This week US President Barack Obama spent twenty minutes alone each with Pakistan President Asif Zardari and Afghan President Hamid Karzai and then twenty minutes with the two of them together in Washington. He was trying to tell them something straight. First, the rules of business with America have changed. There will be no weekly video-conferences between President Karzai and the White House, or regular hello-hi long distance chats between the US President and the Pakistan President, a common practice during the Bush years which relied on personal relations to try and sort out problems and failed miserably. Second, there will be formal accountability “going forward” in their relationships in which common objectives will be listed and progress monitored.
Mr Obama also tried to hammer some common sense into both leaders who have acquired a reputation for maladministration: get your act together at home, deliver governance to your people; above all, join hands and squarely face the common Taliban-Al Qaeda enemy that threatens to plunge the region into madness, anarchy and war. What began as Al Qaeda-Taliban’s war against America on 9/11 has since become Afghanistan’s and Pakistan’s domestic war as well.
Certainly, in Pakistan, this realization has been dangerously slow in materializing. The Pakistani “free media”, with its religious-nationalist mindset, is singularly responsible for misleading the people and creating a huge wave of sympathy for the Taliban and hostility for the government and army that want to fight them. This “free media” created a wave of sympathy and support for the Lal Masjid terrorists (portrayed as some sort of medieval heroes for defying America and the army) in the heart of Islamabad and put the army and government on the back foot. This media also made this war America’s war exclusively by propagating the false notion that if America were to walk away from this region the Taliban and Al-Qaeda would melt away into thin air and all would be peaceful again. Ultimately, this “free media” drummed up support for all the dangerous peace deals between the Taliban and the army or government, especially the last one in Swat on February 28, and enabled the Taliban to exploit the political space and public support to seize large areas of the Frontier.
Fortunately, however, three recent developments have helped to turn the tide. First, the public flogging of a young girl in Swat and its vicious defense by the Taliban in the face of resistance from the public and even ulema in the rest of the country has created a wave of revulsion against them. Second, the spokesmen of the Taliban have rubbished everything sacred to the media, like the constitution, law, civil society, democracy, elections and personal and institutional freedoms. Indeed, the Taliban’s threat to gag the media and punish it according to its version of Shariah has sent journalists reeling with rage and fear. Third, the people who are now fleeing Taliban-held areas in FATA and NWFP and pouring into refugee camps are also full of fear and loathing which the media cannot deny. Rage against the government and army for abandoning them instead of protecting them and fear of the Taliban’s wrath if they dare to stand against them and oppose their brand of shariah.
If this, then, is Pakistan’s moment of reckoning on the home and foreign front, its existential time-out, what are the two or three most critical items on the agenda? First, clearly, the opposition, government, army and media must be on the same page. Since the last three are as close to one another as they can possibly get on the issue of the Taliban now, this objective will be broadly accomplished if Nawaz Sharif’s PMLN joins the federal government and agrees to share responsibility “going forward”. Second, America has to lean on Hamid Karzai to stop tilting against Pakistan in particular and pro-Pakistan Pakhtuns in general so that Pakistan can feel secure on its western border. Third, India has to settle outstanding disputes with Pakistan large-heartedly so that the latter’s fear and distrust of India can be dissipated and a resultant peace dividend exploited for the welfare of Pakistanis. The peace process must be revived unconditionally and as soon as possible.
In the midst of political strategy for military and financial assistance for Pakistan and Afghanistan, three important initiatives in Washington last week didn’t get the attention they deserve. But they show the process of “going forward” most subtly and significantly. The first is an MOU between Pakistan and Afghanistan to open, protect and consolidate the transit trade route from Central Asia to South Asia, which essentially means opening up Afghanistan and Central Asia not just to Pakistan but also, importantly, to India and its aggressive quest to expand the home market. The second is an American pledge to help Pakistan and India resolve their pending water disputes so their agricultural backbones are strengthened and secured. Both initiatives are core elements of the theory of regional economic interest and dependency. The third is, perhaps, the most important. This is the advice to the Pakistani national security establishment that it must change its anti-India mindset with its attendant identity-culture crisis and state-posture problems that are the root cause of the region’s continuing descent into chaos.