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Posted by Dr. Manzer Durrani in Foreign Policy on October 19th, 2012
From the early 1950s until recently, strong US-Pakistanirelations were an essential element of American foreign policy in the Persian Gulf. US officials have for decades positioned Pakistan as a first line of defence against America’s enemies – first against Soviet expansionism and then against the forces of Islamist extremism. Since 2001, Pakistan has been the keystone of America’s ‘War on Terror,’ receiving more than $10 billion in American aid between 2001 and 2009 and buying more than $5 billion in U.S. weaponry.
A series of spats between Washington and Islamabad in the past eighteen months have quickly eroded what was once an almost ironclad relationship, however. More importantly, these conflicts underscore the two countries diametrically opposed geostrategic interests.
Washington, on the one hand, is set on propping up a tottering Afghan regime that almost no one envisions surviving without massive amounts of American support; hoping that Karzai’s regime will act as a bulwark against the Taliban and its Islamic foes. Islamabad, on the other hand, is doing what Pakistani governments have done for decades: colluding with Islamic militants in order to exert pressure and destabilize its adversarial neighbors. Islamabad has long seen the Taliban as a useful tool in its endless duel with India and it is simply throwing in its lot with the forces it feels it can best manipulate. Unfortunately however, the Islamic militants are a markedly unruly lot, not given to submitting to outside control.
Pakistani officials distrust the Karzai regime and its close links to Pakistan mortal enemy, India, rightly seeing the Karzai regime as doomed once America begins its inevitable military withdrawal from the region. No matter how chronically corrupt and inept, Islamabad sees what Washington refuses to acknowledge. In the words of former CIA Station Chief in Kabul, Graham Fuller:
[American] military force will not win the day in either Afghanistan or Pakistan. Crises have only grown worse under the US military footprint….The Taliban represent zealous and largely ignorant mountain Islamists. They are also all ethnic Pashtuns. Most Pashtuns see the Taliban, like them or not, as the primary vehicle for restoration of Pashtun power in Afghanistan lost in 2001. Pashtuns are also among the most fiercely nationalist, tribalized and xenophobic peoples of the world, united only against the foreign invader. In the end the Taliban are probably more Pashtun than Islamist. [1]
American officials are well aware of Pakistan’s Afghan policies. In September of 2011, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta confirmed that the Haqqani network, a terrorist network that earlier attacked the U.S. Embassy in Kabul, is a “veritable arm” of the Pakistani Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) Directorate. [2] Pakistan, according to the Council on Foreign Relations, has emerged as a terrorist sanctuary. [3]
The White House has attempted reign in its erstwhile ally using diplomatic pressure and monetary incentives, to little avail. In September 2009, Congress passed bill P.L. 111-73 authorizing the President to provide $1.5 billion dollars a year in aid to Pakistan from 2010 through 2014. Laws attached to the loan stipulate, however, that American aid can only be released if Islamabad adheres to American counter-insurgency policies in Pakistan. [4]
More and more, however, Islamabad has proved an unwilling dance partner. After P.L. 111-73 was passed, Islamic army leaders expressed “serious concern regarding clauses [P.L. 111-73] impacting on national security.” [5] Even more, Washington’s persistent use of unilateral drone attacks in Pakistan, resulting in the deaths of many innocent Pakistani civilians, have whipped up a wave of anti-American furor in Pakistan, and nourished Islamic sentiment in the region. [6] The assassination of Osama Bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan in late 2011, in flagrant breach of Pakistan’s sovereignty, outraged Pakistani officials and the public equally.
America’s geostrategic clout in the region is declining rapidly, as is its credibility. Even though NATO’s forces in Afghanistan are at their peak, Washington still cannot wrangle in the Taliban. Declared a victory upon departure, US encroachment into Iraq nonetheless showed the limits of empire. The Arab Spring robbed Washington of some of its political stalwarts in the region. Two failed wars and an ailing economy have uncloaked Washington’s fallibility and given America’s rivals in the region room to maneuver.
In the backdrop of America’s waning influence in Pakistan lies China, Pakistan’s South Eastern neighbour. The now second largest world economy relishes the prospect of Washington’s diminished role in the region, and has steadfastly pursued strengthened ties with Islamabad in recent years.
