militants in Pakistan’s tribal areas. And the Pakistani government still needs the billions that come each year from Washington to, among other things, keep pace in its arms race with India.

Once the war in Afghanistan winds down, though, the relationship could change. Some analysts foresee a new Great Game for dominance in the region, with stakes like billions of dollars in mineral wealth in Afghanistan, access to vital shipping lanes, and a need to monitor the longstanding tensions between India and Pakistan.

Some experts say that a bit of breathing room in the American-Pakistani relationship — managed responsibly — might be just the right therapy for the partnership. In the 10 years since Sept. 11, 2001, both the Bush and Obama administrations have made dozens of official visits to Islamabad to implore, lecture or demand that Pakistan sever ties to militant groups, even attaching strings (without ever really pulling them) to billions of dollars in annual aid. Pakistan’s reaction seems to have been little more than resentment of its dependency on Washington, and a determination to pursue an independent course, whether by hiding some of its intelligence agency’s activities or by openly hinting at taking another partner, like China.

One question, however, is whether China sees such a partnership quite the same way.
Daniel Markey of the Council on Foreign Relations said that on a recent trip to Islamabad he was struck by how openly Pakistani officials talked about China as a promising strategic alternative to the United States. But he also said that travelling to Beijing made it clear to him that the Chinese didn’t return the sentiments.

“The Chinese are simply not interested in playing Pakistan’s game, and they don’t want to be played as a card against the United States,” said Mr. Markey.

What they might be willing to do, however, is cooperate in creating new opportunities to stabilize the region. Instead of the United States, China and others being at cross-purposes there, the regional powers might team up not only in trying to keep a lid on Pakistan’s combustible dynamics, but also on the thorny problem of the endgame in Afghanistan.

As much as India, China, Pakistan, Iran and Russia are all jockeying for influence inside Afghanistan, most experts believe that they all fear a rushed American military pullout and a chaotic power vacuum that might follow.

These fears have as much to do with economics as security. India, China and Russia, for example, have been exploring ways to tap vast mineral reserves in Afghanistan, and have supported major road projects that could again make Afghanistan a regional transportation hub. But that goal could be reached only when the shooting stops, and all the powers therefore have an interest in pushing the Afghan government, the Taliban, and some of the other warring Afghan parties toward a peace.

If such a patch of common ground could be cleared, it might also be used for influencing Pakistan to exert leverage over the Taliban, Haqqani network and other Pashtun groups with which it has historical ties. From the American point of view, that would mean turning Pakistan’s years of double-dealing to positive effect.

Some people who have spent time in the trenches of United States-Pakistan diplomacy said that as tempting as it might be just to walk away from the headaches of the relationship, a far better approach would be to bring others into the game.

Vali Nasr, who left the State Department in April after working for the late diplomat Richard Holbrooke, said that the “wheels have jammed” in the alliance: Because neither side trusts each other, the United States cannot exert any of the leverage it has with Pakistan.

As he sees it, the United States could help escape the pathologies of the alliance by convincing China, Saudi Arabia, and other nations like the United Arab Emirates that it would be truly ugly if Pakistan were to implode.

It’s a scare tactic, he admits. But, with a battle for Pakistan’s soul being waged among its Islamists, the security establishment, and a moderate middle class, Mr. Nasr says he believes that an unraveling in Pakistan is a clear possibility. At the least, he said, this approach might allow America to coordinate its efforts with countries that Pakistan is more eager to listen to.

He also wants to ensure that the alliance can survive in the future.

“We’re behaving as if killing Bin Laden was our last piece of business in Pakistan, and that’s incredibly dangerous,” he said.

After all, the United States beat a hasty exit from the region when the Soviets left Afghanistan, with chaotic results. This time around, the region is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons, and it could become far messier.

Source: New York Times

 

[nirreich]

New challenge for U.S.-Pakistan ties

By Griff Witte and Karen DeYoung, Published: June 10

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Twice in recent weeks, the United States provided Pakistan with the specific locations of insurgent bomb-making factories, only to see the militants learn their cover had been blown and vacate the sites before military action could be taken, according to U.S. and Pakistani officials.

Overhead surveillance video and other information was given to Pakistani officials in mid-May, officials said, as part of a trust-building effort by the Obama administration after the killing of Osama bin Laden in a U.S. raid early last month. But Pakistani military units that arrived at the sites in the tribal areas of North and South Waziristan on June 4 found them abandoned.

