The Exit from ‘AfPak’: Don’t Blame Pakistan

http://www.foreignpolicyjournal.com/2012/06/27/the-exit-from-afpak-dont-blame-pakistan/

by Ali Ahmed

June 27, 2012

New Delhi — At its Chicago summit, NATO read out what has been the writing on the wall all through Obama’s first term. It is that its departure from Afghanistan is inevitable, with the addition being that it is now imminent. That this has not unfolded according to script is cause for some hand wringing among commentators. Ashley Tellis, Christine Fair and Robert Kaplan have in quick succession sought to point to Pakistan as spoilsport, with the former dwelling on Pakistan’s impending strategic defeat. Will his hope materialize?

All through the war in its vicinity, Pakistan has been scalded, but has avoided being burnt. The much reviled Musharraf took a wise decision by siding with the west. In retrospect, it seems as though it was the only choice he had. The blame for the west’s inability to push through its agenda of peace-building has been laid at Pakistan’s door. Its provision of sanctuary to the Taliban is taken as a willful challenge. Yet again Pakistan may have had little choice in this since it would have been unable in any case to wrap up the Taliban and their Pakistani affiliates. If the west could not succeed despite the ‘surge’, it is too much to expect of the Pakistan army to have had a better showing. From these two strategic choices made by the Pakistan army, based on a clear understanding of its limitations, it is clear that Pakistan can be credited with doing at least some things right.

So where does the responsibility lie? It is with Obama’s inability to convert the military surge into political gain. The surge was meant to represent the stick as part of a carrot and stick policy. It was to be supplemented by Pakistani army actions on its side of the Durand line, thereby choking the Taliban. In the event, the Taliban by forging a joint front with its ethnic fellows in Pakistan and Punjabi extremists, has been able to confront Pakistan with a dilemma: the more close it got to finishing the Taliban off in keeping with the desires of the west, the less stable it would get. The terror bombings in the later part of the last decade suggest as much. Pakistan, valuing its own survival above any doles the west could spare for its efforts, chose strategic prudence. Its holding out for an apology over the killings of 24 of its soldiers by U.S. forces at best provides a cover.

The gratuitous advice it has been at the receiving end of assumes that it could have gone the distance in taking on the Taliban. The west had got India on board to wind down tensions over time, after the spike in wake of the 26/11 terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India. This was to enable Pakistan to transfer its attention to the western front. Could the Pakistan army have succeeded as per western expectations?

Firstly, the terrain is forbidding. It has been seen in Kashmir where the going is easier and the foe is less formidable, that it takes considerable troop strength. Pakistan does not have those levels of troops, even if it could spare them entirely from the eastern border. Secondly, the tentacles that the Taliban has acquired due to anti-Americanism in Pakistan and religious extremism enable it to expand the arc of instability at will to include Lahore and Karachi. This would have stretched Pakistan’s suppressive capabilities to the extent of challenging their institutional integrity by internal ethnic and ideological fissures. If the Pakistan army cracked, then Pakistan could have gone under, there being no forces of equivalent strength in polity. This would have been to the advantage of extremists. That the Pakistan army judged the possible outcome and refrained from provoking it, is to its credit.

The expectation that Pakistan not playing ball has led to dissipation of the promise of the surge is therefore not a fair one. If Pakistan could arrive at a conclusion that it could at best be supportive and not hyperactive, the possibility should not have escaped Pentagon planners. To compensate they really should have weighed the carrot part of the strategy appropriately. This means that the peace process needed to have been an equally significant prong of strategy. It was instead geared to create fissures in the Taliban between the ‘good’ and irreconcilable Taliban. It was outsourced to the Karzai regime, with its notable legitimacy deficit as far as the intended interlocutors, the Taliban, were concerned. Their attitude was evident from the efforts of Karzai’s pointsman, Burhanuddin Rabbani, being rewarded with assassination. Only later, did U.S. special envoy Marc Grossman, the successor to Richard Holbrooke, get into the act; a case of too little too late. While it cannot be said for certain that the Taliban would have proved responsive, persistence with the military option, in the tradition of the actions post 9/11, foreclosed any possibility of finding out.