When American marines were reported to have killed Osama Bin Laden, Beijing voiced its outrage at America’s breach of Pakistani sovereignty. Both China and Pakistan oppose American plans to maintain bases in Afghanistan following NATO troop withdrawal in 2014. Beijing also provided, and paid for, 50 JF-17 fighter jets to Pakistan. Mutual dislike of India, which both countries see as a regional rival, bolsters the burgeoning Pakistani-Chinese alliance.
Even more, China is planning on investing up to $3 billion a year into Pakistan by the end of 2012; double the annual assistance from Washington and with no strings attached. In China, Pakistan has a very potent counterweight to the US.
Flush with its newfound political leverage, Pakistan recently told the White House that it is “re-evaluating [its] entire relationship” with Washington. [7] The White House got a first feel for the shifting power balance when Pakistan retaliated for an American airstrike that killed 26 Pakistani soldiers by closing supply routes into Afghanistan. While few would argue the merits of Washington’s current modus operandi in Pakistan, the end of the American-Pakistan partnership has the potential to throw the entire region into chaos. Most experts argue that the Pakistani state is one good push away from a sudden collapse – the implications of which are significant.
Sources:
[1] Graham Fuller (former CIA station chief in Kabul), “Obama’s Policies Making Situation Worse in Afghanistan and Pakistan,” May 10, 2009, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/graham-e-fuller/global-viewpoint-obamas-p_b_201355.html
[2] Tony Capaccio, “Haqqani Terrorist Group ‘Veritable Arm of Pakistan Intelligence,’ September 22, 2011,http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-09-22/haqqani-terrorist-group-veritable-arm-of-pakistan-intelligence.html
[3] Jayshree Bajoria, “Pakistan’s New Generation of Terrorists,” December 9, 2011,http://www.cfr.org/pakistan/pakistans-new-generation-terrorists/p15422
[4] Susan B. Epstein, “Pakistan: U.S. Foreign Assistance,” Congressional Research Service, June 7, 2011,http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/166839.pdf
[5] Ibid.
[6] US embassy cables, Reviewing our Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy, The Guardian, 30 November 2010:http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/us-embassy-cables-documents/226531
[7] Eric Schmitt, “U.S. Prepares for a Curtailed Relationship with Pakistan,” December 25, 2011,http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/26/world/asia/us-preparing-for-pakistan-to-restrict-support-for-afghan-war.html?pagewanted=all
Posted by Dr. Manzer Durrani in Foreign Policy on October 17th, 2012
For all the talk of “smart power,” President Obama is pressing down the same path of failure in Pakistan marked out by George Bush. The realities suggest need for drastic revision of U.S. strategic thinking.
— Military force will not win the day in either Afghanistan or Pakistan; crises have only grown worse under the U.S. military footprint.
— The Taliban represent zealous and largely ignorant mountain Islamists. They are also all ethnic Pashtuns. Most Pashtuns see the Taliban — like them or not — as the primary vehicle for restoration of Pashtun power in Afghanistan, lost in 2001. Pashtuns are also among the most fiercely nationalist, tribalized and xenophobic peoples of the world, united only against the foreign invader. In the end, the Taliban are probably more Pashtun than they are Islamist.
— It is a fantasy to think of ever sealing the Pakistan-Afghanistan border. The “Durand Line” is an arbitrary imperial line drawn through Pashtun tribes on both sides of the border. And there are twice as many Pashtuns in Pakistan as there are in Afghanistan. The struggle of 13 million Afghan Pashtuns has already inflamed Pakistan’s 28 million Pashtuns.
— India is the primary geopolitical threat to Pakistan, not Afghanistan. Pakistan must therefore always maintain Afghanistan as a friendly state. India furthermore is intent upon gaining a serious foothold in Afghanistan — in the intelligence, economic and political arenas — that chills Islamabad.
— Pakistan will therefore never rupture ties or abandon the Pashtuns, in either country, whether radical Islamist or not. Pakistan can never afford to have Pashtuns hostile to Islamabad in control of Kabul, or at home.
— Occupation everywhere creates hatred, as the U.S. is learning. Yet Pashtuns remarkably have not been part of the jihadi movement at the international level, although many are indeed quick to ally themselves at home with al-Qaida against the U.S. military.
— The U.S. had every reason to strike back at the al-Qaida presence in Afghanistan after the outrage of 9/11. The Taliban were furthermore poster children for an incompetent and harsh regime. But the Taliban retreated from, rather than lost, the war in 2001, in order to fight another day. Indeed, one can debate whether it might have been possible — with sustained pressure from Pakistan, Iran, Saudi Arabia and almost all other Muslim countries that viewed the Taliban as primitives — to force the Taliban to yield up al-Qaida over time without war. That debate is in any case now moot. But the consequences of that war are baleful, debilitating and still spreading.
