Politics and Governance

China-US relations may dominate news coverage this week as the country's presumptive next leader - Xi Jinping - visits the United States. The two countries have conflicting interests and ideologies in currency valuation, military developments in East Asia, and how to deal with the violence in Syria. In an election year, US politicians from both parties can be expected to heighten criticism of China. But as discussions begin between US President Barack Obama and Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping, there are important areas of agreement between the two countries

Differences are real, as should be expected between two large countries with large economies, separated by large differences in development and history. The notion of simple competition between a powerful United States and a rising China, however, does not withstand scrutiny in view of the broad and important areas of agreement and common interest. In an era of global trade and increasingly pervasive digital connectivity, peoples and economies are not so easy to divide along geographic lines.

Three areas of agreement - Iran, clean energy, and cybersecurity - might not get much attention during Xi Jinping’s US tour and the coming political season, but they reveal a change of mindset needed to maintain peaceful ties across the Pacific.

Read the full article at Al Jazeera English.

Image credit: Creative Commons photo via nznationalparty.

After the lows of the U.S.-Russia relationship during the George W. Bush administration, no one thought that Barack Obama’s “reset” policy towards Russia would be easy. But does it have to be this hard?

The reset has been under fire in both Russia and the United States. On the Hill, many Republicans are eager to target a policy that has been such a central tenet of Obama’s foreign policy and to express their lingering mistrust and even outright hostility toward Russia. Russian critics have also pounded the reset, which is closely identified with President Dmitri Medvedev. Especially among Vladimir Putin’s circle, mistrust of the United States runs deep—and Putin himself has been a vocal opponent of his protégé’s policy. The main criticism is that Russia has given up too much and received too little in return, which ironically mirrors a common refrain in Washington: that Russia has given too little and the U.S. too much. In other words, many on both sides continue to view each other in zero-sum Cold War terms. 

While acknowledging that the reset was never meant to be a panacea, the Obama administration rightly points to its accomplishments—notably, the New START treaty, the Northern Distribution Network for resupplying efforts in Afghanistan, and Russian entry into the World Trade Organization.  These have (or should in the case of WTO accession if Congress normalizes the trade relationship with Russia) resulted in concrete gains for both countries. But Iran, missile defense, human rights concerns, Putin’s decision to return to the presidency, the December parliamentary elections in Russia and ensuing widespread protests, and now Syria are important conflict points in the relationship—ones that challenge the optimism of even the most ardent reset supporters.

All of which has led to a ratcheting up of fiery rhetoric. High-ranking U.S. officials publicly used words like “disgusting” and “a travesty” to describe Russia’s Syria veto. During the height of the Middle East uprisings last year,  Senator John McCain used Twitter to convey taunts like “Dear Vlad, The #ArabSpring is coming to a neighborhood near you,” and Putin responded in kind, calling McCain “nuts” and referencing McCain’s lengthy term as a prisoner of war. 

Even before Russia’s recent veto of the U.N. Security Council resolution on Syria, ties had become increasingly fraught between Russia and the United States. A few recent examples: 

• Missile defense has been the thorniest issue in the relationship. Russia insists that NATO’s U.S.-led European missile defense system could eventually be targeted against Russian missiles. Washington has repeatedly offered assurances that the system is not directed against Russia and suggests data exchanges but refuses to provide the written guarantee that Russia is asking for—even though Medvedev knows full well that such a guarantee would never survive congressional scrutiny. In another bit of ironic symmetry, at least one U.S. lawmaker asked Obama to provide written assurances that the United States would not share data with Russia. In response, Medvedev threatened again to deploy Iskander missiles in Kaliningrad and even to withdraw from New START. The difficult missile defense talks had collapsed, he said.  
• Secretary of State Hillary Clinton criticized the conduct of the December 2011 Duma elections, which were widely seen as tainted by irregularities at best and rigged at worst. When Russians took to the streets in protest, Putin accused Clinton of sending a signal to protestors and decried the “foreign money” that he claimed was being used to stir up trouble.
• Washington’s new ambassador in Russia, Michael McFaul, was greeted by charges in the pro-government media that he had been sent to foment an Orange Revolution (and/or Arab Spring) in Russia. Shortly after he arrived, his meeting with opposition figures triggered even more criticism. 

