Time for Generals to smell the coffee – Firstpost

Pakistan is deeply concerned that it is not on the mental horizon of US President Donald Trump and will have a low priority in the global preoccupations of his administration. This is unlike the situation when Trump assumed the presidential office in January 2017. Then Pakistan was a vital conduit for (i) sustaining the US and NATO military presence in Afghanistan and (ii) a channel of communication with the Taliban, and (iii) the US hoped that it would be a source of moderation on the Taliban.

Trump was personally frustrated by Pakistani duplicity on the Afghan Taliban. He had strongly vented his anger regarding Pakistani conduct in some of his tweets, but the Pakistani army shrugged off Trump’s concerns because it knew that he desperately needed it to extricate the US from its ‘forever war’. Trump made a deal with the Taliban on February 29, 2020, and that led to the withdrawal of US forces in August 2021. By that time, he had lost the election and Joe Biden was in office. Biden stuck to the Trump deal, but the US made a mess of the last stages of the withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan. The withdrawal also witnessed a bombing at the Kabul airport by the Islamic State terrorist group, which led to 182 deaths, including of 13 US defence personnel.

Trump has no interest in getting involved in the affairs of South and Central Asia, but his hostility towards Iran continues. He is tightening economic sanctions against it. He is determined to also ensure that Iran does not acquire a nuclear weapon. His administration will also monitor Afghanistan so that international terrorist groups remain in check there. But there is no evidence that he wishes to involve Pakistan in any of these activities.

The India-US Joint Statement, issued on February 13 after the Modi-Trump talks, also indirectly makes all this clear. Pakistan has become infuriated with the reference to cross-border terrorism in the Joint Statement and specifically that it was named in the context of terror. In order to appreciate Pakistan’s angry response to these references, it is necessary to fully quote it.

Paragraph 32 of the Joint Statement is formulated thus: ‘The leaders reaffirmed that the global scourge of terrorism must be fought and terrorist safe havens eliminated from every corner of the world. They committed to strengthening cooperation against terrorist threats from groups, including Al-Qa’ida, ISIS, Jaish-e Mohammad, and Lashkar-e-Tayyiba, in order to prevent heinous terror attacks like the attacks in Mumbai on November 26, 2008 (26/11) and the Abbey Gate bombing in Afghanistan on August 26, 2021. Recognising a shared desire to bring to justice those who would harm our citizens, the US announced that the extradition to India of Tahawwur Rana has been approved. The leaders further called on Pakistan to expeditiously bring to justice the perpetrators of the 26/11 Mumbai and Pathankot attacks (2016) and ensure that its territory is not used to carry out cross-border terrorist attacks. The leaders also pledged to work together to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems and to deny access to such weapons by terrorists and non-state actors.’

Apart from the reference to cross-border terrorism—a ghost that Pakistan had thought it had buried when the Biden administration went along with lifting its FATF grey list inclusion—what would have hurt the men in khaki the most is the lack of any recognition of what Pakistan believes is its main terrorist challenge—the Tehreek-e-Taliban-Pakistan (TTP). The specific mention of the Mumbai attack would have also outraged the Generals. Most of all, they would have discerned that the Trump administration, by avoiding any reference to the Afghan Taliban, has not forgotten or forgiven Pakistan’s duplicitous role in the US’ Afghan war. It was Pakistan that had made a big contribution to the US defeat in Afghanistan. All of Pakistan’s anguish and anger is reflected in the Pakistan Foreign Ministry’s reaction to Paragraph 32 of the India-US Joint Statement.

In a press release on February 14, the Pakistanis stated that the paragraph was “one-sided, misleading, and contrary to diplomatic norms”. Regretting that Pakistan’s contribution to the international fight against terrorism was ignored, the Pakistan Foreign Ministry, predictably, went on the offensive against the Modi government. It stated, “Such references cannot cover up India’s sponsorship of terrorism, subversion, and extrajudicial assassinations in the region and beyond, nor can they shift international attention from the stark reality of India being a safe haven for the perpetrators of hate crimes against Muslims and other minorities”.

The problem from Pakistan’s viewpoint is that all these charges cut no ice with the Trump administration. It is giving no salience to the Pannun matter, and the Nijjar issue in Canada has also receded from the headlines. This indicates that Pakistan cannot milk the “extrajudicial assassinations” charges. This will be a disappointment to the Generals, for the idea of Pakistan remaining a centre of terrorism and of extremist Islamic theologies is embedded in global consciousness. This is reinforced by the occasional manifestations of its blasphemy laws, which have caused such grief to many innocent persons, especially those belonging to the minorities.

Pakistan has also complained that it was “also deeply concerned over the planned transfer of advanced military technologies to India. Such steps accentuate military imbalances in the region and undermine strategic stability. They remain unhelpful in achieving the objective of a durable peace in South Asia”. There is a great irony in Pakistan’s objections. There was a time when India complained against the supply of advanced defence systems by the US to Pakistan. India’s point then was that such supplies led Pakistan to move away from seeking to normalise relations with India and retain a belligerent stance.

However, the significant difference between Pakistan’s posture on this issue and Delhi’s position on advanced arms supplies to Islamabad in yesteryears is that Pakistan is still using the terms “strategic stability” and “regional imbalances”. This indicates that Pakistan is living in a time warp. It is not willing to reconcile to the fact that it is no longer in India’s league and that the difference in power between the two countries will only grow.

Sane Pakistanis should know that the path to their country’s security and prosperity lies through good ties with India. However, the two-nation theory, which the Generals and the political class remain committed to, prevents them from normalising ties and leads them to still retain the option of use of calibrated terror. However, the Balakot strikes drove home the point to Pakistan that India will not hesitate to exploit the space under the nuclear threshold to undertake a conventional strike if there is an unacceptable terrorist attack.

Pakistan’s India policy is driving it more and more towards China even though it can never achieve either macroeconomic stability or progress through the Chinese connection. All that it can attain through it is more military equipment. Along with it Pakistan will continue to retain terrorist organisations at a time when India, for which it has enduring hostility, is moving ahead.

The truth is that the Pakistani political class and the establishment are incapable of realistic introspection.

The writer is a former Indian diplomat who served as India’s Ambassador to Afghanistan and Myanmar, and as secretary, the Ministry of External Affairs. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect Firstpost’s views.