Secretary
of State Clinton, Afghan President Hamid Karzai
[left]
and Pakistani President Asif Ali Zadari,
before trilateral
talks
at the State Department, May 6. The men are here to
meet
the secretary and President Obama to try and plot a
way
out of a crisis that has much of the world alarmed.
The Frontier Post,
Pakistan
'Pakistan in a
Trance, Doing America's Dance'
"The
Americans, one and all, are demonizing our army and ISI
without any restraint. They are throwing dirt on our elected officials in
heaps. … Furthermore, much of our
intellectual elite, loathsome though it may be, love being zealous mouthpieces of
and active campaigners for the insulting inanities of Washington."
EDITORIAL
May 6, 2009
Pakistan
- The Frontier Post - Home Page (English)
What opiate have our public
officials and intellectuals consumed that they live in such an exuberant trance,
while the Americans do such a merry dance so freely on our backs? It's
something like a master swatting a slave with all manner of indignities and
insults, and the slave taking the punishment submissively without even a whine.
The Americans, one and all, are demonizing our army and ISI without any restraint. They are throwing dirt on
our elected officials in heaps. And with their bought and paid for shills, they
[the Americans] are spreading fear around the globe that our nuclear assets are
insecure and could fall in terrorists' hands.
Yet our officials let this
bunkum go uncontested - and if they respond at all, they do it unbecomingly,
effeminately. Furthermore, much of our intellectual elite, loathsome though it
may be, love being zealous mouthpieces of and active campaigners for the
insulting inanities of Washington. A
queer air of ebullience is sweeping the government and intellectual gentry over
legislative moves in the U.S. Congress to provide the puny economic assistance
of $1.5 billion a year over the next five years. None are even a tad worried,
despite President Barack Obama's impudent, imperial tone, that such checks will
not be written for free. Nor do any of them seem a wee bit chastened by the
inexorable reality that in the American calculus there's no free lunch.
This assistance, which in
reality will be a loan plain and simple to be returned with interest, will not
come without strings. It may carry conditions that any respectable nation would
rather spit at than accept. The Americans say they'll set benchmarks for
Pakistan to achieve to keep receiving this aid. And make no mistake, those
benchmarks will serve and promote their own interests alone, not Pakistan's.
Pakistan may indeed even find them damaging.
Directly or indirectly, India
is sure to be a very important figure in this benchmarking business. Let no one
here be in any doubt about it. Even though formally, India may be no part of
Obama's Af-Pak strategy, practically it is very much
a part of it - with no obligations but with all the advantages that will accrue
from promoting its own strategic regional objectives with full American
acquiescence and backing. The Obama Administration is mincing no words by
making clear that it wants all Pakistani military withdrawn from the Indian border.
Posted by WORLDMEETS.US
SEE ALSO ON THIS:
The Nation, Pakistan:
To Reduce Militancy, the U.S. Must Pressure India
As Safir, Lebanon:
Obama and bin Laden Confront 'Day of Reckoning'
The Telegraph, India:
Obama 'Deliberately Dramatizes' al-Qaeda Threat for Domestic Political Reasons
Asia Times, Hong Kong:
Thanks to U.S.,
Taliban Have a New Target
Asia Times, Hong Kong:
Karzai Gets the 'Last
Laugh' on White House
Since the U.S. has anointed
India as the region's preeminent power, it will certainly expect Pakistan to
accept this too, and will exact compliance from us in the process. In any case,
it will not be Pakistan but America that will decide on what projects the money
is to be spent, as is almost always the case with handouts like this. And in
all probability, this spending will be channeled not through official agencies,
but through NGOs (the current fashion in international aid), as has happened
for the most part in Afghanistan. But have we not had a bitter experience with
American aid, to cite just one instance, with the $4.2 billion that President
Reagan pledged when we let him piggyback off of us to give a bloody nose to Afghanistan's
Soviet invaders? He too had a benchmark for us. And what happened? Not even
half of the money promised had poured in when the Red Army withdrew from
Afghanistan. Then his successor, President George H.W.
Bush refused to certify to Congress that we had complied with the benchmark. The
aid was forgotten instantly, and instead we were pilloried and made a pariah by
our American friends.
So why are our public
officials singing and dancing over this uncertain and unreliable American aid?
And why is our intellectual elite, too, hypnotized by this American soap opera?
Why are our people so willingly beguiled? And why is our honorable ambassador
in Washington, Hussein Haqqani, adding to his
infamous reputation for shifting loyalties by roping in American officials to
deny what our people heard with their own ears and saw with their own eyes:
President Obama saying that Pakistan's civilian government was fragile? Can't
they all have mercy on us poor folks?
[Posted by WORLDMEETS.US May 6, 2:58am]
