Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan: Geo-political Perceptions

Events in Afghanistan have a crit­i­cal impact on India’s Inter­nal Secu­ri­ty because as Robert Gates, for­mer Direc­tor CIA and then US Defense Sec­re­tary, said some years ago, “22 per cent of all ter­ror­ists oper­at­ing in Jam­mu and Kash­mir were either from Afghanistan or had been trained there”. The writer, one of India’s fore­most experts on Afghanistan and a for­mer DGMI, car­ries out an inci­sive analy­sis of Pakistan’s role in Afghanistan — espe­cial­ly the spoil­er dimen­sion that pro­vides sanc­tu­ary sup­port to the Haqqani, Quet­ta and Hek­mat­yar Shooras and has recent­ly tor­pe­doed the peace talks between the Karzai gov­ern­ment and the Tal­iban. In get­ting Rab­bani killed and tar­get­ing the US embassy in Kab­ul has Pak­istan over­reached itself? 

This arti­cle is pub­lished with the kind per­mis­sion of “Defence and Secu­ri­ty Alert (DSA) Mag­a­zine” New Delhi-India

Defence and Security Alert (DSA

 -

The geo-polit­i­cal per­cep­tions of Pak­istan in Afghanistan should be exam­ined in the light of Pakistan’s per­sis­tent efforts for estab­lish­ing a pli­able and sub­servient regime in Afghanistan. Pak­istan has been advo­cat­ing the neces­si­ty of strate­gic depth in Afghanistan to mask its ter­ri­to­r­i­al ambi­tions and its aim of expand­ing its strate­gic fron­tiers towards West and Cen­tral Asian regions. Secure west­ern bor­ders and a sub­servient Afghanistan will enable Pak­istan to deploy most of its armed forces against India. Pakistan’s pol­i­cy of gain­ing strate­gic space in Afghanistan is not new but prob­a­bly is direct­ly relat­ed to their ambi­tion for carv­ing out a larg­er Islam­ic enti­ty in the South Asian region joint­ly with the glob­al Islam­ic jihad move­ment, to emerge as a dom­i­nant pow­er in South Asia. Pak­istan military’s unwar­rant­ed con­cerns about the Afghan army devel­op­ing a poten­tial to take on Pak­istan comes in the con­text of India’s increas­ing influ­ence in Afghanistan. To counter this Pak­istan obvi­ous­ly wants Afghanistan ruled by a rad­i­cal Islam­ic group over which it has sig­nif­i­cant influ­ence and that would give no quar­ter to India.

Pak­istani interest

Pak­istani mil­i­tary presents India as the prime adver­sary and a per­sis­tent long-term ene­my and it has been con­stant­ly mak­ing efforts to con­vince Wash­ing­ton that Pakistan’s strate­gic needs must be met in Afghanistan. This means keep­ing Afghanistan firm­ly in Pak grip by exploit­ing reli­gious affil­i­a­tions. Their inter­ests in Afghanistan are pri­mar­i­ly linked to the Indo-Pak­istani con­flict. Accord­ing­ly, it has man­aged to turn almost every oth­er dimen­sion of its region­al pol­i­cy — such as its dis­pute with Afghanistan regard­ing the bor­der issue and Pash­tunistan and its deal­ing with Cen­tral Asia and the Unit­ed States — into a zero-sum game with India.

Pre­vent­ing a dom­i­nant Indi­an influ­ence in Afghanistan, which could evolve into an alliance between the two coun­tries and trap Pak­istan in a two-front sit­u­a­tion, is Islamabad’s first objec­tive. Para­noia feeds its strate­gic out­look, hence the float­ing accu­sa­tions of ter­ror­ism and sab­o­tage, con­spir­a­cy the­o­ries regard­ing Indi­an con­sulates in Afghanistan and alle­ga­tion of Indi­an sup­port for the Baloch and Wazir insur­gen­cies. A sta­ble, friend­ly and coop­er­a­tive Afghanistan, in the eyes of Pak­istan, is nec­es­sar­i­ly an Afghanistan under close Pak­istani con­trol, denied all pos­si­bil­i­ties of direct trade with India.

Pash­tun question

The Pash­tun ques­tion is an issue in its own right and reflects to a large extent Pakistan’s iden­ti­ty relat­ed inse­cu­ri­ties. It con­cerns both Afghanistan’s irre­den­tist claim on the ter­ri­to­ries locat­ed between the for­mer Durand Line and the Indus Riv­er as well as to the deep-root­ed sus­pi­cion of extra-ter­ri­to­r­i­al affil­i­a­tions of the Pak­istani Pash­tuns. It is also an eco­nom­ic prob­lem for Pak­istan, as smug­gling across an unrecog­nised bor­der deprives the Pak­istani state of bil­lions of rupees every year. Islam­abad fears Pash­tun irre­den­tism and Afghan claims over the ter­ri­to­ries between the Pak-Afghan bor­der and the Indus Riv­er. This explains the con­stant fight between the two coun­tries over the demar­ca­tion of the border.