U.S. officials say they do not know how the operation was compromised. But they are concerned that either the information was inadvertently leaked inside Pakistan or insurgents were warned directly by Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, or ISI.

A senior Pakistani military official said Friday that the United States had also shared information about other sites, including weapons-storage facilities, that were similarly found empty. “There is a suspicion that perhaps there was a tip-off,” the official said. “It’s being looked into by our people, and certainly anybody involved will be taken to task.”

In the past, Pakistan has strenuously denied allegations that its security services are colluding with insurgents.

The incidents are expected to feature prominently in conversations between Pakistani officials and CIA Director Leon Panetta, who arrived in Pakistan on Friday. The U.S. argument, one official said, will be: “We are willing to share, but you have to prove you will act. Some of your people are no longer fully under your control.”

U.S. officials said Panetta would also carry a more positive message, reiterating that the United States wants to rebuild a trusting, constructive relationship with Pakistan. Immediately after bin Laden’s death, some administration officials and lawmakers argued that the al-Qaeda leader’s presence in a suburban Pakistani compound was reason enough to withhold U.S. assistance from Pakistan. But the prevailing view has been that the two countries need each other despite their problems.

Pakistan has frequently responded to U.S. entreaties to move against insurgent safe havens in the tribal areas by asking for proof of their presence. Officials said that video of the two installations indicated both were being used to manufacture improvised explosive devices, or IEDs — the roadside bombs that are the principal killers of U.S. and coalition troops in Afghanistan.

One was located in a girls’ school in the city of Miram Shah, home to the Haqqani network’s North Waziristan headquarters. The other, in South Waziristan, was thought to be an al-Qaeda-run facility, according to officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

While the United States has conducted an aggressive campaign of drone strikes in the tribal areas, both sites were considered poor drone targets because of the high potential for civilian casualties.

The video was handed over to Pakistani army chief Gen. Ashfaq Kayani and ISI head Lt. Gen. Ahmed Shuja Pasha during a visit last month by Marc Grossman, the Obama administration’s special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan, and CIA Deputy Director Michael J. Morell. The classified videos have also been shown to members of the congressional intelligence committees.

After the visit by Grossman and Morell, the administration also demanded in a series of high-level telephone calls that the CIA be given access to the compound in the city of Abbottabad where bin Laden was killed.

That access was granted two weeks ago, leading to a visit by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and Adm. Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. At that time, Clinton asked about action on the videos. She has since followed up with two telephone calls to Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani.

The two installations had been cleared out before Pakistani military units moved against them on June 4, satellite imagery subsequently revealed.

A local security official in North Waziristan confirmed that Pakistani forces had raided the girls’ school after militants had abandoned it. A local tribal official, who, like the security official, spoke on the condition of anonymity, said it is common for insurgent groups to use schools and hospitals to manufacture weapons.

Tense relations

When Clinton visited Pakistan two weeks ago, she said Washington expected to see “decisive steps” from Pakistan “in the days ahead.”

But in recent weeks, Pakistan has seemed only to further distance itself from its U.S. alliance, forcing out most of the 135 U.S. troops who had been here training Pakistani forces.

On Thursday, Kayani issued a pointed statement that called for U.S. military aid for Pakistan to be converted into economic assistance, demanded an end to U.S. drone strikes in the tribal areas and insisted Pakistan would not be pressured into conducting military operations.

The United States has been pushing Pakistan for more than a year to mount an offensive in North Waziristan. But Pakistan has resisted the calls, saying its forces are already stretched too thin.

Tribal leaders in North Waziristan said Friday that a government official had recently visited the area and told residents not to leave their homes, because no military operation was imminent.

In addition to pressure from the United States, Pakistan’s military has faced intense domestic criticism since the May 2 raid.

On Friday, opposition leader and former prime minister Nawaz Sharif accused the army of running “a parallel government” and demanded that it end its “dominance of Pakistan’s foreign policy.” The comments were unusually bold in a country where civilian politicians have long bowed to the military’s authority.

Panetta, who has been nominated to be the next U.S. defense secretary, left for Pakistan soon after confirmation hearings on Capitol Hill concluded Thursday. Pakistan’s army issued a terse statement saying that Panetta had met with Kayani, and the two discussed “the framework for future intelligence sharing.”

Karzai arives for talks

Panetta’s arrival coincided with that of Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who traveled to Islamabad on Friday for two days of talks with top Pakistani leaders amid cautious hopes that the two nations can forge a coordinated strategy for reconciling with insurgents.

