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London [UK], Dec. 8 (ANI): Relations between the United States and Pakistan have long been turbulent. Is the new momentum developing between Islamabad and Washington today a geopolitical imperative?
The Democracy Forum, a London-based think tank, convened a panel of experts on Dec. 7 to discuss the relationship between the two countries in a virtual workshop titled “U.S.-Pakistan Tensions: What’s Next for a Former Ally?”
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In his opening remarks, TDF chairman Lord Bruce highlighted “a series of diplomatic activities” following the fall of Imran Khan’s government in April and the coalition government of Sheikh Baz Sharif.
He cited several high-level visits by the Biden administration, including senior military personnel and Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, whose visit coincided with the announcement of a $450 million allocation to refurbish the Pakistan Air Force’s F-16 fighter jets.
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But despite these diplomatic overtures, recalibrating relations is unlikely to be an easy process, with Lord Bruce warning that the “unfortunate timing” of Bhutto Zardari’s visit to Washington coincides with that of Foreign Minister S Jaishankar, who has publicly blasted F-16 deal, and criticized Washington’s alignment with Islamabad as “a relationship that ultimately served neither Pakistan nor US interests well”.
The outgoing chief of the Pakistan Army, General Bajwa, visited Washington in October after President Biden casually made a comment that Pakistan was “probably one of the most dangerous countries in the world” with “nuclear weapons without any cohesion.” Lord added that this did not reassure Biden about the stability of Pakistan.
In fact, Bajwa’s successor, General Munir, has inherited many unfinished tasks as he juggles the dual task of seeking to improve relations with the United States and engage with China, which will pose a major challenge to the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy , and increased US-Pakistan tensions.
However, despite Pakistan’s rocky relationship with Washington, former president Imran Khan acknowledged Pakistan’s need for a good relationship with the US — though Khan also likened the relationship to a “master-slave” or “master-slave” relationship, adding : “We were used like guns for hire.
Lord Bruce concludes by citing commentator Syed Ali’s observation that U.S. policymakers would do well “to adopt a Pakistani strategy that goes beyond the need to build personal rapport with individual rulers and instead creates a more permanent The basics”.
With regard to US perceptions of Pakistan, Wajid A. Syed, US correspondent for GEO TV and The News, speaks of the US’s interest in maintaining relations with Pakistan as they are now – that is, shifting rather than traditional patron-clients Trading partnerships in which Pakistan is a poor country taking advantage of its strategic location. Pakistan has always been through the prism of other countries – “Af-Pak” for example – in the sense that anything to be achieved in Afghanistan has to be done through Pakistan.
Saeed said US attempts to develop and strengthen bilateral ties to support a civilian government and encourage democratic values had backfired, largely because of Pakistan’s own internal political imbalances and power infighting, as well as rising anti-American sentiment.
For the current U.S. administration, Biden has known Pakistan in Congress, and his attitude towards Pakistan also reflects this. When Osama bin Laden was found in Abbottabad, the United States was outraged by evidence of betrayal, a duplicity that has strained relations between the two powers.
Saeed drew attention to further de-escalation in relations under Donald Trump, with the US shifting its attention to China and reducing its reliance on Pakistan. Saeed said the security of Pakistan’s nuclear assets is a key concern for the US, as is its internal instability and social/economic woes such as population explosion, food insecurity and political-religious divisions.
While U.S.-Pakistan relations have gone from distrust to total distrust to finding ways to cooperate in areas of mutual concern, on other key geopolitical issues the U.S. relies on and supports other stakeholders, notably India, and Japan and the United States. UAE takes precedence over Pakistan.
In fact, the South Asian portion of the Indo-Pacific strategy includes all countries except Pakistan. Thus, Saeed concluded, US-Pakistan relations are in “revision mode”, although Pakistan’s importance has been greatly reduced.
Pakistan’s security relationship with the US is the focus of Dr Ayesha Siddiqa, a research fellow at King’s College London. Technically, she insisted, the only meaningful U.S.-Pakistan relationship is the national security and military one.
The impasse under Imran Khan represented a very bad patch in US-Pakistan relations, far from what Pakistan had hoped — that is, on par with US-Israel relations. But Siddiqa argues that what is seen as a bad patch is actually a reassessment of the security relationship going back to 2012 and how the US will position itself.
The United States has been shifting its focus more to the Indo-Pacific region and away from non-state actors to state actors, namely China, as the core threat. So the US national strategy for 2022 is driven by this overarching factor.
Siddiqa said there was a reassessment on both sides, not because it was related to one leader or the other, but because of what happened in the military establishment (GHQ). She spoke of General Bajwa’s famous “enough” principle for the United States, but since Khan’s ouster, there has been a “modest reassessment” in relations between the two countries.
The reasons behind the reassessment include the India factor, which is always present behind the scenes. Given that New Delhi is trying to maintain a more independent policy toward the United States and is building relations with Russia, the United States may send a message to India that it can also “rebalance” in South Asia. Regarding the “four major drivers” of US-Pakistan relations—Afghanistan; counterterrorism; nuclear proliferation; and China/CPEC—objectives were reordered, driven by the needs of both sides.
Thus, Siddiqa concluded, Pakistan is trying to reposition itself and is tactically at odds with the US and China as it depends on China for arms supplies but economically on the West and the US.
Islamabad-based physicist, author and activist Dr Pervez Hoodbhoy draws attention to the growing mismatch between the two cultures – Western liberalism, Pakistani Islam – and its implications for relations at the national level. When we talk about US-Pakistan relations, we are referring to the relationship between the US government and the Pakistani military, he said.
The army that rules Pakistan today is very different from that of the first two decades after Partition – at the time, it shared values with the Indian and British armies, whereas today it is sociologically and culturally distinct, viewing India as the enemy of civilization. During the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and its aftermath, the military was forced to change its values and become more Islamized and radicalized—it was no longer just a defender of territory but also a guardian of ideological borders.
Why has the Pakistani army’s rhetoric about the US changed? Hoodboy asked. He pointed to two main reasons. During the Clinton administration, the US considered India far more important to its place in the world than Pakistan, much to the disappointment of Islamabad. The second reason is that Pakistan used the Mujahideen for foreign policy purposes after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the US leaving the region.
Hoodbhoy also believes that behind the deterioration of US-Pakistan relations is the rise of religious beliefs among the lower ranks of the military. Pakistan believes that the only interests of the United States in the region are to seize Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and destroy Islam. Imran Khan took advantage of this, accusing the US of ousting him for supporting Islam.
As for the future, Hoodbhoy said anti-Americanism is so pervasive and pervasive that the US might even trump India. The level of vitriol it has absorbed from Pakistan, he does not see changing anytime soon.
TDF Chairman Barry Gardiner said at the close of the event that the military is and has always been the linchpin of power in Pakistan. Its underlying tenet is that a close relationship with the United States is at the heart of Pakistan’s geopolitical relevance – and this has never been more important than now in times of economic, political and ecological crisis.
The U.S.-Pakistan relationship has always been based on military and counter-terrorism cooperation, on strategic geopolitical influence in the region, and a third relationship after development, trade, and humanitarian investment.
However, while the United States has long been committed to Pakistan’s stability and investment, it is shifting toward cooperation with other partners in the region—possibly in response to Pakistan’s relationship with China, which has actively invested in Pakistan through CPEC and has become Pakistan’s number one. One source of FDI. (Arnie)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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