Many years ago, I interviewed the grand old man of India’s foreign policy, Mr. K. Subrahmanyam. He observed how shrewd Pakistan has been in conducting its foreign policy within the parameters of realpolitik. His explanation for that was that the rulers of that country envisioned themselves as heirs of the great Mughal dynasty. In that capacity, they feel very much at home with the notion of being in the big league of nations. I do not necessarily agree with that observation; but the old guy had a point. Pakistan has never accepted the fact that, as a middle power, it belongs to a different league than India, which definitely belongs to the great power league.

In the past few months, the Pakistani ruling elite has been showing its deftness when it persuaded the participants of the London conference on Afghanistan in January 2010 that a dialogue aimed at bringing the Taliban to the negotiating table should be initiated. India, on the contrary, stuck to the simplistic logic that all Taliban are bad guys and should be excluded from any attempts to bring them back to the negotiating table.

India also made the mistake of backing Abdullah Abdullah for the presidency against Hamid Karzai in the last presidential election. Abdullah is a Tajik; and in that capacity, he represents a minority of the Afghan population. My own sense is that India’s decision to support Abdullah against Karzai was the result of hubris stemming from its strategic partnership with the United States. The best option for India was to remain on the sideline and watch in silence, especially because Karzai has been quite receptive (some say enthusiastic) to India’s increased diplomatic presence in his country.

In any case, Hamid Karzai got even by supporting the Pakistani argument about negotiating with the Taliban. Another point that is ignored by many is that negotiating with the Taliban is very much in harmony with General Stanley McChrystal’s counterinsurgency (COIN) doctrine, which is highly political in its emphasis in Afghanistan. Negotiating with the Taliban is exactly what Pakistan has proposed.

The third point that has been ignored by most analysts is the fact the General Ashfaq Kayani of Pakistan is proving to be a hell of a lot smarter than his predecessor, General Pervez Musharraf, in his dealings with the United States. Kayani is earnestly attempting to gain the upper hand over, if not outrightly defeating, the Tehrik-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan (TTP). The entire DoD leadership is convinced of that reality and is eager to reward Pakistan.

The preceding analysis is not meant to suggest that Pakistan is totally out of the woods. The United States is not likely to assign it anytime soon the important status that India currently enjoys as America’s strategic partner.

What this means, however, is that the United States is willing to talk “high politics” with Pakistan, including a possible civil nuclear deal, which is highly coveted by Pakistan. That indeed is a major breakthrough. Once this type of a dialogue ensues, there is no telling where it will end. Pakistan is hoping that it will result in its attainment of the highly cherished status of a strategic partner.

From Pakistan’s point of view, the Kayani approach carries enormous payoffs. To start with, it might be the beginning of an era when Pakistan makes a clear break from the Islamists of al-Qaida inclination, who wish to take that country back to the 7th Century. Secondly, it might be the beginning of a time when the FATA and the NWFP areas are administered by the Pakistani government, thereby bringing an end to making them safe places for al-Qaida and its ilk. Thirdly, Pakistan might use this policy to extract a grand bargain from Washington, whereby it can gain access to cutting-edge civilian and defense technology that it direly needs to rebuild itself as a modern nation.

If Subrahmanyam’s observation about Pakistan’s deftness regarding realpolitik is correct, we may be witnessing the beginning of a new tug-and-pull between South Asia’s two major antagonists. And the Obama administration is about to learn the topsy-turvy nature of South Asian power games.

All historical eras and events are associated with some slogan or idea.  Rightly or wrongly, they serve as a clarion call for nations either to accept or to reject them, and then use them as guideposts for their policies.  The First World War’s moniker was “a war to end all wars,” and that phrase became a cause célèbre for its supporters as a rationale for sacrifices.  The Second World War was depicted as “the last good war,” not because any war is good, but because it “was a war that had to be fought and won.”   The phrase “containment” [of communism] remained a major driving force for the Cold War in the United States as well as in the so-called “free world.”

When the United States was attacked by a number of Middle Eastern terrorists on September 11, 2001, the phrase “post-9/11 era” was frequently used by the analysts all over the world, especially to describe its gruesome side.  It was more than a casual phrase.  It was the beginning of new but sinister way of thinking about how to deal with global terrorism and how the United States would go about determining which countries are on its side and which have a soft spot for terrorists.  The Bush administration declared a “war” against it, and the world had to become familiar with another phrase, the “global war on terrorism” or GWOT. 

That phrase itself became a lightning rod for controversy in Europe and the rest of the world.  The critics asked how the lone superpower could declare a war against an action and expect to become a winner.  Another group of critics asked how the United States could expect to win against “global terrorism” by applying only its military muscle. 

The United States, wittingly or unwittingly, treated “global terrorism” as a monolithic entity along the same flawed lines whereby “international communism” was depicted in the Cold War years as a “monolithic” force that could be tackled and defeated.  It was only in the late 1950s—during the second administration of President Dwight Eisenhower—and later on that the United States moved away from that silly notion of monolithism in portraying communism. 

