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Bruce Reidel, arguably one of the best informed and most experienced American analysts on the Afpak region recently wrote an interesting analysis entitled “Battle for the Soul of Pakistan”.
Reidel noted: “Pakistan also remains a state sponsor of terror. Three of the five most-wanted on America’s counter-terrorism list live in Pakistan. The mastermind of the Mumbai massacre and head of the Lashkar-e- Taiba, Hafeez Saeed, makes no effort to hide. He is feted by the army and the political elite, and calls for the destruction of India frequently and Jihad against America and Israel”.
Reidel adds: “The Head of the Afghan Taliban Mullah Omar shuttles between ISI safe houses in Quetta and Karachi. The Amir of Al Qaeda, Ayman Zawahiri, is probably hiding in a villa not much different from the one his predecessor (Osama bin Laden) was living in, with his wives and children, in Abbotabad, until May 2011.”
MISCONCEPTIONS GALORE
Despite these realities, a new narrative seems to be creeping in, as uncertainties grow in western capitals over how the much touted “end game” will play out. American combat operations are progressively ending and Afghan forces assuming full responsibility to take on the Taliban. There is uncertainty over whether Afghanistan’s Presidential elections scheduled in April 2014 will be free and fair and whether the new President will enjoy support cutting across ethnic lines, as President Karzai, a Durrani Pashtun currently enjoys.
As Pakistan remains an integral part of western efforts to seek “reconciliation” with the Taliban and for pull out equipment by the departing NATO forces, there appears to be a measure of Western desperation in seeking to persuade themselves and the world at large that there has been a “change of heart” on the part of the Pakistan army.
INDIA AS SCAPEGOAT?
The Americans and their NATO allies are evidently looking for scapegoats in case their “exit strategy” fails as it did in Vietnam. India now appears to be the new scapegoat in the event of such failure, as the US and its NATO allies seem to be bent on blaming India, for any failures by them, to deal with the Pakistan army’s support for the Taliban, which could lead to an ignominious exit for them from Afghanistan. In a recent paper published by the Washington-based Brookings Institution William Dalrymple avers: “While most observers in the West view the Afghanistan conflict as a battle between the US and NATO on the one hand and the Taliban and Al Qaeda on the other, in reality the hostility between India and Pakistan lies at the heart of the conflict in Afghanistan”.
As a self-styled historian, Dalrymple conveniently forgets that the present AfPak tensions flowed from British colonial policies advocated by Imperialists like Lord Curzon, whose “forward policy” aimed to check growing Russian influence in Central Asia and also give the British undisputed and unchallenged control over the oil resources of the entire Persian Gulf.
The problems between Pakistan and Afghanistan since the birth of Pakistan have been primarily because of the past actions of Imperial Britain, as no Afghan Government has ever recognised the borders imposed by Imperial Britain.
India has never taken sides in this Pakistan-Afghanistan dispute. The Afghans, in turn, have never taken sides on differences between India and Pakistan, except during Taliban rule.
CHANGED CONTEXT
Dalrymple and his American and European friends should remember that the religious extremism and violence that ails and afflicts Pakistan and Afghanistan today is a direct outcome of the backing given by the ISI, joined by the CIA and MI 6, to armed fundamentalist groups, to wage Jihad against the Soviet Union on Afghan soil and beyond. This, in turn, encouraged the ISI to believe that promotion of “Militant islam” is the ideal means to build influence within Pakistan, “bleed” India and carry the forces of “radical Islam” to Afghanistan and beyond. India will have to keep these realities in mind when fashioning its policies in Afghanistan.
There is need for New Delhi to be prepared to build new bridges in relations with its old partners like Russia, Iran and the Central Asian Republics.
(The author is a former High Commissioner to Pakistan.)
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