The challenges continue to stack up. On Feb. 7 the Russian police announced that they were prepared to prosecute lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, who died at the age of 37 in pre-trial detention on trumped-up tax charges. Never before has Russia undertaken a posthumous prosecution. American critics point to the Magnitsky case as clear evidence of the Russian government’s disregard for human rights and the rule of law. Russian critics point to the U.S. focus on Magnitsky, and especially the legislation introduced in the U.S. Senate and House about the case, as another unacceptable example of American efforts to interfere in Russian domestic politics.

The biggest new challenge for the reset is managing the fallout of Russia’s veto of the U.N. Security Council resolution on Syria. Russia is standing nearly alone in its support for Bashar al Assad. China also vetoed the resolution but has faced far less criticism. The probable reason: There are no striking photos of Chinese officials meeting with Assad as civilians continue to be killed in Homs, whereas Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov took a very public, well-documented, in-your-face trip to Damascus. Russia seems convinced it needs Assad in power to advance what it sees as its strategic and economic interests in the region  

If Assad manages to cling to power, the U.S.-Russia relationship will continue to suffer. Both Putin and Obama may be forced to decide if the practical gains of the reset outweigh this very big, very public falling out over Syria. If Assad is overthrown soon—especially before the U.S. presidential election—the damage to the reset is more likely to be manageable. But in that case Russia will be even more bitter about losing Assad and thus Syria given its lingering resentment about the toppling and execution of Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi. 

All of these tensions are playing out against the backdrop of an election year in both Russia and the United States. That Vladimir Putin will win the presidency of Russia again is not in doubt. What is in doubt—and surprisingly so—is whether Putin will retain enough credibility to effectively govern. For now, he is resorting to the familiar tactic of blaming Washington for his troubles. By so doing, he hopes to discredit many of the protesters and appeal to nationalist sentiments. That means he’s unlikely to ease up on his anti-American rhetoric anytime soon. 

Can the reset survive the next Putin presidency? What is clear is that Presidents Obama and Putin will not enjoy the same kind of relationship the Medvedev and Obama did. And if Obama loses the November presidential election, his victorious Republican successor—whoever that turns out to be—will be coming off a campaign filled with tough talk about Russia. 

But the reset was never set up to resolve all differences, only to work on improving the U.S.-Russia relationship in the areas where their interests overlap. While Putin and Obama will never end up as best buddies, both are practical politicians. And practical considerations are likely to push them in the direction of salvaging the reset. Any new Republican president would be likely to begin the process of abandoning some of his harshest campaign rhetoric once he is faced with the practical task of governing. That is, unless some surprising development, most likely a dramatic new twist in Russia’s domestic political drama, throws all rational calculations out the window. So it seems safe to say it’s too early to write off the reset…sort of. 

Jacqueline McLaren Miller is a Senior Associate in the EastWest Institute's Strategic Trust-Building Initiative, where she runs the U.S. and WMD programs.

Russia and China Defend Their Vetoes

Russia

“[F]rom the very beginning of the Syrian crisis some influential members of the international community, including some sitting at this table, have undermined any possibility of a political settlement, calling for regime change, encouraging the opposition towards power, indulging in provocation and nurturing the armed struggle.” –U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin, at the U.N. Security Council, Feb. 4.

 "A cult of violence has been coming to the fore in international affairs ... This cannot fail to cause concern…We of course condemn all violence regardless of its source, but one cannot act like an elephant in a china shop…Help them, advise them, limit, for instance, their ability to use weapons but not interfere under any circumstances." –Prime Minsiter Vladimir Putin,  Feb. 8.