The concept the “clash of civilizations” became divisive in the early 1990s when it was coined by Samuel Huntington.  In that decade, the debate on the utility of that concept largely involved only American, and a few Asian and European, intellectuals who labeled it contentious and partially correct in explaining the emerging conflict after the implosion of the Soviet Union in 1991.  American strategic thinkers, after getting so used to dealing with the mega-conflict of the Cold War years, thought that a conflict along the same magnitude would become the dominant basis of a division of nation-states in several camps.  So the concept “civilizational conflict”—which Huntington borrowed from the writings of Phillip Hitti and Bernard Lewis—appeared as a logical way of thinking “big” about the post-Cold war era.

Usama Bin Laden’s public musings between the late 1990s and 2001 about declaring a “Jihad” against the U.S. and the West became the basis for “legitimizing” and globalizing Huntington’s proposition related to Islam and Christianity.  However, once the United States was attacked by Muslim terrorists, who, as it was later known, were carrying out a plot that was personally blessed by Bin Laden himself, no doubts were left in the minds of American and Western strategic thinkers about how “prescient” Huntington really was all along. 

In Muslim countries, the clash of civilizations also caught on as an idea legitimizing the “fact” that the United States had declared a war against Islam.  President George W. Bush’s uninformed use of the phrase “crusade,” was treated as “evidence” of that “fact” in the world of Islam.

However, it was Bush’s decision to invade Iraq soon after he invaded Afghanistan that became the chief basis for the “credibility” to the proposition in the world of Islam that the leitmotif for the U.S. presence in Muslim countries was to enslave them and change the essence of Islam into something that is very much akin to Christianity. 

Needless to say, despite his one-time use of the unfortunate phrase “crusade,” Bush reiterated that America had no fight against Islam and that America respects Islam.  But that country’s continued presence in Afghanistan and Iraq was speaking louder than Bush’s words, and the lone superpower was envisioned as an “enemy” of Islam.  As the table from the Pew Research Center shows, a majority of people in a number of Muslim countries continued to envision the United States as a military threat.

President Obama’s overtures toward the world of Islam, indeed, are welcoming.  However, what is needed is substantive policy change.  His decision to create a distance between President Hamid Karzai’s government and the U.S. is a positive development.  However, one has to wait and see how that transformation is reflected in other policy measures that his administration intends to bring about in Afghanistan. 

President Obama’s overall approach to “PafAf” is also comprehensive and promising.  However, one has to wait and see how the “surge” of troops in Afghanistan affects that country’s stability.  America’s continued use of drones to carry out attacks in the Pak-Afghan border areas is weakening the support of the Zardari government.  But, given the fact that such attacks have also resulted in a few deaths of al-Qaida and Taliban groups, there is little doubt that such attacks will continue.  Despite having a comprehensive approach to Pakistan and Afghanistan, the United States appears confused about what other modalities it ought to develop in its policies to persuade its NATO allies that Afghanistan will be stabilized in the near future. 

In the absence of a clear-cut indication of America’s success in stabilization of Pakistan and Afghanistan, the notion of the clash of civilizations—even though it has lost a substantial aspect of its popularity in South Asia and in other Muslim countries—is likely to be revived.  Such a happenstance is likely to be one of the greatest challenges to President Obama’s well-meaning new approach to the world of Islam.  He has initiated his battle for slaying the beast of the clash of civilizations.  For now, at least, his administration appears to be waging an uphill battle.

That is not an acceptable choice.  But one has to keep thinking about how to win in Afghanistan.  The victory is not going to be either quick or without a radically different approach toward that troubled country.

The Obama administration has the right approach of coupling Afghanistan’s security with that of Pakistan’s.  The appointment of Richard Holbrooke as Special Envoy is also a good thing, provided that he does not adopt a “bull-in-the-china shop” approach toward creating a winning strategy.  Holbrooke needs to take time in his long and boring journeys to South Asia to read the history of the great power involvement in Afghanistan and Pakistan. 

Afghanistan has been an historical burial ground of all mighty warriors of the past, from Alexander the Great to the second superpower of the Cold War years—the Soviet Union.  Secondly, as much as the Afghan’s unity against the invaders and occupiers of their homeland is legendary, so is their internecine war among themselves once the occupier is expelled.  That is just another reason Afghanistan needs a helping hand to evolve itself into a stable place, which will require a lot of patient involvement of the United States and enormous economic and knowledge capital.

The United States is increasingly being viewed as an occupier of Afghanistan. 

That notion has to be defeated by conducting elections and by developing an approach that enhances the legitimacy of the next elected government.  As unpopular President Hamid Karzai has been inside Afghanistan, prospects of someone’s election as his replacement might not be too bright.  Thus, U.S. strategy must be focused on enhancing the legitimacy of whoever is the next elected president of Afghanistan, including Karzai. 

In this context, Washington must revisit the political strategy that was applied toward enhancing the legitimacy of the government of Prime Minister Noori al-Maliki.  Karzai is not Maliki, but the next elected president (even if it is Karzai) must operate by adopting a new governing strategy.  A starting point for that strategy ought to be nullification of the rule of the warlords and eradication of the opium trade.

A popular suggestion inside the U.S. is to destroy the opium crop and thereby take away the livelihood of poor Afghan farmers.  An alternative is not to destroy that crop, but only to purchase it, or use it in legal worldwide use for medicinal purposes.  That approach is likely to get a lot of criticism inside the U.S., but the option of destroying the opium crop without providing a substitute crop or an alternate way of living for Afghan farmers is also a recipe for disaster.  On this particular issue, the United States needs to heavily rely on the expertise of Afghan specialists in Asia and Europe in order to develop policy options.    