The US was either a victim of its own hubris or strategically ineffective due to its internal politics and institutional fights. Obama, having wound down the Iraq war, perhaps needed an arena to prove he was tough. The bureaucratic tussle, set off by the reaction to 9/11, between Foggy Bottom, Langley and Pentagon, played out in dysfunctional policies towards ‘AfPak’. The responsibility for a suboptimal outcome can hardly be laid at Pakistan’s door, even if, in election year, Obama needs a fall guy.

Highlighting this is important, since the refrain in the commentaries cited and extant largely is that Pakistan has stabbed the west in the back, despite receiving $ 20 billion as incentive. A consensus over the consequence for such double dealing is being built up in terms of pushing Pakistan over the brink, the euphemisms used being ‘containing’, ‘isolating’ etc. Pakistan needs being wary of an embarrassed superpower.  It can safely be predicted that the ability of the army to hold steady despite internal political disarray, demonstrated in weathering a decade long storm along both its external and internal axes, will now be sorely tested.

Inside the Pakistan Army
http://www.purpleberet.com/details/wellness_detail.aspx?id=111

Sun Tsu rightly maintains, knowing the enemy is half the battle won. Carey Schoefield by humanizing the Pakistan Army has done a signal service. She presents the Pakistan Army as a social organization. This helps flesh out the foe India is up against. Arguably India’s adversary is not Pakistan, the state but its army. It is widely appreciated that Pakistan is a state and society that has been commandeered by its army for its own institutional purposes. It is for this reason that India follows a dual pronged strategy for addressing its Pakistan problem. On the one hand it is reaching out to the people and the civilian government of Pakistan. This helps empower them internally against the army, even while it is intended to bring democratic peace closer. Simultaneously, India is deepening the asymmetry with the Pakistan Army using the divergent economic trajectories of the two states gainfully. The idea is that the Army, as a rational actor, would realize its incapacity to match India and veer round to bandwagoning instead of balancing. In the interim, India keeps its deterrent honed at all levels: subconventional, conventional and nuclear. This explains India’s strategy of restraint. Reading Schoefield’s book would help younger generation officers understand the Pakistan army better, and thereby, also, India’s policy towards Pakistan. It is particularly suitable for junior officers since it deals with the opponent not at the policy or operational level, but at the tactical. They get to examine the opponent as they would apprise a boxer in the opposite corner.

Other books that engage with the Pakistani Army at higher levels on civil-military relations and strategy are Shuja Nawaz’s Crossed Swords, Brian Cloughley’s A History of the Pakistan Army, and Ayesha Siddiqua-Agha’s Military Inc. More sophisticated works need to be negotiated progressively such as Ayesha Jalal’s Democracy and Authoritarianism in South Asia. Arriving at a fairly accurate picture of the opponent this way enables appreciation of its choice of action. The enemy would, for his part, add to the problem by putting up a smokescreen. Seeing through this requires self-study to begin early. Schoefield’s work serves as a useful starting point. Currently, there are myths that cloud the perceptions. Misperceptions speak more of the self than of the object. For instance, there is the notion that the Pakistani military officer takes an oath to avenge the 1971 defeat. There also exists a misinterpretation of the term, ‘terror’, in the book authored by a Pakistani brigadier, SK Malik titled The Quranic Concept of War. A reading of the book would indicate that the term refers to inflicting psychological paralysis in the enemy’s mind through military action. This is perfectly understandable. The term however has been variously interpreted in India as an advocacy of terrorism! Such misconceptions can be cleared by being clear-eyed about the opponent. Sympathetic works such as the one under review and, for instance, that of Cloughley are useful on that score. The book is an outcome of a few years spent by Schoefield as a guest of the Pakistan army. Schoefield’s is a social snap shot of the army now run by an officer cadre, much like in India and elsewhere, having its origin in the lower middle classes. The army’s grip on power and the access to resources this furnishes helps provide social opportunities to those self-selecting to the profession and managing to get selected to the cadre. Schoefield describes the journey through the portals of Kakul and in the regimental system. The socialization in the Army makes it cohesive and responsive, force multipliers in a smaller force. However, the political maneuvering in the upper echelons, brought out in her coverage of the killing of General Faisal Alavi of the SSG (Special Services Group), does indicate the achilles heel of that Army. What would appeal to readers of this journal is Schoefield’s description of the predicament faced by the Pakistan army in tackling insurgency for the first time. The problems and how these were faced would whet professional fascination. Two implications of interest emerge. One is that a blooding has taken place of the Army that would position it as an abler enemy than it would otherwise have been. Secondly, the insurgent opposition is strong. This implies that stabilisation operations by India after conventional thrusts have made headway will be very severely tested by asymmetric warfare.

