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Muskan Ghuman · #2 Friday, March 03, 2006

Bush’s crucial visit

By Ghayoor Ahmed

GEOPOLITICAL realism demands that the United States, being the sole superpower of our times adopt a policy of even-handedness towards Pakistan and India. It should strengthen its strategic ties with both of them. Regrettably, however, the United States, desirous of India playing a dominant role in Asia, has entered into an alliance with it last year and has thus thrown its weight behind it for that purpose.

It seems that in order to fulfil its strategic objectives in Asia, the United States has sought to strengthen India militarily and has apparently lost sight of the adverse implications it will have for Pakistan. Political observers are completely baffled by the strange behaviour of the US, which describes Pakistan as its most allied ally in Asia. However, Mathew P Dale, who was a senior adviser on South Asia in the State Department, some years ago, has provided the answer.

In his candid statement, Mathew has stated that in the past there were attempts to impose intellectual constraints such as balance or evenhandedness in American policy towards Pakistan and India. Those days are over, if indeed they ever existed. At any given moment or on any given topic the United States might appear to be evenhanded that would be an incidental outcome of a policy, not the objective of the policy — meaning thereby that America tents to be partial to India.

The existing US policy towards Pakistan reflected, as enunciated by Mathew, is one of expediency. Regrettably, our policy-makers have once again failed to see which way the wind is blowing in the corridors of power in Washington. They remain content with the heap of praise showered by the US leaders and its media on Pakistan for its role in the fight against terrorism.

If Pakistan wants to avoid a bitter disillusionment, it should evolve a clear-sighted policy that would protect its long-term strategic interests in the region and beyond. It should not, however, be interpreted as meaning that a change in Pakistan’s policy should underestimate its strategic ties with the US which are rightly seen to be of great importance to the country.

During his forthcoming visit to Pakistan, President George W Bush need to be convinced that the US-India strategic partnership will not promote any discernible American interest in South Asia where India’s continuous desire for political and military hegemony has already created serious concern to this country. America’s partisan attitude in favour of India is bound to create awkward problems for it.

The US policy-makers are probably convinced that Pakistan will continue to play the role of a toady in consideration of the financial assistance it receives from the United States. Given the favourable attitude of America to its ruling elites, there would be no opposition by it to the proposed US-India strategic partnership. To some extent, it is true as, for many years, the policy-makers in Pakistan have kept silent over the emerging “new relationship” between Washington and New Delhi that poses a real threat to Pakistan’s security interests in the region. The US-India Strategic Alliance is now a fait accompli.

During the last five years or so, Pakistan’s relationship with the United Stated has undergone a significant change. Pakistan is an important partner of the United States in its global war against terrorism. Pakistan is therefore, thinking in terms of the US as the main source of support for strengthening its defence capabilities to address its security concerns in the region. Regrettably the United States strategic partnership with India has largely falsified this hope.

Pakistan’s annoyance with the United States on this account is fully justified. The Bush administration was by no means unaware of the adverse implications of the US-India agreement for Pakistan. But it made no effort to allay Islamabad’s concerns on this score and has tended to pay greater attention to India’s interests. Needless to say, a weak Pakistan which occupies one of the most strategic areas in the world would not be in the United States’ global interest and it should therefore rectify the situation without undue delay.

Our media, both official and private, is trying to make the people of Pakistan believe that President Bush would take personal interest in getting the Kashmir problem resolved. President Bush’s address at the Asia Society’s meeting and the interviews he gave to some of the Pakistani media men on the eve of his trip to South Asia may have created this impression. However, some political observers in Pakistan believe that Bush’s emphasis on the need for an early resolution of the Kashmir dispute was an empty rhetoric. Their argument is that President Bush’s predecessors had also made a similar plea but nothing came out of all because of India’s inflexibility and obduracy.

It remains, however, to be seen if the strategic partnership between Washington and New Delhi makes any difference to India-Pakistan relations and that President Bush would indeed be able to play a meaningful role on Kashmir during his visit to the subcontinent. The US policy-makers should, however, realize that a South Asia at peace with itself is in the US interest and, therefore they must strive hard to resolve the Kashmir problem which is not only a perennial source of tension between Pakistan and India, but can also be a destabilizing factor in the region.

The writer is a former ambassador.