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US has always treated Pakistan unfairly
Asif Haroon Raja
The US has always remained inclined towards India and treated Pakistan unfairly. In the early 1950s, when the US built a defensive arc to contain communist southward expansionism, Pakistan was made part of SEATO and CENTO only when India turned down the offer. Pakistan agreed because of its acute security concerns from hostile India and unfriendly Afghanistan. During and after Indo-Sino border conflict in 1962, the US and the west filled up India s arsenal with weapons and equipment. By so doing, it tilted the regional military balance towards India which was aligned with USSR.
During the 1965 Indo-Pak war, the US blocked supply of armaments to Pakistan and India, despite knowing that Moscow was continuing to supply India its defence needs uninterruptedly. Pakistan s military reserves got so critically depleted that it had to agree to ceasefire at a stage when its strategic reserves were well poised to mount a counter offensive in Ravi-Chenab corridor. The US sanctions seriously jeopardized Ayub Khans second five-year development plan which had all the potential to address east-west economic imbalance.
The US once again stopped the flow of military supplies to Pakistan after March 1971 while India kept receiving its defence needs from Moscow. It placed Pakistan at a serious disadvantage when war broke out in November 1971. The US, western world as well as the UN remained drawn towards India and none came to Pakistan s rescue when it was dismembered. India was let off by USA and the west for its nuclear explosion at Pokhran in 1974. But when ZA Bhutto expressed his intentions to make Pakistan nuclear, he was threatened of dire consequences. India s progress in nuclear program was ignored, but Pakistan s nuclear program was subjected to unrelenting propaganda campaign in the 1980s and bogey of Islamic bomb was raised to frighten the world. Harsh sanctions were imposed on Pakistan by USA in 1965, 1971, 1979, 1990 and 1998 and thus became the most sanctioned country in the world despite being the most allied ally of USA . India on the other hand was never punished either by USSR or USA despite its poor track record in state terrorism, cross border terrorism and human rights violations. Despite series of sanctions, Pakistan s economy till 1990 was much healthier than India .
The visible discriminatory incline was again seen on the occasion of nuclear tests by India followed by Pakistan in May 1998. While India was given a polite slap on the wrist, all hell broke lose on Pakistan . Its sin has not been forgiven to this day since nuclear capability with a Muslim state is unacceptable to USA , Europe , Russia and India . China and North Korea are the only two non-Muslim countries that have no ill-designs against Pakistan s nuclear program. Rather, the two have contributed towards it. Deliberate efforts are underway to disable Pakistan s nuclear program.
The US has awarded civilian nuclear deal to India in violation of NPT to allow India further upgrade its nuclear capability. It has however, denied the same to Pakistan and also wants to roll back its modest program. While it has no objection to India inking nuclear agreements with Russia , Japan , France and Israel , it expresses its deepest concerns over China installing another reactor at Chashma. The US has also been trying to smuggle out enriched uranium from Pakistan . In the conventional field also, while India has been given full leverage to shop sophisticated weapons from anywhere in the world, Pakistan could get its F-16s after a delay of 23 years. Even counter terrorism equipment is given with undue hesitancy so as not to displease India .
During the Kargil conflict, G-20 countries led by USA came down heavily upon Pakistan . Intense pressure was put on Pakistan to withdraw its forces from occupied territories. Ultimately it was forced to give up its gains without getting anything in return. India has never been accused of its massive human rights abuses in occupied Kashmir . Ignoring UN resolutions, which clearly lay down the need for a fair plebiscite, and also turning a blind eye to freedom struggle raging since 1989, the US and the west never question India . They agree with India s harebrained stance that liberation movement is Pakistan aided and fall within category of terrorism. Now when the armed resistance has got converted to unarmed movement led by teenagers demanding freedom from India, the champions of human rights are still tightlipped and the western media silent.
Despite knowing that Kashmir is a flashpoint, the US has distanced itself from playing any part towards its resolution. It has however been applying pressure on Pakistan to settle the dispute on Indian terms by accepting Line of Control (LoC) as permanent border. India has not committed a single soldier in Afghanistan or Iraq to fight the militants. Pakistan is fighting US dictated war on terror since 2001 and has committed nearly 150,000 troops. Its casualty rate is many times more than combined fatalities suffered by 48 countries involved in counter insurgency. Yet the wrath of USA falls on Pakistan and affections and benefits are reserved for India .
During ten-month Indo-Pak military standoff in 2002 when the entire military might of India had got deployed on Pakistans eastern border on a fabricated charge that Pakistan was behind the terrorist attack on Indian Parliament, the US sympathized with India. It made no effort to make it pull back its forces from the border. In that timeframe, Pakistan was extending all out support to US military to consolidate is gains in Afghanistan . Four air bases in Balochistan were leased to US military and 70,000 troops had been deployed along its western border to prevent the fleeing Taliban and Al-Qaeda fighters to enter Pakistan . Since India was on the wrong, it had to withdraw with egg on its face. The US pressured Pakistan to disable six Jihadi groups including Lashkar-e-Taiba engaged in supporting liberation movement in occupied Kashmir , control cross LoC movement and to let India fence the LoC in Kashmir . These steps took the life out of freedom movement.
Indian military leaders started crowing that its forces had succeeded in snuffing out terrorism in Kashmir . Pretending to be a strategic ally, the US allowed CIA, FBI, Mossad, RAW, MI6 and RAAM to carryout intensive covert operations against selected regions in Pakistan from Afghan soil with a view to weaken Pakistans hold over nuclear arsenal. ISI trying to foil foreign inspired conspiracies displeased USA . It strove to cut ISI to size so that it was not in a position to put up a frontline defence for Pakistan .
When Mumbai attacks took place in November 2008, Pakistan was blamed and the entire western world and USA began to sympathize with India and are still doing so. USA and UK exerted extensive pressure on Pakistan to let Indian air force carry out surgical strikes against suspected terrorist camps in Azad Kashmir and Muredke so as to avoid a full fledged war. All the strike formations of Indian military remained in battle locations for many months in 2009 and Gen Kapoor hurled threats of limited war under a nuclear overhang. The US took no notice of these jingoistic statements. Several RAW sponsored terrorist group attacks were launched in Lahore on sensitive targets. Ignoring Pakistan s protests, the US harped that India posed no threat to Pakistan s security and that it should shift all its forces from eastern to northwestern border.
With this background and ongoing history of discriminations, how can the US claim that it doesnt harbor ill intentions against Pakistan and has not been treated unfairly? The US will have to do a lot more to alleviate the misgivings and fears of people of Pakistan and win their hearts and minds. Attitude and evenhandedness and not aid will bring the change.
The writer is a defence analyst.
US has always treated Pakistan unfairly