— The situation in Pakistan has gone from bad to worse as a direct consequence of the U.S. war raging on the Afghan border. U.S. policy has now carried the Afghan war over the border into Pakistan with its incursions, drone bombings and assassinations — the classic response to a failure to deal with insurgency in one country. Remember the invasion of Cambodia to save Vietnam?
— The deeply entrenched Islamic and tribal character of Pashtun rule in the Northwest Frontier Province in Pakistan will not be transformed by invasion or war. The task requires probably several generations to start to change the deeply embedded social and psychological character of the area. War induces visceral and atavistic response.
— Pakistan is indeed now beginning to crack under the relentless pressure directly exerted by the U.S. Anti-American impulses in Pakistan are at high pitch, strengthening Islamic radicalism and forcing reluctant acquiescence to it even by non-Islamists.
Only the withdrawal of American and NATO boots on the ground will begin to allow the process of near-frantic emotions to subside within Pakistan, and for the region to start to cool down. Pakistan is experienced in governance and is well able to deal with its own Islamists and tribalists under normal circumstances; until recently, Pakistani Islamists had one of the lowest rates of electoral success in the Muslim world.
But U.S. policies have now driven local nationalism, xenophobia and Islamism to combined fever pitch. As Washington demands that Pakistan redeem failed American policies in Afghanistan, Islamabad can no longer manage its domestic crisis.
The Pakistani army is more than capable of maintaining state power against tribal militias and to defend its own nukes. Only a convulsive nationalist revolutionary spirit could change that — something most Pakistanis do not want. But Washington can still succeed in destabilizing Pakistan if it perpetuates its present hard-line strategies. A new chapter of military rule — not what Pakistan needs — will be the likely result, and even then Islamabad’s basic policies will not change, except at the cosmetic level.
In the end, only moderate Islamists themselves can prevail over the radicals whose main source of legitimacy comes from inciting popular resistance against the external invader. Sadly, U.S. forces and Islamist radicals are now approaching a state of co-dependency.
It would be heartening to see a solid working democracy established in Afghanistan. Or widespread female rights and education — areas where Soviet occupation ironically did rather well. But these changes are not going to happen even within one generation, given the history of social and economic devastation of the country over 30 years.
Al-Qaida’s threat no longer emanates from the caves of the borderlands, but from its symbolism that has long since metastasized to other activists of the Muslim world. Meanwhile, the Pashtuns will fight on for a major national voice in Afghanistan. But few Pashtuns on either side of the border will long maintain a radical and international jihadi perspective once the incitement of the U.S. presence is gone. Nobody on either side of the border really wants it.
What can be done must be consonant with the political culture. Let non-military and neutral international organizations, free of geopolitical taint, take over the binding of Afghan wounds and the building of state structures.
If the past eight years had shown ongoing success, perhaps an alternative case for U.S. policies could be made. But the evidence on the ground demonstrates only continued deterioration and darkening of the prognosis. Will we have more of the same? Or will there be a U.S. recognition that the American presence has now become more the problem than the solution? We do not hear that debate.
(C) 2009 GLOBAL VIEWPOINT NETWORK; (TM) TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC.
Graham E. Fuller is a former CIA station chief in Kabul and a former vice-chair of the CIA’s National Intelligence Council. He is author of numerous books on the Middle East, including The Future of Political Islam.
Posted: May 10, 2009 03:41 PM
Posted by Dr. Manzer Durrani in Foreign Policy on August 28th, 2012
COMMENTARY
By
Khurram Shaikh
The Deceptive Hindu Mind and US Ignorance About it.
Unlike the US and UK, Russia has never double-crossed Pakistan. It had a consistent policy towards Pakistan, even though hostile, partly due to dysfunctional foreign policies of Pakistan towards it and the rest of the Urals and Central Asian States region. It is also partly, an Asian nation. Its interests are more in harmony with those of Pakistan, than that of US, which has time and again, (except for Nixon era and Republican Administrations), back-stabbed Pakistan. Pakistan has always been betrayed by Democratic Party Governments in US. The Republican Party has always had a balanced policy towards Pakistan. President Nixon also understood the deceptive nature of the Indian Hindu mind.
