General Pervez Musharraf's visit to the US is a crucial moment in the history of South Asia, and what transpires between him and President George W. Bush at the scheduled conclave at Camp David will substantially determine not only the direction of future events and equations in this region, but also the future of international Islamist terrorism. For it is in America's handling of what Bernard Henri Levi has described as "the most delinquent of nations" that the proximate future of Islamist terrorism will be defined.
Pakistan remains, today, the primary "platform for terror", in Ambassador Nancy Powell's words, and neutralizing this platform is among the primary challenges of the global war against terrorism. In dealing with General Musharraf, it will be useful for his interlocutors to keep in mind - no doubt among other and more expedient matters - that they are dealing with the man who currently presides over the world's largest network of terrorists, and over a state that has, for over two decades, used terrorism as an integral instrument of state policy - and still continues to do so from day to day.
This terrorism is widely nuanced and exploits every possible weakness in both adversary and ally. This is why America's policies since 9/11, with their overwhelming reliance on financial sops, have failed to significantly alter the character of the Pakistani state, or to dismantle the infrastructure of terrorism on its soil. Nor will provision of further financial relief change anything, beyond giving Pakistan's ruling elite another billion or two to fritter away on military adventures and their quest for strategic extension through Islamist extremism.
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Pakistan has been surviving on international charity for much of its existence, and this has not strengthened the country, or created a sound domestic production base and economy. Pakistan is, at best, and temporarily, a 'rich beggar', and cannot be expected to retain this status unless it radically restructures both its politics and its economy. There is little evidence, yet, of such restructuring, and any transformations that may have occurred have only tended to entrench the Islamist extremist elements even deeper in the nation's politics.
And yet, despite the growing international recognition of Pakistan's continued role in supporting and sustaining international terrorism, there is virtual acceptance of the fact that Musharraf will come away from Camp David with significant 'rewards' for 'helping America' in its war against terrorism. It is useful, within this context, to assess what it is the General will seek at Camp David, and the strategy he would employ to secure what he wants.
The first component of the General's quest is 'more of the same' - further financial aid in the form of a waiver of bilateral debt to the tune of US $ 1.8 billion. America had already written off $ 1 billion as a reward for Pakistan's 'support' in Afghanistan against the Taliban and Al Qaeda, and had also helped secure large external inflows, concessional multilateral loans and grants that have helped Pakistan build up foreign exchange reserves of US $10.5 billion form a position of near bankruptcy.
The second crucial component is to force the acceptance of a 'clear road map for resolution of the Kashmir conflict' on what is being propounded as the 'Chenab' formula, which envisages the division of Kashmir along religious lines, with Muslim-majority areas going to Pakistan. This formula would reconfirm Pakistan's underlying ideology of religious exclusion - the two nation theory -, would confer a quantifiable 'victory' on its strategy of cross border terrorism, and would further the Islamist fundamentalist enterprise within the region.
The third component - currently being actively pursued - is a renewed role in Afghanistan, as America struggles to contain the revival of the Taliban movement. Pakistan is, once again, offering to 'step in' to fill the power vacuum by 'mediating' with Taliban survivors, as well as other radical Islamist groupings such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar's Hizb-I-Islami. With American frustrations in Afghanistan mounting, the possibility of a revival of a surrogate Pakistani influence in that country is being actively sought, and threatens to give rise to another political travesty, if the US succumbs to the imperatives of expediency.
Musharraf will also seek to negotiate a 'free hand' for himself and his military regime in Pakistan. The rigged elections of October 2002 have not produced the compliant Parliament and State Assemblies that Musharraf had hoped for, and these bodies are now creating problems on the General's continuance as both President and Chief of Army Staff. In addition, the Talibanised Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) administration in the North West Frontier Province is proving to be a source of both domestic and international embarrassment, and there is significant speculation in Pakistan that Musharraf would seek carte blanche for the suspension or dismissal of these 'elected' bodies in case present political maneuvers fail to secure his continuance with full powers, or if the Parliament or Assemblies present him with unacceptable difficulties.
Finally, Musharraf would like to come away with a lifting of the present embargo on military supplies to Pakistan, and a substantial package of Arms, including the delivery of a batch of 40 F-16s that have been sought by Pakistan since the early 1980s.
It is in the last of these that Pakistan's strategy of negotiation is most clearly demonstrated. During his present international tour, in an interview to The Times in London, Musharraf argued that, with a rise in India's defence spending, coupled with restrictions on Pakistan's acquisition of military equipment, a 'dangerous imbalance' was emerging in the force levels between the two countries. In such circumstances, he declared, "Pakistan would have no choice but to rely on its nuclear weapons."
This pattern of continued nuclear blackmail has consistently been at the heart of Pakistan's case for concessions, aid and a heightened threshold of international tolerance for its sponsorship and support to Islamist terrorism. To understand how this works, it is useful to conceive of Pakistan as a state acting as a suicide bomber, arguing that, if it does not receive the extraordinary dispensations and indulgences that it seeks, it will, in effect 'implode', and in the process do extraordinary harm to others.
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Part of the threat of this 'implosion' is also the specter of the transfer of its nuclear arsenal and capabilities to more intransigent and irrational elements of the Islamist far right in Pakistan, who would not be amenable to the logic that its present rulers - whose interests in terrorism are strategic, and consequently, subject to considerations of strategic advantage - are willing to heed.
This is the bluff that the Musharraf dictatorship has confronted the Western world with, at least for the past twenty months, and it is a bluff that the world has failed to call. It has allowed the General to dismiss an elected government; to rig elections; to continue supporting the operation of terrorist groups from, and the existence of their infrastructure on, Pakistani soil; and despite all this, to secure massive financial and political rewards, instead of the natural penalties that should have attached to such criminality of conduct.
It is improbable that this bluff will finally be called at Camp David, but it would be worse than myopic if President Bush fails to heed the warning that came from Mike Evanoff, the chief of diplomatic security at the US Embassy in Islamabad: "This is the epicenter for terrorism. It really is. This is the only country I know in the world that has so many groups that are against the US or Western ideals."
Ajai Sahni is Executive Director, Institute for Conflict Management and Editor, SAIR - the South AsiaIntelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism Portal - courtesy which this article appears here.
