A history of US policy towards Pakistan since the 1950s has played out like a LifeTime Channel movie: at times endearing, and at other times demonizing.
Lawrence Korb, the government’s and the media’s go-to-guy on these matters since the 1980s, testified before John Kerry’s Senate Foreign Relations Committee in 2007 on how the US policy towards Pakistan since the 1950s has…well, has sucked( www.americanprogress.org, Dec. 6, 2007).
With the Truman Doctrine and Marshall Plan ideology still in vogue at the time (dolling out dollars for democracy), the US gave over $3 BILLION to Pakistan between 1954 and 1964. In 1964 The Beatles even stopped in Pakistan to refuel their plane and probably to buy some really good weed.
Then in 1965 Pakistan behaved badly towards their neighbor India and the two would stir things up in the region for the next 6 years.
The US took away their allowance and would only send about $5 BILLION in aid to them over the next 15 years.
Smilin’ Jimmy Carter would reduce this further in 1979 when he found out that Pakistan was playing with nuclear toys.
Late in 1979, when Jimmy was fighting off swimming attack rabbits, the Soviets decided to invest in some really rocky real estate and they invaded Afghanistan.
During most of the 1980s, the US once again coddled Pakistan with American tax dollar aid by using them as a go-between to “covertly” fund the anti-Soviet tribes in Afghanistan.
Some of this “covert” support came in the form of weapons, like surface to air missiles, which according to the WikiLeak documents have been used against US forces now fighting in Afghanistan.
The US would send about $5 BILLION in aid to Pakistan between 1980 and 1990.
George Bush I would cut off most aid to Pakistan in 1990 because, as a former head of the CIA, he knew damn well they were still playing with that nuclear stuff.
Bill Clinton just ignored the whole region and let things go all to hell and less than ½ BILLION in aid made its way to Pakistan up to the new millennium, 2000.
Christian Science Monitor writer Dan Murphy says (7/26/10) it was during this time that the Taliban rose with crucial support coming from Pakistan’s intelligence services and despite the BILLIONS in aid to Pakistan since then, the Taliban-Pakistan intelligence ties have never been broken.
Then came Florida, George Bush II, 9/11, and the War on Terror and Pakistan was once again on the US payroll…big time!
During the Bush II years, nearly $12 BILLION was sent to Pakistan to urge them to fight the Taliban, capture Bin Laden, and let Kashmir be just another Shangri-la in a Led Zeppelin song.
You can count on us, said Pakistan as they worked to undermine the work of the US military in Afghanistan – thus being responsible for who knows how many American lives.
Then came Hope and Change and Pakistan had to deal with both Hillary and obama at 3 in the morning.
They have been smiling on their way to the bank ever since.
Hillary starts it off with a call for $110 MILLION in US aid to Pakistan in May of 2009. She called it “essential” (USA Today, 5/20/09).
Apparently Pakistan’s agreement with the Taliban, which gave the Taliban free reign over the Swat Valley area, had produced over 2 million homeless Pakistani refugees.
Who woulda thunk it?
Let’s get this straight.
America is at war with Taliban. American gives $12 BILLION to Pakistan to assist American in war with Taliban. Pakistan “covertly” undermines US war in Afghanistan against Taliban. Pakistan enters into agreement with Taliban giving them control of a piece of Pakistan. Pakistanis suffer at hands of Taliban. Pakistan asks US for help. Hillary and obama agree that help for Pakistan is needed.
Then along comes the anti-war war “hero” John Kerry, who having both fought for and denounced the Vietnam war effort and yet not having learned a damn thing, and introduces a bill to send over $7 BILLION in US taxes to Pakistan.
Kerry has what is seen as a special relationship with Pakistan; he has welcomed the country’s army chief to his house for dinner and accepted flowers from the country’s president (Boston Globe, July 27, 2010).....
obama, knowing full well that Pakistan has been working against the US war effort in Afghanistan, agrees and signs Kerry’s little bill.
Hillary called the obama-kerry Pakistan policy “different than anything that has been tried before” (USA Today, 5/20/09).
Pretty much. It is more money being sent to Pakistan in a five year period than any previous administration had doled out to this unfriendly ally.
But Hillary said it is different because the financial assistance comes with “stern advice and counsel” (NYTimes, 5/20/09).
This administration depends way too much on the idea that “words matter.”
How much faith can you have in people that wear robes and sandals to war?
Pakistan wants the Kerry spending largesse, yet they are not altogether happy with the conditions; conditions they say are “humiliating” and a “violation of sovereignty” (UK Reuters, 10/07/09). Protests have taken place in Pakistan against accepting the conditions.
Kerry says that the Pakistanis are crying over nothing and that his bill contains nothing new in the way of conditions that do not already exist, mainly that they have to help us fight the Taliban…but really this time.