The Obama administration’s consideration of offering massive economic assistance to Pakistan is an approach in the right direction.  Senators John Kerry and Chuck Hagel have already made a good start by endorsing a “strategy” for Pakistan that was developed by the Atlantic Council. 

Pakistan needs massive economic assistance, but with high standards of transparency and accountability.  A large part of that assistance must go to revamping the educational institutions in that country, especially religious schools.  The issue of reforming religious curricula has been a highly controversial one.  However, Islamists should not be given a free hand in implementing their half-baked theological perspectives as the only correct interpretation of Islam. 

Pakistan has a large number of religious scholars whose expertise in this regard should be fully utilized.  This issue will probably lead to intense controversy, and even violence.  However, it has to be tackled with the same vigor as the highly contentious objectives of the Islamization of Pakistan that Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and General Zia ul-Haq implemented.  As a secular politician, Bhutto adopted the Islamization policy only to appease the Islamists in the 1970s, and to counterbalance the powerful Army.  Zia was most resolute in following up the precedent of Bhutto, except Zia had no problem in becoming a hero of the Islamists, who were pursuing the same agenda at that time.

Another thrust of educational reforms of the Pakistani educational institutions ought to be insertion of a massive dosage of modern scientific and technological education.  The future stability of Pakistan is largely dependent upon its continued emergence as a modern state and not a place where religious obscurantism prevails.

Regarding the military aspect of a winning strategy, the solution is not just in providing 30,000 more American troops, even though that approach, in tandem with other measures, is likely to be helpful, but definitely not by itself.  The United States has already recognized the fact that the security of Afghanistan is intrinsically linked with that of Pakistan’s and vice versa.  But the Obama administration has not gone far enough. 

The next step is to involve India in the security-related negotiations.  India has been paranoid about the possible American decision to reintroduce the “hyphen” in its handling of the Indo-Pak ties, which India abhors.  However, no negotiations regarding the security of Pakistan and Afghanistan is complete without insisting on the reentry of India into such negotiations.  This is not tantamount to reentering the “hyphen” in the Indo-Pak ties.  It only ensures Pakistan that the U.S. comprehends Islamabad’s legitimate security concerns and is determined to take it fully into consideration by getting India involved. 

The Obama administration has to recognize the fact that Pakistan is as much concerned about cross-border “shenanigans” from the Indian side as India has been of similar activities initiating in Pakistan.  In the Indo-Pak power games there are no “good guys.”  Both countries have a record in destabilizing the other side.

The U.S. invitation to Iran to participate in the impending March 21, 2009 conference is also remarkable.  It sets up the first face-to-face meeting between the Obama administration and Iranian officials.  More to the point, it creates ample stakes for Iran regarding the stability of Afghanistan and Pakistan.

In terms of defeating the Taliban and al-Qaida forces in Afghanistan, the United States needs a version of counterinsurgency strategy that is markedly different from the one implemented in Iraq.  Such a strategy requires opening a negotiating front with the Taliban and attempting to drive a wedge between them and the al-Qaida forces.  There is no negotiating with al-Qaida elements who only know the language of death and mayhem.  They should be dealt with by implanting the tactic of “fighting fire with fire.”

The very proposition of winning in Afghanistan is not just a paradigm shift; it is, indeed, an earth shattering proposition, and the potential creation of a new historical precedence.  That approach also requires highly unique measures.  Fortunately, the United States has a President who appears to be much more revolutionary in his actions than he sounded in his rhetoric as a presidential candidate.  The only question is how resolute will he remain in his sustained departure from using “conventional” and tired old approaches of stabilizing Afghanistan and Pakistan.  He has a number of ill-wishers inside his own country.  But the most important reality is that the entire world wants him to succeed in South Asia and everywhere else.

The U.S. turned Iraq into hell between 2005 and 2006; Pakistan is steadily edging toward becoming a hellish place in the post-9/11 era; and Afghanistan is heading in that direction.  In the Horn of Africa, a similar situation prevails.

In the post-9/11 era, the militarily powerful nations have taken it upon themselves to set the “rules of engagement” for wars or war-like violence in Muslim lands, while the extremists are letting loose violence and mayhem from their side.  Iraq had its killing fields between 2005 and 2007, and Afghanistan’s most “fertile” killing fields started in the late 1970s, when the Soviet Union invaded it with a view to incorporating it into the Soviet empire.  Those killing fields continue to multiply in the first decade of the 21^st Century.  Lebanon’s killing fields come alive periodically, and—in view of its highly explosive internal dynamics—that country seems at the precipice of witnessing them on a regular basis.  Gaza’s killing fields are getting bloodier by the hour.  

The chief victims of this bloody phenomenon are the ordinary people, whose main aspirations is are to have productive careers, raise families, and live happily.  But happiness is increasingly becoming a rare commodity.

Here is the essence of the problem in many Muslim countries:  The U.S. has decided to wage violence in the name of that awful phrase “global war on terrorism,” which is as meaningless as the “war on poverty.”  Terrorism, like poverty, has been around forever, and no use of military power alone will eradicate it from the face of the earth.  Awful concepts like “regime change,” “preemptive war,” and the “war of choice” were applied to Muslim countries.  George W. Bush’s warning, “either you are with us or with the terrorists,” was also largely aimed at Muslim countries. 

