As mentioned before, Monday Backgrounder is a weekly feature of Dreams of a Typewriter (DoT) that lays out the basic history of a current issue. With Americans giving away US$ 2 billion, it seems appropriate to chalk out the recent history of US and Pakistan.
The passionate romance of United States and Pakistan began in the end of 1970s with Soviet Union invasion of Afghanistan. It was followed by ten-year-long love-making involving guns, rocket launchers and billions of dollars. It was only after the fall Soviet Union in 1989 that Pakistan realized that America was just using it to make USSR jealous. For the next twelve years US didn’t call or write, while Islamabad seethed as a rejected lover. After 9/11 US came knocking at Pakistan’s door. Although the forgotten mistress let US in, its vengeance was not yet satisfied. It continued to milk US for it was worth while continuing to conspire domestic plots with its new “friends” (Taliban). Now the relationship has evolved into something no one understands but the US and Pakistan continue to stay together in a sham of a marriage while both try to cheat on each other.
This in short is the complex relationship between US and Pakistan, with orphan child Afghanistan in between. When the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979, the US saw an opportunity to bleed their mighty foe by giving guns, money and training to the Afghan insurgents. In this they found Pakistan as a perfect ally. Pakistan – brimming with hundreds of thousands of Afghan refugees – offered to train and equip the insurgents that would fight the evil communism. The US was only too happy to let Pakistan do the dirty work while just pumping money and guns. Of course, not all the money ended up with the insurgents but that’s beside the point.
In 1989 Soviet Union withdrew from Afghanistan and soon it was on the verge of collapse. Americans hailed victory and within year forgot all about Afghanistan and the money that was being pumped into Pakistan. The civil war in Afghanistan waged on and Pakistan (now with much lesser funds) continued to play its politics to find a winner of its liking (see a previous post on this). In 1994, it found its protégé in Taliban. They were ruthless, of the correct ethnic and religious attitude and most importantly knew how to win. Meanwhile Washington, although disinterested in South Asia, worried over the growing Islamization of Pakistani Army. CIA would do a beard count in the annual passing out parade of Pakistani Army. Too many beards in accordance to Islam meant trouble.
After 1998, Clinton administration continued to pressurize Pakistan about the nuclear weapons (Bin Laden was a minor issue in the relationship) and their security and not to get in trouble with India. Reportedly, Clinton was really mad about Pakistan’s Kargil operation. However, the relationship remained lukewarm.
After 9/11 when the Americans decided to blow up Afghanistan, they called Musharraf and told him to either help the US or be prepared to be invaded. Musharraf obliged. But the Pakistan army refused to leave its old friends (Taliban and other insurgents) in lurch. One, these guys helped Pakistan recruit and train the terrorists for Kashmir and second, they were likely to remain there while the US can decide to leave at any moment. Predictably, US did leave (at least mentally) in 2003 to attack Iraq. When they came back, they found that the insurgency had spread to the western regions of Pakistan, ISI continued to help out Taliban (see a previous post for more) meanwhile the Pakistani Army was facing the wrong direction looking at India. US again started pressurizing Pakistan for cutting help to Taliban (which is done unofficially) and fight some insurgents in its own backyards which were helping out their Afghan counterparts. Unfortunately, US fails to develop a stick for Pakistan. All it has is carrots. Pakistan, constantly worried that US might just up and leave again leaving Pakistan with an angry Taliban on one side and a hostile India on the other, eats up the carrot but refuses to do all the bidding that US requests. This is where the situation stands as of now. There is no easy solution to this problem and hence we are in for a long haul in the AfPak region.
Image Credit: pkpolitics.com, Reuters
