The Heart of Asia Conference (HAC) in Amritsar last week has posed some critical, almost existential, questions for Pakistan for which solid, credible and fruitful answers are required from our civil-military leadership.
Twenty countries, including Pakistan, have vowed to help end the civil war in Afghanistan and make it politically stable and economically viable. But that noble goal is nowhere in sight. The Taliban are rampant, Kabul is despairing while New Delhi is painting Pakistan as the villain of the piece.
Interestingly, a section of Pakistan’s media has criticised the Pakistan government for not lashing back at the Indian PM Narendra Modi and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. Mr Sartaj Aziz, PM Sharif’s advisor on Foreign Affairs, has taken the brunt of the criticism, because he didn’t “talk back” in Amritsar. It is argued that he is an ineffective stand-in foreign minister because he has to share policy making with GHQ, the prime minister and Mr Tariq Fatemi, who is the PM’s point man at the Foreign Office. Too many cooks, it seems, are spoiling the broth.
The criticism is partly valid. If Mr Aziz were solely in charge of the Foreign Office he would have institutional backing for his efforts. But the greater problem lies in the lack of an institutional arrangement between the civilian government and the military to discuss national security policy and formulate foreign policy accordingly. This is critical because, no matter what the civilian government thinks or wants to do vis a vis foreign policy, it is the military establishment that is solely in charge of implementing it on the ground, especially as regards India and Afghanistan. If the military isn’t on board, the civilian government is not in any position to fulfil any commitments or make policy formulations. In fact, if the military deems fit, it has all the tools at its command to actively sabotage any civilian initiative in this regard. Merely dispensing with the services of Mr Fatemi and replacing Mr Aziz with an elected parliamentarian as Foreign Minister will not yield fruit if the core civil-military problem isn’t resolved. The device of the Cabinet Committee on Defence chaired by the PM, that includes the three service chiefs, hasn’t been able to fill the vacuum for three reasons. First, it doesn’t meet often enough to update policy and review implementation. Second, it is not intellectually competent to discuss and plan paradigm change because the civilian politicians and bureaucrats in it don’t have expert input from top quality civilian think tanks. Third, the civilians and the brass don’t sufficiently trust each other to put their uninhibited views on the table and hammer out a workable consensus.
Be that as it may, and regardless of Narendra Modi’s anti-Pakistan “offensive defense” doctrine, Kabul has justifiable complaints against Islamabad. Two years ago, President Ashraf Ghani risked internal disharmony and estrangement with India by putting all his eggs in General Raheel Sharif’s basket in the expectation that the Pakistan army chief would bring the Taliban to the table and help negotiate a cease fire in Afghanistan. But, for a variety of good and bad reasons, General Sharif wasn’t able to deliver. Bitterly disappointed, President Ghani has now turned to India and the international community to put pressure on Pakistan to keep its end of the bargain. A core element of the proposed solution is for Pakistan’s military to hunt down all those non-state actors with sanctuaries in Pakistan who are launching strikes in Afghanistan and hurting the Kabul regime. That is why the joint communiqué issued at the conclusion of the HAC specifically mentions concerted and determined action against the Haqqani network, Jaish-e-Mohammad, Lashkar-e-Tayba and allied terrorist organisations.
Herein lies the rub. Pakistan’s military establishment isn’t ready to snuff out these militant organisations for one main reason: they are part of its India-centred security doctrine in which non-state actors, no less than nuclear weapons and a friendly regime in Afghanistan, are expected to provide critical leverage in any potential conflict with India. And this, because of asymmetrical conventional defense logistics. Short of abandoning long cherished notions of national security that form the raison d’etre of the military establishment, which in turn are based on resolving “core” disputes with India to the satisfaction of Pakistan, our foreign policy establishment will continue to be tied up in knots. Regional and international isolation and censure are inevitable. The world cannot sleep at night at the thought of nuclear armed Pakistan with aggressive claims vis a vis neighbours India and Afghanistan; and a country that is unable to cope with radical Islamists in its midst, a failing economy, ethnic strife and constant civil-military squabbling.
Going forward, we must recognise that the fault lies at home and not abroad. We have created ideological narratives and nurtured radicalised non-state actors in pursuit of objectives that have hugely hurt us as a nation-state, destabilised the region and alarmed the world. At the Heart of Pakistan, we must have the courage and will to fashion an alternative paradigm that works better for all.
