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| India-Pakistan |
| US planning to co-opt MMA? |
| 2003-10-24 |
| This seems like the worst thing the US could do, but I have never understood American policy towards Pakistan anyway. They donât seem to realise that the MMA is already coopted into the establishment of Pakistan, and that they wouldnât be able to run private armies, support the Taliban, and churn out thousands of brain washed Jihadis if the Pak Army didnât want them too. The United States attempt to reach out to the religious political forces in Pakistan and get them to participate in the process of governance is a positive step but may not work out as intended, say sceptical liberal and political observers. The issue is being debated since the US ambassador to Pakistan Nancy Powellâs September 24 visit to Peshawar where she met with politicians from different parties including leaders of the ruling Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal government. The US move seems to try to replicate its experiment in Tajikistan where Islamists have joined the government following hectic efforts to get them to do so by the US and European governments. Keen political observers in Pakistan, however, say it may not be possible to replicate the experiment here. âThe fundamentalists in Central Asia are different. There it is more about non-participation in governance,â says Juma Khan, a Peshawar-based political analyst. Unlike Central Asia, religio-political parties in Pakistan have always participated in the political process. They have a vote-bank and they mobilised it pretty well in the last elections. Today, they rule the NWFP and are in the coalition government in Balochistan. âThey have no reason to change their spots. They are in government on the basis of the very ideology which is anathema to the liberal forces in Pakistan and abroad. Why should they leave that anchor and begin to dance to a different tune,â asks another political observer. This is an important argument. For the Mutahidda Majlis-e-Amal to take a different political line would mean looking like any other party. âIf they have to become liberals they might as well merge themselves in the PPP,â says an observer. Khan also points to the fact that in Pakistan the âsituation is worse than Central Asiaâ. âThe state supports fundamentalism and petro-dollars from the Arab states have made fundamentalists even stronger in Pakistan.â During her meeting in Peshawar with senior leaders of a liberal political party, the US ambassador talked of her countryâs successful experiment in Central Asia where Islamists were threatening the former communist-led Tajikistan government. She hoped a similar experiment in Pakistan might yield some good results. âThat is what I understood when I sought her opinion on the MMAâs role,â says a leader of the party. This politician, who is also a member of the conservatives-dominated Frontier Assembly, said he did not agree with the American diplomat. âI told her that she should not treat Pakistani fundamentalists with those in Central Asia. The fundamentalists in Central Asia are completely different from those in Pakistan.â The Islamists in Tajikistan where much more modernist, and mostly drawn from several clans who had been kept out of the power structure after the collapse of the Soviet Union. They may have wanted Sharia, but the Pakistani Islamists are in a completely different century from them. The US government is working on the same pattern in Afghanistan also. They are trying to co-opt conservative leaders like former president Prof. Burhanuddin Rabbani and Rasool Sayyaf. But Khan has strong objection to the US approach in Afghanistan. âThe Americans have made a mistake by allowing former jihadi leaders to be a part of the government in Kabulâ. That may be so but the policy cannot be entirely faulted. It is at least an attempt to try and reach out to the religious right and see if the rightwing would be amenable to becoming a part of the process of governance. âWhat can anyone lose,â says an analyst in favour of the approach. âThey are politically powerful and canât be wished away. It wonât do any good to ignore them. Reaching out to them may not do much good but neither can it do any more harm than their presence in the system is already capable of doing,â he says. Taken with the alleged recent moves to negotiate with moderate Taliban, through Mutawakkil, it looks as if the Americans are cutting some deals that might lead to even more blowback. The US and the European countries continue to stay in touch with the MMA government in Peshawar. Even the World Bank continued negotiations for a loan to Chief Minister Akram Khan Durrani government. Donor countries, unexpectedly, did not cut off any aid to the Frontier government despite the fact pro-Taliban MMA is ruling the province. TFT approached the US embassy spokesman Bruce Kleiner in Islamabad to seek his governmentâs opinion on the issue but his office said that he was busy. Despite many calls, Mr Kleiner did not respond to TFT. I beginning to think that America will hand over Afghanistan to the Islamists, to allow themselves an exit strategy. An Islamist run Afghanistan would be a natural ally to Pakistan, which is the reason they have been supporting the Taliban resurgence, through the MMA for deniability, all along. |
| Posted by:Paul Moloney |
