the sort of place where Washington would prefer to see a significant and grow-
ing nuclear arsenal. On the contrary, it is precisely the sort of state that could
share nuclear know-how with other dangerous states or find itself vulnerable
to “insider” threats from violent extremists who enjoy too-cozy relationships
with sympathetic members of an increasingly radical ruling regime.
Most of the present batch of Pakistani generals would never wish to see
this scenario unfold. Sadly, they might find themselves powerless to stop it.
That prospect turns Islamabad’s nuclear program from an issue of serious
regional concern into a vital American interest. It should lead U.S. policymakers
to appreciate the stakes at risk in Pakistan’s long-term stability and political
trajectory. When framed in this context, Pakistan’s nuclear challenge, like the
terrorist threat, is clearly here to stay.
the emergent threat: regional instability
Over the past several years, when American officials spoke of Islamabad’s
regional role, they were usually referring to the war in Afghanistan. Pakistan
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No Exit
19
has been a conduit for NATO supplies into Afghanistan, and Islamabad has
held considerable influence over the stability of the Afghan state as well as the
success of the fight against the Taliban insurgency. In this context, by the end
of 2011, the consensus in Washington correctly perceived Pakistan’s regional
role as less than friendly.
The deterioration in relations between the United States and Pakistan over
the course of 2011 and 2012 had many different specific causes, but the fact
that the two sides mistrusted each other in Afghanistan was the immediate
bone of contention. Pakistani officials, particularly the generals who control the
country’s foreign and defense policies, believed that Washington was insensitive
to their concern that the Afghan state being built by NATO was a house of
cards poised to collapse into a warring mess once international forces pulled
out. Worse than that, they believed Karzai’s Kabul was too inclined to play
the Pashtun ethnic card in ways that would destabilize Pakistan, and was too
susceptible to Indian influence for their tastes.13
Given the mixed successes and many missteps in the American-led campaign
in Afghanistan since 2001, such Pakistani skepticism was hardly unwarranted.
But Pakistan’s response was also profoundly unhelpful. Rather than improving
upon a flawed American effort, Pakistan contributed to its troubles. Pakistani
sanctuaries permitted Afghan Taliban forces, especially the Haqqani network
based just inside Pakistan’s northwest frontier, to evade NATO forces even
when the Obama administration tripled U.S. troop strength to roughly 100,000
by summer’s end in 2010. As an irate Ryan Crocker, then U.S. ambassador to
Afghanistan, put it after a series of Haqqani-sponsored attacks in April 2012,
“We know where their leadership lives and we know where these plans are
made. They’re not made in Afghanistan. They’re made in Miramshah, which
is in North Waziristan, which is in Pakistan. . . . We are pressing the Pakistanis
very hard on this. They really need to take action.”14 In September 2012,
Washington officially designated the Haqqani network a Foreign Terrorist
Organization.15
How the Afghan war ends will set the stage for future U.S.-Pakistan rela-
tions. If the destructive trends of the present hold, if Washington and Islamabad
fail to find a mutually acceptable way to cooperate in Afghanistan, then U.S.
officials will blame Pakistan for the deteriorating security and instability that
Afghanistan is likely to experience as NATO forces depart. If, as many now
fear, Afghanistan then slips back into full-scale civil war, Americans are likely
13 On Pakistan’s concerns related to the “Pashtunistan” issue, see Ashley J. Tellis, “Creating New Facts on the Ground,” Policy Brief, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, May 2011, http://www.carnegieendowment.org/files/afghan policy.pdf.
14 “Pakistan Needs to Act against Haqqani Network: US,” Dawn, April 20, 2012, dawn.com/
2012/04/20/pakistan-needs-to-act-against-haqqani-network-us/.
15 Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Report to Congress on the Haqqani Network,” Press Statement, U.S.
Department of State, Washington, DC, September 7, 2012, http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/
2012/09/197474.htm.
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20
No Exit from Pakistan
to perceive Pakistan’s perfidy as the primary cause, discounting many of the
other troubling failures of the NATO war effort. This perception would drive
the wedge deeper between Washington and Islamabad and raise the political
hurdles to cooperation on other matters of American interest, whether coun-
terterrorism or nuclear security.
