Alissa J Rubin, a journalist, has written a dispatch in the New York Times about the situation in Kabul. It is eye-opening. Americans in the city, even the troops, no longer travel by road. If they have to go to the embassy from the airport and vice versa they take a helicopter ride. Most of the cafes and restaurants frequented by expatriates have closed down. Security contractors and aid workers are pulling out.
Long queues form every morning, starting from as early as 2am, outside Kabul’s lone passport office. The rush to get out of Kabul is getting desperate. This is a city under siege. And it’s quaint to think that the Americans have spent close to 715 billion dollars ever since their imperial entry into Afghanistan.
They experienced this before in Vietnam, Saigon, South Vietnam’s capital, falling to the North Vietnamese army within two years of the Paris Accords. The same thing is happening in Afghanistan or about to happen there, although not many people are willing to admit it yet in these stark terms.
At any rate, isn’t it odd that outsiders should be telling us what it’s like in Kabul? If we had any sense there would be Pakistani reporters permanently based in Kabul. But we thrive on ignorance. There should be Pakistani reporters in Delhi, Kathmandu, Dhaka, Colombo and Teheran, not to mention Kabul. But it’s like asking for the moon.
Anyone regularly watching our local TV channels wouldn’t have the foggiest idea what it’s like in the region. Kabul could be in Central America for all that most Pakistanis know about what’s happening there. And we think Afghanistan should lie in our sphere of influence. Whatever for? We can’t keep a single reporter in Kabul and we want to be its godfathers.
Private channels are into quickie profits and ‘infotainment’. Expect them not to throw money the wrong way. But what about the state news agency, APP, and that mother of all that is holy, Pakistan Television? What about our experts in the foreign office and the leading temple of national security, General Headquarters? Do they never think about such things?
Afghanistan’s defences against the Taliban are just not holding up. Afghans in leadership positions can rant and rave all they like about Pakistan but it is not Pakistan’s fault that the Taliban are on the march. The Taliban are no one’s puppets. They are playing their own game. If the Americans couldn’t defeat them with their endless resources and occupation army it is too much to expect that Pakistan can turn the Afghan tide. Since when did Pakistan become that powerful? Pakistan can help but it cannot turn matters around.
The one abiding lesson from the last 200 years of Afghan history – ever since the First Afghan War – is that the Afghans do their own thing and do not take kindly to outside interference or dictation. The Taliban have proved tough and resilient. The Afghan government and its security forces will have to prove equally tough – a match for the Taliban on the ground – if there is to be any hope of a negotiated settlement. You can’t lose on the battlefield and hope for victory, or even a draw, on the negotiating table.
But as the storm-clouds gather over Afghanistan, there are certain things that we could do. Now is the time to devote all our attention to the western frontier, the Durand Line. It is a porous border. It can’t be plugged entirely, not even with the best goodwill in the world, the geography just being too tough. But it can be made less porous if we treat the Afghan border as we treat the Line of Control in Kashmir or the Working Boundary next to Sialkot.
Despite the occasional sabre-rattling from the Indian side, our eastern border is static with heavy troop concentrations on both sides. But the western border is the more dynamic and dangerous one because danger lurks on the other side. The native Taliban, the TTP, fleeing their safe havens in Fata are now based there.
And the political leadership should have the imagination to do something about the constitutional status of the tribal areas. Isn’t it high time they were formally integrated into Pakistan? Wouldn’t the ordinary tribesman welcome this?
In socio-economic terms Pakistan is a land divided, the central Islamabad-Lahore corridor and the Karachi region far ahead of the rest of the country. Fata and Balochistan are in a slightly different century. Pakistan’s central security problem is not the threat from India – we have an adequate measure of that threat and have ample means to meet it. The central problem is to bring Fata and Balochistan closer to the rest of the country. The focus of development therefore should be on those far-flung areas and not, as is presently happening, the already relatively pampered urban centres of Punjab and Sindh.
But who’ll do the thinking? Is everything the army’s responsibility? This underlines the crisis of leadership in Pakistan. Those who should be taking the lead as far as these issues are concerned have their attention fixed on a narrow range of subjects: 1) the power crisis which of course merits the most careful attention but even on that front progress is not what it should be; and 2) a lopsided view of development emphasising eye-catching projects like metro-buses, etc.
Unfortunately, there is little prospect of any change in this equation. The civilian leadership will continue sailing in those waters where it feels more comfortable while Afghanistan, India, the Taliban, etc, will remain the army’s babies. And national direction on these issues will be set by the army.
It needs no professor of political science to tell us that this is not an ideal situation. It signifies an imbalance, a strengthening of the military arm and an atrophying of the democratic process. But this is how it is and although after the 2013 elections it was widely expected that Nawaz Sharif with his credible mandate and years of experience would be able to assert civilian authority, it hasn’t turned out that way.
Where he should have acted such as on the terrorism issue he chose to sit quietly, banging on about talks when any fool could have seen that talks would lead nowhere. And where he should have bided his time such as on the Musharraf treason trial he chose to rush in without properly weighing the pros and cons.
He thus squandered much of his political capital and the army lost little time in stepping into the breach. This is an old story by now but it is relevant in the Afghan context. The situation there poses a danger to Pakistan because if the Taliban become stronger, knocking in time at the gates of Kabul, our own Taliban – the Fazlullah and Khorasani brands and even elements sympathetic to the Islamic State – will have reason enough to be emboldened by the Afghan example.
Who’ll think about these issues? Who will decide what Pakistan should do? Will it again be the army and will the civilians keep swatting the flies on their desks? Pakistan needs leadership, firm and decisive leadership. God knows, it also needs an electric charge up its collective spine. And it needs to rethink India and take advantage of the witches’ brew being prepared there by the ruling BJP and its fellow-travellers. Who will do this?
