For an Army Chief who says he is retiring next month, Pakistan’s General Qamar Javed Bajwa has been getting a lot of attention. He recently spent nearly a week doing the rounds in Washington and meeting the top echelons of the US establishment. Three factors might explain the renewed American engagement with Pakistan. For one, Pakistan’s army chief never really went out of reckoning in Western capitals. Bajwa was visiting the US after a long time. However, the visit was planned much earlier and had to be rescheduled because of the Covid-19 restrictions.
Bajwa has also been a very frequent visitor to the UK, where he has always been welcome. London has long been a consistent friend of Pakistan and has often acted as its interlocutor in Washington, whose interest in Rawalpindi could be intense and instrumental but also episodic. Bajwa, whether formally in charge or not, is the de facto CEO of the world’s fifth-most populous state. Even more important, Pakistan occupies a vital piece of real estate that sits between the Subcontinent, Iran, Arabia, Central Asia, Russia and China.
The Army Chief is the arbiter of Pakistan’s domestic politics, sets the goals for Pakistan’s international relations, and controls the main directions of its diplomacy. Bajwa leads one of the world’s largest armies and has a nuclear button under his thumb.
Rawalpindi’s support for international terrorism continues to give much leverage — both negative and positive — to Pakistan. Whether it is promoting jihad against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s or in countering international terrorism during 2001-21, the Pak Army’s cooperation was seen as vital in Washington. Recently, Pakistan’s support was said to be critical in the killing of al Qaeda leader Ayman al Zawahiri in a Kabul neighbourhood by a US drone strike in July.
Second, the deepening conflict between Washington and Beijing has generally increased the strategic significance of all countries on China’s periphery — including India — to the US and the West. For decades now, Pakistan enjoyed productive relations with both the US and China as Washington and Beijing were valued strategic economic partners for Rawalpindi. Pakistan has been a “major non-NATO ally” of the US. At the same time, China and Pakistan have long proclaimed their “all-weather relationship” as “higher than Himalayas, deeper than the Indian Ocean, and sweeter than honey”.
But as the Sino-US relationship headed south in recent years, the triangular relationship with Pakistan has become more complicated. China has been nudging Pakistan into the anti-American coalition led by Beijing and Moscow.
Prime Minister Imran Khan’s decision to show up in Moscow and meet Vladimir Putin as he was launching the aggression against Ukraine on February 24, according to some reports, was at Beijing’s encouragement. It might be recalled, China had unveiled a sweeping partnership with Russia — without limits and no forbidden areas — on February 4, barely three weeks before Putin’s invasion.
Bajwa was apparently very concerned about Imran Khan marching into the anti-American camp. As the US-China conflict began to sharpen in the last few years, Rawalpindi watched warily as Delhi gained ground in Washington. Rawalpindi recognised the dangers of a strong Indo-US strategic partnership and has been eager to revive the bilateral relationship with the US that had nose-dived in the Trump years amidst the differences over Afghanistan.
As it steps up the geopolitical contestation with China, the Biden Administration has been eager to draw Pakistan away from Beijing’s embrace. This leads us to the third factor — the role of Bajwa for the US in resetting the domestic politics of Pakistan. Washington has rarely seen a civilian leader like Imran Khan who has been so good at whipping up anti-American sentiment during his tenure.
Recall Imran’s celebration of the US defeat and departure from Afghanistan in August 2021 as the Taliban breaking the “shackles of slavery”. Since he lost the PM’s job in April, Imran has accused the US officials of conspiring with Bajwa to oust him. He has labelled the Shehbaz Sharif government as an “imported government” and has railed against American conspiracy in the massive rallies he mobilised. As he reorients Pakistan’s internal and external policies in a direction that is more conducive to US interests, Washington is eager to tilt the scales in Bajwa’s favour.
Here is the potential wrinkle in the US-Pakistan entente. Bajwa’s second term as Army Chief comes to an end on November 29 and he has ruled out an extension. He would certainly like his policies to endure, but there is no certainty that his successor would follow in his footsteps. Nor is it clear if the armed forces are united in their commitment to Bajwa’s policies, including his anti-Imran stance.
Bajwa’s decision to oust Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on flimsy grounds, rig the 2018 election, and stitch together a majority in the national assembly in Imran Khan’s favour has backfired — spectacularly so. No civilian leader has so directly challenged the army as Imran Khan has, by mobilising the masses against the establishment.
In a speech at the Kakul military academy over the weekend, Bajwa warned Imran by saying “no force will be allowed to destabilise Pakistan”. Bajwa has joined the battle to put Imran down, but is yet to win.
Bajwa now says the Pakistan army should stay away from politics; he has also repeatedly reaffirmed the case for geo-economics over geopolitics. And has emphasised the importance of putting Pakistan’s house in order and seeking regional peace to achieve that objective. Bajwa has struggled to translate these good intentions into concrete outcomes. There is no guarantee that his successor can positively change civil-military relations, focus relentlessly on economic growth, and seek reconciliation with Iran, Afghanistan, and India.
Each of these objectives is hard enough; making progress on all three will require a root and branch overhaul of Pakistan’s national strategy. That appears a tall task amid the current dysfunction in Pakistan.
Meanwhile, both the US, which has long invested in Rawalpindi to pursue its interests and India which seeks a peaceful relationship with its western neighbour must come to terms with the Pakistan paradox.
Whatever its sins might be, Pakistan is important enough to avoid total international isolation. Although Pakistan’s geopolitical salience is enduring, there is no escaping its relative decline in the region. Pakistan might have its uses for Washington, but there is little basis to bet that Rawalpindi will regain its past position as a leading strategic partner of the US.
India’s economy today at nearly $3.5 trillion is 10 times larger than Pakistan’s. Pakistan’s political leverages against India have steadily weakened. India’s international strategic significance has grown thanks to Delhi’s new economic salience and critical role in stabilising the Indo-Pacific.
Delhi is right, therefore, not to be rattled by renewed US engagement with Pakistan. India should focus instead on the long-term consequences of Bajwa’s reign which has seen the army’s dominance over Pakistan’s polity weaken. Addressing Pakistan’s new internal instabilities might now demand a lot more Indian attention than Rawalpindi’s diplomatic reset.
The writer is senior fellow at Asia Society Policy Institute, Delhi and contributing editor on international affairs for The Indian Express
Bajwa has also been a very frequent visitor to the UK, where he has always been welcome. (Illustration by C R Sasikumar) 
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