The US in Pakistan

The US in Pakistan

I refer to Janjua’s letter, “Can US act as world’s policeman?”, published in the Post, June 4.

He forgets that Pakistan chose to join the US in the “War on Terror”, and “stone-age” talk of Mr. Armitage notwithstanding, it was never forced into it. In fact, all president Bush asked Pakistan was, “Either you are with us or against us.” Pakistan chose to be “with the US”.

I quote here a small part from a research paper by Shabana Fayyaz, a lecturer in strategic defense studies at Quaid-i-Azam University in Islamabad, Pakistan. The whole paper is really worth reading.

President Musharraf, in his nation-wide televised address on September 19, 2001, just after 9/11, said that at that juncture he was worried about Pakistan only … he gave top priority to the defense of Pakistan. Defense of any other country came later.

Following Pakistan’s decision to join the international coalition against terrorism, Pakistan was successful in altering its earlier “most sanctioned” status and “internationally isolated, economically fragile” image.

Musharraf proffered five reasons for choosing to offer “unstinted cooperation” to the US in its war against terrorism. The five reasons for choosing this course of action were: secure Pakistan’s strategic assets, safeguard the cause of Kashmir, prevent Pakistan from being declared a terrorist state, prevent an anti-Pakistani government from coming to power in Kabul and have Pakistan reemerge politically as a responsible and dignified nation.

This decision marked a U-turn in Pakistan’s decades-long security policy with respect to Afghanistan and set in motion the redefinition of its strategic priorities accompanied by the immense challenges on the home front. Here the Musharraf government’s decision to ally with the US was a rational “choice” based on the realization of prevailing domestic (economic, social, political, sectarian threats), regional and international trends prior to 9/11. 

K.B. Kale, Camp, the US

First published in JP on 13/06/2011
http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/06/13/letter-the-us-pakistan.html

Mr Janjua's letter: Can US act as world’s policeman?

If Pakistan is burning today – of courtesy supporting the US – if it has suffered immensely in terms of collateral damage, loss of lives, economic collapse, political instability, social upheaval and frequent bomb blasts, let’s get one thing straight, they don’t give a damn.

Everyone looks out for their “own best interests”. The assertion that Pakistan was in league with Osama bin Laden may just be a well-thought tactic to isolate Pakistan and expand the theater of war into the country. I am in total agreement with Mohammad’s assertion (“Can’t we live without war?”, The Jakarta Post, May 30) that the apparent grand design may bring catastrophic consequences for South Asia.

The few Americans who still swallow the official line that the US is in Afghanistan solely to destroy Bin Laden’s organization are about to face the stark fact that the government has been lying. By poll data, at least two-thirds of Americans want to withdraw troops from Afghanistan now.

The declared purpose of the “war on terror” was to snuff out the reputed leader and financier of 9/11, not to crush the Taliban or install the phony democracy Afghanistan now has. George W. Bush showed remarkably little zest in ferreting out the alleged culprit — “alleged” because the US could not prove anything at the time.

According to their own ever-shifting accounts, American spokespersons found Bin Laden himself really posed no threat. al-Qaeda was a brand name anyone could adopt. So Bush probably had a point: Bin Laden really wasn’t worth fretting about anymore except as a mobilizing figurehead to keep enough of the American public on the government’s side — a war for feeding vast profits into Wall Street, energy companies and other well-connected industries.

Bin Laden was doing invaluable service for American elites by staying alive. Accidentally or not, he fulfilled the dearest desires of Washington’s second-rate right-wing ideologues. Bin Laden and Bush, and their allies, played happily into each other’s hands at the cost of the rest of us.

The former sensed that his arrogant enemies would pounce on the opportunity to attack Muslim lands, gut civil rights at home and bankrupt the economy. Once any “mission” is set in motion, as any bureaucrat knows, a hundred additional reasons are concocted to enable it to continue beyond the stated goal.

Yet the US cannot afford to act as the world’s policeman nor even the world’s hit man. The US economy remains on its knees, or at least for 90 percent of the citizens who find they do not count anymore.

Janjua, Jakarta

Published in JP on 4th June 2011

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2011/06/04/letter-can-us-act-world’s-policeman.html

Musharraf’s letter indirectly replies to Janjua’s letter (June 4). Here none other than the “architect” of the “War on Terror” accepts that he dragged Pakistan voluntarily into this alliance with the US with five objectives.
K.B. Kale
The US