Even Former Ambassadors Can Think in Surprisingly Flawed Terms ─ Former Bush Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad Wants to Invade Pakistan to Improve the Situation in Afghanistan

© 2010 Peter Free

 

19 October 2010

 

By framing arguments disingenuously or naively, people who should know better encourage still more mistaken geopolitical strategies

 

The very distinguished former Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad recently made a short-sighted, poorly reasoned suggestion for improving the war effort in Afghanistan ─ invade Pakistan.

 

Mr. Khalilzad was President George W. Bush’s ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq, and the United Nations.

 

Perhaps the fact that Ambassador Khalilzad is now even older than I am accounts for his willingness to expend young people’s lives in pursuit of an idea that has no chance for success.

 

Ambassador Khalilzad’s reasoning

 

The former Ambassador explained what he proposes in an essay entitled, Get Tough on Pakistan.

 

The title is aptly chosen.  It clearly indicates what Mr. Khalilzad suggests President Obama do.  And it reflects the black-and-white, gunslinging attitude that got the Bush Administration and the United States into this mess.

 

Extracts include:

 

Pakistan gives not only sanctuary but also support to the Afghan Taliban and the Haqqani terrorist network. This has hampered our military efforts; contributed to American, coalition and Afghan deaths; and helped sour relations between Kabul and Washington.

 

They are confident that if they continue to frustrate our military and political strategy — even actively impede reconciliation between Kabul and Taliban groups willing to make peace — pro-Pakistani forces will have the upper hand in Afghanistan after the United States departs.

 

The United States should demand that Pakistan shut down all sanctuaries and military support programs for insurgents or else we will carry out operations against those insurgent havens, with or without Pakistani consent.

 

© 2010 Zalmay Khalilzad, Get Tough on Pakistan, New York Times (19 October 2010)

 

Ambassador Khalilzad's unrealism is reflected in his proposed incentivization strategy

I rarely call ambassadors’ thinking rabbit-brained, but when they take to ignoring domestic politics, as well as geopolitical realities, in order to propose a scheme that lacks even one iota of implementable detail, they should know better.

Mr. Khalilzad suggests that the United States should present Pakistan with incentives that would make American intervention unnecessary.  These include:

(1) offer to mediate Afghani-Pakistani disputes;

(2) connect Pakistan to Central Asia with a trade corridor;

(3) prevent Pakistan’s enemies from using Afghan territory to aid insurgents in Pakistan’s portion of Baluchistan;

(4) commit to keeping an American governmental presence in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region;

(5) assist the development of Pakistan’s security infrastructure, democracy, economy, and society;

and

(6) improve the diplomatic atmosphere between Pakistan and India.

“Has it occurred to you Mr. Ambassador that not even one of these suggestions is reasonably achievable?”

Geopolitical reality is the obstacle that the George W. Bush Administration tripped over in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Former Ambassador Khalilzad, despite his admirable experience and dedicated service to the United States, continues to ignore the same obstacle.

In regard to each of the Ambassador’s proposed incentives, I ask:

(1) How is the United States going to mediate between Pakistan and Afghanistan, when both nations have fragmented and fundamentally uncontrollable domestic and governmental elements that militate against an even a falsely harmonious relationship?

(2) What is a “trade corridor” made of, and how is an American Administration going to sell the expense and commitment to making one (whatever it is comprised of), when most Americans will see no benefit to it for the United States?

(3) How can the United States commit to preventing Afghani meddling in Pakistani Baluchistan, when America can’t even “win” the war it already has in Afghanistan?

(4) Given America’s short memory and its overweening emphasis on the short-term, how is an American President going to commit to a long-term, meaningful presence in the Afghani-Pakistani region without being soundly chastised by American voters?

(5) How are we going to nation build in Pakistan, when we have already proven reluctant and unable to do so in Afghanistan?

(6) Last, where Gandhi and more than sixty years have failed, how is the United States going to ameliorate religious and the cultural hostilities that characterize relations between India and Pakistan?

A further insight into Mr. Khalilzad’s thinking ─ black, white, and no gray

Without inducing a change in Pakistan’s posture, the United States will have to choose between fighting a longer and bloodier war in Afghanistan than is necessary, at the cost of many young American lives and many billions of dollars, or accepting a major setback in Afghanistan and in the surrounding region. Both are undesirable options.

Instead, the Obama administration should be forcing Pakistan to make some choices — between supporting the United States or supporting extremists.

© 2010 Zalmay Khalilzad, Get Tough on Pakistan, New York Times (19 October 2010)

 

“Black, white, and no gray” thinking befuddles us into making mistakes

 

As is characteristic of the hawkish Right Wing, Mr. Khalilzad predetermines the outcome of analysis by presupposing its endpoints.

 

He assumes that the United States will continue a “longer and bloodier war,” even when the Administration has already announced (probably deceptively) that it will not.

 

He characterizes the aftermath of a pull-out as a “major setback,” without defining the geopolitical terms that would make it such.

 

And he frames Pakistan’s choice as an either-or conundrum, “between supporting the United States or supporting extremists.”  The statement is inescapably similar to the naive, ridiculously unnuanced George W. Bush dictums that got the United States into its current predicament.  I can guarantee that Pakistan, and any other independently-minded nation, does not see its choices in that way.  And never will.

 

In sum, former Ambassador Khalilzad’s prescriptions for success in Afghanistan and Pakistan are nonsense designed to deepen the quagmire of stupidity we are already bleeding to death in

 

Respectfully, sir, be serious.

Please.