We Know Not What We Do in Pakistan Pt. 2 Posted by Patrick Barry

Yglesias makes the point that ongoing problems with the ISI reflect the failure of the U.S. to encourage rapprochement between Pakistan and India:

However much the war in Afghanistan may be termed a “necessary war,” the United States has the option of leaving the region. Pakistan does not. It will always be between Afghanistan and India. A responsible Pakistani official’s first concern is bound to be with India. Consequently, the main objective of Pakistani policy in Afghanistan will always be to secure Pakistan’s interests vis-a-vis India. And the Pakistanis have been consistently convinces—for years—that a stable Afghan government headed by anti-Taliban elements is not consistent with those interests. Unless Richard Holbrooke can conjure up some way to change that larger regional calculus, it’s difficult to see how we can achieve an ambitious set of goals in Afghanistan.

I think that's half-way right.  But just critical as a factor in explaining why ISI factions continue to bedevil the U.S. is Pakistan's civilian government's inability to exercise authority over the military. Even if there were better relations between Pakistan and India, you would still have to face the reality that neither the government nor the Military is able to prevent ISI elements from collaborating with insurgents who have come to threaten not just Afghanistan, but also Pakistan itself. In this case, the failure of U.S. policy might be ever greater, since for years we supported an autocrat whose policies eroded civilian rule, whilst doing almost nothing to push for reform that would bring the ISI under the government's writ.  Remember, Musharraf took action that helped to diffuse tensions with India, and yet you still had the same problem with the ISI. 

Comments

[Zathras]

Oh, for heaven's sake. Not everything that goes wrong in the world is the result of mistakes in American foreign policy. Pakistanis across the political spectrum in that country have consistently taken the view that its relationship with India is central to the identity of Pakistan as a state. Most of the time they have insisted on a strong component of hostility in that relationship -- or more than one, depending on whether both Afghanistan and Kashmir were hot at the moment.

This was true after Partition, long before there was an American presence in the region. It has been true since. It will remain true into the indefinite future regardless of what American policy is. I suppose the silver lining here is that the charge that India and Pakistan are at odds because Washington has failed to bring them together is one that no one in the region will believe.

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