It’s my first week in Denver where I’ll be attending graduate school for the next two years and I’m soaking in how kind this city is. It is the most laid back, genuine U.S. City I’ve experienced. The sincerity with which people prod “No, where are you really from?” when I initially respond “California”, is priceless. I feel like a novelty here. At an Eid Celebration last night, even a local of Pakistani descent pointed out “Wow, the guys are going to flip over you. There are no ethnic girls in Denver”.
“Ethnic”? I’ll take it; I realize I’m getting a pass for being a Californian female. Because in light of increasingly disheartening news from Pakistan, be it about floods, match fixing in cricket, and mostly terrorism plaguing the country since 9/11, Pakistani’s have captured the American state of mind in a less than appealing way. Once indecipherable on a world map for most Americans, Pakistan emerged as our stalwart ally in victory after 40+ years of Cold War. Yet as we turn to Islamabad again to fight a War on Terror, we possess a deep skepticism of Pakistani intentions.
Since September 11, every time I come to the States or western countries I feel people have the wrong impression about Pakistan as a terrorist nation. I just wanted to declare that we are very friendly, loving and caring people, and we want peace in this world as much as Americans and the rest of the world wants.
There are extremists in every religion, but just because of them you cannot judge the whole country as a terrorist nation. I just wanted to get this message across as a Pakistani
In plain terms Qureshi clarified that his country is a mostly moderate nation where people expect the same peace and security desired by all people. He reminded us of Pakistan’s humanity, directly countering the “transactional” ties that progressively complicate our understanding of Pakistan. Fareed Zakaria might agree. In a recent piece, he eloquently concurred:
Across the Muslim world, militant Islam’s appeal has plunged. In the half of the Muslim world that holds elections, parties that are in any way associated with Islamic jihad tend to fare miserably, even in Pakistan.
In his article “We’re Safer Than We Think” Zakaria points out that Muslims in Pakistan and beyond are if anything, less safe from terrorism than we are as they suffer the brunt of radical Islam’s consequences.
Over the last few years, imams and Muslim leaders across the world have been denouncing suicide bombings, terrorism, and Al Qaeda with regularity….The fatal problem with these kinds of attacks is that they kill ordinary civilians—not U.S. soldiers or diplomats—and turn the local population against Islamic radicals.
With more thorough detail, Zakaria’s is saying exactly what Qureshi did; Pakistan is not a country of terrorists. So next time I get asked where I am “really” from, I might just say “I’m from Asiam Qureshi.’s country”.
In the Wall Street Journal this week, he explained “quitting is not an option”, and “time limits” should not drive our exit strategy. Rather, in tandem with additional troops, a “political” surge is key. With firsthand military and political experience in the Af-Pak region and War on Terror, Musharraf gives us substance with which to understand the situation. He explains that when the United States “liberated Afghanistan from the tyranny of Al Qaeda and Taliban, they had unequivocal support of the majority of Afghans.” What we didn’t do though, is establish a “truly representative national government” giving proportional representation to Pashtun’s who are the ethnic majority. He says:
The political instability and ethnic imbalance in Afghanistan after 9/11 marginalized the majority Pashtuns and pushed them into the Taliban fold, even though they were not ideological supporters of the Taliban.
As a result, despite Pakistani efforts during Musharraf’s tenure where “600 Al Qaeda and Afghan Taliban leaders, some of them of very high value” were captured in tandem with the establishment of “1000 border check posts”, the Afghan government never gained legitimacy, and ultimately, sufficient authority. He further attributes insufficient NATO forces and the distraction of invading Iraq as leading causes to the Taliban’s capacity to gain ground, and reassert its center of gravity toward northern Pakistan.
With a grand strategy to destabilize the whole region, the Taliban and al Qaeda established links with extremists in Pakistani society on the one hand and with Muslim fundamentalists in India on the other.
It’s a complex situation, but Musharraff’s recommendations are rooted in a wealth of experience and offer details on a practical solution.
Pervez Musharraf was on Fareed Zakaria GPS this morning discussing the Af-Pak situation in two segments. The second segment focused on Pakistan where Zakaria prefaced Q&A by reminding viewers that General Musharraf is an “authentic representation of Pakistan’s military” and that his comments will reveal that the situation in Afghanistan is rooted in a“60 year geopolitical rivalry that we just walked in to, and its between between India and Pakistan“. Sounded like grand stuff.
And Zakaria jumped right in. He began with questions on whether the Pakistan military is as committed to eliminating terrorists in the north who launch cross border attacks as they are to obliterating terrorists in the South who are responsible for domestic assaults. He said the military “never seems to get around to attacking North Waziristan who attacks India or Afghanistan because they were supported in the past”. Musharraff made clear that during his tenure, he insisted on drone technology needed to obliterate terrorists from both regions, especially given Baitullah Mehsud who assassinated Bhutto and that terrorists were never supported by the military or any government policy. He mentioned that ISI “ingress” in terrorist groups is standard procedure practiced by all Intelligence operations, clarifying that “ingress” is not be equated to “support”, rather it’s standard maintenance of contacts with such groups for the states advantage.
When questioned about the widespread notion that Al Qaeda leader Mullah Umar is in Pakistan, Musharraf said it’s “200% wrong” explaining Umar would have no interest in leaving a safe haven in the northern areas where Taliban has de-facto control for Quetta where US and Pakistani intelligence/ military roam rampant. It was a reasonable response and Zakaria’s questions sounded increasingly implicative.
Zakaria probed the notion saying that the “Afghanistan government and intelligence say he’s in Pakistan” to which Musharraff firmly explained “don’t talk about the Afghan government and intelligence. By design, they mislead the world, they talk against Pakistan because they are entirely under the influence of Indian intelligence”.
Wow, he just said it. It’s often documented in Pakistani media that Indian intelligence is widely responsible for insurgencies in northern areas of Pakistan and the province of Balochistan by way of material support, but rarely is that view expressed in mainstream U.S. media. Former Foreign Minister Sharifuddin Pirzada recently explained to me that warming of relations between Delhi and Kabul come at a direct expense of Pakistan because of such subversive, Indian led dealings with Afghanistan. Similarly, Musharraf explained he has provided “documented evidence” of this activity in the past.
From the first question on Pakistan’s commitment to uprooting cross border terrorism, to the question on Mullah Umar, Zakaria elicited Musharraf into discussion of a supposed “geopolitical rivalry” between India and Pakistan wherein Afghanistan is used as a “client state” by either nation as a buffer against, if not to subvert one another. And although I can’t say that is entirely untrue, Zakaria approached today’s interview with this preconceived notion, and overstepped neutrality by implicating Pakistan in the process.
Zainab B. Jeewanjee
Zainab Jeewanjee 