04.08.2013 Redefining strategic dialogue
Pakistan’s military and new civilian leadership seem united in chalking out new priorities of Pakistan’s relations with the US security establishment
By Syed Hussain Shaheed
Soherwordi
Pakistan-US strategic dialogue was the brainchild of President Barack Obama who wanted to keep Pakistan in closer contact with the US security establishment. It covers a wide-range of issues from Pakistan’s energy needs, its role during the war on terror to health and education sector woes.
The exchange of ideas was a part of American effort to annul fears that the US might repeat the mistake of the 1980s when it left Islamabad ‘high and dry’ after driving out Soviet troops from Afghanistan. It was also meant to remove the widely held perception that relations between the two countries were confined only to security matters. The process started in 2010 with its first meeting at the Capitol Hill in Washington DC.
The strategic dialogue is unique where we have both uniform military and top civilian officials in one room at the same time to discuss high and low politics between the two countries with their preferences. This undermines the notion that Pakistani civil and military policies towards the US are parallel to each other and do not intersect at any point. It can be substantiated from the fact that the Pakistan Army’s top leadership met with Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif just before Secretary of State John Kerry’s arrival to chalk out new priorities of Pakistan’s relations as well as take a unified stance during the dialogue with the US.
On the other hand, Secretary John Kerry with a military background has been in official contact with the Pakistani civil and military leadership as former chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee since long. This makes a solid ground for a successful dialogue between the two countries.
The two historical allies in the Cold War and the war on terror, Pakistan and the United States have encountered many obstacles over the years. Until recently, the two countries had intimate interactions and numerous cooperative endeavours to counter Soviet expansion in the region during later half of the 20th century as well as to contain terrorism during the beginning of the 21st century. However, the relationship deteriorated dramatically over the past few years. Salala incident, Raymond Davis issue, May 2 Operation Geronimo when a US midnight raid in Abbottabad killed al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden, strategic dialogue between the US and India, drone attacks and its civilian killings have indeed maligned relations between Pakistan and the US. Lack of dialogue on these issues, at various levels of government, and the current trust deficit has further fueled the fire.
First Pak-US strategic dialogue took place in Washington DC between the then top US Senator and today’s top US diplomat Secretary of State John Kerry and the then Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi along with Pakistan’s Army Chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and ex-ISI chief Shuja Pasha. It was the first time that during a civilian government, the Pakistani Army and the ISI were participating in a dialogue with the United States.
Pakistan’s delegation submitted a 56-page wishlist with a few drastic demands: to acquire drones technology; help in overcoming Pakistan’s energy crisis; civilian nuclear arrangement on the patterns of Indo-US nuclear deal; and curtailing India’s growing role in Afghanistan.
However, with the Salala attack along with preceding irritants, the confidence was shaken badly. Therefore, the process of dialogue was completely broken and hence there was no chance of strategic dialogue taking place between the two countries. Pakistan and the US were showing negligibly little interest in resuming talks.
Finally, long awaited maiden visit of John Kerry as Secretary of State took place last week. He held consultations with the newly-elected government in Pakistan on various issues — eliminate terrorist safe-havens, ahead of the drawdown (and not the withdrawal) of US-led troops, from neighbouring Afghanistan; the drone strikes in the Pakistani border regions; promoting security; strengthening the Pakistani economy; reinforcing people-to-people ties between the two countries and establishing peace in Afghanistan.
The détente between Pakistan and Afghanistan seems part of the strategic negotiations. The new Nawaz Sharif leadership in Islamabad is very keen to develop positive relations with Afghanistan. Sharif stated that a united Afghanistan was in favour of Pakistan’s interests. His envoy and advisor, Sartaj Aziz, visited Afghanistan and had very conducive and conclusive talks with the Afghan administration.
The success of his visit can be gauged from the fact that the Afghan President, who was talking fire against Pakistan, at once agreed to visit Pakistan sooner in the forthcoming weeks. This reflects that the relationship between the two governments have substantially transformed and placed on more cooperative diplomacy.
