Despite the fact that the United States has been considering Pakistan as its key ally in combating militancy and terror, especially in Afghanistan, Islamabad has always been playing the role of a backstabber. Pakistan has been using a significant portion of military hardware and funds it has been receiving from the United States towards funding terrorist outfits both inside Afghanistan as well as South Asian region, including Pakistan-occupied Kashmir and Indian states, including Jammu & Kashmir. For these factors, to most of the counterterrorism and geopolitical analysts – when discussing the various inconvenient friendships of convenience in which the United States is entangled, they say – by depending on Pakistan, the US actually has not only been committing blunder, it also risks the entire region and the world towards notoriety of terrorism and militancy.
Pakistan has been consistently facing economic juggernauts since its creation in 1947 alongside a series of social challenges which is combined with domestic political instability and continuous threats posed by its military establishment to democracy. Pakistani democracy is mostly seen as a system directly controlled by its mighty military establishment – including Pakistani spy agency Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI). While Pakistan is still facing acute economic hardship – which according to my assessment is responsible for the country’s extreme focus on harboring terrorism – most of its South Asian neighbors, including Bangladesh and India as well as Asian neighbors such as China are gradually achieving economic prosperity with upliftment in various sectors.
Pakistan’s economy is mainly based on agriculture, while it could not achieve expected expansion in other spheres because of its rogue international policies alongside directionless and at times counterintuitive national-defense policies adopted by the ruling elites.
One of the major hurdles behind Pakistan’s inability of attaining expected economic progress is the warmongering tendencies of its military establishment which has fought four wars with India, including the 1971 liberation war in erstwhile East Pakistan which had defeated Islamabad’s mighty military thus paving path to emergence of Bangladesh, a country that has attained tremendous socio-economic progress during the past 53 years, while Pakistan has already become bankrupt and is considered by many nations in the world as a failed state or a rogue state.
Meanwhile, due to reprobate state policies and its military establishment’s unimaginable ambition of remaining as pseudo rulers – its democratic institutions are greatly affected – while its judiciary, which until now is considered to be comparatively independent – is also heading towards the opposite direction. International community has never considered any democratic government in Pakistan to be free from the influence of its military establishment and its intelligence agency, while even today, key figures in the country’s ruling government are deemed to be puppets.
It is important to mention here that due to Pakistan’s ideologies of maintaining its image as a radical Muslim nation with tremendous hatred towards India, Hindus and every “non-Muslim” societies and nations – including the United States Pakistani society has become favorable to Islamist militancy, particularly destructive acts targeting India, Hindu and the “non-Muslim” Western countries. Such notions are definitely counterproductive and to some extent suicidal for any nation.
For Pakistani society and its state-machinery’s sympathy and support towards Islamist militancy, outfits like Al Qaeda, the Taliban, Lashkar-e-Taiba and Lashkar-e-Jhangvi are receiving institutional support from Pakistani military through its intelligence agency – the Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI).
In my opinion, American policymakers now need to reboot their Pakistan policy and its decades-old support towards Islamabad, as such relations can only risk America’s own interest in the region, as Pakistan has always been playing the role of a backstabber.