For EWI's take on Russia's veto, click here.

China

“The international community should provide constructive assistance to help achieve these goals. At the same time, the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of Syria should be fully respected. … To put through a vote when parties are still seriously divided over the issue does not help maintain the unity and authority of the Security Council nor help to properly resolve the issue. In this context, China voted against the draft resolution.” –U.N. Ambassador Li Baodong, UNSC, Feb. 4.

“We will always safeguard the fundamental and long-term interests of the Syrian people…China's voting position in the Security Council is based on the U.N. Charter and principles, China's longstanding foreign policy and also to safeguard the country's fundamental and long-term interests. … We will make unremitting efforts for the peaceful resolution of the Syrian crisis." –Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Liu Weimin, Feb. 8.

Other States Express Outrage

United States

“The United States is disgusted that a couple of members of this Council continue to prevent us from fulfilling our sole purpose here, which is to address an ever-deepening crisis in Syria and a growing threat to regional peace and security. … That intransigence is even more shameful when we consider that at least one of those members continues to deliver weapons to Al-Assad.” –U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice, UNSC, Feb. 4

France

“We cannot and must not overlook the harrowing conclusion that two permanent members of the Council have systematically obstructed all its action. They do so in the full knowledge of the tragic consequences of their decisions for the Syrian people. And in so doing, they are making themselves complicit in the policy of repression being implemented by the Damascus regime. Whatever they may claim, they have de facto taken the side of the Al-Assad regime against the Syrian people.” –U.N. Ambassador Gérard Araud, UNSC, Feb. 4.

United Kingdom

“The United Kingdom is appalled by the decision of Russia and China to veto an otherwise consensus resolution, submitted by Morocco, the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Germany, Portugal, Colombia, Togo, Libya, Bahrain, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Egypt, Tunisia, Oman and Turkey.” –U.N. Ambassador Sir Mark Lyall Grant, UNSC, Feb. 4.

Security Council Members Weigh In

South Africa

“Any solution must preserve the unity, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Syria. We are also satisfied that the final draft resolution (S/2012/77) was not aimed at imposing regime change on Syria, which would be against the purposes and principles of the United Nations Charter.” –U.N. Ambassador Baso Sangqu, UNSC, Feb. 4.

Pakistan

“Pakistan had some serious concerns, mainly against killings, the massacre of innocents. But also, on a point of principle of the Charter, we were not happy about any infringement on the sovereignty or integrity of Syria. …  It is easy for those of us who today voted in the majority to sit back and say, ‘Well, we have done our bit.’ No, we have not. We cannot wash our hands of this. We must continue and seek — as the Russians and the Chinese have stated that they will continue to seek — the way forward. I believe that the best vehicle is the Arab League plan and the very substantial moves that have been accepted over the last few days. I believe that the offer of no regime change, of plurality, and the promotion of democracy are important aspects of this situation.” –U.N. Ambassador Hussain Haroon, UNSC, Feb. 4.

Germany

“In short, the people of Syria and the region have been let down again, and that is a crying shame — even more so in the light of the recent massacres in Homs; even more so in the light of one the bloodiest days of the Arab Spring; and even more so on the tragic thirtieth anniversary of the Hama massacre. And that is the real scandal.” –U.N. Ambassador Peter Wittig, UNSC, Feb. 4.

India

“Our support for today’s draft resolution is in accordance with our support for the efforts of the Arab League for a peaceful resolution of the crisis through a Syrian-led inclusive political process. We note that the  draft resolution expressly rules out any measures under Article 42 of the Charter and calls for a serious  political dialogue between the Syrian Government and  the whole spectrum of the opposition under the auspices of the League of Arab States.” –U.N. Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri, UNSC, Feb. 4.