Pakistan’s Importance in the Islamic World
US does not understand the leadership role of Pakistan in the 57 nation of Islamic world. Pakistan is admired by global Muslim populations for having achieved the nuclear status. It has given them pride, that their brethren in Muslim Ummah, have achieved, the extraordinary in nuclear and ballistic missile technology. US and its allies are choking Pakistan, economically, socially, polItically, and in the US Zionist controlled media. New York Times, Washington Post, and thousand of US News journals launch propaganda against Pakistan. Demonization of Pakistan and insinuation about the security of its Nuclear assets is the biggest propaganda orchestrated from Zionist controlled newspapers and Think Tanks.
The India-Israeli Axis and the Safety of Pakistans Strategic Assets “Red-Herring” used by Zionist Controlled US media and Think Tanks
The cleverly stealth argument is, “Pakistan’s nuclear assets safety is questionable.” US and its allies know better, Pakistan has the most secure nuclear program. It assets are guarded by a dedicated force of commandos trained in combating CBN attacks. Israel and India, through, Afghanistan has tried to interfere in FATA area and sent agents out to locate Pakistan’s nuclear assets. They have been caught and eliminated by Pakistan. Pakistani ISI was merciful to Raymond Davis, a CIA agent, because, it was at that time co-operating with US. But, the duplicitious and back-stabbing game is over. Pakistan has been bitten several times, the people and Armed Forces of Pakistan are quite aware and alert to the international games of Hindus and Zionists.
Pakistan’s Nuclear Response, if Attacked
If Pakistan is attacked by any nation than it will retaliate immediately against it forces in the area, and its neighborhood allies like India. The secret transfer of Russian missile and nuclear technology and its codes has been done by India, a nation based on Chanakiya’s doctrine of Double-Cross, if it is in one’s interest.As early as the third century BCE, India claims to have had the first “double cross agent” named Chanakya. It was his work that governs India’s strategy towards its neighbors and its foreign policy. Chankiya promoted “double cross,” as a tool for national policy during ancient times. He promoted spying on the king’s enemies with his accomplices disguised as traders, merchants and students that earned him the added title of back-stabber.
President Putin, a Great Statesman, who understand Indian duplicity
Pakistan should welcome President Putin, with open arms. He is extremely smart and understands the machinations and subversions of US in Asia. He has also dealt with Zionists during the Gulag days and their duplicitious loyalties, not to Russia, but to Israel. No wonder, he kicked most of them out. But, to the Soviet emigre’s chagrin, Israel, is only for Western European and American Jewry. Russian Jews, African Jews, South Asian Jews, and Sephardic Jews are struggling to find jobs and emigrating in large numbers.
“The third rail of Jewish politics is not the Palestine question, or even the issue of secular against religious that has so divided Jews in Israel and the Disapora. No, buried deep inside the contentious issue of Jewish identity is the primordial split between European Jews, Ashkenazim, and Jews of the Arab-Muslim world, Sephardim.
For all the fractiousness and infighting that constantly takes place in the Jewish world, the vast majority of those whose voices are heard so loudly and often piercingly in the discourse are closely united by their history and culture, a history that begins and ends in the Shtetls of Europe.”
Russia is separate nation from the old Soviet Union. Pakistan should offer Russia trade access from Karachi and Gwader. It is a win-win proposition. Russia is also our neighbor,and it can help control the influx of terrorists coming fro Central Asian States and causing havoc in Pakistan. Russians have found the true nature of India and its Hindu character, “Muhn pay Ram!Ram!Baghul mehn Churi.”
Many Pakistanis can trace their ancestry to Central Asian states and Russia. Pakistan has never caught a Russian spy, unlike, Raymond Davis. Hats off! To Pakistan Air Chief for rebuilding relationship. India is passing russian Sukhoi technology to US, including inspection of its Su-30 inventory and its IFF systems.
India is an existential threat to Pakistan, so is the United States, with its large Zionist population. To combat, this menace Pakistan needs to re-align with nations, with which it has common interest. The biggest mistake, Zia-ul-Haq made was to trust Americans and cause the destruction of the Soviet Union. Now, Pakistan should re-align with China-Russia-Islamic world (as its nuclear leader).
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The relations between the U.S. and Pakistan, despite the numerous attempts to revive them, are falling apart. Therefore, establishing close cooperation with Pakistan will give Russia a real chance to gain a foothold in Central and South Asia. In addition, Russia will be able to access the Indian Ocean, and make the U.S. troops in Afghanistan directly dependent on its logistics.