While the Kerry-obama Pakistan policy was morphing itself into a tax payer burden, Hal Holbrooke..I mean Richard Holbrooke, who along with George Mitchell of Maine has been doing much of the heavy lifting for prop Secretary of State Clinton, and as an obama selected special envoy for the US in Pakistan and Afghanistan, felt that the $7.5 BILLION Kerry bill was not large enough (Bloomberg.com, 4/17/09).
So a party is thrown in Tokyo, Japan and over 20 countries are invited to attend.
Over $5 BILLION more is collected from the attendees to support….Pakistan.
Even Iran gave $300 MILLION. Hmmm…that could be troubling.
The US gave the first installment of Kerry’s $7.5 bill to this effort, $1 BILLION (Christian Science Monitor, 4/18/09).
On announcing the successful collections at the Tokyo “conference,” sub Secretary of State Holbrooke discusses a new phase of the obama policy toward the Taliban in Pakistan: “The US wants to appeal to the majority of Taliban who fight with the group, without agreeing with their ideology.”
Yeah, agreeing with their ideology probably wouldn’t be a great political move here in the US.
But let’s keep the printing presses running for the dollar bills!
Ashley Tellis, a South Asia analyst at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said that this is more of the same, the US “cutting checks to Pakistan without knowing how this money is going to be spent” (Christian Science Monitor, 4/18/09).
Christine Fair, a regional expert at the RAND Corp questions the policy based on the “minimal” returns on our investment thus far: “In some cases, the US knew it was funding programs that were bound to fall flat…because their real purpose was more a ‘strategic bribe’ to gain influence over the military regime in Islamabad” (Christian Science Monitor, 4/18/09).
A “strategic bribe.”
Hope and change, baby!
obama says this is ok, everything has changed with respect to US/Pakistan relations since George Bush went away.
In May 2009, before the WikiLeak stuff, obama said “you’re starting to see the Pakistan military take much more seriously the armed threat from militant extremists” (economictimes.indiatimes.com, 5/1/09). ....
John Kerry in July of this year said he would continue fighting for future funding and that the Pakistani officials were “sincere and committed” toward fighting the Taliban (Boston Globe, 7/27/10).
Really?
India, Pakistan’s other neighbor, does not see it that way.
India says that “sections of the Pakistan establishment continue to use terror as a state policy;” that the Pakistani Army continues to train and arm militant groups; and that there seems to be “no real inclination” on the part of Pakistan to move against the Taliban.
But here in the US, while people watch American Idol and Entertainment Tonight, obama can get away with his b.s. against reality.
Afghanistan has told the US as recently as July of 2010 that the war efforts in Afghanistan will have little effect as long as Pakistan is hedging its bets with the Taliban within Pakistan borders (Christian Science Monitor, July 26, 2010).
American officials believe Pakistan has the means but not the will to capture the Taliban head in Pakistan, Mullah Omar.
Hillary told Fox News and NBC News in July 2010 that some in the Pakistan government are aware of the whereabouts of Osama bin Laden (Sify.com, India internet news, 7/21/10).
Perhaps they need another BILLION DOLLARS.
The reality of Pakistan’s perception of the US according to an April 2010 Pew Research Center poll: 17% of Pakistanis have a favorable view of the US – 15% have a favorable view of the Taliban; 59% of Pakistanis describe the US as an “enemy” of Pakistan – 23% of Pakistanis see the Taliban as their greatest threat (Christian Science Monitor, 7/30/10).
Which may be why the obama administration was quick to announce an additional $10 MILLION would be sent to Pakistan to aid them in dealing with the recent floods in the region(WCSH6 News, Maine, www.wcsh.com, 8/1/10); in competition with the Taliban to provide relief.
The reality of the Pakistan nation that the obama administration is setting records for the receipt of US aid is captured in this piece by former US Ambassador Marc Ginsberg as it appeared on the Huffington Post (7/25/10): ....
“In the global diplomatic supermarket Pakistan occupies prominent real estate on the "can of worms" shelf. Every imaginable toxic threat to America's security lurks there: salafist (more descriptive than "Islamist") extremism, Al Qaeda command and control operatives, a rogue intelligence service aiding the Taliban, a corrupt political establishment, nuclear weapons, serial nuclear proliferators, a foundering economy, a bad case of India-envy, summer camps for wayward westerners taking in the waters at an Al Qaeda terror school, and a rabidly anti-American media, just to name a few! ....
In a country where Americans are blamed for everything from a cricket loss to the latest Taliban suicide bombing, Pakistanis lay at America's feet every real and imagined calamity that befalls them. Never in the annals of conspiracy theory provocateurs has there been so much time and effort devoted to make America out to be the bogeyman.”....
It’s a mess folks, and a former community organizer is in way over his head.....
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