Thursday 3 April 2014

Dancing with the Taliban

Today, the Pakistani nation stands confused and divided on the issue of dealing with the Taliban. The PM, despite a sizable divergence of views in his party, is determined to pursue the peace process through negotiations and most of the right wing religious parties, as well as, PTI are supporting his stance, while a reasonable segment of society, including liberal parties, are skeptical about the out-come. In their view, an all out military operation must be undertaken to quell Talibanization once and for all. Whatever modalities are adopted by the Government to deal with the Taliban, fact is that the latter have gained pre-eminence and all stake-holders are vying to dance with them fof pursuance of their agendas/strategies/objectives.

In given environment, Pakistan needs to adopt a deliberate and well thought-out strategy vis-à-vis Taliban, preferably based on consensus. Such a strategy must be based on; (1) Pakistan’s internal dynamics (2) A deep insight into the developing regional scenario (3) Interests, aims and objectives of various stake-holders and how their pursuance would impact Pakistan’s security in short and long terms.   

USA: USA’s objective of invading Afghanistan, all along, has been to gain and maintain foot-hold in Central Asia, an imperative to pursue their ‘containment of China’ strategy. Crimean crisis has added another dimension as some terming it as start of Cold War II. Thus, under all circumstances, they would continue to maintain their bases in Afghanistan and, by implication, require support of Islamic militants for a stable ‘pliant’ government in Afghanistan, as well as, to serve them as proxies in the long-term. That actually is the reason USA is pushing Pakistan since long to undertake operation in NWA so that they could then strike a better bargain with the depleted Haqqanis/Taliban.

Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabia’s intent to use Taliban as a counter-weight to Iranian influence is well known. For the purpose, unlike USA, they would need a strong Taliban entity to serve their objectives and hence, would prefer a negotiated settlement between Pakistan Government and TTP to obviate the chances of any military operation that may weaken Afghan Taliban’s war potential.

Iran: Though, there is a divergence of strategic and economic interests of Iran and Pakistan as gate-way to Central Asia and Iran played a major role in breeding instability in Afghanistan in the nineties to deny Pakistan access into Central Asian states, yet Pakistan must continue to seek better relations with Iran and under no circumstances the be seen as taking sides in the ongoing conflict between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Doing so would be suicidal with grave ramifications.

Afghan Taliban: Afghan Taliban have valiantly fought for over twelve years to push the US/NATO forces out of Afghanistan in the hope to regain power which, in their perception, is their legitimate right. Sensing a kill due to planned draw-down of foreign forces from Afghanistan, they would not want any military confrontation with Pakistani forces and, therefore, must be exerting pressure on TTP for securing a negotiated settlement with the Pakistan Government, at least for the time being.

India: All along, India has been playing a dirty game in Afghanistan at the expense of US/NATO forces. While the latter were incurring heavy losses in terms of soldiers’ lives and hundreds of billions of US$, Indian RAW remained busy in making in-roads into Afghanistan to undertake covert operations to destabilize Pakistan. Unfortunately, CIA has also been/is collaborating with RAW in certain anti-Pakistan activities, for which a few factions of militants are also being used as proxies. Thus, we may not rule out possibility of attempts by them at de-railing the ongoing peace talks through a major terrorist incident. Failure of peace talks and launching of operation as a consequence by Pakistan military would serve their interests as certain militant factions may fall into their trap to be used against Pakistan, as hitherto.

TTP: Under the circumstances, TTP has little choice but to opt for negotiated settlement with Pakistan Government or face ‘annoyance’ of Afghan Taliban and Saudi Arabia, as well as, risk of being labeled as a proxy serving US interests.  

Pakistani masses: Tthrough the centuries, warriors from the North (Afghanistan and beyond) have been invading the fertile lands of the Punjab and further south on one pretext or another, mostly using religion as an instrument, ruled and ultimately merged with the society. Talibanization is another manifestation of the same phenomenon, the people are either staying indifferent or inadvertently becoming hostage to their ideology and would ultimately be inclined to dance with them, as always. The leadership is no different and hence the confusion on how to deal with TTP.

Pakistan Government: Notwithstanding, Nawaz Sharif’s ideological leanings, desire to become Amir-ul Momnin, faulty assumption that he would be able to use the wooed Taliban as a counter-weight to Army and ‘understanding’ with Saudi Royal family, Pakistan Government also has little space but to seek a negotiated settlement with TTP. The only factor to be kept in mind is that long-term durable peace with TTP can only be achieved by negotiating with them from a point of strength. As such, the Government must be prepared to undertake surgical strikes/covert operations to thwart attempts by anti-talk elements to derail the peace process or by TTP to exert pressure on the Government through terrorist activities for acceptance of their unjust demands.

Finally, any negotiated settlement would be short-lived if the Government does not have a well laid-out policy on how to absorb militants in the society, how to deal with the situation if they start to spread their brand of ideology through coercion and start targeting people of other sects.


Apparently, Government has little clue of how to tackle such post ‘negotiated settlement’ matters and it is on these grounds that people are skeptical about the ultimate out-come of Government’s strategy of dancing with the Taliban.