Obsessed with India, Pakistan to use its weapons in fight against India

The propitious beginnings made by the Prime Minister to foster friendly relations with the immediate neighbours culminated with his swearing-in ceremony. The attendance of Pakistani Prime Minister to that event was touted to lay new foundation for restoring friendly ties with India. But the opportunity was immediately floundered by unprovoked firing across the LoC. Later, miffed by the Pakistani High Commissioner’s interactions with separatists, the scheduled talks between the foreign ministers of both the countries were suspended by India in August 2014. This ended the euphoria pertaining to the rejuvenation of friendship across the border. The stalemate between the two leaderships continued for seven months following which Modi called up his counterpart to express best wishes to Pakistani Cricket Team for the forthcoming World Cup. Later official meetings with Pakistan were resumed by the Indian foreign secretary Subramanyam Jai Shankar on his four-country SAARC Yatra. This strategic outreach program was aimed to achieve a breakthrough in the India-Pakistan dialogue process. Consistently Indian leadership exuded faith and sought refuge in dialogue process but frequent cease fire violations from Pakistani side scuttled Indian commitment. Now the sensational musings and authentic revelations of Pakistani intentions are made public by their former ambassador to US, Hussain Haqqani. In an article penned for the wall street journal, he tacitly justified India’s qualms and reprimanded the nefarious motives of Pakistan. The recent string of events across the Western border too holds testimony to the dubious stance of Pakistan.

In light of the US President’s approval to supply $1 billion worth sophisticated weaponry in the form of war helicopters, missiles etc to Pakistan Mr Haqqani minced no words in saying that this bounty would fuel intense rivalry in the South Asia region. Aid was extended to the Pakistani regime by the US to support its counter terrorism and counter insurgency operations.  But the former diplomat insists that instead of curtailing the jihadi movement Pakistan will subvert these arms to tackle their obsessive domestic enemy- India.

Since 1950 Pakistan has been extracting aid from the US by invoking its apprehensions of being overridden by a bigger neighbour- India. Till now it obtained $40 billion from the US under the mask of security concerns. Thus the US has been instrumental in quenching the insatiable hunger of Pakistan of being India’s military equal in the region. The US instead of discouraging Pakistani ambitions of rivalling with India started providing more military equipment to them. Drawing comparisons to the parities between the nations- Indian economy is 10 times larger than Pakistan and has six times the population. India’s $2 trillion large economy has managed to grow consistently; Pakistan’s $245 billion economy’s grew sporadically and its financial pursuits are largely impeded by the domestic choas and jihadi movement. In sharp contrast to the secular outlook of India which advocates no religious preference/bias Pakistan got caught up in the quagmire of Islam ideology which began cast its shadow on all the state institutions. It was soon engulfed by the religious intolerance and extremism.

Further since independence Pakistan leaders advocated a strong anti-Indian tirade. Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, military dictator during 1977 expounded greater vehemence towards India. Overwhelmed by the objective of turning the state into a Citadel of Islam, he strongly enforced Islam ideology and laid foundations for a religious extremism. This ideological milieu enabled the religious and political groups to take control over the Pakistan establishment, led by the military. The people’s representation has become nominal as elections were held sporadically paving way for the outgrowth of jihadi groups, one more vicious than the other.

Pakistan’s state sponsored terrorism received a shot in the arm with the latest bounty extended under the provisions Kerry-Luger Act. The US president on his visit to India sharply condemned the punitive actions of Pakistan but continued with the largesse, a precedent set by its predecessors and expects a different outcome. It is highly intriguing as how the US continues to fund Pakistan even when LeT chief, Hafeez Muhammad Sayeed openly spew venom against the US on television in Lahore and a mystery that how it could suddenly trust Pakistan in spite of the Navy SEAL operation which hunted down Osama bin Laden from the garrison town of Abbotabad in Pakistan and killed him.