The constant and rude attempts of the United States to interfere in the internal affairs of a nuclear power raise overt anger in this country at all levels. An opinion poll conducted by Pew Research Center (USA) in the beginning of this year showed that 74 percent of Pakistanis view the U.S. as an “enemy.” Not that long ago, the whole country was discussing the scandal connected with the resignation of the Pakistani ambassador to the United States. Husain Haqqani wrote a secret letter, in which he asked for help in preventing a military coup, which was allegedly plotted in Pakistan, and promised certain concessions in return.
But even this pro-American official said last week that the goals and priorities of the two countries would not be the same in near future. That is why, he said, the USA and Pakistan should give up their attempts to build a partnership and pay attention to their own interests instead. “If in 65 years we haven’t been able to find sufficient common reasons to live together … It may be better to find friendship outside the family ties,” Haqqani told Reuters.
Font SizeThe brazen drone bombings of the Pakistani territory, the uncoordinated military operation to destroy Osama bin Laden, the accusations of supplying materials for Iran’s nuclear program have prompted Pakistan to seek cooperation with Russia. A special envoy of the President of Russia visited Pakistan in May 2012. Putin himself accepted the invitation to come to Pakistan for a bilateral meeting in Islamabad, prior to the IV quadrilateral meeting on Afghanistan. The meeting is to be held in Islamabad on 26-27 September 2012 with the participation of Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan and Russia. A new strategic partnership is brewing in the region.
Pakistan was one of three countries that officially recognized the power of Taliban movement in Afghanistan. There is no logic in the decision of the USA to make Pakistan its ally after 9/11. Indeed, Afghanistan and Pakistan are two brotherly nations. Ten billion dollars that the States invested in Pakistan’s economy during ten years are not enough to make the country “sell and destroy itself,” as Minister of Science and Technology Azam Khan Swati said.
In case of partnership with Pakistan, Russia could take control of the logistics of the U.S. military bases in Afghanistan. Russia already controls the Northern Distribution Network in Uzbekistan and Tajikistan that border on Afghanistan. If we add the southern routes from Karachi to Chaman and Torkham, then all deliveries will have to be coordinated through the Russian-Pakistani alliance.
If this scenario becomes reality, Russia will obtain enormous leverage over the United States. In one fell swoop, it will remove the Mideastern loop, which can not be tightened today just because of Iran. What is more, Russia will receive access to the Indian Ocean through the Arabian Sea and the ports of Gwadar or Karachi and then to the Strait of Hormuz, bypassing the alliance with Iran, which is not beneficial for Russia now.
In addition, Pakistan has been an observer at the SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization – a regional international organization, founded in 2001 by the leaders of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan) since 2005. One could go further on the geopolitical level, and make the country a permanent member of the SCO. Given that Afghanistan, India and Iran also look for partnerships in the bloc, one should welcome them as members too. The U.S. would thus face a dilemma: either give away South Asia for the SCO (to Russia and China that is) or try to retain the region at all costs.
With Pakistan’s help, Russia would be able to control terrorist activities in Central Asia. The Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU) is the largest Islamist political organization in Central Asia. It is present in Afghanistan on both sides of the Afghan-Pakistan border, and Pakistan’s role could be crucial in the fight against this menace.
The Commander of Pakistan Air Force, Air Marshal Tahir Rafique Butt, visited Russia in August. He told Thenews.com.pk portal that “it was a great visit with a positive result, and we can expect closer cooperation with Russia in the field of defense, particularly air defense.” According to experts, Pakistan is interested in buying Mi-35 attack helicopters, Mi-17 transport helicopters, engines for JF-17 program, missile defense systems, submarines and so on.
Russia made another thoughtful decision as it offered Pakistan help in solving the country’s energy crisis. Gazprom is ready to invest in Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) gas pipeline, rather than in the risky TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India), which has the support of the United States. In addition, Russia’s Magnitogorsk Iron and Steel Factory (MMK), with 75 percent of shares, will help expand the capabilities of Pakistan Steel Mills from 1 million to 3 million tons of production a year. Pakistan, in turn, can provide access to mineral resources in Balochistan and the Thar coal deposit.
