Daily Times

President Trump brashly shifted the blame for American failures in Afghanistan on Pakistan. Even if he is right to some extent, the United States should not forget that it itself helped to train, arm, equip and fund those militants to fight a Jihad in Afghanistan — when it suited them in the ‘80s. So if most of the Islamic terrorists groups coalesce in Afghanistan and Pakistan today, it is also the fault of Reagan era US policies. The present insurgency by the Afghan Taliban is the continuation of the Jihadism inculcated by the establishments of both countries some decades ago.

The much-awaited Afghanistan policy of the United States, which was announced on Tuesday by President Trump, was tough on Pakistan. That was not unexpected: keeping in view the fact that the US has neither been able to win in Afghanistan, nor has it restored peace with the help of the existing government, and therefore required a scapegoat.

For the last 16 years, the US has tried everything and spent almost US$800 billion to suppress the Taliban insurgency, but to no avail. For the failing to crush the insurgency, despite creating and funding a large (but ill-disciplined and untrained) Afghan army, Pakistan cannot and should not be held solely responsible.

President Trump was right when he said that announcing a date for the withdrawal of the US forces from Afghanistan would be counter-productive. It would give the Taliban a hope that the US can be beaten out of Afghanistan, and they (Taliban) would increase attacks to hasten the US withdrawal. Understandably, both sides — the US and the Taliban — would like to come to the negotiating table from a position of power. So to assume that the militants would cease fire for important peace talks for Afghanistan is a grave miscalculation on the part of Pentagon strategists.

Pakistan has to take two features of President Trump’s policy seriously: One, when he says “We will also expand authority for American armed forces to target the terrorists and criminal networks that sow violence and chaos throughout Afghanistan… these killers need to know that they have nowhere to hide; that no place is beyond the reach of American might and American arms. Retribution will be fast and powerful.” And two: when he says “I have already lifted restrictions the previous administration placed on our war fighters that prevented the Secretary of Defense and our commanders in the field from fully and swiftly waging battle against the enemy… micromanagement from Washington DC does not win the war.”

These features of the policy are dangerous because this may give haughty US field commanders license to attack the Afghan Taliban bases — alleged or otherwise — by conducting ‘hot pursuit’ or cross-border attacks inside Pakistan.

There is no doubt that Pakistan’s armed forces are fighting a heroic war against terrorists who challenge the writ of the government — and they are winning. But by giving importance to India in the same policy speech on Afghanistan, President Trump has given no credence to Pakistan’s sovereign concerns that India is encircling Pakistan by entrenching itself in Afghanistan. This fear drives the Pakistani establishment to consider the Afghan Taliban as their insurance policy. Supporting the Afghan Taliban also counters Indian influence on the Afghanistan government and intelligence apparatus.

Frustrated Pakistanis are asking why the US continuously mistreats Pakistan, who has been in the forefront in the fight against terrorism since it began. Pakistan has lost 7,000 soldiers and over 60,000 civilians in terrorist attacks — ten times as many as US casualties. And the damage to the economy goes into the hundreds of billions of US dollars. Pakistan does not want financial assistance: Pakistan wants the world to acknowledge its sacrifices in the war on terror, which surpass every other nation.

To bring peace to South Asia, the multinational asymmetrical war must end. We don’t need the US administration to bully us into stopping aid to the Afghan Taliban; but it is in the interest of the people of Pakistan that this seemingly duplicitous policy should be appropriately dealt with

And even if the world doesn’t, Pakistan needs to rebuild its economy to survive. The government in Pakistan believes that they can checkmate US pressure with China’s economic and political support: the quick response by the Chinese administration in favour of Pakistan obliquely indicates that Pakistan has outsourced its geostrategic interests to China. Today, China is more important to Pakistan than the US: a guarantor of Pakistan’s integrity who is already engaging threats from India in its own Doklam/Donglang region.

President Trump also reminded Pakistan that the US gave in billions of dollars to Pakistan: the facts are that the US itself initiated financial and military assistance, and from 2002 to 2012, it pumped in around $23.6 billion into Pakistan. Out of this, $15.82 billion was military assistance and $7.77 billion categorised as economic assistance. Pakistani finance ministry sources say that $8.8 billion was not mutual assistance as it came for the Coalition Support Fund (CSF), so that should be deducted from $23.6 billion grand total. This leaves the real assistance to $14.8 billion; and according to US Congressional Reports, all of this money has not been disbursed to Pakistan. But even if the figures are accepted, it means that Pakistan has received over $43 billion from the US since 1948, out of which more than $23 billion was allocated in the last 10 years — when the US foolishly unleashed a war in Afghanistan.

Pakistan’s military chief has made it clear that Pakistan should be trusted by the US and Afghanistan in that it is not providing financial or strategic support to the Afghan Taliban. These are not words: these facts are evident from the deeds of the Pakistan army when it comes to fighting with homegrown Jihadi groups. And while the world appreciates our counter-terror activities against local Jihadis, they don’t talk about the terrorists who are a clear and constant threat to Pakistan. So when we talk about sacrifices of fighting against terrorism, the US and world leaders are talking about different sets of terrorists.

Pakistan should take an initiative to reconstitute the Quadrilateral Coordination Group’s peace dialogue on Afghanistan, which included China and the US. The last session of the QCG dialogue was stalled — and some say deliberately sabotaged — when news about Mullah Omar’s death in a Pakistani hospital was leaked by the Afghan sources. It is high time that to bring peace, this asymmetrical war is brought to an end. We don’t need the US administration to bully us to stop aiding the Afghan Taliban. It is in the interest of the people of Pakistan that this duplicitous policy should be dealt with.

The writer can be reached at ayazbabar@gmail.com

Published in Daily Times, August 28^th 2017.