The two governments have long mistrusted one another, with Afghan officials accusing Pakistan of covertly backing the Taliban and other militant groups. But tensions have eased in recent months, and Afghan officials said Karzai’s visit will help to test Pakistan’s assertions that it is prepared to play a constructive role in ending the war in Afghanistan after more than three decades of conflict.

“There is a change of attitude here,” said Mohammad Umer Daudzai, the Afghan ambassador to Pakistan. “Pakistan has been badly hurt by militants. They are under pressure. So we have to realize that this is an ideal opportunity.”

But Daudzai also acknowledged that any negotiated solution to the war is a long way off. Pressed on a likely deadline, he cited 2014, when foreign troops are slated to hand over security responsibility to the Afghan government.

© The Washington Post Company

New setback for U.S.-Pakistan ties - The Washington Post

 

[muse]

‘Musharraf always wanted the best for his people’
By Malik Siraj Akbar | DAWN.COM

A veteran diplomat, Ms Wendy Chamberlin was serving as the US ambassador to Pakistan when terrorist struck the World Trade Center and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001. A former High Commissioner of the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), Chamberlin is currently the president of Middle East Institute, a prestigious think-tank based in Washington DC. In an exclusive interview with Dawn.com, Ms. Chamberlin talks about the ups and downs of the Pak-US relationship and the war in Afghanistan.

Editor’s Note: This interview was conducted before the United States’ decision to withhold $800 million aid to the Pakistani military.

Q: Prior to 9/11 attacks, President General Pervez Musharraf was very unpopular with the United States. Post 9/11, he suddenly became Washington’s favorite man in South Asia. At that time, you were serving as the US Ambassador to Pakistan. How did the new relationship with Musharraf develop?

A: I had my first contact with Musharraf over a dinner weeks before 9/11. That summer, there was a terrible drought in Pakistan and a famine was developing in Afghanistan because the Taliban were preventing the United Nations from distributing food. The civil war and the drought prevented food from reaching the Afghan people. Hungry people (from Afghanistan) were beginning to come into Pakistan and the Pakistanis would threaten to push them back across the border. So, I went to see the situation in a holding camp in the summer of 2001. I felt that Musharraf was a man who always wanted the best for his people.

Q: What were the first contacts like with Musharraf soon after 9/11?

A: I called on him. I was under instructions to ask him to give up support to the Taliban and join the United States with the determination to root out, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda and those who support it. Thus, we started the conversation on how we could work together. The goal ahead was what Pakistan could do for us and vice versa. That year, we kept our promises to Pakistan. We lifted the Pressler sanctions and provided $600 million in immediate grant assistance that subsequently qualified Pakistan for World Bank loans, which otherwise Islamabad could not qualify for. Heads of different governments and states visited Pakistan for rest of the year. We agreed to help in the return of Afghan refugees.

Q: Did the dealings at that point take place with a harsh and threatening tone? Musharraf eventually revealed that the United States had warned to bomb Pakistan back to the Stone Age if Islamabad did not cooperate in the War against terror?

A: That tone and conversation never occurred with Musharraf. I was not there but I think it occurred with the ISI chief General Mahmud [Ahmed] when he was in Washington DC after 9/11.

Q: Did the US government, at that point, imagine that the strike against Taliban, who had provided shelter to al Qaeda, would transform into a full-fledged war which continues even after ten years?

A: No one ever wants to go to war. However, we did realise (and you would be crazy not to realise) that societies change very slowly. Development is a process that lasts for several decades.

The truth is that Afghanistan has developed enormously since the beginning of the war on terror. No one is starving in Afghanistan today as they were in the August of 2001. Food is abundant, roads, schools and hospitals are built. Millions of children are going to school today in a country where only a few boys attended school. Many good things have happened in Afghanistan. The Afghan army is being trained.

This is not the end, rather only the beginning. The situation in Afghanistan is on right enough of a good direction. Now, we can withdraw our troops. Why should we stay in Afghanistan now?

Q: Do you think the war in Iraq diverted attention from Afghanistan?

A: Yes, it did. Personally, I did not support the war in Iraq. It diverted our attention from Afghanistan until President Barrack Obama got elected and brought our focus again on Afghanistan.

Q: Why did the Americans ditch Musharraf?

