Daily Times

Unlike his predecessors, Donald Trump resorted to honesty in his first address about his policy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. By stating that his administration was not interested in sending troops to install “democracies in faraway lands or create democracies in our own image”. President Trump has finally ended the charade of triumphalism of American democratic ideals. However, the arrogance and insecurity of a fading superpower held him back to accept the failures of the US, which led the world into the directionless and endless mess of War on Terror (WoT). Instead, Trump slammed Pakistan as the sponsor of ‘Agents of Chaos’ and expressed his disappointment in wasting ‘billions and billions of dollars’ in foreign assistance allocated to this ‘troubled ally’.

Contemporary debates of international relations (IR) about the WoTscrutinise Pakistan as a failed autocratic state, unable to produce economic and social development, despite receiving billions of dollars in aid funds from the US. The scrutiny addresses the linkages between the hazardous environment of militancy in Pakistan and the wave of terror that threatens the global peace and security. But these discussions ignore the determinants of US aid allocation to Pakistan over the course of history. Determinants of US aid allocation can help to understand how and why the state created through democratic struggle became detached from its democratic roots. And transformed into anautocratic state of praetorian character, marred by disenfranchised populace, crony capitalism, and the havoc of militancy and global terrorism.

When the scarcity of economic resources and security dilemma of the weaker state become the drivers of its foreign policy. It seeks the protection and economic support in the arena of global politics by aligning itself with the hegemon. Thus, a donor-recipient relationship is formed between the two through an asymmetric alliance. Concurrently, in the pursuit of its geo strategic objectives, the hegemon or the donor state exploits the security threats and economic dependence of the recipient state to strengthen its hegemonic status and power. The hegemon employs the instrument of aid as a strategic device. Economic or military assistance is allocated to achieve the geo-strategic objectives. While ignoring the international norms, ethics, transparency standards, and ground political realities of the recipient state.The nature of this relationship transforms the donor-recipient affiliation into client-patron association.The Marshall Plan introduced the phenomenon of foreign aid in the arena of IR in 1948. Since then aid has been a vital instrument of US foreign policy to achieve geo-strategic objectives. There is overwhelming evidence to suggest that aid allocation policies of the US have produced detrimental consequences for the recipient states and engendered long-term problems for global peace and stability.

Pakistan joined the US led Capitalist bloc and became a signatory of the SEATO and CENTO to counter the hostility of its neighbouring states, India and Afghanistan. After this alignment, Pakistan became a vital strategic asset for the US in containing the spread of communism and emerged as its ‘most allied ally’. The US established secret air bases and intelligence networks in Pakistan to conduct aerial reconnaissance missions over the Soviet territory. In exchange, Pakistan began to receive substantial economic and military aid from the US.

Following that, the post 9/11 era renewed the bilateral linkages between Pakistan and US. Under the leadership of the fourth military dictator General Pervez Musharraf, Pakistan’s geostrategic position once again became of vital importance for US government. Pakistan assumed the role of front line state in the WoT and Bush administration declared Pakistan a non-NATO ally. The dictatorship of General Musharraf was awarded generously. Economic sanctions and military embargos were lifted and a considerable aid package was provisioned. Furthermore, the IMF restructured Pakistan’s international liabilities, which created ample fiscal space for the state.

The US generosity towards Pakistan stemmed from US geo-strategic objectives. The first Pakistani dictator Ayub Khan received the total aid of USD 20.19 billion during his decade long reign.