It is important to remember that Pakistan sits on the crossroads of east to west and north to south trade corridors, including the new Silk Road Project in South Asia, which the Americans cherish. Russia needs to firmly define its economic priorities and defend them strongly. If the resources are not needed, then one should keep the transportation routes of those resources under control. A mega breakthrough is possible in the future: the “Persian Gulf – Bering Strait” railroad. The road will cross the Trans-Siberian Railway, the Turksib and the Trans-Asian Railway from China to Europe.
Lyuba Lulko
Pravda.Ru
28.08.2012
Posted by Dr. Manzer Durrani in Foreign Policy on August 17th, 2012
Posted by Dr. Manzer Durrani in Foreign Policy on July 13th, 2012
April 12, 2012
As Pakistan reasserts national-sovereignty, the US responds with arming & backing Baluchi terrorists.
By Tony Cartalucci
BLN Contributing Writer
Carving up Pakistan by fomenting separatist movements along Pakistan’s western border has been on the US geopolitical drawing board for years. As reported in December 2011’s, “The Coming War With Pakistan:”
“In a 2006 report by the corporate-financier funded think tank Carnegie Endowment for International Peace titled, “Pakistan: The Resurgence of Baluch Nationalism,” violence starting as early as 2004-2005 is described. According to the report, 20% of Pakistan’s mineral and energy resources reside in the sparsely populated province. On page 4 of the report, the prospect of using the Baluchi rebels against both Islamabad and Tehran is proposed. In Seymour Hersh’s 2008 article, “Preparing the Battlefield,” US support of Baluchi groups operating against Tehran is reported as already a reality. As already mentioned, in Brookings Institution’s “Which Path to Persia?” the subject of arming and sending Baluchi insurgents against Tehran is also discussed at great depth.
The 2006 Carnegie Endowment for International Peace report makes special note of the fact that above all, the Baluchistan province serves as a transit zone for a potential Iranian-India-Turkmenistan natural gas pipeline as well as a port, Gwadar, that serves as a logistical hub for Afghanistan, Central Asia’s landlocked nations as well as a port for the Chinese. The report notes that the port was primarily constructed with Chinese capital and labor with the intention of it serving as a Chinese naval station “to protect Beijing’s oil supply from the Middle East and to counter the US presence in Central Asia.” This point in particular, regarding China, was described in extricating detail in the 2006 Strategic Studies Institute’s report “String of Pearls: Meeting the Challenge of China’s Rising Power across the Asian Littoral.” Throughout the report means to co-opt and contain China’s influence throughout the region are discussed.
The Carnegie Endowment report goes on to describe how the Baluchi rebels have fortuitously begun attacking the development of their province over concerns of “marginalization” and “dispossession.” In particular attacks were launched against the Pakistani military and Chinese facilities. The question of foreign intervention is brought up in this 2006 report, based on accusations by the Pakistani government that the rebels are armed with overly sophisticated weaponry. India, Iran, and the United States are accused as potential culprits.
The report concludes that virtually none of Pakistan’s neighbors would benefit from the insurgency and that the insurgency itself has no possibility of succeeding without “foreign support.” The conflict is described as a potential weapon that could be used against Pakistan and that it is “ultimately Islamabad that must decide whether Baluchistan will become its Achilles’ heel.” This somewhat cryptic conclusion, in the light of recent reports and developments can be deciphered as a veiled threat now being openly played.”
Quite obviously, tensions between the US and Pakistan have only further deteriorated, with the West playing victim accusing Pakistan of “double dealing” them during America’s decade-long occupation of neighboring Afghanistan and frequent cross-border murder-sprees in Pakistani territory. Pakistan has more recently passed a resolution calling for the cessation of all US drone attacks on Pakistani soil. Additionally, as noted by geopolitical analyst Eric Draitser of Stop Imperialism, Pakistan has also prepared provisions to ban foreign bases on Pakistani soil and stem US covert terrorist activities inside Pakistan operating under the guise of “security contractors.”
US Prepares Armed Uprising
The US had frequently answered the reassertion of Pakistani national sovereignty with random drone attacks on civilian populations, but seems now to be shifting into gear for a full-blown destabilization of Pakistan’s Baluchistan province. Violence has notably increased in tandem with calls from Western politicians to support the “Free Baluchistan” movement and the establishment of an independent “Baluchistan” carved out of sovereign Pakistani territory.