A: I don’t think we ditched Musharraf. I, like many Americans, still consider him a personal friend. In fact he has many close friends here. He is welcomed here. We had a reception for him at the Middle East Institute. It was the people of Pakistan who voted against Musharraf, not the Americans. The Americans pushed for democratic elections in Pakistan. But we did not push at all for Musharraf or his party’s (Pakistan Muslim League-Quaid-e-Azam) defeat.

Q: Ten years after the beginning of the war in Afghanistan, what would you consider the major successes gained in the Afghan war?

A: Well, people tend to forget what a sorry state Afghanistan was prior to the war. Our analysts judged that by the beginning of 2002, six million Afghans would be caught in the midst of a famine. Today, Afghanistan has had two elections, although not fully meeting the international standards, a government and its own health and education systems. There is international trade taking place inside Afghanistan. It is a country that has risen from the rubble and we should take all these changes as our biggest collective achievement in Afghanistan.

Q: In an article in Newsweek Pakistan, you had proposed the resolution of the controversy over drone strikes in Pakistan “in a way that recognises both Pakistan’s sovereignty and the national-security threat that extremists operating in northern Pakistan pose to the US and NATO”. Can you elaborate on your suggestion?

A: I support military, police and judicial actions that protect civilians. If and when the drones protect civilians against the people who bring violence to them, then it is an instrument of national security. What I would like to see is the forces of national security as the ones that protect the people of a nation.

President Obama has an obligation to protect his citizens and he is doing so. While, running for the presidential race, Obama had promised to his nation that he would do whatever it took to protect the American people against al Qaeda terrorism. The president kept his promise after his election by dismantling and weakening al Qaeda through drone strikes. He said he would do it and he did it. There was no surprise about his actions, including the killing of Osama bin Laden. In the same way, the Pakistani security forces are responsible for protecting the Pakistani people.

Q: Although the United States has historically granted assistance to Pakistani military and the military rulers, you belong to the breed of American diplomats who staunchly advocate civilian assistance for Pakistan. Why do you particularly demand civil assistance for Pakistan?

A: I think the American government must give balanced assistance in Pakistan. The civilian institutions in Pakistan are under-funded. The health care system and education sector are equally under-funded not only in terms of money but also in terms of knowledge, capacity and technology. The United States should be a part of any assistance that goes to the people of Pakistan to build public institutions.

I believe the American assistance should go to the most destitute and the weakest. My thoughts are always evolving. I think the best way to make use of the American assistance is to create jobs because if you have many businesses, people become employed and they can build their own lives. I am looking for entrepreneurship programs and enterprise funds, for example, that encourage Pakistani middle class instead of the truly wealthy and the military. I would like to see the American funds going in that direction to benefit the ordinary people of Pakistan.

Q: You have called for a “compact relationship” between the United States and Pakistan. What is that supposed to mean?

A: In 2001, the understanding the United States reached with Pakistan while starting a new epoch of cooperation was based on the promise that Pakistan would reverse its policy with regard to the Taliban and al Qaeda extremists. In return, we agreed to lift the sanctions, provide aid and restore military-to-military relationships. Pakistan asked for certain things such as not to deploy [international] troops on the ground. We agreed to this term hoping that Pakistan would not support al Qaeda and Taliban.

Over the years, that trust has been broken and it has been replaced with mistrust for which both the sides are a little guilty of violating that understanding. So, we need to seriously talk about it again.

Q: What do you think both the countries should talk about?

A: We need to reach a clear understanding. We [Americans] are not stupid. We know what is going on [with regard to the support provided to Islamic militant groups].

Q: But the Pakistanis argue that there is no change in America’s policy towards them. President Obama, they complain, is pursuing the same policies initiated by President George Bush vis-à-vis Pakistan by coaxing the latter to “do more”. Many say Washington’s unchanged attitude has compelled Pakistan to become a rebel ally in the war against terror.

A: That is not true. The policy has changed a great deal. For example, during President Bush’s time, Pakistan did not have a Kerry-Lugar Bill nor did it have a civilian aid programme. President Obama has been much more aggressive than President Bush in defending the American interests.

Q: Today, if you were the US ambassador to Pakistan again, what would you do to gain support for the controversial Kerry-Lugar Bill?

A: I would do what our Secretary of Education, Arne Duncan, does. He was given eight billion dollars to improve the American education system. Instead of sitting in Washington DC and designing a plan and telling the school systems what to do, he put out a notice saying that he has eight billion dollars and he will spend it on the communities and schools that come up with the best ideas and plans how to spend this money. He called his strategy “Race to top”.