Multilateral Organizations

Arab League

"There was no need for the veto, We were about to reach a conclusion on the resolution that would have been supported by everyone. The [Syrian] government, definitely, may have interpreted this as the international community unable to do anything and [so] we can do whatever we want." "If we are going to send another mission, and we are contemplating that, it has to be stronger in numbers and in equipment. The mandate has to be different…The real problem here is you cannot force your way in. You have to do this in agreement with the authorities in Syria. The authorities in Syria by now realize they have a serious problem and cannot go on with the way they are."  –Arab League Secretary General Nabil el-Araby, Feb. 6.

Gulf Cooperation Council

“It is necessary for the Arab states … to take every decisive measure faced with this dangerous escalation against the Syrian people. … Nearly a year into the crisis, there is no glint of hope in a solution.” –Official Statement, Feb. 8.

Key Regional States Express Concern

Turkey

"We are going to start a new initiative with those countries that stand by the people, not the Syrian government. We are preparing this. … The process that occurred at the United Nations in relation to Syria is a fiasco for the civilized world. … The U.N. Security Council has once again held captive the conscience of the international community. Possessing the power to veto is a great responsibility. Using this power gives a green light for the persecution to continue" –Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Feb. 7.

Iran

"If any vacuum happens suddenly in Syria, nobody can anticipate the outcomes ... the consequences could be even worse because there may be internal wars, internal clashes between people.” "We have to avoid the worst and give enough chance to the government of Syria to carry on with its reforms. … We cannot deny that some people in Syria, a portion of people in Syria are looking for their legitimate rights just like any other people in any other country … but we also cannot deny the outside interferences in Syria." –Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi, Jan. 29.

Click here to read this column in The News International.

US Defence Secretary Leon Panetta raised a storm signalling that US and Nato troops in Afghanistan will transition from a combat role to a “training, assist and advice” role by late 2013, a year earlier than the mandated 2014 schedule. Presidential candidate Mitt Romney had earlier railed against US troops fighting a war of independence for another nation.

Political expediency now dictated his calling Panetta’s withdrawal announcement “misguided” and “naive.” “Why should you tell the people you are fighting with the date you are pulling out your troops?” Echoing his sentiments Senator John McCain said none of the US military commanders had recommended the drawdown. The US commander in Afghanistan, Marine General John R Allen, cautioned that “the drawdown schedule is more aggressive than anticipated.”

Ambiguity is bedevilling US strategic decision-making for the last 50 years. How to come up with correct geopolitical conclusions when politics comes into conflict with military objectives? President Obama cautioned against setting goals beyond US responsibility, the means thereof and the primary US interest. President Eisenhower lived by the premise: “Each proposal must be weighed in the light of a broader context, the need to maintain balance in and among national programmes.” Less than three months after becoming president in 1961, an inexperienced Kennedy caused the “Bay of Pigs” disaster.

He redeemed his reputation in 1962 by imposing a naval “quarantine,” foiling the Soviet attempt to put land-based medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles in Cuba that would have permitted them to attack the US mainland almost without warning. Kennedy did not listen to his generals wanting an immediate pre-emptive nuclear strike on the Soviet Union, which would certainly have led to a nuclear holocaust. The public showdown was matched by concurrent secret diplomatic talks leading to reciprocal US withdrawal of its missiles from Italy and Turkey.

Obama’s 2008 platform called for lifting the US economy out of the dumps into which it was sinking and getting the US out of the Iraq and Afghan cauldrons. A full US review of the options saw his military and civilian advisors hopelessly divided about Afghanistan. His commanders in the field, Generals Petraeus and Stanley McChrystal, recommended a “military surge” to combat the Taliban. Others, led by Vice President Joseph Biden, counselled a staged withdrawal. Obama’s instinct was to cut US losses and exit Afghanistan, but he chose not to second guess his military advisors and opted for the middle course of a limited military surge, with the caveat being a 2014 withdrawal date beginning in stages in mid-2011.

