Donald Trump's new Afghan policy is good shock therapy for Pakistan after 16 years of cajoling & bribing
Donald Trump's new Afghan policy is good shock therapy for Pakistan after 16 years of cajoling & bribing
ET CONTRIBUTORS | Updated: Aug 27, 2017, 12.36 AM IST
Trump’s new policy — if implemented as it is articulated — should restore some balance in the power politics of South Asia.
Donald Trump’s new Afghanistan policy has clarity of purpose, it identifies the real problem and marks a distinct shift from the past. Trump has given no timetable for the return of US troops, has put Pakistan on notice with an “or else” hanging in the air and has openly embraced India as a partner in the project to stabilise Afghanistan. This is a radical departure from the previous administration’s policies.
“We can no longer be silent about Pakistan’s safe havens for terrorist organisations…. We have been paying Pakistan billions and billions of dollars at the same time they are housing the very terrorists that we are fighting. But that will have to change,” Trump said. “It is time for Pakistan to demonstrate its commitment to civilisation, order and to peace.”
The use of words as weapons, the implicit threats and the scope of possibilities are bigger than before. But how much is bombast and how much is ballast remains to be seen. Still, it can’t be pleasant for the Pakistani establishment to be called out for providing safe havens to the “agents of chaos, violence and terror”.
The policy is clearer and appears harder without the usual bureaucratic diplomatic caveats and rationalisations. The American toolkit could go deep — starting small but growing bigger with economic sanctions and denial of IMF tranches in the future. India will watch if the toolbox is used at all, used sparingly or used well.
The Pakistanis are shocked despite early warnings. It seems they were expecting only a rap on the knuckles but what they have got is a full-fledged blow to the head. How they react would determine the future of US-Pakistan relations for some time.
The Pakistan Dependence
American shock therapy for Pakistan may or may not work in the end but after 16 years of bribing, cajoling and failing, it’s worth a try. Barack Obama’s carrot-heavy attempts over eight long years to persuade Pakistan to break its dependency on terrorists didn’t produce results. He began by treating Pakistan on a par with India, buying Rawalpindi’s line that the road to peace in Afghanistan went via Kashmir. He offered Islamabad a strategic dialogue to match the one with India, poured billions of dollars into Pakistan army’s coffers while his administration treatedRawalpindi generals as de facto prime ministers.
It took years for the Obama Administration to publicly acknowledge India’s development aid to Afghanistan because it feared an Ashfaq Kayani or a Raheel Sharif might take umbrage. Obama even approved the sale of F-16s to Pakistan except the US Congress came in the way. As a former official of the Obama Administration admitted after leaving office: “We tend to overstate our dependence on Pakistan and understate our leverage.” The embrace of reality towards the end was halfhearted and a case of too little too late when the administration withheld $350 million in coalition support funds after a huge internal fight.
Trump has begun where Obama left off without going back to square one and thus avoiding the long learning curve on Pakistan. That his team had the temerity to go against entrenched views — don’t rock Pakistan’s boat, placate not punish, push India on Kashmir — is noteworthy. The risk-averse thinking had severely burdened US presidents in the past.
The intense scepticism in Washington from the academic-expert community to Trump’s speech was expected. A president they don’t particularly respect has challenged their deeply held, theoretically safe assumptions. Their main concern: Pakistan will go completely rogue, as opposed to being partially rogue.
Trump’s open call to strengthen the strategic partnership with India in the same speech sent shock waves not just in Islamabad but also in Washington, so ingrained is the tendency to equate India and Pakistan. The general Beltway view is that Trump undermined his pitch to Pakistan by urging a bigger role for India.
The expert commentary casually equates Pakistan’s deadly game in Afghanistan with India’s role in building roads, schools, dams, the Parliament building and providing training to Afghan security forces. There is hardly any recognition of what the Afghans want. It’s all about Pakistan’s need to feel secure, a need that cannot be filled in any realistic fashion.
Trump’s new policy — if implemented as it is articulated — should restore some balance in the power politics of South Asia. To be sure, Chinaand Russia will try to undermine US objectives in this new game of thrones. That presumably was a good part of the US calculation.
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