The United States encountered something called the “Iraqi quagmire,” and almost lost its war in that country until the Sunni Muslims came to its rescue.  The same group (Sons of Iraq) is still crucial for the durability of peace and continued success of America’s “surge” strategy.  A strategy, which was aimed at clearing the hostile territory, by holding it, stationing security forces, and by rebuilding civilian authority and economic development.  But that is just one precondition; the other being a systematic inclusion of Sunni Muslims in the governance of Iraq.  Iraq remains a work in progress.  It is likely to return to its instability of 2005-2007, if the Sunnis do not become an important part of its ruling circles.

Israel has adopted the same approach—letting loose its military fury—in the name of establishing its “credible deterrence” among Arab nations, especially since it was humiliated by the Hezbollah in the “war” of July-August 2006.  Purely on a force-on-force basis, Israel did not lose that war.  Its mistake was that it established very precise goals of eradicating Hezbollah and having its own captive soldiers released.  When those objectives were not achieved and Israel stopped bombing Southern Lebanon, both the Western and the Arab media declared it the “loser” of that war.  To Israel’s bitter resentment, the Hezbollah not only survived, but became an inordinately popular organization in the Arab streets, as well as in Lebanon.  As such, it also challenged the governing authority of the U.S.-backed government of Premier Fouad Siniora.  Siniora has remained a weak head of the government in Lebanon primarily, if not solely, because Washington supports him.  Consequently, the legitimacy of the government in Lebanon remains shaky, at best. 

It has been a long-established fact that no outside power can institute its credibility inside a country through the use of military force or through occupation alone.  That is a universal principle. 

Syria learned that lesson at the end of many years of occupying Lebanon.  The U.S. has also learned that bitter reality after remaining an occupying power in Iraq for the past eight years.  It is likely to face the same fate in Afghanistan.  Israel refuses to learn that lesson as it invades Gaza and remains an occupying power of Palestine.  The gloomiest fact of that occupation is that the mounting toll of Palestinians will create new generations of even more enduring—and even more radical-minded—resistance to Israel than Hezbollah and Hamas have thus far demonstrated.

Unlike the historical accord between the U.S. military and the Sons of Iraq, no basis of rapprochement has been established between Israel and the Palestinians.  The Oslo Peace Accords of the early 1990s are long dead and buried.  Israel does not want to trade land for peace, and the Palestinians are much too divided to offer the Jewish state a great deal of confidence that they are ready to live in peace with their Jewish counterparts. 

Israel played a crucial role, if not in the creation of Hamas, then in definitely enhancing the presence and clout of that organization in the occupied territory many years ago.  As an Israeli historian at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Zeev Sternell, stated, “Israel thought that it was a smart ploy to push the Islamists against the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO).”  Today, Hamas is the governing authority in Gaza.  Ironically, Israel’s stated objective of waging a war against Gaza is to weaken, if not eliminate, Hamas. 

However, no matter how badly the military conflict damages Hamas, it is likely to emerge as the most popular organization within the occupied Palestine as well as in the rest of the Muslim world.  According to a news dispatch from Egypt, “As the war in Gaza burned though its 14^th day, Arab governments have felt their legitimacy challenged with an uncommon virulence.”  It adds, “With each passing day, and each Palestinian death, the popularity of Hamas and other radical movements has ratcheted higher on the Arab street, while the standing of Arab leaders has suffered.”

The frustrations of the Arab masses stem from a reason that is larger than the occupation of Palestine, even though the mounting suffering of the Palestinians is also adding further fuel to those frustrations.  The chief reason for the Arab frustrations is the presence of authoritarian rule, which lingers on like an eternal curse over their existence.  From their point of view, their collective suffering will not end unless the United States stops supporting the status quo in their countries.  From the U.S. side, that authoritarian rule-based status quo is preferred over the alternative–the return of Islamist rule.  Two examples continue to haunt the U.S. decisionmakers–the Islamist-dominated rule in Iraq and the successful emergence of Hamas as the ruling entity after the elections of January 2006.  The Arab autocrats in Egypt, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia suffer from the same fear.  The emergence of Hamas as the governing body over Palestine did not end their internal turbulence. 

The plight of the Palestinians was worsened when, after a bitter fight between Hamas and Fatah in June 2007, the latter took over the West bank, while Hamas maintained its political control of Gaza.  However, Hamas was unable to make a breakthrough regarding reaching a peace an agreement with Israel. 

Egypt did bring about a ceasefire between Hamas and Israel in June 2008.  That agreement ended early last November.  The fact that Hamas was describing that agreement as tahdiya (a period of calm, which is temporary), as opposed to hudna (truce, which is concrete and lasting) underscored the fact that it was only a tactical maneuver.  The leaders of Hamas were adamant about describing on Al-Jazeera a tahdiya as “a tactic in conflict management and a phase in the framework of the resistance [meaning all forms of struggle].” The Israelis were not willing to fall for that ploy.  That so-called tahdiya ended early last November.  The escalating violence between the two sides since then has led to the Israeli military invasion of Gaza.

The systematic destruction of the already feeble institutional infrastructures and mounting human misery has already transformed Gaza into a hellish place.  Even though Hamas challenged Israel, and even though Hamas is also largely responsible for the breakdown of the tahdiya, the fact that Israel has been wreaking major havoc and is responsible for mounting civilian deaths in Gaza, Hamas’ popularity is most likely to escalate.  