No matter the significance of the Afghan war, it is important to recognize
that Pakistan’s regional profile does not begin or end in Afghanistan. Pakistan’s
connections with India and China are of equal or greater significance to Islam-
abad. These ties draw Pakistan into a much bigger geopolitical game, the subject
of Chapter 6. That game centers on the rise of China and the shift of global
power and wealth to Asia.
The United States views the rise of China with at least a little trepidation. The
unanswered question is how China will use its newfound wealth and power, and
in particular whether it will seek to uproot U.S. influence from Asia. Put simply,
Washington’s goal is to navigate this shift in global power in a way that least
disrupts American interests. If possible, the United States seeks to encourage
China to adopt principles at home and abroad that are consistent with, or at
least not threatening to, those shared by the United States and its allies.
Although much of the American agenda with China centers on East Asia
and the Pacific where the two countries deal with one another most directly,
both the George W. Bush and Obama administrations have correctly viewed
a good relationship with India as necessary for managing the implications of
a rising China. Leaders in both capitals across a wide range of the political
spectrum have proclaimed the world’s oldest and largest democracies to be
“natural allies.”16
In addition to its own rising power and appeal to American businessmen and
policymakers alike, India also offers a pluralist and democratic alternative to
the authoritarian Chinese model. Among other common interests, New Delhi
shares Washington’s interest in at least hedging against the risks associated with
China’s rising influence. Assuming India’s economy grows apace, it will offer an
additional wealth-creating engine for a region that might otherwise depend too
heavily on Beiji
ng. And in areas where size matters, India delivers: its population
is young and growing quickly, likely to surpass China’s total by 2025. On the
military front, India lags far behind China in many capabilities, but unlike
America’s allies in East Asia such as Japan, Korea, or Australia (or for that
matter, unlike the members of NATO), India’s army brings massive manpower,
and all of its services are investing billions of dollars in new purchases of
equipment and technology.
For all of these reasons, the United States is likely to have an interest in
seeing India achieve its ambitions of growth and power. On the whole, this
16 The term was originally used by Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in September 2000. See Malini Parthasarathy, “India, U.S. Natural Allies: Vajpayee,” The Hindu, September 9, 2000, http://hindu.com/2000/09/09/stories/01090005.htm.
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No Exit
21
will be true even if New Delhi never seeks or accepts a formal alliance with
Washington.
India’s rise is likely, but not assured. Many of the primary obstacles to India’s
rise are internal ones, such as ineffective state institutions, entrenched poverty,
insufficient infrastructure, and political corruption. But Pakistan remains the
greatest external threat to Indian growth and security. India and Pakistan are
locked in a hostile relationship that has nearly spiraled into war on several
occasions even after they both tested their nuclear weapons in 1998.
Looking to the future, Pakistan’s own weakness and fragility will also pose
realistic threats to India. If Pakistan falls into an extended civil conflict, India
would face the prospect of millions of refugees, or worse, of energized revolu-
tionary movements aspiring to take their violent struggle beyond Pakistan and
into Muslim-majority communities in India. Unless the Indo-Pakistani relation-
ship improves and Pakistan becomes stable enough to make the peace hold,
India will be stuck with an albatross around its neck. Like South Korea, India
might manage to grow in the shadow of its threatening, nuclear-armed neigh-
bor, but India lacks (and might not even accept) a superpower patron to foot
its security bill as the United States has done for South Korea over decades.
Then, there is the open question of how China is likely to play its cards in
India and Pakistan. Since the 1960s, Pakistan has been a useful Chinese ally for
multiple reasons, not the least of which has been Islamabad’s ability to distract
and bloody India. Since the 1990s, however, as China’s economy has grown
and even its trading relationship with India has boomed, Beijing has been more
inclined to pursue regional stability to discourage hostility between India and
Pakistan, even to the point of placing firm pressure on its ally in Islamabad
in times of crisis. China’s concern about Uighur separatist groups based in
Pakistan has also created some tension between Beijing and Islamabad.
Beijing’s relationship with Islamabad might wane in significance as an
increasingly mighty China perceives that it has less to gain from such a trou-
bled neighbor. On the other hand, Beijing might continue to see Pakistan as
a useful piece in its expanding sphere of influence throughout much of Cen-
tral Asia. Thousands of Chinese workers, mainly technical staff and engineers,
are already hard at work inside Pakistan building power plants and ports,
constructing mines, and fulfilling defense contracts. Cheap Chinese goods fill
Pakistani markets as they do throughout much of the world. Hundreds of
Pakistanis, mainly those with technical educations, have also traveled to China
to participate in government-sponsored training programs. Even if China does
not have a grand scheme in mind for Pakistan, the steady process of Chinese
business investment is expanding Beijing’s influence into a country that bor-
ders the Arabian Sea and offers overland access from there to China’s western
provinces.