Long queues form every morning, starting from as early as 2am, outside Kabul’s lone passport office. The rush to get out of Kabul is getting desperate. This is a city under siege. And it’s quaint to think that the Americans have spent close to 715 billion dollars ever since their imperial entry into Afghanistan.
They experienced this before in Vietnam, Saigon, South Vietnam’s capital, falling to the North Vietnamese army within two years of the Paris Accords. The same thing is happening in Afghanistan or about to happen there, although not many people are willing to admit it yet in these stark terms.
At any rate, isn’t it odd that outsiders should be telling us what it’s like in Kabul? If we had any sense there would be Pakistani reporters permanently based in Kabul. But we thrive on ignorance. There should be Pakistani reporters in Delhi, Kathmandu, Dhaka, Colombo and Teheran, not to mention Kabul. But it’s like asking for the moon.
Anyone regularly watching our local TV channels wouldn’t have the foggiest idea what it’s like in the region. Kabul could be in Central America for all that most Pakistanis know about what’s happening there. And we think Afghanistan should lie in our sphere of influence. Whatever for? We can’t keep a single reporter in Kabul and we want to be its godfathers.
Private channels are into quickie profits and ‘infotainment’. Expect them not to throw money the wrong way. But what about the state news agency, APP, and that mother of all that is holy, Pakistan Television? What about our experts in the foreign office and the leading temple of national security, General Headquarters? Do they never think about such things?
Afghanistan’s defences against the Taliban are just not holding up. Afghans in leadership positions can rant and rave all they like about Pakistan but it is not Pakistan’s fault that the Taliban are on the march. The Taliban are no one’s puppets. They are playing their own game. If the Americans couldn’t defeat them with their endless resources and occupation army it is too much to expect that Pakistan can turn the Afghan tide. Since when did Pakistan become that powerful? Pakistan can help but it cannot turn matters around.
The one abiding lesson from the last 200 years of Afghan history – ever since the First Afghan War – is that the Afghans do their own thing and do not take kindly to outside interference or dictation. The Taliban have proved tough and resilient. The Afghan government and its security forces will have to prove equally tough – a match for the Taliban on the ground – if there is to be any hope of a negotiated settlement. You can’t lose on the battlefield and hope for victory, or even a draw, on the negotiating table.
But as the storm-clouds gather over Afghanistan, there are certain things that we could do. Now is the time to devote all our attention to the western frontier, the Durand Line. It is a porous border. It can’t be plugged entirely, not even with the best goodwill in the world, the geography just being too tough. But it can be made less porous if we treat the Afghan border as we treat the Line of Control in Kashmir or the Working Boundary next to Sialkot.
Despite the occasional sabre-rattling from the Indian side, our eastern border is static with heavy troop concentrations on both sides. But the western border is the more dynamic and dangerous one because danger lurks on the other side. The native Taliban, the TTP, fleeing their safe havens in Fata are now based there.
And the political leadership should have the imagination to do something about the constitutional status of the tribal areas. Isn’t it high time they were formally integrated into Pakistan? Wouldn’t the ordinary tribesman welcome this?
In socio-economic terms Pakistan is a land divided, the central Islamabad-Lahore corridor and the Karachi region far ahead of the rest of the country. Fata and Balochistan are in a slightly different century. Pakistan’s central security problem is not the threat from India – we have an adequate measure of that threat and have ample means to meet it. The central problem is to bring Fata and Balochistan closer to the rest of the country. The focus of development therefore should be on those far-flung areas and not, as is presently happening, the already relatively pampered urban centres of Punjab and Sindh.
But who’ll do the thinking? Is everything the army’s responsibility? This underlines the crisis of leadership in Pakistan. Those who should be taking the lead as far as these issues are concerned have their attention fixed on a narrow range of subjects: 1) the power crisis which of course merits the most careful attention but even on that front progress is not what it should be; and 2) a lopsided view of development emphasising eye-catching projects like metro-buses, etc.
Unfortunately, there is little prospect of any change in this equation. The civilian leadership will continue sailing in those waters where it feels more comfortable while Afghanistan, India, the Taliban, etc, will remain the army’s babies. And national direction on these issues will be set by the army.
It needs no professor of political science to tell us that this is not an ideal situation. It signifies an imbalance, a strengthening of the military arm and an atrophying of the democratic process. But this is how it is and although after the 2013 elections it was widely expected that Nawaz Sharif with his credible mandate and years of experience would be able to assert civilian authority, it hasn’t turned out that way.
Where he should have acted such as on the terrorism issue he chose to sit quietly, banging on about talks when any fool could have seen that talks would lead nowhere. And where he should have bided his time such as on the Musharraf treason trial he chose to rush in without properly weighing the pros and cons.
He thus squandered much of his political capital and the army lost little time in stepping into the breach. This is an old story by now but it is relevant in the Afghan context. The situation there poses a danger to Pakistan because if the Taliban become stronger, knocking in time at the gates of Kabul, our own Taliban – the Fazlullah and Khorasani brands and even elements sympathetic to the Islamic State – will have reason enough to be emboldened by the Afghan example.
Who’ll think about these issues? Who will decide what Pakistan should do? Will it again be the army and will the civilians keep swatting the flies on their desks? Pakistan needs leadership, firm and decisive leadership. God knows, it also needs an electric charge up its collective spine. And it needs to rethink India and take advantage of the witches’ brew being prepared there by the ruling BJP and its fellow-travellers. Who will do this?
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