In a perverse way, similar conditions prevail in Afghanistan.  The Western occupation forces are attempting to strengthen the authority of the government of President Hamid Karzai, whom most Pushtoon regard as a puppet of the United States.  The legitimacy of the Karzai government is a shrinking commodity.  Historically speaking, the occupiers of Afghanistan—from Alexander the Great to the Soviet Union—have faced nothing but bloody battles and resulting defeat.  The Taliban—who are primarily Pushtoon—know that fact only too well.  They also know that history is on their side, as long as they do not let up on the use of violence.  The United States cannot afford to lose in Afghanistan, and the Taliban refuse to seek a rapprochement with the Karzai government.  In the process, Afghanistan has become a hellish place.

No single actor is more responsible in Pakistan’s emergence as a highly unstable country than Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto and General Zia ul-Huq.  The former started the process of Islamization of that country, and the latter took it to the extreme.  The practice of using an extremist interpretation of Sunni Islam, which was intensified under Zia’s rule, was continued under the rule of General Pervez Musharraf, but with a different twist. 

Zia was forthright about his commitment to the extremist interpretation of Sunni Islam and used it unabashedly to maintain himself in power.  Musharraf, on the contrary, was duplicitous and cunning.  He presented the face of moderation toward the American interlocutor, while sustaining his alliance with the Islamists inside his country, especially in Baluchistan and in the border areas between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

The extremist Islamist forces had a clear sense that Musharraf was creating a façade of suppressing or containing them.  They understood that game and played along until they decided to take on the Army, after the massacre at the Lal Masjid (red mosque) on July 13, 2007.  That bloody event marked the beginning of the end of the Musharraf regime.  But when he was forced out of office and democracy returned to Pakistan, it was a feeble government while extremist forces were very much on the offensive.

The continued escalated pace of violence—which resulted in the assassination of Benazir Bhutto on December 27, 2007, and an assassination attempt on the life of Prime Minister Yusuf Reza Gilani on September 3, 2008—numerous suicide attacks and the resultant deaths of civilians as well as military personnel, leave little doubt about the march of Pakistan toward further instability.

As the United States gets ready to enlarge the presence of its troops in Afghanistan, the biggest question is whether the Surge strategy can be successfully implemented in Afghanistan.  Even if one were to be optimistic about such prospects, it should be kept in mind that stability and security of Afghanistan has been intrinsically linked to the security and stability of Pakistan since the 1980s.  The United States has known that fact.  But, under the administration of President Barack Obama, it might not remember, at its own peril.

In summarizing the overall situation in many Muslim countries, what is needed in Gaza, for starters, is a reinstatement of indirect negotiations between the parties, with Egypt serving, once again, as an intermediary.  After that, the only alternative for the Obama administration will be to plunge itself into endless rounds of negotiations, first with Hamas and Fatah, and then by bringing all Arab and Israeli contenders to the negotiating table. 

Even under the heap of mounting bitterness, the Palestinians know that the United States is the only actor that can exercise its influence on Israel.  This is not about putting pressure on the Jewish state.  Israelis know better than anyone else that there is no way they can resolve the conflict with the Palestinians by resorting to military force alone.   However, there is no denial of the significant role of an intermediary.  And only the U.S. can play that role, largely because Israel trusts the U.S., and also because it is a major recipient of U.S. military and economic assistance.  Besides, the Obama administration does not carry the same baggage of high partisanship that the Bush administration demonstrated toward Israel.

In South Asia, there is an urgent need for the application of a new “surge” strategy.  Such a strategy must treat Pakistan and Afghanistan as two sides of the same coin and it should be multi-dimensional.  Its features include massive economic assistance, revision of educational curricula, building of civilian infrastructure, implementation of civil-military relations that assign supremacy of civilian authority, eradication of the opium trade culture, and elimination of the proliferation of small arms from both Pakistan and Afghanistan. 

The chief tactic to escalate the feeling of security in the Pakistani ruling circles (of which the Pakistan Army is the most important part) is to ensure that India has minimal diplomatic presence in Afghanistan.  Any heightened Indian diplomatic presence in Afghanistan—which is the current reality on the ground—will motivate Pakistan to destabilize Afghanistan, fearing collusion between Afghanistan and India, whose purpose it is to destabilize Pakistan.  A general suspicion is that Pakistan’s highly secretive intelligence service, Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), sponsored the terrorist attack on the Indian embassy in Afghanistan in July 2008. 

The most unfortunate part of the current reality is that both Pakistan and Afghanistan have become fertile places for the mushrooming of extremism.  The deteriorating quality of life in those countries—as is also the case in occupied Palestine—is definitely adding further momentum for the growth of that phenomenon.  No simple solution that comprises only the use of military force will work.  In the pre-surge days, Iraq was the primary example of that fact.  It was only through the multidimensional application of the surge strategy that Iraq is making steady progress toward political stability.  That reality becomes a powerful argument for the implementation of the aforementioned multidimensional strategy in Afghanistan.

There is some reason to be optimistic, however, that the United States will develop a sophisticated understanding of the significance of Pakistan in the coming days.  According to a recent New York Times dispatch, the outgoing Bush administration has handed over to the Obama transition team a lengthy report on Afghanistan and Pakistan.  That report concluded, “that in the end, the United States has far more at stake in preventing Pakistan’s collapse than it does in stabilizing Afghanistan or Iraq.”

