From friends in Pakistan one hears that the Taliban have been more or less scrapped. This should be repeated with irony, for jaded political analysts have already started speculating on the ways in which American action has already sown the seeds of the next batch of problems that the region will face. I want to point out a few things that people might possibly take into consideration before they voice opinions about the nature of political American military action in Afghanistan, what its targeting and what I may accomplish; if the glibness of assertions that America is rescuing the region in any straightforward manner is diminished, it will cause for mild rejoicing.

This is not to say that America is liable to any special criticism vis a vis Pakistan. In Pakistan we have small pretensions to a public discourse that carries influence where it counts. Everything is known and said: little of it matters. Americans do not have a comparable sense of futility in things political. It is a pity to see them repeating clumsy views with sometimes touchingly good-hearted intentions. What I want to say is this: the Afghan situation shows the stupidity of believing that you can use the political problems and disaffection of a people for your own ends, and then wash your hands of it.   If Pakistani Governments have so exasperatingly ignored the fact that the relationship of the user and the used is bound to be inextricable, a great deal of public opinion in the country has understood this to mean that the intentions of their rulers are not innocent. Sections of public opinion in Pakistan have consistently both condemned and endorsed developments in Afghanistan, which it cannot very well ignore, Afghanistan being its neighbour. The sectarian organisations in Pakistan are by no means united in support of the Taliban: the shia ones, especially, have been targeted for assassination and disruption by the organisations receiving training and assistance from the Taliban; others have ideological disagreements with them. It is annoying to hear Pakistan being referred to as having a one-dimensional political orientation, and little or no awareness of the reasons for which it entered the Afghan scene.

Pakistan is not at war with America and has uncritically aided and abetted its actions; it continues to do so. Recently Pakistan closed down the Taliban Embassy in Afghanistan, and from the accounts one has been reading, it was a given a nudge in this direction by the Rumsfield outfit. New reports indicate that this is possibly because the Americans
were not competing very well in terms of media strategy and got a little sulky. The Taliban were the ones who let in 50 reporters into Afghanistan a when the Americans were still being special and secret. Their ambassador beat the American to the daily press conference, bagging a larger quantity of front-page space.
 
 The rise of the Taliban was the first time in the history of Pakistan that it was cheek by jowl with a government in Kabul, and even this alliance had been wearing thin for some years past. When the soviet government took Kabul, money and leftist propaganda poured into Pakistan, fueling local nationalist movements. one of the first things the both the NA and Zahir Shah did after the fall of Kabul was to issue statements warning Pakistan off. This is one of the reasons why Pakistan offered itself with such alacrity to the American proxy war in Afghanistan. These Nationalist movements arose in Balochistan and the Northwest frontier, areas inhabited by populations kin to those living in Afghanistan, and some of the least developed in Pakistan itself.   They continue to be so. America did not do the region a favour by the way it used every backward and reactionary force available to mount the attack on Afghanistan. The madrassahs were American babies before the Saudis stated taking a paternal interest in them; so was Usama bin laden. Much water has flown under the bridge since the Russian invasion: the Pakistani government, however, has not been able to address issues of poverty and inter-provincial disparity in these two provinces, neither has it been taken into account how these very causes have contributed to Madrassah recruitment in Pakistan, apart form the direct influence of the Pakistani army. Since American economy and American policy has gone global, it is obvious that a real war against terrorism would involve addressing some developmental issues that are the cause of terrorism. How far the current war encompasses this, I leave it up to those who know something about it to judge. Some people sound as if America were relieving the world of Islamic fundamentalists ; I am sure they know better.  And if Americans don't watch out, they might do nothing but exacerbate the problem. The Northern alliance is a celebrated band of robbers and murderers. Neither might they seem a better alternative to many of the Afghans than the Taliban. Reports emanating form refugee camps in Pakistan suggest that notably the Pushtoons may have considered the Taliban rule a better alternative to what went before it, that is the NA. Reports of looting and vengeance from Kabul suggest that armies do not improve because their opponents have called down the fury of the Americans on their heads. This has nothing to do with the evil qualities of the Taliban. Afghanistan is a country where a whole generation has grown up seeking the lesser carnage. This principle will not change because America has discovered the true nature of the Taliban: the lesser carnage will remain the greater good.
 
 

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posted 1/20/02