The US president is about to reveal a new policy for Afghanistan and Pakistan. Few Pakistanis have high hopes, notes Graham Usher in Islamabad Sometime before the NATO summit in Paris on 3 April United States President Barack Obama will unveil a "strategic review" of American policy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. Much has already been leaked. There will be a "surge" in American troops in Afghanistan as well as a strengthening of Afghan security forces; an increase in civilian aid to the Karzai government; an attempt to negotiate with "moderate" Taliban insurgents rather than immoderate ones; and a "more regional diplomatic approach" working not only with friends like India but also foes like Iran. But the mission, insists the new American president, is the same as what drove former US president George W Bush to first send in the marines to Kabul after the 9/11 attacks on New York and Washington. "Making sure that Al-Qaeda cannot attack the United States homeland and US interests and allies," Obama told CBS on 23 March. What has changed is the endgame. Whereas Bush used 9/11 as a useful pivot to implant a pro-American regime in the heart of energy- rich Asia, Obama is seeking an exit strategy from a losing war. But America cannot leave Afghanistan as long as Al-Qaeda and its allies are active and able inside Pakistan. "As long as you've got safe havens in those border regions that the Pakistan government can't control or reach in effective ways, we're going to continue to see vulnerability on the Afghan side of the border," said Obama. But on the basis of what has so far been divulged in the review, America's policy on Pakistan remains incoherent, inconsistent and likely to fail. Obama will not only continue CIA missile strikes inside Pakistan's border regions that have killed 350 people in the last eight months; he may expand their reach. On 18 March the New York Times said the US was considering strikes in Quetta in Pakistan's Balochistan province, whence Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Omar is said to orchestrate the insurgency in Afghanistan. Quetta is not a remote tribal badland. It's an urban sprawl of a million people. Civilian casualties would be inevitable and so would mass political protest. The Pakistani government is in a bind over the strikes. It has provided bases and intelligence enabling the CIA to kill several "senior" Al-Qaeda leaders. But the strikes are politically counterproductive, says the Pakistan army, lending a nationalist, anti-imperial luster to tribal militants it would prefer to isolate. Last month rival Taliban factions joined forces against the "three evils" of America, Pakistan and Afghanistan. One was Baitullah Mehsud, an Al-Qaeda inspired tribal militant whom the government believes is behind most suicide bombings in Pakistan, including an attack on a police station in Islamabad on 23 March that killed an officer. The other two factions support the Afghan insurgency but have launched no attacks in Pakistan. They made do now. They have come together to resist the CIA missile strikes, say sources. It's too soon to say what impact the new coalition will have. But "clearly", says a senior military official, "a united Taliban is more dangerous than a divided one." Unifying the Taliban also contradicts one of the stated aims of a US policy that tries to sift out "nationalist" militants from "jihadi" ones. A similar inconsistency runs through the American aid programme. Obama is likely to endorse legislation that will increase non- military aid to Pakistan from the current $450 million to $1.5 billion a year. This is good news, especially if the money is spent on creating schools, infrastructure and jobs in the destitute border regions. But questions will be asked whether it is wise to pour so much money into the coffers of a civilian government marked by political and financial recklessness. Earlier this month President Asif Zardari risked major political violence with Pakistan's main opposition parties because of a crude grab for power in the Punjab province. And his government has already earned renown for graft, especially in the tribal borderlands. But the biggest flaw in the review is the assumption that the right blend of carrot and stick will persuade Pakistan to fight the war in Afghanistan on America's terms. There is a deep political divide in Pakistan on its role in the war. While most Pakistanis have little stomach for the kind of state offered by the Taliban, similar majorities oppose the American-led occupation in Afghanistan, whose violent overspill is now seeping into cities like Islamabad. Most analysts believe the only way a genuinely national consensus can be built on policies against the Taliban and Al-Qaeda in Pakistan is if they are "de-linked" from American sponsorship. But the review calls for America's "intense engagement" with Pakistan politically, militarily, financially and diplomatically. The only hope is Obama's openness to a greater regional engagement. If such glasnost enables countries like Pakistan, India and Iran to discuss the issues that divide them in Afghanistan and the kind of regime they could accept in Kabul, the future may be brighter. After all, "both India and Pakistan must realise that one day the US and Europe will leave the region," says former Indian ambassador Rajiv Sikri. Nothing in the last eight years or in the strategic review suggests there can be peace in Afghanistan with American soldiers in occupation. The challenge for Islamabad, Delhi, Tehran and other regional capitals is whether there can be peace in Afghanistan without them.