That tragedy thrust Zardari into the limelight.  As the interim Co-Chair of Pakistan’s Peoples Party (the other co-Chair is their 19-year-old son Bilawal), he handled himself with ample adroitness and class.  But Zardari also has a clouded (some say shady) past, which includes an accusation that he might have been behind the murder of one of Bhutto’s brothers. 

As a politician, he is a totally unknown quantity, aside from serving as a minister of environment in Bhutto’s government (1993-1996), when he earned the moniker “Mr. Ten Percent.”  In his new position as President, which is not a powerful office in Pakistan, he is expected to indulge in a balancing act with the Prime Minister, parliament, and, above all, the Army, which remains the most powerful entity in Pakistan.  How sophisticated is he likely to be is one source of concern.  The other is whether he will become just another tool in the hands of the Army, or whether he will push Pakistan toward another crisis, if he is not to get his way in the power game with the Army.

From its very creation, democracy has been in a constant power struggle with the Army in Pakistan.  In that struggle, the Army has always won.  However, Pakistan’s current volatility stems from the fact that, since the 1970s, the phenomenon of “Islamization” has emerged as the chief challenger of both democracy and the Army. 

Benazir’s father, former Prime Minister Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, initiated this phenomenon, and it was brought to a point of no return by General Zia ul-Huq.  Both Bhutto and Zia used Islamization purely to achieve objectives of solidifying their political power and sabotaging democracy.  Bhutto was fearful of the Army, whose chief—Zia—eventually hanged him on a trumped-up charge in 1979.  Zia was fearful of democracy and went through all sorts of shenanigans to postpone its return.  He planned to stay in power indefinitely, only to be assassinated in 1988.  In the interim, Pakistan emerged as a place where democracy faces a grim future.      

In the domestic politics of Pakistan, Islamic parties emerged as major players as a direct outcome of Islamization.  The educational institutions—which were never given primacy in the government’s expenditure priorities, suffered even more in the sense that religious education emerged as a major requirement in the curricula.  Scientific education was given a secondary role, while the Mullahs became increasingly vocal about the primacy of religious education.

Islamization came in handy as a tool for the United States, when it entered Pakistan for the purpose of defeating and expelling the Soviet Union from Afghanistan, starting in 1979-1980.  America militarized the doctrine of Jihad to the hilt to fight and win that war.  Ultimately, it was the fighting zeal of the Mujahideen, the doctrine of militant Jihad, and American weaponry and money that defeated the Soviet Union.  Pakistan was the chief facilitator and a major player in that bloody war.

After the Soviet ouster from Afghanistan, America left the battlefields of Pakistan-Afghanistan, but Islamization of both countries became a permanent phenomenon.

After the 9/11 attacks on the United States, the lone superpower realized that Islamization had to be curtailed in Pakistan by, inter alia, introducing curricular reforms.  However, the top priority was given, once again, to fighting and defeating the Taliban-al-Qaida nexus. 

General Pervez Musharraf, who came to power in 1999 by ousting democracy, agreed to fight the Taliban-al-Qaida alongside the U.S.  But he took no earnest and sweeping measures to eradicate Islamization from his country.  In fact, he followed a duplicitous policy of forming a political alliance with the Islamists in the Northwestern Frontier Province and Waziristan regions domestically, while maintaining the façade of fighting them, for external consumption.

Indeed, in the post-9/11 era, Pakistan has continued its march toward becoming “Talibanistan.”  That is a phenomenon that made that country a battleground between Islamic radicals of the Taliban and their ilk, and the Army.  The decision of the Pakistani Army to fight the Taliban—taken under Musharraf—is the chief reason why it is envisaged by the Islamists as the “enemy” of Islam.  The Taliban forces of Pakistan have been accused of carrying out two assassination attempts on Musharraf.  They could very well have been responsible for the assassination of Benazir Bhutto in December 2007.  

The worsening political climate, American schizophrenic demands of fighting the Islamists, and bringing democracy back to Pakistan forced General Musharraf to retire as the Army chief.  On that very same day, he also signed the death certificate of his political career as the strongman of Pakistan.  He clung to power a little longer and maintained the bravado of fighting the growing demand of impeachment, only to succumb to the reality that his rule has been formally put to rest.

Now the baton of American demands to fight the Islamists has been passed to a civilian government, with Zardari as the new President, and the Army.  Under Musharraf, the Bush administration had a target to heap on rewards and anger whenever the circumstances deemed necessary.  Musharraf received billions of dollars in aid and assistance and was also blamed often for “not doing enough to fight al-Qaida.”  Now, Washington will be hard-pressed to place that blame on any one actor in Pakistan. 

The current Army chief, Ashfaq Kayani, though portrayed as a pro-American General, will be well advised to remember the fate of Musharraf.  Anyone—civilian or military official of Pakistan—who sticks his neck out for the United States, will sign the death certificate of his career, a la Musharraf.  Zardari, even though he is also described as pro-American, will be forced to rethink his own course of action in dealing with the Islamists.