Secur­ing inter­na­tion­al support

In addi­tion to pre­vent­ing Indi­an influ­ence in Afghanistan, secur­ing US and inter­na­tion­al sup­port against India, even if indi­rect­ly, is also one of Pakistan’s key inter­ests in Afghanistan. Pak­istan has nev­er been able to secure the long-term alliance against India it desires. In recent his­to­ry, it has only gar­nered US com­mit­ments to its secu­ri­ty on an ad hoc basis. The Sovi­et inva­sion of Afghanistan was one such occa­sion. The “war on ter­ror” against the Tal­iban in Afghanistan and against Al Qae­da in Pak­istan pre­sent­ed a sim­i­lar oppor­tu­ni­ty. The US pres­ence in Afghanistan and its mil­i­tary sup­port to Pak­istan are seen as parts of the same equa­tion. The for­mer is seen as a guar­an­tee against dom­i­nant Indi­an influ­ence in Afghanistan, the lat­ter as a way of strength­en­ing the Pak­istani forces against India. Hence the US$ 8 bil­lion Pak­istan spent on con­ven­tion­al equip­ment for its army and air force, tak­en from the US$ 15 bil­lion the coun­try received from the Unit­ed States osten­si­bly as a reim­burse­ment of its expens­es in the war on ter­ror. Post Abbot­tabad, US atti­tude towards such grants has how­ev­er dras­ti­cal­ly changed.

Pak­istan obvi­ous­ly wants Afghanistan ruled by a rad­i­cal Islam­ic group over which it has sig­nif­i­cant influ­ence and that would give no quar­ter to India

Cen­tral Asia is viewed through the same prism of Indo-Pak­istani rela­tions, albeit to a less­er degree. As a poten­tial alter­na­tive sup­ply route to Pak­istan, the Cen­tral Asian Republics, in par­tic­u­lar Tajik­istan and Uzbek­istan are seen as a threat — not to Pak­istan but to Pakistan’s cen­tral­i­ty in the Afghan con­flict. An alter­na­tive sup­ply route would like­ly dimin­ish US and inter­na­tion­al depen­den­cy on Islam­abad and, indi­rect­ly, on Islamabad’s over­all Afghan pol­i­cy, mak­ing the Unit­ed States less like­ly to accept Pakistan’s demands and there­fore ben­e­fit­ing India.

Refugee ques­tion

The refugee issue is only of sec­ondary impor­tance to Pak­istan. As of March 2009, 1.7 mil­lion reg­is­tered Afghan refugees were still liv­ing in Pak­istan, where they are also allowed to work and attend school. These refugees are a drain on the country’s scarce finan­cial resources. Only a peace­ful and rel­a­tive­ly sta­ble Afghanistan would allow their return to their home­land. These inter­ests are some­times con­tra­dic­to­ry but do con­sti­tute the back­ground against which Pakistan’s Afghan’s pol­i­cy is formulated.

Ambiva­lent and complex

Pak­istan has posi­tioned itself in sup­port of US and inter­na­tion­al objec­tives and on Sep­tem­ber 12, 2001, it offi­cial­ly announced the end of its tra­di­tion­al sup­port for the Tal­iban. Since then the coun­try has pro­vid­ed some logis­ti­cal facil­i­ties to the Unit­ed States in the form of bases and lat­er to the North Atlantic Treaty Organ­i­sa­tion (NATO) in the form of tran­sit routes. In prac­tice, how­ev­er, Pak­istan pol­i­cy is more ambiva­lent and com­plex. On the one hand, it tru­ly sup­ports the fight against Al Qae­da and more gen­er­al­ly all groups it con­sid­ers a threat to its own inter­ests. But this list of antag­o­nis­tic groups peri­od­i­cal­ly changes. For exam­ple, the Tehrik-e-Tal­iban Pak­istan (TTP), which Pak­istan is cur­rent­ly fight­ing, was pre­vi­ous­ly one of its pro­teges until the TTP turned against the Pak­istani army fol­low­ing the cycle of attacks and reprisals gen­er­at­ed by the Red Mosque inci­dent. This pol­i­cy is not with­out costs for Pak­istan, both human and finan­cial. The bat­tles in the Bajaur dis­trict and the Swat Val­ley have gen­er­at­ed a flow of inter­nal­ly-dis­placed per­sons that Pak­istan has to man­age, plac­ing an addi­tion­al bur­den on an already weak econ­o­my increas­ing social ten­sions. How­ev­er, these costs are some­times seen in some quar­ters as the price to pay for the real­i­sa­tion of Pakistan’s larg­er objec­tives and are there­fore accept­able (even more so if they are paid for by the inter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty). Pak­istan keeps sup­port­ing, train­ing and fund­ing a num­ber of ter­ror­ist groups in the pur­suit of its for­eign pol­i­cy objec­tives. Despite tremen­dous for­eign pres­sure, Pak­istan has done vir­tu­al­ly noth­ing against the Afghan Tal­iban move­ment present on its ter­ri­to­ry; the Quet­ta and Peshawar shooras still oper­ate from Pak­istani soil.