The most astounding of these most recent calls is US Representative Dana Rohrabacher’s “Why I support Baluchistan” op-ed in the Washington Post. Rohrabacher cites the US State Department and Amnesty International – which in reality are one in the same – while accusing the Pakistani government of “violations of human rights.” He then, point-for-point, repeats the above mentioned corporate-financier funded US think-tanks regarding Baluchistan’s rich natural resources and the strategic location the province’s Gwadar seaport serves for the Chinese before admitting that Baluchistan’s brief period of autonomy resulted from the British Empire and the Persians carving it up as a buffer state.
Photo: In the 1980’s Rohrbacher (right) would actually travel to Afghanistan and “fight” alongside the Mujaheddin. It is also reported that he met Bin Laden and his foreign fighters – making him, like many others leading the fraudulent “War on Terror,” quite the hypocrite. The US use of proxy forces to ravage parts of the world is confirmed, and Rohrbacher’s direct role in such ploys is now also confirmed. US State Department-funded propaganda front Radio Free Europe in their article titled, “U.S. Lawmaker Questions Approaches To Pakistan, Afghanistan,” memorializes Rohrbacher’s role in the US-Soviet proxy war.
….
Rohrabacher entirely reveals his hand and the disingenuous concern he hamfistedly feigns in regards to the Baluchi plight when he cites a laundry list of grievances the US has with the Pakistani government and concludes by holding the threat of developing “a closer friendship with India and, perhaps, Baluchistan” over the head of Islamabad. Clearly, just as the British did before them, the US fully plans on carving out a Baluchistan buffer-state to balk Pakistani-Chinese relations, destabilize Pakistan itself, and provide more pressure on Iran’s eastern border.
Video: A proposed Iranian-Pakistani-Indian pipeline which would travel through Pakistan’s Baluchistan province, would essentially render moot US sanctions on Iran and provide Central, Southwest, and East Asia with Iranian oil. There is now talk of Russia helping to implement the planned project – a project the West is apparently willing to start a war and “Balkanize” Pakistan over to prevent.
One point Rohrabacher fails to mention is the planned Iranian-Pakistani-Indian piplelinewhich would in effect render moot all US sanctions and whose proposed path just so happens to pass through Baluchistan province. Such a pipeline would also converge with a planned logistical network being built by the Chinese from the province’s Gwadar port in the south all the way to the Chinese-Pakistani border in the north.
Image: Gwadar in the southwest serves as a Chinese port and the starting point for a logistical corridor through Pakistan and into Chinese territory. The Iranian-Pakistani-Indian pipeline would enter from the west, cross through Baluchistan intersecting China’s proposed logistical route to the northern border, and continue on to India. Destabilizing Baluchistan would effectively derail the geopolitical aspirations of four nations.
Just like the US used fighters in the 1980’s in Afghanistan to fight a proxy war against the Soviets, the US is now planing to use Baluchi terrorists to wage war against both Pakistan and Iran. Rohrabacher is just the latest peddler of a geopolitical ploy long since predetermined, and echos verbatim of calls by Selig Harrison of the Soros-funded Center for International Policy, in editorials like “Free Baluchistan,” and “The Chinese Cozy Up to the Pakistanis.”
US Already Subverting Pakistani Governance in Baluchistan
As in all neo-imperial 4th generation warfare scenarios, arming militants is only half of the overall strategy for defeating targeted nation-states. Subverting national institutions and replacing them with those interlocking with the neo-imperial unipolar order is the other half. The usual suspects, the US State Department-funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and its various subsidiaries, found all across the theater of 4th generation global warfare, are busy at work in Pakistan’s Baluchistan province as well.
Images: In addition to the annual Fortune 500-funded “Balochistan International Conference,” the US State Department’s National Endowment for Democracy has been busy at work building up Baluchistan’s “civil society” network. This includes support for the “Balochistan Institute For Development,” which maintains a “BIFD Leadership Academy,” claiming to “mobilize, train and encourage youth to play its effective role in promotion of democracy development and rule of law.” The goal is to subvert Pakistani governance while simultaneously creating a homogeneous “civil society” that interlocks with the West’s “international institutions.” This is how modern empire perpetuates itself.
NED has been directly funding and supporting the work of the “Balochistan Institute for Development” (BIFD) which claims to be “the leading resource on democracy, development and human rights in Balochistan, Pakistan.” In addition to organizing the annual NED-BFID “Workshop on Media, Democracy & Human Rights” BFID reports that USAID had provided funding for a “media-center” for the Baluchistan Assembly to “provide better facilities to reporters who cover the proceedings of the Balochistan Assembly.” We must assume BFID meant reporters “trained” at NED-BFID workshops.