Nawaz Sharif has moved on by giving clear priority to stability in Afghanistan. Instead of a confused policy, he accords equal weight to the success of Doha process. However, it’s a fact that the Afghan land has been used for subversive activities by Indian intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW). RAW, with money and weapons, is supporting terrorist groups operating inside Pakistan via trans-Afghan border. Pakistan, of course, wants Americans, the de facto custodians of Afghanistan’s security, to check growing anti-Pakistan role of India in Afghanistan first and foremost.
Pakistan will continue pushing for better and preferable access of US corporations and financial institutions, American markets, and a preference based trade for its products in the US. This will have a two-pronged effect. First, the rise of Pakistan’s economy due to its massive preferential exports to the US markets will reduce the US foreign aid to Pakistan. Second, Pakistan will emerge as a regional economic power that will reduce militancy due to more employment, industrialisation and foreign investment. There is insufficient US economic interest in Pakistan, with American investment in Pakistan coming too slowly.
Pakistan is currently the 59th largest goods trading partner of the US with $5.8 billion in total (two way) goods trade during 2011. Goods exports totaled $2.0 billion while imports totaled $3.8 billion. The US goods trade deficit with Pakistan was $1.8 billion in 2011. Pakistan was the United States’ 62nd largest goods export market in 2011. This statistical data deserves attention of negotiators of the Strategic Dialogue. With political relations, the volume of the trade needs to be lifted for a durable and long lasting strategic partnership.
At the same time, it’s a fact that strategic relations between the United States and Pakistan have expanded considerably. The emergence of terrorism in shape of al-Qaeda and the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) created a scene where national security interests of the two countries converge. Thus, they have important places to cooperate and past mistakes of each other to forget for a smooth sailing in future tactical relationship.
However, Pakistan’s tensions with India for its negative role in Afghanistan pose a challenge for US policy makers. The security situation in Afghanistan is another critical area for both the United States and Pakistan. India poses a major stumbling block in US-Pakistan relations. Pakistan considers India’s growing role in Afghanistan at the instigation of the US just to keep Pakistan on the edge of seat. India cannot support the United States to the extent that Pakistan can and hence Pakistan wants a substantial role in the reconstruction and development of Afghanistan. Neglecting Pakistan at the cost of India will not be in the strategic interest of the US.
In the light of the arguments put forth, following strategic thoughts may be forwarded to Secretary John Kerry for making the strategic dialogue a success:
1. Pakistan’s security interests are different from those of the US. It continues to face the problem of proxy war (sectarian clashes) and terrorism with its neighbours.
2. Since 9/11, the US has become a very important factor in Pakistan’s strategic thoughts in its national security. However, Pakistanis realise that the same degree of importance is lacking in the US strategic thinking. They feel that Americans are taking Pakistan’s sacrifices during the war on terror for granted which in fact frustrates Pakistan’s strategists.
3. The US realised the war on terror as a tool to curtail terrorism for its own national security. However, it does not give equal importance to Pakistan in the same context.
4. The US drone attacks are proving counter-productive due to their notorious number of civilian killings as a collateral damage. Pakistan has been demanding an end to US drone attacks targeting al-Qaeda and Taliban operatives, saying it has caused civilian causalities.
5. The US has not applied its own value system in its foreign policy. The invasion of Iraq would have had more legitimacy if it had had an international coalition behind it. Similarly, the Doha process of negotiations between the Taliban and the US would have had more meaningful results if it had participation of other stakeholders like the UN, Pakistan and other neighbouring countries of Afghanistan. Unless the United States is responsive to the concerns of other neighbouring countries, there will be no stability in Afghanistan.
This is the kind of strategic interaction that both Pakistan and the United States will need to keep working at. Candid exchange of ideas, diplomats and people is the key to ensuring that national differences of interests and perspectives do not lead back to the drifting apart that characterised the relationship between the two countries during the 1990s and between 2011-July 2013.
The author teaches International Relations, at the University of Peshawar