The Afghan escalation in 2010 duplicated the escalation of the Vietnam War, strategically incoherent and not supporting any overriding interest or purpose. The military promised a better job in stabilising Afghanistan and restoring peace, but without really forensically examining what the job actually was or should be. Forced into resigning for making inappropriate remarks about his civilian superiors in the chain of command, McChrystal’s much-trumpeted foray into Helmand province fell far short of accomplishing the desired results. Gen Petraeus took ownership by stepping down from his Central Command appointment to take over. Without real success in any of his stated objectives in Afghanistan, Petraeus has since retired, to head the CIA.

Lt Col Daniel Davis, into his fourth combat deployment (and his second in Afghanistan) wrote in his article “Truth, Lies and Afghanistan” in The Armed Forces Journal: “What I saw bore no resemblance to rosy official statements by US military leaders about conditions on the ground. I am hardly the only one who has noted the discrepancy between official statements and the truth on the ground. Anthony Cordesman of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies noted that the ISAF and the US leadership failed to report accurately on the reality of the situation in Afghanistan.

Since June 2010, the unclassified reporting the US does provide has steadily shrunk in content, effectively ‘spinning’ the road to victory by eliminating content that illustrates the full scale of the challenges ahead. They (the military leadership) were driven by political decisions to ignore or understate Taliban and insurgent gains from 2002 to 2009, to ignore the problems caused by weak and corrupt Afghan governance, to understate the risks posed by sanctuaries in Pakistan, and to ‘spin’ the value of tactical ISAF victories while ignoring the steady growth of Taliban influence and control.”

Col Davis asks: “How many more men must die in support of a mission that is not succeeding and behind an array of more than seven years of optimistic statements by US senior leaders in Afghanistan? No one expects our leaders to always have a successful plan. But we do expect-and the men who do the living, fighting and dying deserve-to have our leaders tell us the truth about what’s going on.” Those doubts are widely shared, if not usually voiced in public, by officers on active duty.

The Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF) requires $4.7 billion annually, approximately 447 percent of government revenues. An understandable burden, but a mismatch of both the performance level expected and the fiscal calculations about the country’s anticipated revenues in the future. The IMF estimated $6 billion yearly on the civilian side for the next five years, and even till 2023, $15-20 billion is additionally required annually for the Special Operations Command (SOC) that will take up the slack when Coalition forces gradually scale back combat operations. Given the current US economic realities, who is going to foot the bill?

According to Obama, “the current US deployment in Afghanistan is neither a ‘counter-insurgency’ nor ‘nation building.’ The costs of doing either would be prohibitive.” His contention is that the resetting of strategic balance by the US will mean the scaling back of strategic interests but that the US will remain a global power with an essential leadership role to play. Obama cites an unlikely source, The World America Made by Robert Kagan. The key Romney policy advisor says that overreaction to short-term events-including the financial crisis – overlooks the continued economic, military and political dominance by the US, but “the US could still slip into decline if it slashes the military spending too dramatically."

Panetta’s drawdown pronouncement gives Obama the ability in an election year to claim that instead of a precipitous withdrawal he would be phasing out the war in Afghanistan like he successfully managed to in Iraq. Our problem is that the US can opt out of a tough neighbourhood, albeit both at moral and material cost (more importantly that of reputation), we can’t! However we can hold accountable those leaders who got us into this mess and those who kept us there. To paraphrase Col Davis, the Pakistani soldiers living, fighting and dying at 10-12 times the Coalition ratio deserve their leaders to tell them the truth. 

Pakistan cannot shed tears over something it has no control over, US strategic decision-making and mistakes thereof. Ours is not to reason why, ours is but to gear up to cope with the residual eventualities, preferably in 2014, or in a worst-case scenario, even earlier by the end of 2013.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called the veto a "travesty"; U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice tweeted that she was "disgusted" by the dual veto. And 2011 Nobel Peace Prize recipient Tawakkul Karman said China and Russia "bear the moral and human responsibility for these massacres." But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov dismissed all such criticism as "hysterical."

