George Bush146;s war

One of the big American film releases of this winter is Charlie Wilson8217;s War, starring Julia Roberts and Tom Hanks. Wilson, a Texas politician, was one of the most colourful characters among a motley group that organised support to the Mujahideen fighting the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s. He struck up a great rapport with Zia-ul-Haq, and as is well known, Zia8217;s government was the conduit for the transfer of aid from the US to the guerrilla fighters. That modality bred much of the trouble that later came with the Taliban/Al-Qaeda take-over of Afghanistan. But it also bred a guessing game about the fraction of those monies and assistance which was diverted to Pakistan8217;s training of militants in Kashmir. Curiously, the film8217;s success comes at a time when the American establishment has begun asking whether they may have again let Pakistan get away with diversification of assistance.

According to a report published in The New York Times this week, 5 billion of American aid was given to Pakistan after 9/11 to counter the Taliban/Al-Qaeda network in Afghanistan and in its northwestern territories. Senior Bush administration and military officials told reporters that they had reason to believe that much of this money was instead used by Pakistan on weapons systems 8220;to counter India8221;. Two points flow from the revelation of this credible suspicion. The first is not just that American policymakers have not learnt from old mistakes, but that they continue to inadvertently breed the very anti-Americanism that they see as such a threat. The US proves to be very unpopular in opinion polls in Pakistan for protecting Pervez Musharraf8217;s non-democratic government to fight its own wars. Now, if that government too has been swindling the Americans, surely it would not inspire much faith in Washington8217;s claim to lead the 8220;war on terror8221;.

There are also the consequences India8217;s suffered 8212; in the 1980s and possibly now 8212; on account of American miscalculation in Pakistan and its western neighbourhood. America8217;s superpower status in a post-Cold War world demands of it much greater sophistication in playing its foreign and strategic policies so that an ally8217;s rival can still be an ally. In this case, if Islamabad8217;s duplicity is proved, Washington too would have some explaining to do.