The good news about Pakistan is that it has just started a new phase of democracy.  The bad news is that U.S. officials will find it hard to deal with the democratic Pakistan, as they have been finding out in democratic Iraq.  Anti-Americanism in Pakistan is also on the rise.  Zardari will have to keep that fact in mind while he sets the course of his country’s policy toward the lone superpower.  In this interaction, the Army will also remain an important but very cautious player.  A democratic Pakistan may someday emerge as a stable and serene place.  Sadly, that day seems to be in its distant future. 

This straitjacket requires the American president to view the Arab-Israeli conflict from the point of view of Israel first, and only then from the U.S. perspectives.  Barack Obama, if elected, is likely to be more constrained by it than John McCain.  The first and foremost reason is the allegation that he is (was) a Muslim and allegedly holds strong sympathies for the Palestinian cause.  Consequently, as President, he is likely to bend over backwards to prove that he is really a friend of Israel.  He has already fired the first salvo in that direction by stating that the American embassy should be moved to Jerusalem, something that even the staunchly pro-Israeli President, George W. Bush, has not implemented.  Still, the Israelis are showing their strong skepticism of Obama by heavily favoring the Republican nominee for President, John McCain (by 25 points), according to a recent report.  McCain’s profound sympathy toward Israel is just another evidence of how his presidency would be a mere continuation of Bush’s steadfastly pro-Israeli policies.  As such, one cannot be any more hopeful about the increased prospects of breakthroughs under McCain than has been the case under George Bush.  

On the issue of withdrawal of American troops from Iraq, Obama and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki see eye to eye.  At least for now, that reality favors Obama.  However, if the security situation were to worsen in Iraq, it is difficult to predict whether Obama or McCain will have an upper hand.  A lot will depend on which way the American people would lean under such a condition.

Regarding Iran, the presidential straitjacket limits the chances of creating an approach, which was most imaginatively proposed by the former Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger, when he discussed the prospects of offering a “grand bargain” to Iran.  Neither Obama nor McCain has made any reference to that proposition.  Still, Obama is somewhat original in insisting that the U.S. conduct a dialogue with Iran.  However, the stridency of Obama’s rhetoric explicating his description of Iran’s behavior may not be viewed with high optimism by Iranian leaders.  Nevertheless, Obama’s approach is markedly different from McCain’s militant rhetoric, and especially his recent juvenile demonstration of singing a parody of a  Beach Boy’s song, “Bar, Barbara Ann” to “Bomb, bomb, Iran,” while cameras recorded it for the view of future generations.  Needless to say, that event is one of the most visited sites on You Tube. 

Regarding South Asia, Obama is outdoing McCain in mouthing off ”McCainism,” when he proposed to take unilateral military action against the Taliban hideouts in Pakistan.  On this issue, the foreign policy handlers of Barack Obama have their work cut out for them to educate him extensively if he enters the White House in 2009.

Pakistan has long envisaged its security as inextricably linked to the security of Afghanistan.  The deciphering of that observation means that two preconditions have to be met. 

First, no government of Afghanistan will be allowed to be anti-Pakistan/pro-India.  This hyphenated relationship has to be both understood and empathized by the United States, characteristics that have been grossly absent from America’s foreign policy toward South Asia.  Second, from the vantage point of Pakistan, India’s heightened presence in Afghanistan is fully aimed at destabilizing Pakistan.  Consequently, as preemptive (or in some instances as a preventive) measure, Pakistan would do everything to destabilize Afghanistan.  This proposition is not likely to be spelled out by the Pakistanis through official foreign policy pronouncements in the future.  Only General Zia ul-Haq, in a moment of brutal frankness with the Journalist, Selig Harrison, in the 1980s, admitted the significance of Afghanistan for the ”strategic depth” of Pakistan. 

However, in the turbulent politics of South Asia—where bomb blasts speak more frequently than accomplishments stemming from quiet diplomacy—one is left to draw one’s own conclusions about why the Indian staff in Afghanistan was recently targeted in a suicide attack in Afghanistan and why there were several bomb attacks in Ahmadabad, India.

Even though the United States has long been involved in South Asia, the American foreign policy establishment has never impressed the world about its understanding of the highly nuanced and equally cataclysmic geopolitics of South Asia.  In the remainder of this decade, and under a new U.S. president, that fact is not likely to change perceptibly. 

America’s foreign policy in the Middle East and South Asia is not likely to witness much change in the coming years.  The peace process in Israel awaits a new and highly credible leader—of the caliber of the late Yitzhak Rabin—whom Israelis can trust to make a deal with the Palestinians.  Long before that, the Palestinians have to unite behind one leader, a proposition that appears hard to materialize in the post-Arafat days, when the PLA and Hamas factions are busy fighting and killing each other. 

There is a serious crisis of legitimacy in the Palestinian nation.  The West perceives the diffident Mahmoud Abbas as a legitimate leader, a point of view that is not relevant from the perspective of the Palestinians.  The Palestinian voters, on the contrary, after voting overwhelmingly for Hamas in January 2006, have not yet renewed their mandate for that organization.  So, from their vantage point, one can only guess that Hamas still has a lot of support.  The U.S. and the EU continue to envisage Hamas as a “terrorist” entity with which they will not do business.  In the interim, the plight of the Palestinians continues to worsen.

Iran has long desired a negotiating process aimed at concluding a grand bargain with the lone superpower.  That might happen if Obama is elected.  However, even that accomplishment is buried underneath enormous historical baggage from the U.S. and Iranian sides.

