The writer is a former editor of Dawn.
IF Pakistan has evidence that the Indian intelligence agency RAW acted in cahoots with its Afghan counterpart NDS to plan and execute the Quetta atrocity then the sooner New Delhi is confronted with this the better.
The offices of the national security advisers may be appropriate for this purpose as Pakistan’s Nasser Janjua, former corps commander in Quetta, is said to have developed an excellent rapport with India’s Ajit Doval, former head of RAW, over a cigarette break during one of their meetings in Bangkok when the two advisers stepped outside as their aides remained in the conference room. The two have been in regular contact since.
Although Pakistan has prepared a dossier reportedly chronicling Indian involvement in terrorist incidents in Pakistan and even presented this to the UN secretary general, nobody seems to have taken much notice of this damning evidence internationally.
You are right. I haven’t seen this dossier to ascertain if it is indeed damning but surely it must be. With its credibility already in question, the country would not submit anything other than an ironclad case against its rival to the UN secretary general.
So, while Pakistan raises the issue bilaterally with India and also at multilateral institutions in the hope that its efforts will bear fruit one day, should it not also focus on other areas so the challenge is addressed in a more holistic manner?
The situation is so critical that a multipronged effort to combat terrorism, and the underlying radicalisation which contributes to it, is imperative if we wish to give ourselves half a chance of overcoming what is often described as an existential threat.
One of the first steps that needs to be taken is to clearly tell the Afghan Taliban shura believed to be based in Quetta that unless its fighters decimate the camps of the Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan on Afghan soil where, security officials believe, all attacks on Pakistan originate, they will not be afforded the same level of protection as in the past. (This protection, too, should be contingent on their not using Pakistani territory to launch attacks inside Afghanistan.)
We hear often enough that the Afghan Taliban now control large swathes of territory inside their country and strike even Kabul at will. Since they have had many bases in Fata and the other side of the Durand Line, it is clear that they can take out Mullah Radio and his cronies if they do not consider them their allies.
In addition, the intelligence agencies must ensure that jihadist groups operating in the country cease their activities forthwith. Unfortunately, the state believes that organisations such as the Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT), or Jamaatud Dawa as it is called now, Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) and the Sipah-i-Sahaba Pakistan, always act in the best interest of the country and are its second line of defence. It should be clear to the security apparatus that attempts at ‘mainstreaming’ such groups that claim to be patriotic, and inserting them in areas, such as Balochistan and parts of Sindh, where there is discontent among the population, will fail, even backfire, in the long term.
One need only turn the clock back a little over 10 years to remind the national security policy architects of the consequences of such a folly. It was a mere 10 to 12 years ago when the corps commanders of the Musharraf-led army were being garlanded as friends in Fata after concluding peace agreements with Taliban leaders.
Each of these leaders and groups would eventually turn on the state, necessitating military action which, in turn, would lead to the loss of several thousands of our valiant soldiers. In addition, this folly has caused thousands of casualties, in high five figures, of civilians whether they were praying in mosques, relaxing in parks, waiting at a bus stop, or studying in school. Neither were the politicians spared, nor did the intelligentsia get a respite as the merchants of terror ran amok.
All jihadist groups share an ideological affinity and it is generally a matter of time before they opt for the same path leading to their common goal. Pakistan cannot assume that one group is different from the other just because its actions are not hurting the country at a given point.
I have heard a security official expressing admiration for Jamaatud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed and his activists because, according to him, they have so far played a monumental role in combating the militant Islamic State group in Pakistan.
This may well be true but fighting evil terrorist groups is not a task a sensible nation outsources to a proxy non-state entity. I say this knowing very well how patriotic our security services believe Hafiz Saeed and his followers to be.
But it is amazing how they forget that this very group mourned the killing of Osama bin Laden and still hail him as a hero; this when Bin Laden and his cohorts waged a war against the state of Pakistan and almost assassinated its military ruler.
LeT’s actions were also responsible for bringing the subcontinent almost to the point of a nuclear confrontation with their callous attack on civilians in Mumbai; a similar horror had been averted just years earlier when JeM attacked the Indian parliament in New Delhi.