The United States need not necessarily fear Chinese involvement in Pakistan.
Washington may even seek to encourage it as a means to improve infrastructure,
provide much-needed foreign investment, and help to stabilize Pakistan’s ailing
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22
No Exit from Pakistan
economy. Troubles will arise, however, if a weak and inward-looking Pakistan
turns away from the United States and toward China as its primary benefactor.
Because Beijing does not share America’s belief in the stabilizing influence of
democratic rule or the value of individual political freedoms, its prescription for
stability in Pakistan is likely to be a harshly repressive authoritarianism. That
model has never worked in Pakistan; success would almost certainly demand a
great deal of bloodletting, as it did in Mao’s China or Stalin’s Russia. It is more
likely to send Pakistan off a revolutionary cliff than to bring lasting stability.
In addition, the more Pakistan assumes a role similar to that of North Korea –
as an insecure, nuclear-armed Chinese prot ég é – the more it is likely to rep-
resent another flashpoint for crisis between Washington and Beijing. Such a
scenario may seem far-fetched, but it is not. As U.S.-Pakistan relations cratered
they needed to patch things up, specifically because Beijing had no interest in
finding itself embroiled in a dispute with Washington.
Because of the number of variables at play, America’s future geopolitical
interests in Pakistan are more difficult to pin down than U.S. concerns regarding
terrorism and nuclear weapons. At present, Pakistan is playing its most chal-
lenging regional role in Afghanistan. In the future, Islamabad has the potential
to play the part of the spoiler on a much grander stage, whether by under-
mining India’s progress or exacerbating differences between Washington and
Beijing. Looking beyond the Afghan arena, these regional concerns are thus far
only emergent challenges, but they suggest the utility of thinking about U.S.
interests in Pakistan within a broader regional framework. In particular, they
point to the fact that a U.S. rupture with Pakistan over immediate concerns like
the Afghan war would have long-lasting implications that extend well beyond
Afghanistan itself.
what is achievable?
Given these immediate, vital, and emergent U.S. interests in Pakistan, the next
question is what Washington might realistically expect to achieve in its rela-
tionship with Islamabad. There is no point in tilting at windmills.
Over the sweep of history since Pakistan’s independence in 1947, senior
American policymakers have experienced more frustrations than successes in
dealing with Pakistan. This discouraging track record coul
d easily lead to
the conclusion that the United States has repeatedly set its sights too high in
Pakistan. By this logic, the United States simply lacks sufficient policy tools,
whether carrots (like military and civilian aid) or sticks (like diplomatic coer-
cion or sanctions), to set Pakistan or the U.S.-Pakistan relationship onto a track
that advances U.S. interests.
This particular critique is unwarranted. The historical record is full of dis-
appointments, but rather than simply interpreting these episodes as evidence of
an American pattern of over-ambition, it is smarter to read them as individual
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No Exit
23
failures that occurred for a variety of reasons, some even because Washington
lacked sufficient ambition to seize opportunities when they presented them-
selves.
As Chapter 4 describes, it was a narrow, focused U.S. ambition that char-
acterized the period shortly after 9/11. The Bush administration confined its
attention to the hunt for al-Qaeda rather than taking on a comprehensive
approach to its dealings with Pakistan. This approach paid immediate divi-
dends in terms of mopping up a number of senior al-Qaeda leaders like Khalid
Sheikh Mohammed, but as Osama bin Laden’s trail went cold and the war in
Iraq eclipsed the war in Afghanistan, Washington found itself poorly positioned
to grapple with the growing problem of Taliban safe havens on Pakistani soil
and in even worse shape to respond to Musharraf’s waning hold on power.
Inattention and missed opportunities, not the attempt and failure to achieve
overambitious ends, characterized this frustrating period in U.S. relations with
Pakistan.
On assuming office, the new Obama administration expanded its agenda
in Pakistan in a variety of important ways, each discussed in Chapter 5. The
White House announced plans to seek what it called a “strategic” rather than
“transactional” relationship with Islamabad, intensified diplomatic interaction
across the board, and received from Congress a massive infusion of new funds