Likewise, I would go to Pakistan with the civilian aid saying that we know you need this aid. You need curriculum reforms so that your schools will lead to jobs. You need a better health system so that your children do not die before reaching the age of five. You need reliable and sustainable energy so that your factories continue production without any interruptions so that you sell your goods abroad.

We share the same objectives but we are not going to tell you how to do it. You should tell us how we can help you. We will partner with local (Pakistani) money on projects that you think are worthwhile or your design to accomplish the goals that we collectively wish to achieve.

Malik Siraj Akbar, a Hubert H. Humphrey Fellow based in Washington DC, is a visiting journalist at the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), a project of the Center for Public Integrity.

 

[AgNoStiC MuSliM]

The Downward Spiral​

By H. D. S. GREENWAY

Published: July 15, 2011

It would be hard to imagine a more self-defeating gesture than cutting a third of America’s aid to Pakistan, but that’s what the Obama administration appears to be doing. The reason: to punish Pakistan for expelling American military trainers, and to force the Pakistani Army to be more effective in fighting Islamic militants.

One can understand America’s frustration. NATO soldiers are being killed by Taliban who can skip back over the border to rest up in Pakistan any time they want, often without Pakistan taking action against them. And when bomb factories are identified, Pakistanis warn the would-be bombers.

The U.S. Congress is in no mood to authorize taxpayers’ dollars to such an unreliable ally, and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton says the U.S. is not prepared to continue providing military aid at the current level “unless and until we see certain steps taken.”

But America needs to consider what it really wants. Is punishment likely to convince Pakistan to subordinate its own interests to America’s? Will it promote a better relationship? Is cutting aid to the Pakistani military likely to make it more eager, or more able, to go after cross-border militants?

The answer to all three questions is no. And it would be helpful to remember that Pakistan has taken more casualties in the fight against militants than has the United States.

As in a marriage, it may be temporarily satisfying to punish your partner in a quarrel, but is it going to help sustain the relationship? And in this marriage, America needs Pakistan just as much as Pakistan needs America.

Much of America’s supplies to Afghanistan come through the port of Karachi and are trucked up through the mountain passes. It would be impossible to conduct U.S. military operations without Pakistan’s good will.

American drone attacks in Pakistan have been vital to degrading Al Qaeda and the Taliban. Pakistan allows this violation of its territorial integrity even though it is extremely unpopular and has killed many innocent Pakistanis.

The trouble with the U.S.-Pakistani relationship has always been that it’s transactional from America’s point of view rather than strategic, as Pakistan would wish it to be. America is always saying: We give you money, now do exactly as we say and do it right now. Pakistan, on the other hand, would like to see more understanding of its problems.

Not that Pakistan is blameless in this downward spiral of relations with the United States. The impact of the Raymond Davis affair was very hard on Pakistan. Davis, a C.I.A. contractor, shot and killed two Pakistanis in the streets of Lahore and then stepped out of his car to photograph the corpses. Davis claimed it was a robbery, but it is more likely that the two dead Pakistani youths were following Davis on behalf of Pakistani intelligence to keep an eye on him.

One can imagine the uproar if a Pakistani intelligence operative shot and killed two Americans in a U.S. city. But, nonetheless, it was short sighted of Pakistan to retaliate by expelling American military trainers because the Pakistanis are the first to admit their soldiers are not sufficiently trained in antiguerrilla warfare.

That being said, the United States needs to be more understanding of Pakistan’s position. Pakistanis are a proud people, and the humiliation of the Osama bin Laden raid will long linger. Obviously Bin Laden had some Pakistani help, but there is no indication that his whereabouts were known at the senior level. Obviously there are Islamic sympathizers within the Pakistani establishment. But that is a problem that cutting aid will only make worse.

The United States has to appreciate how deeply unpopular it is with the rank-and-file, both within the armed services and the population at large. Washington should not do more to humiliate those who support America in the Islamabad government and armed forces, making their position even more untenable.

As for the those militants the Americans want Pakistan to attack, it is clear to everyone that the United States is leaving, and that there will be elements of Taliban in Afghanistan’s future. The Americans are trying to make a deal with the Taliban, why shouldn’t the Pakistanis? A friendly Afghanistan next door is a vital Pakistani interest. The United States needs to understand Pakistan’s desire to keep up relationships with some Taliban as a hedge against the future, just as the Americans are trying to establish relations with the Taliban in order to get out.