Figure no: 1/ Chronological account of US aid flows towards Pakistan

The aid inflows are adjusted for inflation and presented in 2011 constant dollars

Source: US Overseas Loans and Grants/ Centre for Global Development

Projections from the figure no: 1 suggest that US foreign policy towards Pakistan has been determined by its imperial pursuit of geo-strategic objectives. Successive US governments have favoured the military dictatorships of Pakistan over democratic governments. Out of USD 54.86 billion of total US aid allocated to Pakistan from 1948-2008, USD 48.5 billion went to the four military dictatorships that collectively ruled for 33 years. Whereas, the five democratically elected governments in the given period received only USD 6.0 billion.Figure no: 1 illustrates that in 1971 and 1989, when Pakistan made a transition from dictatorship to democracy the US aid declined sharply. The US aid was virtually non-existence for the four democratic governments of 1990s (1989-1999). The analysis of the above US aid allocation data, reveals that the achievement of geo-strategic objectives rests at the core of US aid allocation policies. This confirms that the considerations of morals, economy, democracy, human rights and transparency have little or no influence on the foreign aid allocation trends.

In the final phase of the Cold War, 51 percent of the US aid went to the forty-seven autocrat states, figure no: 2 illustrates this trend. In the post-Cold War period, the decline of 5 percent was observed for the autocrat states and the trend continued after the 9/11 terror attacks, which shows persistence in US aid allocation towards the autocrats. The percentage share of democratic regimes rose to 29 percent from 34 percent in the post-Cold War era and a further increase of 17 percent was observed after 9/11. it is important to note that the number of autocrat states decreased from forty-seven to twenty in the post-Cold war period. This marks 42 percent decline in the number of autocrat states. However, their aid allocation ratio only fell to 5 percent.

Similarly, military dictators in Pakistan have enjoyed the generosity of US governments in terms of aid and abundant credit. Without exception, dictators in Pakistan have paraded their personal friendship with US presidents to promote their image as statesman. Thus, establishing their personal legitimacy, reaping economic benefits for themselves and their political coalition and strengthening the grip of military establishment on the state affairs of Pakistan.

Foreign aid and assistance is a state to state transection, where funds are allocated directly to the federal government, which leads to centralization of power. Consequently, the process of the devolution of power is adversely affected. The available fiscal space drives the federal government to undertake public sector expenditure without a meaningful cost-benefit analysis. The centralisation of power is more pronounced if the recipient state is a dictatorship. The abundance of resources, helps the dictator establish and promote his political coalition, which implies that foreign aid provides longevity to dictatorial rule. The policies of rewarding the coalition membersto concentrate wealth in a few hands, creates gross inequalities in the society. This practice of political bribery perpetuates the culture of kickbacks, nepotism and mega corruption.

The historical trajectory of US-Pakistan alliance empowered the political and economic role of the military in Pakistan. Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, WoT and military takeovers damaged the social, political and economic progress of the state. The WoT entrenched these problems and polarised the society.

It is astonishing how the policy makers of the strongest super power in history are failing to recognise the striking contrast between their self-proclaimed democratic posture and the patronage of the most notorious of world regimes. The instrument of US foreign aid has become a curse for the third world rather than a blessing. As the evidence suggests in the cases of Vietnam, Iran, Philippines, South America, Middle East and South Asia, the imperatives of US aid allocation have strengthened the tyrannical regimes around the globe. The US applied the foreign policy instrument of aid to finance dictators and usurpers under the disguise of human and economic assistance. Consequently, various third world states have been plunged into the vicious trap of alliance curse.

Figure no: 2/ distribution of US Assistance to low Income autocrat states

Source: Green Book and the PRS Group International Country Risk Indicators

These conditions have engendered vast networks of crony capitalism, hampered the process of democracy, human rights and economic development.

The criticality of the failure of US foreign policy is, to learn from its mistakes of the Cold War era. US foreign policy decision makers have imitated the blunders of that era during the WoT in Pakistan, Afghanistan and Middle East. Nonetheless, the profligacy of US foreign policy has transformed the superpower into the patron of vast tyrannical clientele behind the smoke screen of the biggest donor state on the planet.

The writer is a research student of Political Economy at Griffith University, Australia. He can be reached at adnanhafeez@gmail.com Twitter: @abdalian4ever FB:adnan.hafeez.549

Published in Daily Times, August 31^st 2017.