Image: A screenshot of “Voice of Balochistan’s” special US State Department message. While VOB fails to disclose its funding, it is a sure bet it, like other US-funded propaganda fronts, is nothing more than a US State Department outlet. (click image to enlarge)
There is also Voice of Balochistan whose every top-story is US-funded propaganda, including the above mentioned op-ed by Rohrabacher, foundation-funded Reporters Without Borders, Soros-fundedHuman Rights Watch, and a direct message from the US State Department. Like other US State Department funded propaganda outfits around the world – such as Thailand’s Prachatai– funding is generally obfuscated in order to main “credibility” even when the front’s constant torrent of obvious propaganda more than exposes them.
Image: Far from parody, this is the header taken from the “Baloch Society of North America.”
Dr. Wahid Baloch considers Baluchistan province “occupied” by both the Iranian and Pakistani governments – he and his movement’s humanitarian hand-wringing gives Washington the perfect pretext to create an armed conflagration against either Iran or Pakistan, or both, as planned in detail by various US policy think-tanks.
Should an escalation in violence spiral out of control and the US commit to the complete destabilization of Pakistan, it is a good bet Dr. Wahid Baloch’s face will be omnipresent on CNN, BBC, MSNBC, and the likes giving his “expert” opinion on humanitarian violations inside of Pakistan and the need for NATO to intervene. He may even be nominated by his US handlers as “President of Baluchistan” just as long-time US resident and BP, Shell, Total-funded Petroleum Institute chairman Abdurrahim el-Keib was in Libya.
There is also the Baloch Students Organisation-Azad, or BSO. While it maintains a presence in Pakistan, it has coordinators based in London. London-based BSO members include “information secretaries” that propagate their message via social media, just as US and British-funded youth organizations did during the West’s operations against other targeted nations during the US-engineered “Arab Spring.”
Image: A screenshot of a “Baloch Human rights activist and information secretary of BSO Azad London zone” Twitter account. This user, in tandem with look-alike accounts has been propagating anti-Pakistani, pro-“Free Baluchistan” propaganda incessantly. They also engage in coordinated attacks with prepared rhetoric against anyone revealing US ties to Baluchistan terrorist organizations.
While Pakistan lies buried in the news and obfuscated with complexity regarding a myriad of tribes, difficult to pronounce names, confusing geography, and a culture many Westerners do not understand or appreciate, it also lies at the crossroads of China, India, and Iran. It represents a convergence of conflict between East and West with potentially catastrophic implications and even the prospect for a nuclear exchange.
China and Pakistan are more than aware of the West’s unfolding geopolitical gambit. China in no uncertain terms has declared that they and Pakistan will “stand with each other `in all circumstances’ and vowed to uphold their sovereignty and territorial integrity at all costs.” China by now realizes that what can be done to its immediate neighbors will inevitably be done to China itself. The West’s recent attack on Russia, meddling it its elections and attempting to trigger a color revolution within Moscow itself, reveals that Wall Street and London’s momentum forward is meant to carry them all the way to the end – into both Beijing and Moscow.
The West will continue to whittle away at nation-states around the world by attacking and dismantling indigenous national institutions and replacing them with their homogeneous “civil society” model. They will continue enticing all interested parties to find a comfortable place amongst their global order, while producing unpleasant penalties for all who resist. Such penalties range from economic sanctions to armed militant groups fighting proxy wars on Wall Street and London’s behalf.
What has developed, however, is a subtle but ever more apparent pattern of ultimate betrayal – meaning that many around the world are beginning to notice the West’s “carrot” is just as bad as the “stick” and regardless of which one that is chosen, the result is the same. A paradigm shift must be made, one from competing parties seeking superiority over one another, to a paradigm of solidarity. And while organizations like BRICS appear to be moving in this direction, at least for the sake of self-preservation, a paradigm shift toward solidarity must begin at the grassroots.
Individuals must make the conscious decision to no longer pay into Fortune 500 corporations and banks, recognize the consolidation of power for what it is and begin seeking human empowerment not through gimmicks like “democracy” and “human rights” but throughpragmatic solutions such as technical education, local industry and agriculture, collaborative research and development, and leveraging technology and our human ingenuity to improve our world through inventions and innovations instead of quotas, policies, and legislation.
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