Twenty countries, including Pakistan, have vowed to help end the civil war in Afghanistan and make it politically stable and economically viable. But that noble goal is nowhere in sight. The Taliban are rampant, Kabul is despairing while New Delhi is painting Pakistan as the villain of the piece.
Interestingly, a section of Pakistan’s media has criticised the Pakistan government for not lashing back at the Indian PM Narendra Modi and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani. Mr Sartaj Aziz, PM Sharif’s advisor on Foreign Affairs, has taken the brunt of the criticism, because he didn’t “talk back” in Amritsar. It is argued that he is an ineffective stand-in foreign minister because he has to share policy making with GHQ, the prime minister and Mr Tariq Fatemi, who is the PM’s point man at the Foreign Office. Too many cooks, it seems, are spoiling the broth.
The criticism is partly valid. If Mr Aziz were solely in charge of the Foreign Office he would have institutional backing for his efforts. But the greater problem lies in the lack of an institutional arrangement between the civilian government and the military to discuss national security policy and formulate foreign policy accordingly. This is critical because, no matter what the civilian government thinks or wants to do vis a vis foreign policy, it is the military establishment that is solely in charge of implementing it on the ground, especially as regards India and Afghanistan. If the military isn’t on board, the civilian government is not in any position to fulfil any commitments or make policy formulations. In fact, if the military deems fit, it has all the tools at its command to actively sabotage any civilian initiative in this regard. Merely dispensing with the services of Mr Fatemi and replacing Mr Aziz with an elected parliamentarian as Foreign Minister will not yield fruit if the core civil-military problem isn’t resolved. The device of the Cabinet Committee on Defence chaired by the PM, that includes the three service chiefs, hasn’t been able to fill the vacuum for three reasons. First, it doesn’t meet often enough to update policy and review implementation. Second, it is not intellectually competent to discuss and plan paradigm change because the civilian politicians and bureaucrats in it don’t have expert input from top quality civilian think tanks. Third, the civilians and the brass don’t sufficiently trust each other to put their uninhibited views on the table and hammer out a workable consensus.
Be that as it may, and regardless of Narendra Modi’s anti-Pakistan “offensive defense” doctrine, Kabul has justifiable complaints against Islamabad. Two years ago, President Ashraf Ghani risked internal disharmony and estrangement with India by putting all his eggs in General Raheel Sharif’s basket in the expectation that the Pakistan army chief would bring the Taliban to the table and help negotiate a cease fire in Afghanistan. But, for a variety of good and bad reasons, General Sharif wasn’t able to deliver. Bitterly disappointed, President Ghani has now turned to India and the international community to put pressure on Pakistan to keep its end of the bargain. A core element of the proposed solution is for Pakistan’s military to hunt down all those non-state actors with sanctuaries in Pakistan who are launching strikes in Afghanistan and hurting the Kabul regime. That is why the joint communiqué issued at the conclusion of the HAC specifically mentions concerted and determined action against the Haqqani network, Jaish-e-Mohammad, Lashkar-e-Tayba and allied terrorist organisations.
Herein lies the rub. Pakistan’s military establishment isn’t ready to snuff out these militant organisations for one main reason: they are part of its India-centred security doctrine in which non-state actors, no less than nuclear weapons and a friendly regime in Afghanistan, are expected to provide critical leverage in any potential conflict with India. And this, because of asymmetrical conventional defense logistics. Short of abandoning long cherished notions of national security that form the raison d’etre of the military establishment, which in turn are based on resolving “core” disputes with India to the satisfaction of Pakistan, our foreign policy establishment will continue to be tied up in knots. Regional and international isolation and censure are inevitable. The world cannot sleep at night at the thought of nuclear armed Pakistan with aggressive claims vis a vis neighbours India and Afghanistan; and a country that is unable to cope with radical Islamists in its midst, a failing economy, ethnic strife and constant civil-military squabbling.
Going forward, we must recognise that the fault lies at home and not abroad. We have created ideological narratives and nurtured radicalised non-state actors in pursuit of objectives that have hugely hurt us as a nation-state, destabilised the region and alarmed the world. At the Heart of Pakistan, we must have the courage and will to fashion an alternative paradigm that works better for all.