If these acts were sanctioned by the state, God help us. But I believe that Pakistan was equally taken aback by these attacks especially since it didn’t seem to have a contingency plan in place to deal with possible repercussions.
Can we afford to just blame India and sit back and relax? I think not. We have to take the jihadi bull by the horns and defeat radical thought in order to root out terrorism. I would only be optimistic if there were signs of this happening. http://www.dawn.com/news/1277162/good-bad-or-just-evil
The American perspective; By Hussain Nadim in The Express Tribune, Aug 13, 2016.
The writer is coordinator of the South Asia Study Group at University of Sydney
The flux in American foreign policy as well as the changing geo-political landscape that has been in the works for the better part of a decade but which somehow has been missed by Pakistan’s security establishment, is now causing major anxiety within the political and military leadership of the country.
One of the major concerns that the Americans have tried to address is their reliability as a partner to Pakistan, treading between carrots and sticks. The Pakistani establishment is of the view that Americans are easily distracted from the end-goal and, in the process, have the tendency to create havoc for their partners. From the American perspective, however, through the Kerry-Lugar-Berman Bill, the US has tried to ensure Pakistan of its reliability and that America is here to stay until stability is at satisfactory levels in Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Similarly, with a focus on relations with the civilian government, the Americans have tried to take the US-Pakistan relationship beyond mere matters of security. At the same time, however, on the question of reliability, the Americans have been blunt in saying that they will not support or intervene on Pakistan’s behalf in its complicated relationship with India. In fact, this has been the American policy since the 1960s, when Pakistan mistakenly expected American help in the 1965 and 1971 wars with India.
Anxiety over American overtures to India is also deeply felt by Pakistan, but the Americans have been quick to address those by clearly stating that US ties with India and Pakistan are completely independent of one another and are equal. At my recent meeting with the assistant secretary of South and Central Asia in the State Department, the message was very clear: America has a strong economic and commercial interest in India that will translate into a geo-political interest in the context of the Asia pivot. With Pakistan, the US has a continued geo-political interest, especially in the context of Afghanistan and the Muslim world. The State Department, for the last decade, has re-configured the global map and categorised Pakistan within the Central Asia and Middle East section, allowing it to deal with India and the rest of South Asia separately.
Pakistan’s security establishment has also expressed clear concerns to the Americans that not all the enemies of the US are enemies of Pakistan and that Pakistan will not indiscriminately bomb or wage war against elements that are not a direct threat to it, so as to avoid a blowback in the country. This concern is the major bone of contention between the US and Pakistan, and the Americans have argued excessively with the Pakistan government to take the enemies of the US as its own enemies, to avoid a total collapse of the state through such non-state actors.
With half of the country already in a state of war, it is hard for Pakistan to pick more battles than it can afford — hence, it tolerates the presence of the Haqqani network in the country.
From the American perspective, Pakistan’s major concerns are not foreign policy-related in the context of Afghanistan or India, but involve the domestic problems that Pakistan is facing in the form of an economic meltdown, energy shortage, youth bulge, and the water and health crises. For the Americans, such issues are a matter of national security and there is very little focus of the Pakistan government to address these issues that have the potential to escalate into a major national security crisis. Foreign policy is an extension of domestic policy, where Pakistan is suffering to keep abreast.
From the viewpoint of the Americans, there is a genuine fear that due to Pakistan’s inaction and misplaced priorities, it may become isolated in a region which is becoming deeply interconnected as a result of economic and commercial interests. It is for this reason that the Americans have welcomed the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor as a way of ensuring that it doesn’t miss the tide of development and regional connectivity that is changing the map of Asia. For the Americans, the more connected Pakistan is in the region and in global society, the more stable it will be.
The belief that foreign aid agencies, or America, can help make or break Pakistan is a misplaced one. The driver of change has to come from within the country through a consolidated and inclusive effort. The American message in almost all its diplomatic engagements with our country is that only Pakistan can help itself.
http://tribune.com.pk/story/1161216/the-american-perspective/
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