By Asif Haroon Raja
After 9/11, stated US objectives were to eliminate Taliban militia, capture Osama dead or alive, destroy Al-Qaeda network and affect a regime change of its choice. Bush and others roared belligerently that we will smoke them out and push them into Stone Age. Behind the rhetoric the actual objective was to gain control over energy resources of Central Asia. Pakistan fitted into its calculus because it provided shortest route to ship oil and gas through Balochistan.
More so, without its intimate cooperation, Afghan venture would have become onerous and expensive in terms of human losses. In context with Pakistan, US in alignment with India, Britain and Israel aimed at breaking the nexus between Pakistan and Taliban led Afghanistan and subsequently denuclearising and balkanising Pakistan so that it could be converted into a vassal state of India.
Objectives against Pakistan were as under:
Take President Musharraf on board and make him all powerful but under their thumb.
Form a dream team of secular parties and turn national assembly into a rubber stamp.
Defame Pakistan and its premier institutions through an orchestrated Indo-US-western propaganda campaign.
Weaken the Army by pitching it against well trained, effusively armed and fully supported militants.
Pulverize ISI by subjecting it to propaganda and placing it under unelected Rehman Malik.
Weaken judiciary by appointing PCO judges and sidelining judges of integrity.
Energize ethnic fires and stoke regionalism to inculcate hatred among smaller provinces against federal government and Punjab.
Forment unrest in Balochistan, FATA and NWFP and work towards their detachment from Pakistan.
Make inroads in all government departments and position its loyalists in important seats.
Overplay threat of religious extremism and vulnerability of nuclear assets.
Promote obscenity, vulgarity and immorality through Indo-western cultural invasion.
Crush concept of jihad and make the youth fun loving, effete and devoid of warrior spirit.
Dilute sense of nationalism and patriotism by promoting regionalism and opening debates on settled issues like two-nation theory, role of our founding father and Objectives Resolution.
Glamorize India and portray Pakistan as a failing state on verge of splintering apart.
Accentuate Islamic-secular divide, demonize Islamists and secularize the society.
For the attainment of their sinister objectives against Pakistan with which USA professed friendship and strategic alliance, it undertook multi-pronged strategies and conspiracies. Lulled by assurances of intimate cooperation in various fields and aid flow, our rulers fell into the trap and opened the doors of Pakistan wide open for CIA, FBI and MI-6 to operate unchecked under the pretext of nabbing terrorists. Northern Alliance (NA) heavy government led by Hamid Karzai in Kabul was befriended well knowing innate animosity of NA leaders towards Pakistan and their closeness with India.
Peace treaty with India further compounded matters since we lowered our guards and got involved in deceptive confidence building measures with India and in fighting terrorism. Our exaggerated policy of appeasement towards India enabled RAW to establish its tentacles in selected areas of interest in Pakistan and making them restive. To please India we forced our Jihadis operating in occupied Kashmir to turn their guns inwards
Easy AdSense by Unreal
Looking back in retrospection, notwithstanding dismal performance of USA in Afghanistan where it is fighting a losing battle, it has achieved most objectives it had set against Pakistan. These are listed hereunder:
Weight of war on terror has been shifted from Afghanistan to Pakistan and latter has now been dubbed as hub centre of Al-Qaeda and terrorism.
The loyal tribesmen of northwestern tribal region who had effectively guarded western border at their own and regarded as our second line force have turned hostile.
Western border that had become safe from 1989 onwards has assumed dangerous proportions because Afghanistan and Pakistan have been turned into a single battleground and India given a key role in Afghan affairs.
Pakistan is now faced with two-front war threat.
Pakistan Army has got deeply embroiled in fighting its own people on its soil with little hope of its extrication in near future.
Hostile forces are operating in whole of FATA, settled parts of NWFP and in Malakand Division including Swat where an expensive operation was recently launched. Talibanisation has also infected South Punjab.
Balochistan is restive since 2004 where insurgency has taken shape of separatist movement backed by foreign powers. Brahamdagh Bugti based in Kandahar and some other Baloch nationalist leaders demand nothing short of independence.
Both rural and urban Sindh are violence prone. Violent streaks were seen on 27 May 2007, on 27 December, on 8 April 2008, on the eve of entry of IDPs from Malakand Division in Sindh and recent spate of target killings.
While CIA, FBI, and MI-6 have made deep inroads in all government departments and media, RAW has established its network in all troubled areas.
US Administration has firmed up its grip over our pliant leadership and has started to treat Pakistan as its 51st state. Planned expansion of US Embassy in Islamabad and Consulate in Peshawar, hiring of large number of houses in Islamabad and Peshawar, reported arrival of Marines, secret construction of US operational facilities in Gharo in Sindh as a base for 200 Marines, establishment of Operational Command Centre in Balochistan, use of Shamsi Base and Tarbela by drones and circulating rumors of presence of Black Water are cases in point.
Kashmir has almost become a lost cause.
Economy has become subservient to US controlled IMF and at the whims of so-called Friends of Pakistan.
Education has been secularized and institutions of Madrassas and mosque considerably weakened.
Apart from heightened secular-Islamist divide in the wake of demonisation of Taliban, religious forces have got further polarized as a consequence to Deobandi-Barelvi antagonism and break up of MMA.
Moral turpitudes have declined and corruption institutionalized. The youth is more inclined towards life of fun and frolic and sense of patriotism and nationalism has diluted. Warrior spirit is on the wane.
The army, ISI and our nuclear program have come under pressure due to an orchestrated propaganda campaign; political forces are polarized and leadership stands discredited.
Pakistan has become morally, socially, politically and economically effete and vulnerable.
But for firm stand taken by Army chief about placement of ISI under Ministry of Interior, and successful operation in Malakand Division, our detractors would have succeeded in weakening these two vital institutions that not only guard the frontiers but also our nuclear assets and disrupt conspiracies.
The Army has gained admiration and respect of the entire nation and is today standing tall and confident. Even skeptical and critical US officials had to reluctantly reverse their negative perceptions and are now praising it lavishly much to the chagrin of India and Israel. None in Pakistan is prepared to compromise on nuclear assets. Balochistan package aimed at removing sense of deprivation of Balochistan will soon be announced which would hopefully defuse low level insurgency. Thanks to lawyers movement and firm stand taken by judges of integrity, judiciary has survived and is a huge check on morally bankrupt elite which doesnt believe in rule of law.
Success in Swat should not make us complacent since militants in Swat, Bajaur, Mohmand, Kurram, Orakzai and Khyber Agencies, Kohat Frontier Region, DIK and Peshawar are still indulging in random acts of militancy. They must be kept on the run and process of rehabilitation of affected people speeded up. Waziristan is yet to be neutralized. We must remain wary of US dangerous designs. As long as foreign troops remain in Afghanistan and RAW-CIA-Mossad continue exporting terrorism and propaganda themes to destabilise Pakistan, insurgency will keep seething and security situation will remain in turmoil no matter what protective measures we may adopt.
(The article first appeared in The Asian Tribune)
