Simply Outrageous!

Look at him. In case you just got out of sleep, his name is General Michael Hayden, Director of CIA. This spectacled, clean-shaven, almost bald, four-star Air Force general means business, representing the mighty and haughty ways of the Bush administration, or perhaps the US establishment. Make no mistakes. This old-looking guy has the temerity (and the capability) to shock the Pakistan government and the Pakistani nation by making no bones about the US administration’s intention of bombing the Pak-Afghan border area to nip a likely terrorist attack in the US in the bud. And why shouldn’t he? The locals have more than once cried US in the past. They have become accustomed to the sight and the following sound of the US drones, which results in the killing of a few people, nay terrorists, including children. Blame yourself for everything that happens to you. Instead of putting our own house in order, which we have just started doing, we love lobbing a stone or two hatred at the US.

Listen to a Paki rebel and he would be foaming while blaming it all on what we call ‘the establishment’ in Pakistan. He would say that we have been bending over backwards to serve as a stooge to the US interests in the region and beyond. He would not hesitate in comparing our ‘policy makers’ in the khakis with an animate object that wags its tail whenever it sees its master. But who cares about the so many ordinary folks in our country spouting their venom at the US, a favourite pastime in our part of the world.

So, do not doubt Hayden. Minutely and accurately prepared reports of the secret agency makes Hayden sure about what he should do. Intelligence believes that Osama is hiding somewhere in the rugged terrain along the Pak-Afghan border and is in a position to launch another strike at the US mainland. But we cannot totally absolve the US of what it has been caught in. It is partly because these trigger-happy Americans have become so predictable overtime. Even a simpleton knows what may be coming, a pre-emptive strike. This is besides the point at the moment what the intelligence reports did to Iraq on the question of the WMDs.

Wait a minute! Do not call Hayden a Yankee or you may be booked for being a member of the most-feared al Qaeda. Still, it would not be crossing the line to see into the timing of this statement. The consensus government in Pakistan is in the process of being formed. The policy initiatives announced by Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gillani, while they serve as a beacon of hope for the Pakistani nation, seem to be a thorn in the side of the US. No sooner did the Pakistani leadership announce an apparent shift in its foreign policy that the US officials, including some Congressmen made a beeline to Islamabad in a bid to stop something extra-ordinary from happening. Gillani has talked sense in inviting for a dialogue those Taliban who lay down their arms. With the government of the Awami National Party (ANP) in the NWFP, the US has every reason to wake up and take measures to safeguard its ‘interests’ in the region.

Why is it that whenever we are discussing our foreign policy we often end up asking the same questions, the answers of which are either evident or one-dimensional? Are we free as a nation to formulate our foreign policy options? What are the determinants of our foreign policy? The skeptics question the existence of a mechanism of shaping a foreign policy that at least partly addresses our interests as a nuclear state, located at a critical place in terms of geography. The more disillusioned ones go as far as asking whether we have a foreign policy in the first place.

The coming months seem to be holding a lot for the country, hopefully good. While the US keeps up pressure on the political leadership of Pakistan, the internal dynamics of politics are playing out to the attentive Pakistanis. It is quite clear now that the emerging political equation at the Centre and in the provinces such as Punjab and NWFP does not seem to be serving the US interest. In their recent visits, the US officials kept looking for those who could listen to them and nod in the affirmative. They found none, at least not in the political leadership of the country. Nawaz Sharif, whose PML-N is going to form government, has no soft corner for the US adventurism, neither does any other political party. President Musharraf’s yes-men, the PML-Q, have been wiped off from the scene. The president himself has to watch its steps and take a cautious approach in dealing with the new political realities. The judges he sent home packing are going to be reinstated sooner rather than later. The power that he exercises in the shape of 58(2)(b) may not remain with him once the parliament starts doing its everyday business. In this situation, the only friend that he can fall back on is the US. Will that be enough?

The ‘war on terror’ has been a ‘war of terror’ for Pakistan. God knows how many of the ‘terrorists’ were handed over to the US to be at the Guantanamo Bay in lieu of the dollars that our establishment earned. But that is changing fast and the US has clearly read the writing on the wall.