The attack by the Taliban on Pakistan's “Pentagon” in the garrison city of Rawalpindi had barely been quelled, when jihadi militants struck an army convoy on Monday in the Swat Valley, killing 40 and injuring dozens more.
Although it was the fourth terrorist attack in a week, it was the raid in Rawalpindi that has stunned governments around the world and left the people of Pakistan in a state of shock. How could the Taliban infiltrate Pakistan's most guarded military institution, take senior military officers hostage, then engage in a 22-hour battle that left 20 dead, including a brigadier-general and a lieutenant-colonel? The questions being asked are: Was this an inside job? Did the attackers have links to rogue elements of the Pakistan Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI)?
The four terrorist attacks in Pakistan were preceded by an audacious attack by the Taliban on an isolated U.S. military base in Afghanistan in the town of Kamdesh. Reports say more than 300 Taliban fighters attacked the U.S. base under cover of fog. When the battle was over 24 hours later, eight Americans lay dead, dozens more were wounded and the Taliban attackers had vanished into the mountains with at least 25 Afghan policemen as hostages.
Lost in the details of this deadly firefight is the fact the U.S. base was located near the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, and that the large Taliban attack force is suspected of being made up of fighters who had been driven out of the Swat Valley by the Pakistani Army. Had the Pakistanis extended their fight beyond Swat, the Taliban would have been caught in a pincer, but for some odd reason, the offensive was eased. This allowed the Taliban to move across the border.
Observers believe the sudden surge in terrorist activity in Pakistan is linked to a new bill approved unanimously by the U.S. Congress that will ensure the Pakistani Army and ISI do not subvert the civilian administration. This has unnerved shadowy rogue elements in the Pakistan Army's intelligence service, the ISI, who fear an end to their ability to turn on and off, at will, military and financial aid to the very Taliban they claim to be fighting.
The thought of peace between India and Pakistan on one hand, and Pakistan and Afghanistan on the other, terrifies the elites of Islamabad who feed off the hysteria of Islamism and anti-Americanism while sending their own children to the U.S. to be educated.
Opponents of détente between Pakistan and its eastern and western neighbours are so riled, they've targeted the Kerry-Lugar bill, which for five years authorizes $1.5-billion (U.S.) annually in aid to Pakistan, primarily for economic assistance. The bill, expected to be signed into law this week by President Barack Obama, carries a possibility that it could be extended for another five years – i.e. 2015-19.
For the first time in U.S.-Pakistan relations, American aid will be directed at Pakistan's economy and social infrastructure and not entirely toward its armed forces. The result is an uproar among the beneficiaries of the country's military-industrial complex whose sense of entitlement seems to be in a state of disbelief.
Buried deep inside the Kerry-Lugar bill is a line that has unnerved the Islamists and their military and media allies. The bill states quite explicitly: “No security assistance and offer to sell major defence equipment to Pakistan may be provided, until the Secretary of State certifies that ... the security forces of Pakistan are not materially or substantially subverting the political or judicial processes of Pakistan.”
This unprecedented clause places the Pakistani Armed Forces firmly under the thumb of the civilian government, where they should have been all along. In the past, U.S. policy-makers trusted the Pakistani Army to be America's ally, not the elected democratic government. This change of policy by the Obama administration has stung the beneficiaries of the Islamist agenda in Pakistan.
For the first time in decades, a U.S. administration is backing an elected civilian government over its traditional military allies. This is almost a U-turn in U.S. strategy in the Third World and bodes well for the world.
Pakistan's traditional power elites, who have benefited immensely by playing surrogates to the mullah-military alliance, have whipped up anti-American hysteria, hoping to derail the government's efforts to fight the Taliban and eliminate Islamic extremism in Pakistan.
They have depicted Pakistan's ambassador to the U.S., Husain Haqqani, as an American agent and President Asif Zardari as a sellout who is soft on India and warm to Kabul. Pro-Islamist media commentators are demanding Mr. Haqqani be dismissed for his role in securing the aid package, which forces the generals to respect Parliament's supremacy over the nation's armed forces.
The West has an opportunity it shouldn't let pass. The Pakistani people have shown tremendous maturity in defeating the Islamists in the last election. In the current military offensive against the Taliban, the people of Pakistan were solidly behind their army, as were the people literally liberated in the Swat Valley.
If Mr. Obama wants to rescue American prestige and avoid a defeat in Afghanistan, he should first strengthen the civilian democratic government in Islamabad. If the rogue retired generals of Pakistan and their Islamist media cohorts succeed in toppling democracy in Pakistan, all is lost.
The road to Kabul passes through Islamabad. Without a stable civilian, democratic government in Pakistan, there is no possibility of even a semblance of victory in Afghanistan.
Tarek Fatah is author of Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State. He is a former activist in Pakistan and a founder of the Muslim Canadian Congress.