In South Asia, the most crucial aspects are stabilization of Pakistan and Afghanistan.  The U.S. plays virtually no role in materializing the stability of Pakistan, except if it decides to create massive economic plans towards that country whose purpose it is to ensure that Pakistan does not become a failed state.  As complicated as that process appears to be, it becomes comparatively simpler when one considers how awesome the task of stabilizing Afghanistan really is.

The winner of the American presidency in 2008 will be faced with the type of challenges that are marked by characteristics that promise to ensure failure.  Transforming those characteristics into a template for success will require a superhuman endeavor, which can be achieved only through multilateralism.  In this sense, a unilateral approach toward any of the aforementioned problems has to be discarded categorically and at least on a long-term basis.

Feith has written a book, War and Decision: Inside the Pentagon at the Dawn of the War on Terrorism, and is using the opportunity of its promotion to push the neo-con line. He even appeared on Jon Stewart’s The Daily Show , one of the US’s most popular shows that specializes in spoofing daily news.

Even Paul Wolfowitz, former deputy secretary of defense, is making himself available to offer revisionist perspectives on the war in Iraq. The George W Bush administration’s chief neo-con, Vice President Dick Cheney, is likely to present his version of revision at the end of Bush’s presidency.

Rumsfeld is writing his own book explaining his take on the Iraq war, and so is former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Richard Meyers, a staunch defender of the decision to go to war with Iraq in 2003.

The purpose of this campaign can be interpreted as a move to develop a new school of revisionist history of the early 21st century in which the neo-cons and hawks will be heroes, rather than the villains. As a report in the Washington Independent said, “They see this fight for historical dominance as the last battle of the war in Iraq.”

These developments are taking place during a presidential campaign in which one of the candidates, Republican Senator John McCain, has emerged as a darling of the neo-cons, while his opponent, Democratic Senator Barack Obama, has staked his candidacy on a much more critical assessment of the Iraq war. Clearly, the post-George W Bush era will mark the return of the neo-cons to the corridors of power if McCain were to win the White House.

The neo-cons’ campaign to establish “uncontested American supremacy” without care for the long-term implications for the lone superpower’s global interests or reputation will start again with gusto.

The chances of a return to power for the neo-cons will improve markedly if Iran is attacked by Israel, with America’s connivance, before the presidential elections in November. The US and Israel, among others, consistently claim that Iran’s nuclear program is aimed at building nuclear weapons, while Tehran says it is solely for civilian purposes.

The “defanging” of Iran may not be discussed openly as an option during the presidential campaign, but it is increasingly envisaged as an important precondition for re-establishing America’s dominance in the Middle East.

That dominance appeared shaky while the insurgency in Iraq was at its peak in 2007. Now, since Iraq – relatively speaking – appears to be calming down, there is a rising hope among neo-cons that America’s clout in that region will rise. Iraq, though, may be experiencing a false sense of calm before the outbreak of another round of chaos.

Shi’ite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army is a potent force capable of conducting asymmetric war against the US and Iraqi security forces, much as Hezbollah in Lebanon, another Shi’ite group, successfully saw off Israel in the summer of 2006. There are powerful linkages between the Sadrist forces of Iraq and Hezbollah, although it is not clear what operational collaboration and training exists between the two groups.

In the case of al-Qaeda in Iraq, it is very much on the defensive. However, if the Sadrists were to launch an asymmetric war, al-Qaeda and related groups would do their utmost to fully exploit the ensuing turbulence.

Afghanistan boils
In the Pakistani tribal areas and in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda is resurgent and has established strong links with the Taliban, which continues to make gains against coalition forces in Afghanistan.

Given that militants make good use of sanctuaries in the tribal areas, United States and North Atlantic Treaty Organization forces, given Pakistan’s reluctance, will eventually have to expand operations into Pakistan.

One such recent attack severely rattled Islamabad, any more and ties between the US and Pakistan, a key “war on terror” ally, would further deteriorate – something that would be most welcomed by Islamists in Pakistan.

As complex as these issues are, and as obdurate as the linkages between the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq appear, the potentially harmful implications of these variables to America’s strategic presence and interests in South Asia and the Middle East are not even mentioned by McCain and Obama.

Yet in the Middle East and South Asia regions battles are raging between Islamists who are determined to oust US forces and those who support a long-term American presence.

Supporters of the latter include Sunni rulers such as Saudi Arabia, but not the newly elected civilian leaders of Pakistan, who are waiting for the outcome of the presidential elections before deciding how close they want to be to Washington.

The current high sentiment of anti-Americanism in Pakistan is a fact they must weigh heavily. Besides, the leaders have other matters to consider. They have to deal with sections calling for the ouster of President Pervez Musharraf, who has been a staunch backer of the US over the past seven years.

In the Middle East, Sunni rulers are fearful of growing Iranian clout, but there is no suggestion of their support for an attack on Iran. They prefer not to antagonize the Bush administration, so they don’t publicly oppose military action, but they also don’t want to encourage Iran in its confrontation with the US. This deferential attitude of the Sunni rulers will strengthen the hands of the neo-cons, who very much want a military strike on Iran.

Should Obama, who has talked of staging dialogue with Iran, become president he has a chance of quieting the clamor for war, but his voice might not be enough.