One only needs to look at who the Americans and indeed Afghans meet the most when the peace process is deadlocked to see just who is the most crucial outside player in the negotiations. And now, once again, as US Special Envoy Zalmay Khalilzad and commander of the Resolute Mission in Afghanistan General Austin Scott Miller came to meet General Qamar Javed Bajwa one couldn’t help but notice how much things have changed over time. Gone are the days when all the Americans could say about Pakistan was that the country’s military, especially its intelligence agency, was trying its best to keep the fire of the war burning brightly. Now they hardly seem able to utter a word without thanking Pakistan for all its efforts with regard to the peace process. And since the Afghan government has also come round to this point of view, it seems India is the only country remaining that still subscribes to the old theory – which was pretty much of New Delhi’s own making. That fact of the matter is that after trying for almost two decades, and failing in every way imaginable, the main protagonists of the conflict have finally embraced Pakistan’s view that it will not have a military conflict and whenever the need for peace is felt it will only be achieved through negotiations. Now who looks embarrassed when they try to accommodate the Taliban after throwing everything but the kitchen sink at them during the two decades of war? Surely the Americans didn’t come to Rawalpindi just to say hello to the Pakistani army chief. They must need Pakistan’s help yet again. And since the negotiations are going on the old theme of one-step-forward-two-steps-back, it could be that they need the GHQ to just nudge things along one more time. Or perhaps they were here to talk about the side agreement between Islamabad and Kabul that the American media has been full of lately. Most likely they just want to look good in the election back home; that while they were making peace in Afghanistan they also got everybody else in the region to promise that nobody’s territory would ever be used again against the other. That would be a really good thing since a good number of insurgents that have been targeting soft targets inside Pakistan are holed up just on the Afghan side of the difficult and porous border. If that is really what it is about, Pakistan should take the side deal. *