Pak­istan keeps sup­port­ing, train­ing and fund­ing a num­ber of ter­ror­ist groups in the pur­suit of its for­eign pol­i­cy objec­tives. Despite tremen­dous for­eign pres­sure, Pak­istan has done vir­tu­al­ly noth­ing against the Afghan Tal­iban move­ment present on its ter­ri­to­ry; the Quet­ta and Peshawar shooras still oper­ate from Pak­istani soil

A rel­a­tive­ly new phe­nom­e­non has also emerged in the Fed­er­al­ly Admin­is­tered Trib­al Areas, tra­di­tion­al­ly a launch­ing pad for jiha­di oper­a­tions in Afghanistan: the replace­ment of local jihadist organ­i­sa­tions by more exten­sive Pun­jabi ones, Lashkar-e-Toi­ba being the most promi­nent. Because of the post 9/11 effect of the flu­id­i­ty of jihadist affil­i­a­tions, it may not be fair to see the process as an oper­a­tion entire­ly staged by the Pak­istani army. The sim­i­lar­i­ty with the Pak­istani army’s strat­e­gy in Kash­mir, how­ev­er, is too strik­ing to be coincidental.

The Pak­istani strat­e­gy in the area is high­ly selec­tive. Pak­istani offi­cials clear­ly indi­cate that they want to hit one spe­cif­ic tribe, the Mehsuds, from which the TTP orig­i­nates, in order to teach oth­er groups a les­son and keep them qui­et, on the basis of which they will con­clude peace agree­ments. They have also stat­ed that they will not touch any organ­i­sa­tion that does not tar­get the Pak­istani state. As a result, this pol­i­cy pro­tects, for exam­ple, Lashkar-e-Toi­ba a group with an inter­na­tion­al agen­da, as demon­strat­ed by the Headley affair, but always pre­sent­ed by the Pak­istani army and intel­li­gence agen­cies as a local organ­i­sa­tion. Inso­far as rec­on­cil­i­a­tion process is con­cerned Pak­istan wants a stran­gle­hold on this issue. It has done its best to sab­o­tage any direct talks between Afghanistan gov­ern­ment and the Tal­iban. The most glar­ing has been the assas­si­na­tion of Burhanud­din Rab­bani, for­mer Pres­i­dent of Afghanistan is per­haps the last straw that broke the camel’s back as far as the peace talks are concerned.

Cur­rent situation

Cur­rent prob­lem post Osama and attack on their naval base is three fold. First, its rela­tions with Afghanistan con­tin­ue to dete­ri­o­rate. This is com­pli­cat­ed by a sec­ond prob­lem, its wors­en­ing rela­tions with the US. Then there is the third wor­ry of being out­paced and out­wit­ted by India in the days to come. Afghanistan accus­es Pak­istan of being behind cross bor­der attacks which have killed many in the bor­der regions. It also sus­pects the sup­port­ive hand of the ISI in Tal­iban led attacks in Afghan cities. All this, even as Islam­abad woos Karzai and urges him to work close­ly with Pak­istan. This is typ­i­cal of how Pak­istan oper­ates, says one observ­er. “The left hand does not know what the right hand is doing.” There is lit­tle that can be done to pro­duce a more coor­di­nat­ed pol­i­cy because of the dom­i­nant role ISI plays in rela­tions with Afghanistan.

Team GlobDef

Seit 2001 ist GlobalDefence.net im Internet unterwegs, um mit eigenen Analysen, interessanten Kooperationen und umfassenden Informationen für einen spannenden Überblick der Weltlage zu sorgen. GlobalDefence.net war dabei die erste deutschsprachige Internetseite, die mit dem Schwerpunkt Sicherheitspolitik außerhalb von Hochschulen oder Instituten aufgetreten ist.

Alle Beiträge ansehen von Team GlobDef →