How Do You Solve A Problem Like Pakistan? Part II Posted by Michael Cohen

With the United States and Pakistan having apparently de-friended each other on Facebook, the United States has chosen perhaps the strongest weapon in its arsenal to ratcheting up tension . . . they're now leaking unfavorable stories to the New York Times. 

Indeed, today's piece by Carlotta Gall about a Pakistani ambush of US soldiers in Pakistan is quite the blockbuster - and appears, magically, only four years after the event in question:

A group of American military officers and Afghan officials had just finished a five-hour meeting with their Pakistani hosts in a village schoolhouse settling a border dispute when they were ambushed — by the Pakistanis.

An American major was killed and three American officers were wounded, along with their Afghan interpreter, in what fresh accounts from the Afghan and American officers who were there reveal was a complex, calculated assault by a nominal ally. The Pakistanis opened fire on the Americans, who returned fire before escaping in a blood-soaked Black Hawk helicopter.

The attack, in Teri Mangal on May 14, 2007, was kept quiet by Washington, which for much of a decade has seemed to play down or ignore signals that Pakistan would pursue its own interests, or even sometimes behave as an enemy.

What is perhaps more disturbing about this story is, if American policymakers, were so familiar with Pakistani perfidy why was the 2009 escalation strategy in Afghanistan predicated in large measure on support from Pakistan?

One thing we've seen repeatedly in regard to the war in Afghanistan is that Pakistan will, even at the risk of eroding their alliance with the United States, aggressively pursue its interests in Afghanistan - and yet the US strategy for Afghanistan has been based, in part, on the notion that Islamabad would shift its strategic calculus at the urging of US officials (and the carrot of foreign assistance).  Two years later we're seeing the singular foolish of that strategy - but again it should have been evident back then. Rather than trying to get Pakistan to act against its interests the United States should have been looking to put in place a strategy that melded with Pakistan's strategic calculus regarding Afghanistan. We're today reaping the ill-rewards of that approach.

Nonetheless, the leaking of this story continues the growing war of words between the United States and Pakistan and suggests that US policymakers are willing to risk a break with Islamabad over its continued support for Taliban insurgents in Afghanistan (particularly the Haqqani network). Indeed, one plausible interpretation of why this story has been leaked is to coax Congress into doing something rash in regard to the billions of dollars that we provide to Pakistan every year. 

None of this makes much sense to me. Why is the United States willing to risk a rupture in relations with Pakistan - a country that is an unstable nuclear power and a hub of jihadist terror - over a war in Afghanistan where US interests are more faint and American leverage is on the decline? What is the end game here? What if the Pakistanis - as they've already done - tell the United States they are not going to crack down on the Haqqanis? Will Congress cut off aid? And then what happens with the US drone war in Pakistan or counter-terrorism efforts? How is that worth a likely uncertain impact on the war in Afghanistan - a war in which Pakistan is going to continue to play a influential role no matter what the United States does?

I'd like to believe that the US government has a plan in regard to Pakistan or that it has some reason to believe that public pressure will shift Islamabad's thinking - but if the US track record is any indication I'm not feeling terribly confident.

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This piece, and the previous one, fail to specify an alternative policy. Where's the solution?

Daniel Serwer
www.peacefare.net

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