Russia's veto may have been a disappointment, but it certainly wasn't a surprise. Russia's internal and external politics, over the short and long term, made the veto hard to avoid. For Moscow, the following factors were critical considerations:

Internal Stability

Some Russians may be concerned with the potential for renewed unrest in the Caucasus. Lavrov has labeled the opposition in Syria as "militants and extremists," much the same language used to describe separatists in the Caucasus, who many in Russia see as a threat to national stability. Russia's stand in Syria further reflects its general misgivings about the Arab Spring—and the fear that the Arab Spring could provide sustenance and inspiration to the Caucasus.

Russia is also facing a surprising and large domestic opposition movement (or, perhaps more accurately, several movements) in response to the recent parliamentary elections, where charges of vote-rigging abounded, and Putin's decision to return to the presidency. These large-scale protests have clearly rattled the Russian government. Although no one seriously doubts that Putin will win the presidential election next month, he is ratcheting up anti-American rhetoric. This allows him to blame outsiders for his troubles while deflecting critics from the right who think Russia has given too much to the United States under the "reset."

Arms Sales

Russia's arms sales to Syria are big business. Just last month, Russia signed a deal to sell Syria 36 Yakovlev Yak-130 jets worth some $550 million.

Syria's annual arms purchases from Russia are estimated to be about $700 million (anywhere from seven to ten percent of Russia's total revenue from arms sales). If Assad is overthrown, the contract could be canceled. But growing international frustration with Russia would be an extremely high price to pay to maintain a client—especially when Russia has already forgiven about $10 billion in Syrian debt.

Playing the Long Game

Russia's relationship with Assad also has a broader economic dimension. Russia is investing heavily in Syria, to the tune of some $20 billion in infrastructure, energy, and tourism. For years, Russia has helped to prop up a regime that now has little legitimacy internationally.

So why is Russia willing to bear the brunt of international condemnation?

All these practical economic and regional strategic concerns in Syria point to what Russia is actually concerned about and why it is willing to pay a high-price to maintain its relationship with Assad: the United States. Russia's fundamental motivations in Syria seem reminiscent of Cold War great power politics, where Russia seeks to prevent the United States from increasing its influence in the region.

Russia still believes that a limited mandate from the U.N. no-fly resolution on Libya was turned into a push for regime change by Western powers, and it may not wish to trust the same countries to restrain themselves. Russia abstained from the Libya resolution, allowing it to pass. With Syria, it exercised its veto to protect one of the few proxies Russia can turn to in the region in the wake of the Arab Spring.

Russia is, in short, trying to balance short- and long-term interests in the region and it needs Assad in power to realize those interests. But as the brutality of the Syrian regime dominates headlines, Russia's painfully close association with Assad is what people will remember.

Jacqueline McLaren Miller is a Senior Associate in EWI's Strategic Trust-Building Initiative, where she runs the U.S. and WMD programs.

Click here to read a round-up of statements by governments and organizations concerning the crisis in Syria.

To start believing that democracy is taking root in Pakistan because the political confrontation between Prime Minister Gilani and General Kayani has not resulted in a military coup would be premature. There have been moments in Pakistan’s political history when the army has lost public support — both General Ayub and General Musharraf were ousted by civil revolts — without leading to any durable triumph of democracy in the country. Why should it be different now?