The book is well turned out and of a length that does not daunt a first time reader. It has a useful appendix for cavalry officers on the armoured regiments of Pakistan. Its index can help those short of time to navigate the book. A set of photos could have enhanced interest in the book for its intended clientele, the lay public in the West wondering if its dollars are not being misappropriated. All in all, the book is worth reading to get a fix on the ‘red corner’ before the next round.

Strategy Advocacy for Pakistan claws.in

Ali Ahmed

Research Fellow, IDSA

E-Mail-aliahd66@hotmail.com

A saying that is as accurate as well known is, ‘While states have armies, the Pakistan Army has a state.’ This owes to the Army being on top of the power hierarchy there and in control of Pakistan’s security, India, Kashmir and Afghanistan policies. Taking advantage of its control of the state, the Pakistan Army has consistently advanced its own institutional interests under the garb of national interest. Samuel Huntington, in his seminal thesis on military professionalism, The Soldier and the State, observed, “The military ethic is thus pessimistic, nationalistic, militaristic, pacifist, and instrumentalist…It is, in brief, realistic and conservative.” The Pakistan Army has had a long association with the US military that believes in realism. Therefore, it is axiomatic that the Pakistan Army subscribes to the realist school that privileges power, power balancing and realpolitik in strategic matters. Realist thinking is known to be sensitive to power asymmetry and the requirement to compensate for imbalance through internal and external balancing. This explains in some measure Pakistan’s attitude to and behaviour towards India. External balancing involves relying on China and the US for weapons and economic aid in an attempt to offset India’s forces equipage. Internal balancing by Pakistan includes reliance on religious extremism to generate national cohesion and to create cannon fodder in terms of irregular forces as force multipliers. These constitute Pakistan’s ‘strategic assets’ deployed for proxy war. Pakistan is at a critical strategic juncture in which its utility to the international effort in taming the Taliban is peaking. Nevertheless, Pakistan remains in the category of potential ‘failed’ states as also ‘rogue’ states. What are the implications of the current juncture on appraisal through the lens of institutional interest and the realist perspective of the Pakistan Army? Pakistan is now in the cross hairs of a terror backlash. Its Army’s corporate cohesion is under threat from both the ethnic divide and religious extremism. Its perceived adversary, India, has taken significant measures to defuse the proxy war in Jammu & Kashmir and terrorism elsewhere in India. It intends to continue to refrain from discussing Pakistani concerns till the latter indicates its sincerity in rolling back the terror infrastructure. More dangerously for Pakistan, the visiting US Defence Secretary observed that India is poised at the limit of its tolerance. Pakistan’s complaint on Baluchistan to the Indian prime minister indicates its sensitivities. Further, the US has added democratic strictures in monitoring its largesse as evidenced in the passage of the Kerry-Lugar bill. China, while an acknowledged ‘all weather friend’, would not like to become embroiled in any India-Pakistan conflict. It would instead use Pakistan for its own strategic ends of encircling India, but not at a cost to its growing economy. India in any case is preparing to face down a ‘two front’ challenge. India pursuing a multi-vector policy of partnerships may prove more useful for both the US and China. Therefore, external balancing has its limits. For institutional interest, internal politics matters. The lawyers’ movement and media awakening, portends an expanding middle class. The institutional regeneration of the judiciary has potential for demonstration effect on other institutions. These would with time demand the democratic dividend of civilian control over the military. The backlash of the Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan has been contained temporarily by public support for military action against it. Also the growing backlash that includes targeting of the Army indicates that the groups are becoming autonomous. They could subvert sections of the Army inclined to reactionary ideology and disrupt its internal cohesion. Externally, in case of further provocation of India, a post-conflict call to accountability, as was evidenced after the 1965 and 1971 Wars, may witness the permanent eclipse of the military. From the twin lenses what would be the recommended strategy? Over the middle term, India, through higher defence budgets based on a thriving economy would be able to tide over gaps in its current military inventory. By then changes in the higher defence organisation may also be in place. Thereafter, the asymmetry would be irreversible. The pulls of India’s rise on Pakistani commercial and middle classes would deepen; particularly the need to benefit from trade, cultural exchange and access to educational and medical resources. In contrast growing population, dwindling economic prospects and increase in the underclass attraction for fundamentalism imply that sustainable alternatives to external largesse need to be found. Accessing India’s growth miracle may be an answer. Realism indicates that where balancing is not possible, ‘bandwagoning’ be considered instead. For Pakistan, the material advantages are obvious. In case its identity is not threatened, then it could consider opening up. Actions of India’s right wing politicians, namely visit of former prime minister, AB Vajpayee, to the Minar-e- Pakistan, the sentiment of LK Advani on the Quaid-e-Azam and Jaswant Singh’s appreciation of Jinnah, are potent signals. Even as Pakistan gains, so would, counter intuitively, it’s Army. The commercial foundations of the military would gain a wider market. A growing economy lifted by the Indian economic tide, would enable a larger resources cake for the Army. External largesse would likely continue in any case since the US is unlikely to switch off once again from the region in a hurry. Declining Indian threat would enable military modernisation. The nuclear assets would be preserved in perpetuity. Politically, since the Army would control the opening up, thus benefiting many sectors, societal respect for it would grow. Would India oblige? India has been following a dual-pronged ‘carrot and stick’ policy. Its major gain would be in ending of its ‘Two Front’ challenge. Its relations with China also stands to improve since Chinese support to Pakistan would cease to matter. SAARC would become relevant to regional problems and gain India credibility as a regional leader, enhancing its Great Power credentials. The strategy recommendation through the institutional and realist lens for Pakistan is ‘bandwagoning’. The implication for India is that its strategic thrust should be to create conditions for Pakistan to ‘bandwagon’. Towards this end a strategic dialogue with Pakistan outside of the composite dialogue may be a beginning. (Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not represent the views either of the Editorial Committee or the Centre for Land Warfare Studies).