The generous bounty from the US at regular intervals of time had emboldened Pakistani despotic terrorist attacks against India. The relentless aid packages of the US to Pakistan for the past six decades augured Pakistani extremism. Mr. Haqqani opined that it must have been easy for the US to sell helicopters than strategically change the deeply ingrained hatred of its ally. As declassified documents of the US reveal, between 1950 and 1969 the US has granted aid of $ 4.5 billion to use the Pakistan army for destroying the communist troops. Pakistan didn’t send even a single soldier to aid American troops in their war with Vietnam or Korea. Instead it prepared for a war with India in 1965.

The US unperturbed by Pakistani avarice, granted an aid of $4.5 billion during 1980 to combat the Russian troops in Afghanistan. Pakistan diverted all of it for training the jihadis and for stealthily dispatching hundreds of them across the border to Jammu and Kashmir. It also fomented trouble in Punjab by rousing the passions of people through an organised movement. Pakistan violated its promise to the US of not acquiring nuclear weapons and went ahead with nuclear weapons testing in 1998 on a pretext that it can’t afford to remain without nuclear weapons as India went ahead with its nuclear program.

The list of Pakistan misdemeanours continued endlessly. From 1990 it started arming various kinds of jihadi’s including the Afghanistan Talibans. After General Pervez Musharaf assumed reigns as President he vowed to discontinue support to the Islam radicals and the US subsequently granted $15.1 billion but he went back on his promise and started silently patronising the extremist outfits. He later admitted in an interview with the Guardian that he continued to support the Afghanistan Talibans even after 9/11. Thus the US was relentlessly aiding the country that was in turn arming the insurgents, who were killing American soldiers fighting on the Afghan soil.

Last year in a dastardly, inhuman act Afghan Talibans opened fire in a school which claimed lives of 130 innocent children. This raised intense domestic and International furore spurring Pakistan into immediate action. Following the uproar Pakistan vowed that henceforth it will not discriminate between good and bad terrorism and will root out the evil from its soil. In retrospective it launched massive combing operations and enforced strict punishments for the punitive actions of Talibans. But the disarming, dismantling and destruction of the terror elements was never part of the serious agenda of Pakistan as it lacked the strong will to exterminate the extremist outfits. Till date jihadi elements and the home bred terrorists of Pakistan didn’t refrain from indulging in their scandalous operations.

Needless to say the Pakistan’s vindictive attitude indicates that it would definitely utilise the latest equipment acquired from the US in promoting the jihadi movement in the Kashmir and against the secular insurgents in the Southwest province of Balochistan but not against the abdominal Afghan Taliban. It is really startling as how Obama administration could trust the Pakistan in spite of repeated detractions. The US could have at least attested the intentions of the Pakistan by initially leasing out the helicopters and monitoring where they are deployed before showering the generous gift of modern weaponry.

Incidentally over the years Pakistan has become an all-weather friend of China. President Xi Xinping during his recent visit to Pakistan had pledged $46 billion towards purchase of submarines and infrastructure development. With reigning super powers of the World shouldering and supporting Pakistan, it should no longer feel insecure about its neighbour India. Thanks to the interminable monetary aid from the US, a country of 200 million people with one-third of subsisting on less than one dollar per day waged four conventional wars with India and continues to flare up aggression and chaos in the state of Jammu and Kashmir, an integral part of India. The succinct essay of Pakistan’s former diplomat clearly surmised the future course of action of his country based on its past history.

For the original article, kindly follow the link: http://www.wsj.com/articles/why-are-we-sending-this-attack-helicopter-to-pakistan-1429480299

Even Pakistan’s latest move pertaining to the release of Zaikur Rahman Lakhvi, the commander for the Laskhar e Taiba (LeT) who master minded terrorist operations not only in India but in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Bosnia also testifies its dubious stance of obliterating terror elements on its soil. India was keen on his persecution for his dispensation in the 26/11 Mumbai terrorist attacks and 2006 Mumbai train blasts that killed over 200 people. The release of Lakhvi was strongly condemned by the international community as 28 citizens from the US, the UK, Israel, Australia, Singapore and Canada perished in the 26/11 terrorist attacks. Under the present circumstances, Delhi can only think of activating the Congress and the public opinion of the US to extradite Lakhvi in the US courts for killing US citizens.

 

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