Pakistan: Friend or Foe?

Following last month’s terrorist attacks in London, the world’s attention was once again directed to Pakistan after the Pakistani connections of several of the bombers were discovered.

Last year Pakistan came to the world’s attention when the extent of nuclear proliferation perpetrated by Pakistani scientist Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan began to be exposed. Pakistan survived that disclosure just fine—at least as far as the U.S. was concerned, which values the nation as a strategic ally in the war against terror. The fact that Pakistan’s President Pervez Musharraf pardoned Khan for selling sensitive nuclear secrets to nations such as Iran (even hailing him as a “hero”) didn’t seem to bother Washington much.

One would think the fact that Pakistan’s military and secret service (which hold an iron grip on the country) were obviously complicit in this vast web of nuclear proliferation would be a wake-up call for America—a prod to take another look at its so-called ally.

The realities of geopolitics—and the limitations of the United States—however, precluded this.

Now we see that, besides sanctioning the distribution of nuclear know-how around the planet for years, Pakistan is also aiding and abetting the very enemy the U.S. is fighting in the war against terror.

Pakistan’s part in fueling terrorism was brought home by the fact that three of the London suicide bombers were children of Pakistani immigrants. The terrorists had recently visited Pakistan and it is suspected that two of them attended a militant training camp in that country (Wall Street Journal, July 28). Evidence surrounding the Egyptian bombings also pointed to Pakistan.

In June, two U.S. citizens of Pakistani descent arrested in California were accused of receiving jihadist training at al-Qaeda camps in Pakistan in 2003 and 2004. “That a major non-nato ally seemed to harbor an al-Qaeda training camp as recently as 2004 should be cause for alarm” (ibid.).

Yet still, America looks the other way. In fact, as the Wall Street Journal wrote, President Bush has gone so far as to characterize Pakistan’s General Musharraf as “the last bulwark against a radical Islamist takeover, praising the general for his commitment to ‘banning the groups that practice terror’” (ibid.).

The U.S. has for some time been involved in efforts to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda operatives hiding in the border regions of Afghanistan and Pakistan. In this effort, the U.S. has heavily relied upon Pakistan’s cooperation, pressuring it to crack down on Islamic militants—specifically al-Qaeda. The going has been slow, however, with Pakistan apparently unable to locate insurgents’ safe havens in its tribal areas and America afraid to apply too much pressure lest the Islamists topple the Musharraf regime and it loses its “ally.”

There is more, however, to Pakistan’s hesitancy to eradicate terrorists from its midst than lack of capability. It seems there just isn’t the incentive. Evidence points to the fact that Pakistan’s army and the country’s Islamic militants have a longstanding, mutually beneficial partnership.

Husain Haqqani has elaborated on this connection in his book Pakistan: Between Mosque and Military. Haqqani writes as an insider, who worked as a journalist, diplomat and adviser to three prime ministers in Pakistan before moving to the U.S. three years ago. He challenges the conventional belief that Pakistan’s military is a balancing force against radicalized religion in the country.

“Mr. Haqqani does not believe that the generals and the mullahs are adversaries at all. Rather, they exist in a kind of symbiosis—an alliance by which each helps the other ‘in their exercise of political power’” (Wall Street Journal, July 28).

This is not a new phenomenon. Supported by an abundance of evidence, Haqqani shows that the military regimes of Pakistan have had a working relationship with the Islamist organizations—ensuring both the continuing stability of the government and the safe haven of militant Islamic groups, and resulting in the quiet Islamization of the country—since its first military regime beginning 1958.

The rule of Zia ul-Haq (1977-88) cemented both the military-mosque relationship and the key role of Islam in Pakistani society. For 20 years, the Pakistani military has “fueled the passions of some of the country’s most extreme radicals” (ibid.). The military has reportedly followed a policy of divide and rule—sanctioning certain Islamist groups while rooting out others.

In effect, it appears that Pakistan has been hoodwinking the entire Western world, most particularly the United States, into giving its blessing to an anti-democratic military regime.

Stratfor reported last week on the surge in violence in Afghanistan, saying that the Taliban—despite the hammering it has received from the U.S. the past four years—is managing to regroup. How? The terrorists’ ongoing war against the Afghani government and both U.S. and Afghan forces relies on a continual stream of jihadist recruits from other countries. Many come from Pakistan. “The madrassas [Islamic religious schools] in Pakistan provide a steady flow of jihadist recruits to serve as foot soldiers and to replace the many fighters that are killed during combat with U.S. forces” (Stratfor, July 28).

Here, in a very direct way, we see Pakistan—a U.S. ally—sanctioning the training of enemy jihadists.

Stratfor went on to examine the possibility that Pakistan’s intelligence services support the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan. Pakistani intelligence has a history of supporting the Taliban since the civil war following the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan in 1989.

Stratfor asserts that it is likely the mid- and lower-level intelligence officers who today support militant groups inside Afghanistan. “This support is manifested in the use of Pakistani territory for safe havens by the militants to regroup after combat, get medical assistance for the leadership and stage renewed attacks” (ibid.).

This Pakistani support is a major factor in the ability of the Taliban to sustain its insurgency in Afghanistan.

Just how much is the U.S. prepared to overlook to maintain Pakistan’s cooperation—such as it is—in the war against terror?

Pakistan has not only sold nuclear resources to rogue and terrorist-sponsoring nations, but it sanctions on its soil the training and radicalization of terrorists.

And the nation that promises to spread freedom and democracy, and make every effort to eradicate terrorism, not only turns a blind eye to Islamabad’s complicity, but actually supports the anti-democratic military regime and praises it for its “efforts” thus far.

Just as the U.S. has softened its stance on Iran, so it has compromised in its response to Pakistan’s role in nuclear proliferation and aiding of terrorism.

The fact that Washington must take the “friends” and “allies” it can—even if they fuel the passions (and the apparatus) of the very enemy the U.S. is fighting—demonstrates the compromised nature of America’s power on the world scene.