asianaffairs

Revising roles on a shifting world stage

America's increasing frustration with Pakistan has left many US politicians seeking a less strategic link between the two countries, but the UK cannot isolate itself from Pakistan's problems. David Watts reports on a recent gathering at the LSE, addressed by shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander.

By David Watts

LACK OF INSIGHT: Britain's shadow foreign secretary showed no sense of any real understanding of the complexities faced by Pakistan

The growing American frustration with Pakistan following the discovery of Osama bin Laden's hideout and the continuing links to the Haqqani network is leading many Washington politicians to seek a different type of relationship between the two countries.

'The dangerous product' of this new phase of negativity, said Douglas Alexander, the shadow foreign secretary in the British parliament, was a feeling that the relationship should be downgraded from the strategic to a purely transactional one.

The result of that change would be an even greater reliance on drone strikes to disrupt terrorist groups on either side of the Durrand line, he told a gathering at the London School of Economics. Quoting an American official, he said the very fact that the United States had been treating Pakistan as a friend was itself a problem. This had led to 'huge fallings-out and bitter disappointments'.

Relying heavily on American assessments and pronouncements, Alexander

noted that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had warned the Pakistanis on her recent visit that there had been a very specific request to squeeze the Haqqani network that Pakistan backs within Afghanistan, and which is reportedly responsible for attacks on NATO troops in Afghanistan and on the Indians. The 'squeeze' tactic had been requested because the Americans recognized that eliminating terrorist networks and safe havens on one side of the border would not work.

He quoted Clinton as saying: 'You can't keep snakes in your back yard and expect them to bite only your neighbours.'

Despite tough talk from the Secretary of State and Chief of Staff Admiral Mike McMullen, Alexander said that it was difficult to detect any real understanding in Pakistan about the factors behind the increasingly tough rhetoric.

At the lower levels of the American political spectrum, the focus was on withdrawing US troops from Afghanistan and there was an increasing unwillingness to give Pakistan the benefit of the doubt over its links to terrorism.

Angered by accusations that it was orchestrating the activities of such groups as the Haqqani network, Pakistan also felt that its sovereignty was being violated not only by the activities of extremist groups but also by the drone attacks on its territory being staged by the Americans.

Alexander said that the key centrality of Pakistan was shown by the fact that, while some time ago discussions about Afghanistan would end on the subject of Pakistan, now they would begin with talk of Pakistan and end with Afghanistan itself. Pakistan was going to be a key element in the policies of whoever was foreign secretary when Britain held its next general elections in 2015.

With 900,000 British subjects of Pakistani descent, the UK would not be able to isolate itself from the country's problems. Engagement was the only possible policy because the alternative was much worse: 'We cannot simply walk away.'

It was likely that in the next ten years, concerns over Pakistan would overshadow those with Afghanistan.
The focus needed to be on the education of Pakistan's youthful population and while Alexander was mindful of the influence of madrassas with their Islamic indoctrination, he had been particularly struck on a visit to Pakistan some years ago by the inability of the ordinary schools to equip young people with the tools to find work and make their way in the world. 'Education can be a game changer,' he said.

The future of Afghanistan was vital not only for that country, but also for Pakistan. In Afghanistan the question was how to achieve a stable state of affairs by the defined conclusion of military operations in 2014.

'I've been saying for some time that renewed diplomatic and political momentum is to be found that can provide a political settlement that is inclusive of all but excludes al-Qaeda… It is the steady military pressure that the British and NATO forces have applied that has made this even a possibility.'

But even leading military figures had admitted that 'you can't kill or capture your way out of an industrial scale insurgency'. So work should be underway to try and ensure long-term security guarantees that Afghanistan will not host al-Qaeda again in the future. For example, a status of forces agreement to regulate any security role should now be under discussion.

After the London Afghan Higher Peace Council of 2010, there had been a consensus on counteracting corruption and a greater role for women in Afghan society, while thousands of Afghan villages and rural areas would benefit from less centralized government.

Britain, said Alexander, would be required to exercise its diplomatic influence to try and ensure that Pakistan's leadership recognises that terrorism and violent extremism have become the most immediate and pressing threat facing the Pakistan state, using the British intelligence services to help with that process. Afghanistan's stability was vital to Pakistan's. Equally important was work to get the regional countries to help with the stabilization of Afghanistan. Pakistan, just like China, Russia and India, would be ill-served by a chaotic Afghanistan that is the stage for the kind of problems seen after the Soviet troop withdrawal in 1989.

In Pakistan, the old orthodoxy of the need for strategic depth in Afghanistan still permeated the military, who had it drummed into them at every stage of their training. They were still looking east to the threat from India and the need to pull back quickly in the face of invasion but, he said, Pakistan risked being left behind by events both inside and beyond its borders.

Internally, the rise of violent extremism had grown while the rise of India continued apace. Meeting business leaders in Islamabad, Alexander had been struck by the number of them who had recently been in India and wanted greater freedom to trade between the two countries. Britain, along with regional players, should play a part in bringing the two countries closer together. Through Britain's European Union connections, there should be an effort to get the United States to loosen up its trade regulations to allow more of Pakistan's textile exports into the United States, while there should be a drive to inject new life into the Democratic Friends of Pakistan movement founded in 2008.

Many in the audience, made up largely of young politically aware Pakistanis eager for some new insights or policy directions, found Alexander's speech an exercise in frustration.

Depending heavily on American sources and repeating many of the paternalistic platitudes about Pakistan that are heard again and again, he gave no sense of having any real understanding of the complexities that that country has to deal with.

Accusing him of relying on American politicians for his judgements, one student said in frustration: 'You've basically quoted American politicians. You've once again shown how close the UK is to the United States; drone attacks are a big issue.'

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