IDSA COMMENT

Pakistan’s ‘First Use’ in Perspective

http://www.idsa.in/idsacomments/PakistansFirstUseinPerspective_aahmed_120511

Ali Ahmed

May 12, 2011

Before and after Osama’s killing, the spotlight fell momentarily on Pakistan’s nuclear intentions. Prior to his death, the headlines dwelt on Pakistani tests of Hatf VIII and Hatf IX. Demonstrating plausible first use capability, these were intended to deter a conventional attack by India. After Osama’s death, in a verbal salvo, Pakistan’s foreign secretary warned of ‘catastrophic’ consequences in case any state (read India) chose to emulate the US. His reference was perhaps to escalation, with Pakistani nuclear first use as a grim possibility. What exactly are the chances of this?

That ‘first use’ is inherent in Pakistan’s nuclear doctrine is less indicative of what the doctrine contains and more the general consensus with regard to its nature. Pakistan has not declared its nuclear doctrine as India has done. The fact that it does not subscribe to NFU does not by default imply a first use doctrine. Therefore, it cannot categorically be said that Pakistan’s operational nuclear doctrine is one of nuclear first use.

Having acknowledged this, it has to be said that all indicators point to Pakistani ‘first use’. Firstly, Pakistan wishes not only to deter a nuclear attack but also a conventional attack by compensating for its conventional disadvantages through nuclear means. Second, it has not subscribed to NFU and as per Wikileaks revelations, General Kayani was not in sync with his president’s inclination towards NFU. Third, there are several statements from important personages on the Pakistani intention to escalate in case of conventional conflict. Fourth, since it is the military that has control over the nuclear button, the nuclear arsenal may be more attuned to developments in conventional warfare than would otherwise be the case. Lastly, Pakistan’s nuclear deterrent is operated under military control through service specific strategic commands. This indicates a greater readiness to follow through.

Pakistan is also ambiguous about the nature of its first use. One option is along the time dimension. For some, first use could be a Samson option - as a ‘last resort’. This may command greater legality in terms of extreme resort in self-defence. Alternatively, as the development of the ‘Nasr’ suggests, it may be taken early on when the conflict in a ‘low threshold mode’.

