Ever since
General Pervez Musharraf’s government signed a peace treaty with
Taliban in the North Waziristan region of Pakistan, the world is
trying to assess its impact on the ongoing War on Terrorism.
Many are of the opinion that the deal amounts to a complete
surrender by Islamabad to the Islamic mujahideen. Others think
that it is an indication of a strategic change in Islamabad’s
policy towards Afghanistan. And in the eyes of still many it is
a signal that the nuclear Islamic state doesn’t find itself
obliged to continue to follow Washington’s war plan against
Al-Qaeda.
The real story is
much more complicated. Pakistan’s reasons in aligning itself
with the US in the War on Terror were totally different than
those of the US. Islamabad had agreed to side with the US
believing that if it didn’t, India would take advantage of the
situation and establish its foothold in Afghanistan. Pakistan
was also convinced that the US would somehow use India to launch
an attack on its strategic assets – nuclear installations. Then
there was this question of Kashmir: the Pakistani government
thought that by going along with the US, it would win its
support against India on this issue.
On
September 19,
2001, Musharraf
addressed the people of Pakistan and stated that while he
supported the Taliban, unless Pakistan reversed its support,
Pakistan risked being endangered by an alliance of India and the
USA. He said, “Let us now take a look at the designs of our
neighboring country (India). They offered all their military
facilities to the United States. They have offered without
hesitation, all their facilities, all their bases and full
logistic support. They want to enter into any alliance with the
Unites States and get Pakistan declared a terrorist state. They
want to harm our strategic assets and the Kashmir cause.”
Trying to
explain the Indian motives, General Pervez Musharraf said, “What
do the Indians want? They do not have common borders with
Afghanistan anywhere. It is totally isolated from Afghanistan.
In my view, it would not be surprising, that the Indians want to
ensure that if and when the government in Afghanistan changes,
it shall be an anti-Pakistan government.”
http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/pakistanpresident.htm
It is obvious
that by agreeing to support the US in the war on Islamist
terror, Pakistan had to stop working on many of its own
strategic projects, which were critical in securing a long
lasting advantage and leverage in the affairs of its own region
of interest – Central Asian Muslim republics, Persian Gulf and
South Asia. The Taliban were not a group of strangers that
Islamabad was helping. They were a very critical part of
Pakistan’s plan to gain the long coveted strategic depth. And
they were supposed to open up the Central Asian region for
Pakistan’s long-term interests.
There is no
question of surrendering to the Taliban forces by Islamabad as
Taliban are not the outsiders – they are Pakistanis. Pakistan
armed forces and the Taliban are the two sides of the same coin.
Worried and frustrated by the continuing anti-Pakistan policies
of Afghanistan, Pakistan had started to create a force like
Taliban much before a Communist coup in Afghanistan in 1978.
Pakistan had
established contacts with ultra-religious groups in the northern
regions as far back as in 1974 to counter then pro-India
Afghanistan government’s moves to encourage Pushtoon separatist
groups to demand their own independent state of Pakhtunistan.
And it had succeeded in establishing a basic network there. This
effort was in line with Pakistan’s plan to create an armed
militia that could not be identified with Islamabad so that when
they start their insurgencies nobody could point a finger at
Islamabad.
The importance of
these mujahideen increased greatly when the Soviet Union
imploded and the whole Central Asian Islamic region became
independent. Now Pakistan could use these mujahideen in creating
a safe and stable corridor to gain access to this energy-rich
region: a pro-Pakistan Afghanistan.
Opening up of the
energy-rich Central Asian Muslim states also added to the
geo-strategic importance of Pakistan. Policy makers in Islamabad
started linking exploitation of the rich energy resources of the
region to Pakistan’s economic prosperity and security. That
prompted Pakistan to start working on a policy of detaching
itself from South Asia and aligning it with the energy-rich
Islamic region in the west. Islamabad believed that alignment
with the Central Asian Islamic states will not only strengthen
its Islamic identity but will also integrate it closely to their
economies. Pakistan was one of the first countries to send a
delegation to all the Central Asian countries in
November-December 1991, led by the then minister of state for
economic affairs, Sardar Assef Ahmed Ali. During his visit to
the US in 2002, General Musharraf told a group of Pakistani
expatriates that Pakistan is a gateway to the landlocked
countries of Central Asia. He said that Pakistan working with
Afghanistan could help the Central Asian countries in breaking
their decades old isolation.
[ Part II ]
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Tomorrow, read about the effects of
Pakistan’s relationship with the Taliban and what it means for
stability and security in Asia, and therefore, for the United
States’ strategic interests.
Source:
FamilySecurityMatters.org