| #4 Liberalhawk, I agree with everything you said about Pakistan's dual policy, I guess our ownly point of disagreement is that I don't see it as acceptable that while we are pumping billions of dollars in a futile attempt to stablise Afghanistan and sure up Karzai, the entire Taliban leadership is right across the border openly recruiting Jihadis which launch raids which have killed 4 Americans and 400 Afghans this year. I also see the continued operating of hundreds of Jihadi training camps in Pakistan as highly dangerous, because even if the different Emirs know to keep their attacks on America strictly rhetorical, it is only a matter of time before some of their followers 'go rogue' and attack Western targets again. And the difference between Jihadis and Pragmatists in the Pakistani Army is over played really, they have a lot more in common than not. The both feel maintaining the Armies dominant role over the country is vitally important, they both want the country to continue spending 30% or more of it's budget on them, they both support the proxy war/Jihad in Kashmir, they both support the sharing of weaponry with states like North Korea, and the Generals all expect to retire to huge mansions, built on land confiscated from peasants. In fact, the military creator of the Taliban, Major General Nasarullah Babar, was as secular as they come, and a strong supporter of Benazir Bhuttos party, but that didn't prevent him for getting the idea of bringing the Taliban to power. At the very least, when it comes to their region, the Pakistani Army is 100% Jihadi in the feelings towards India, and the secular types and the Jihadi types both believe it is in Pakistans interest to disintergrate India, dominate Afghanistan, and become the dominant regional player in both Central Asia and South Asia. The only difference between them is the rhetoric they use, and the fact that the Secularists might drink wine at home and the Islmamists don't. BTW, before he seized power in a military coup in Pakistan, General Zia ul Haq was a secularist, known for his drinking, and helping to put down the Black September revolt by the Palestinians in Jordan. But once he became leader, he opened the Jihadi genie in the country, sponsoring radical madrassas, changing the ciriculum of ordinary schools to include political indoctrination, introducing the Huddod ordinance and the blasphemy law. But he was never pious in his private life. He also cultivated all the current Generals, and one of the promising officers that he was particularly supportive of, was a young Musharaf, who was rapidly promoted by Zia, along with a handful of other officers who are known as Jihadis. Going forward to 1999, when Musharaf was brought to power in a military coup, Pervez actually had nothing to do with it himself (he was in an airplane circling over Karachi when it occured), but the very same Jihadi Generals he was buddies with led the coup, and then put Musharaf in power because he was a more acceptable face than them. |
| Posted by: Paul Moloney 2003-10-24 7:15:19 PM |
| #3 That may be so but the policy cannot be entirely faulted. It is at least an attempt to try and reach out to the religious right and see if the rightwing would be amenable to becoming a part of the process of governance. I agree. You can't wish them away and you can't kill them. So what to do? I understand that it's tough to let them play in the democracy game if their goal is to undermine democracy. But we have groups like that here in our own congress (that actively try to undermine democracy) and we manage. Granted, they don't go around killing people, so it's not the same. But, as they say, you catch more flies with honey and you might as well try. If it doesn't suceed then go on to plan B. |
| Posted by: B 2003-10-24 9:52:35 AM |
| #2 Re Afghan - My impression is that Rahabani is not as bad as Abu Sayaf, and was long considered an enemy by the Taliban and its supporters. In particular he was willing to ally with Russia, India and Iran pre 9/11, so he's no pal of the ISI. Not a pal of afghan womens rights either, but thats another story. It might have been better if Massoud had lived, but he didnt, and we are stuck with dealing with whats available in afghan. I dont know enough about mutawakil to comment - it does strike me that in afghan people routinely switch sides - its more a tribal society than an ideological one, despite Taliban efforts to change that. Pakland is a different story, of course. I appreciate your point of view, but my impression from other sources is that the Paki army is NOT 100% jihadi, there are substantial elements who, if not Kemalist, genuinely see the logic of and support Perv's reversal of alliances. Like Perv they want to get the maximum out of the US and give the least possible - but they WILL give if pressed. As opposed to hardline elements, and the bulk of the ISI, which are still pulling in the opposite direction. So Pak policy is a mass of contradictions - they'll arrest AQ arabs in Punjab and Karachi, and even hesitantly in NWFP, but wont touch Taliban. They'll reluctanty cooperate with US activities on the border, but wont openly let the US cross the border, and do as little as possible themselves (with the most hardline elements surreptiously cooperating with the Taliban) Perv wavers between an olive branch to India, limiting infiltration to Kashmir, but never stopping it. Arresting local jihadis when they get out of hand, or threaten vital state interests. Refusing to align with secularist parties against the fundies, but apparently trying to split the fundies to make his rule easier. As for the US we will put up with this, in the absence of a clear alternative, and with so many balls in the air elsewhere. AS long as we are getting SOME cooperation - which we are. |
| Posted by: liberalhawk 2003-10-24 9:22:09 AM |
| #1 Everyone is corruptible when they're all competing for the bejeweled turban... |
| Posted by: Brian 2003-10-24 2:13:14 AM |