Pak-US Ties Decline After Obama’s One-Year Presidency

By Naveed Ahmad

After Barack Obama’s swearing in as President of the United States, intelligencia in Pakistan was hoping for anything but over a dozen and half US drone missile attacks  in Febrauary alone on its territory bordering Afghanistan, with death toll crossing 100 mark.

US President Obama’s Afghanistan policy review speech brought the fore his desire to pull out troops before his country goes to the next presidential polls but left much to imagination, especially for the country’s neighbouring the war-ravaged country. Moreover, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton met wide variety of the Pakistani people but her interaction was devoid of much-awaited statement on softening of conditionalities on Kerry-Lugar Aid Bill. Islamabad’s expectations with the new US administration have been too short-lived, which have now started to shape up as unease. 

Pakistan-United States relation emerged from a prolonged thaw literally hours after four airliners exploded in icons of United States economic and military might on the 9/11. During the two term of George W Bush in the presidency, the United States relations with Islamabad were confined to person of Pervez Musharraf.

The Pentagon announced sale of military hardware worth $27 million in fiscal year 2002 and worth $167 million in fiscal year 2003. Meanwhile, al-Qaeda operatives could hit a Protestant Church adjacent to the United States embassy.

Soon President Bush announces a five-year, $3 billion package for Pakistan as General Pervez Musharraf flanked him in Camp David. This was the time, when the US military started pointing fingers on Pakistan for manning mountainous and porous border with Afghanistan.

By mid-2003, Pakistan and Afghanistan had developed tense relations over presence of al-Qaeda and Taliban top leadership in each others respective territory, sans any proofs. Finally Musharraf sent first ever batch of 25,000 soldiers to semiautonomous tribal areas.

Under intense American pressure in February 2004, Musharraf dethrones and humiliates father of Pakistan nuclear weapons, Dr AQ Khan, for alleged smuggling of nuclear technology to Libya, North Korea and Iran. While Musharraf-led Pakistan is branded as ‘major non-NATO ally,’ military operation in tribal areas sparked serious opposition against Islamabad.

While the US looked the other on questions regarding his legitimacy and style of governance, Musharraf not only offered airspace to US fighter jets, missiles and spy plane but handed over some 600-plus alleged al-Qaeda and Taliban operative in the absence of any extradition treaty or judicial hearing. The military ruler Pervez Musharraf even admitted pocketing the bounty on the heads of arrested al-Qaeda and Taliban operative in his book, In the Line of Fire.

The massive Kashmir earthquake of October 2005 offered US a rare opportunity for public diplomacy. Besides relief assistance worth $51million, Washington dispatched marines, efficient and sturdy helicopters, and other means of logistical and medical support. During his late 2006Islamabad visit, President Bush agreed for sale of F-16 aircraft to Pakistan.

United States fully backed Musharraf when he unlawfully made Chief Justice Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry dysfunctional and attracted public rage from liberal and Islamists alike. In his bid for re-election as president, Washington brokered a power-sharing deal between Prevez Musharraf and exiled Benazir Bhutto as the former agreed to rub off all corruption cases filed till installation of his coup on October 12, 1999.

Washington’s policies until the ouster of Pervez Musharraf from presidency changed little as Obama administration was only starting its comprehensive review by August 2008. Asif Ali Zardari replaced Prevez Musharraf in the presidency as he had become caretaker chairperson of People Party after Benazir Bhutto’s murder on election trail on December 27, 2007.

The Pakistani nation could not find any significant change in Pakistan’s approach to the United States or vice-a-verse. The Pakistani parliament, under pressure from its electorate, passed a unanimous resolution against drone attacks and killing of predominant number of innocent civilians.

The rare unanimous parliamentary resolution fell on deaf ear in the United States and the Pakistan Air Force chief bitterly responded to a questioning journalist that the country has the ability to hit the invading drone but statement never materialized.

In a goodwill gesture, the new US administration remained neutral when the Pakistani people took to the street for restoration of independent Chief Justice of Supreme Court. However, Islamabad was shocked to see Holbrooke’s appointment limited only to special envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan while as a presidential hopeful Obama had promised to have a special emissary on Jammu and Kashmir.

The military’s operation in Malakand Division, left over 2.5 million people displaced while so far the security forces have suffered the heaviest number of peace time casualties since Pakistan’s creation in 1947. Besides costly military operations, the country’s economy faired badly due to worsening security situation and travel warnings.

President Obama’s speech on Afghanistan strategy could only salt to the injury of the Pakistani government as well as people. Over the past 17 days, 10 drone attacks inside the Pakistani territory has claimed some 100 lives without significant killing of an al-Qaeda or Taliban operative hiding in Waziristan mud-huts.

Though Pakistan and United States are two nations engaged in strategic partnership but the difference of opinion in strategy and policy is both greater than divergence. Though Washington has repeatedly referred to abandoning of Pakistan after the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, yet the actual treatment remains too indifferent to the country’s needs.

While Pakistan suffers severe energy and a rare food shortage, the US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton offered little to ease the public misery, thus wasting a golden chance of bringing a positive change in people daily lifestyle. The least Washington could have done was to offer quick-fix solution to meet the energy shortage to the stabilize this nose-diving economy amid rampant corruption. 

With President Obama completing his first year in office, his ratings have not only plummeted at home but abroad as well. The public sentiment expressed in the parliament and in media suggests that the Obama administration is being seen more trigger happy and right-wing slanted on security issues concerning Afghanistan or Iraq.

Given the soft deadline announced for troops withdrawal from Afghanistan, the Pentagon would have to now not only start withdrawal prior to second term vote for President Obama and for that more firepower seems a quick-fix solution. The cost of Afghan war is set to increase for the United States as well as its partners.

However, political cost of Afghan war is as important for the regime in Islamabad as much the financial one is. Weapon-yielding US diplomats, presence of its private security forces, increasing drone attacks resulting in soaring death and preferential treatment to neighbouring arch-rival India all may lead to widening of Pakistan-US gulf, with no worthwhile attempt by US Defence Secretary Robert Gates to build bridges during his recent visit to Islamabad.

Another highlight is the Pakistani parliament position against fresh security checks introduced by the FAA across the United States. Unlike military dictator Pervez Musharraf, President Asif Ali Zardari and Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani both are accountable to people, an independent judiciary as well as an assertive media. Their pro-Washington policy may not last for long unless responded positively from across the Atlantic.

AUTHOR’S BIO: Naveed Ahmad is an investigative journalist and academic, whose work appears on the TV channel Geo News, Corriere della Sera (Italy), and ISN Security Watch (Zurich). He frequently reports for American and other western newspapers on South Asian security, energy and politics.