For all its faults and contradictions the U.S.-Pakistan relationship is vital to the United States. Washington should not let its imperfections goad it to self-destructive, if self-satisfying, punishments that are unlikely to change Pakistan’s behavior.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/16/opinion/16iht-edgreenway16.html

============

A few sane voices still exist in the US.

 

[muse]

Excellent find Agnostic -

For all its faults and contradictions the U.S.-Pakistan relationship is vital to the United States. Washington should not let its imperfections goad it to self-destructive, if self-satisfying, punishments that are unlikely to change Pakistan’s behavior.


Why is it "vital"?? Has it come down in Sinai or a cave that Pakistan and US must have deep relations? Greeway has it right when he points to the gripes of both sides, however, his strongest point is just how unpopular the US is -- and that isn't going to change any time soon, if at all.

 

[VCheng]

I think this article may be better quoted here as well:

from: Pakistan and America: In a sulk | The Economist

Pakistan and America
In a sulk
Relations grow yet worse between Pakistan and the superpower
Jul 14th 2011 | ISLAMABAD | from the print edition

EVEN at the best of times it would have seemed unusual for America’s embassy in Islamabad to organise its recent gathering for “gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender” people. Given the grim state of bilateral relations, the meeting looked downright provocative. Some in Pakistan’s religiously conservative society promptly accused America of conspiring to attack them by spreading outrageously liberal sexual views. One Islamic political party called it “cultural terrorism”.

Though the United States remains, by far, Pakistan’s biggest financial benefactor, it is reviled among Pakistanis, many of whom genuinely believe that Americans are set on their country’s destruction. What little trust existed before the killing in May, by American special forces, of Osama bin Laden, is disappearing fast. The Americans gave Pakistan no warning; Pakistanis, especially the armed forces, felt humiliated. On July 12th Pakistan’s spy chief went to Washington, DC, for the first time since Bin Laden’s death.

There is plenty to discuss. At the weekend America said it would suspend $800m in military aid, around a third of the total it planned to dish out this year, citing a lack of co-operation by Pakistan in fighting extremists. India cheered, but grumbles echoed in Islamabad. The defence minister, Ahmad Mukhtar, said Pakistani soldiers might be pulled from guarding the Afghan border. One hopes he did not speak for the real power in the land, General Ashfaq Kayani, the armed-forces chief. The idea is desperate: removing such troops would be a boost to insurgents who threaten Pakistan and Afghanistan alike.

In any case, the situation in Pakistan, a nuclear-armed state of 180m people, looks dire. Its rotten economy, broken legal system, Islamist insurgency, and street warfare among ethnic gangs in its main business centre, Karachi, are topped off by politicians widely derided as clowns. The army, still supreme but with its public image tarnished, is sunk in gloom: bitter over Bin Laden’s death, and over CIA agents who roamed across cities without the oversight of local intelligence officers. A risk now is that Pakistan’s huffy leaders drag their country into isolation.

America, too, seems to be pushing it that way. Officials frequently talk of Pakistan as all but a rogue state. Maleeha Lodhi, a former ambassador to Washington, says America’s new policy of “tough love” is “more tough than love”. Getting firmer with Pakistan may not be a bad idea in itself, but America bungles when it is unclear about its goals or tells Pakistan to act against its own strategic interests. Contradictory demands, telling Pakistan both to hunt down Afghan insurgent leaders on its soil and to bring them to the negotiating table, will not get far.

The muddle is not helped by America’s growing eagerness to find a quick way out of Afghanistan. Pakistanis, who fear they will be left holding the mess, accuse it of neglecting wider goals of promoting regional stability. They like to point out, too, that America has abandoned them before, cutting aid and military support when Soviet forces left Afghanistan at the end of the 1980s.

Still, Pakistan is exasperating. Bin Laden was a greater threat to Pakistan than to America in recent years, yet Pakistanis behave as if they regret his death. A festering source of tension is Pakistan’s backing, or at least tolerance, of violent jihadist groups active in Afghanistan, India and beyond. Pakistan is carrying out operations against some extremist networks on its soil, but says that it cannot make enemies of them all. It could obviously do more.

A hope is that Pakistan and America will realise, after all, that they need each other. America shares Pakistan’s long-held view that only a political settlement is possible in Afghanistan, or at least that outright military defeat of the Taliban is impossible. Any deal requires Pakistani help. The two sides also ought to agree on the dangers posed by al-Qaeda and its affiliates. As for Pakistan, for all its bluster, it desperately needs foreign, ie, American money. The sulks may have to end.

from the print edition | Asia