The second ambiguity is over the type of nuclear strike. The first type is a ‘higher order’ strike, attempting to disarm and degrade India’s strike back capability. This is more likely a last resort. The targets could be a mix of counter military, counter force and counter city. The second type is more likely a ‘middle order’ use option in which multiple nuclear strikes are used to blunt India’s conventional offensive capabilities, such as when India’s strike corps are delivering a grievous blow. These could be on counter military targets, and include targets within India - such as supporting air fields. The third is ‘lower order’ first use, as part of nuclear signalling such as demonstration strikes or low opprobrium quotient strike(s). These could include a strike or two -in the oft-discussed scenario of a strike on an advancing Indian armoured column - in Pakistani territory in a defensive mode. In graduated first use scenarios, this is how nuclear weapons may be introduced into the conflict.

Pakistan has demonstrated its tactical nuclear capability through the miniaturisation, low yield, short range and shoot and scoot capability of ‘Nasr’. This helps project a low threshold in the early use mode. This means it can attempt either demonstration strikes or employ these in greater numbers to derail India’s strike formations. This is not so much by physically stopping the pincers, as much as by slowing them down by the strategic, operational and logistics effects of transiting to the nuclear realm.

These weapons have not been delegated to operational formations. Instead, they are controlled by service specific strategic commands, indicating centralisation. This means that any of the options discussed above is available to Pakistan for execution, and it is not necessarily restricted to a default war fighting first use option.

Pakistan can be expected to reinforce its deterrent through an information campaign, surrounding a low threshold projection. This compensates for any weakness or lack of credibility relating to its deterrent, since the deterrent also covers the conventional level. Its projection of irrationality is in keeping with the ‘rationality of irrationality’ thesis - a part of nuclear deterrence theory. The idea is to keep India guessing and hopefully deterred.

To attribute a first use doctrine to Pakistan is to admit that India’s nuclear weapons do not deter adequately. This may not be true since Pakistan too is subject to the psychological effects of deterrence. Deterrence is heightened since first use implies a break in the nuclear taboo. There would also be no guarantee of success and the only certainty would be of costs - known and known unknowns as well as unimagined and unimaginable.

‘First use’ would be dependent on appreciation of gains and costs. Gains from projection of a first use are self-evident. Firstly, the existence of a ‘threshold’ forecloses any expansive options that India’s conventional might may enable. Secondly, it refines the stability/instability paradox in injecting instability at the nuclear level. It indicates a rejection of India’s deterrence as it is currently defined, as a one-step escalatory ladder. This will force India to reconsider its nuclear response strategy, if not its declaratory doctrine. It stabilises the conventional level in reinforcing Indian prudence, thereby opening up the sub-conventional level for proxy war. The paradox can therefore be extended to read instability/stability/instability.

The gain from executing first use is in attempting to escape paying a price that India may set out to exact by catalysing the international community’s intervention. It would also bring home to India grave dangers that it may have discounted in going in for a military showdown. But the costs are much starker.

India’s promise of assured retaliation cannot be ignored, in the light of India’s growing second strike capability. Even if India’s declared intent of visiting ‘massive’ retribution is seemingly lacking in credibility, assured retaliation may yet inflict ‘unacceptable damage’. Secondly, there are risks in a first use intent inviting a pre-emptive strike. India is going down the BMD route. It has a multiple satellite launch capability, which over time can translate into an MIRV capability.

The upshot of this discussion is: firstly that first use is useful only for projection. Secondly, strategic sense favours an operational nuclear doctrine that tends towards NFU. Equally, strategic sense, from Pakistan’s point of view, is in keeping this secret. It can therefore be inferred, that the greater the projection the less likely the intention.

Projection of first use is safe for Pakistan since it rightly counts on India’s strategic maturity. India has no intention of being deflected from its economic trajectory. Pakistan’s nuclear nonchalance therefore owes much to its largely accurate appreciation of its nuclear posturing going untested.

This is one assumption India will not challenge by departing from military prudence. Its recent distancing from Cold Start is not so much on account of the efficacy of Pakistani deterrence, but its own grand strategic economic imperative. Sensibly, even as India wishes to match step with Pakistan, it has no intention of accompanying Pakistan on its way downhill.