Sceptics cannot ignore the responsibility civilian governments bear for Pakistan’s democratic deficit. To view them when in power in Pakistan as helpless victims of military manoeuvres would be wrong, even if they have had to contend with the extraordinary weight of the armed forces within the system. The hallmark of the civilian governments in Pakistan has been misrule, corruption and fractured politics. Their governance has been poor to the point of prompting military intervention with a measure of public support. They have failed to address economic problems meaningfully. Their external policies, controlled in vital areas by the military no doubt, have remained within the traditional Pakistani grooves of confrontation with India. Their larger view of Pakistan’s national interest has not differed essentially from that of the military, and this has included the centrality of the Kashmir issue, the acquisition of nuclear capability, reliance on the United States of America for leverage against India and China for containing it, and close ties with Saudi Arabia for strengthening the country’s Islamic identity and giving it a personality outside the Indian sub-continent. The terror threat to India has not diminished under civilian rule in Pakistan, nor have curbs been imposed on extremist religious groups advocating jihad against India. The water issue is now being artificially raised to unwarranted levels of contention by the civilian set-up. In short, the civilian part of the Pakistani establishment is almost as much answerable for the stunting of democratic institutions and for the country’s many failures as the military is.

The current stand-off between the government and the armed forces in which the civilian government has been unusually defiant does not alter the basic problem with institutionalizing democracy in Pakistan. Does Pakistan have political leaders with a track record of commitment to democratic norms that would make them credible instruments of democratic change in the country? If the political actors in Pakistan and their scripts remain unchanged because the political environment is structured the way it is, meaningful democracy will continue to elude Pakistan. As it happens, the civilian personalities alternating in power have been the same — Nawaz Sharif and Benazir Bhutto, with the latter now replaced by her husband, Asif Zardari — and they have by no means been paragons of democratic values. This is because the blockages in the political system remain intact, with the internal contest for power amidst ethnic divisions, regional differences, the overwhelming weight of the Punjab province in the polity, the role of the armed forces and the judiciary, the religious forces and so on, limiting the scope for a break in traditional thinking on how to solve the country’s many problems, of which charting a new course towards India ought to be an important component.

Is the Turkish model a way out for Pakistan? Turkey is an Islamic country that successfully practices democracy with an institutionalized role of the military in politics. General Musharraf often mentioned Turkey as a country Pakistan could emulate. But there are fundamental differences between Turkey and Pakistan. The genesis of modern Turkey and the new state of Pakistan have nothing in common. Kemal Atatürk, the father of the Turkish nation, was a military leader who established Turkey’s frontiers in war with Greece, followed by a massive population exchange that left no Turks in Greece and no Greeks in Turkey. Kemal Atatürk broke Turkey’s links with the Arab world politically and culturally. By strictly imposing the ideology of secularism on Turkey, he deliberately diluted Turkey’s Islamic profile as he considered Islam an obstacle for the country’s modernization. Pakistan’s case history, its politics, its religious orientation, its links with the Arab world, and so on, distinguish it from Turkey. Unlike in the case of Turkey where the military was the pillar of the country’s national agenda of modernization and secularism, the military in Pakistan not only had no such agenda, it, in fact, played a highly retrograde role under General Zia-ul-Haq in Islamizing Pakistan, quite apart from the links that the Pakistani armed forces have maintained with religious parties and jihadi groups for internal and external purposes.

Any perceived similarity between military coups in Turkey and in Pakistan — three times in both countries — that points to a Turkish solution in institutionalizing the role of the military in Pakistan’s polity would be misleading. Since the country’s inception, the Turkish armed forces have given themselves an institutional role of strictly upholding Atatürk’s secular codes even at the cost of democratic principles, a role eroded in recent years by external pressure from the European Union for a reduction of the military’s role in politics as part of Turkey’s eligibility for membership as a democratic state, and, more importantly, with the rise of Islamist forces in the country through democratic politics with an agenda of tilting the balance between Islam and secularism in favour of the former. The Pakistan armed forces are politically obsessed not with secularism but with India.

The Arab Spring was supposed to herald democratic change in authoritarian, military dominated states like Egypt through a street uprising led by the social media generation. It has ended with the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafists gaining undisputed majority in recent elections. In Tunisia, too, the Islamists have gained from the ouster of autocracy. This raises questions about the nature of democracy in the Islamic world, in particular whether democracy should also mean a liberation of the individual and the society from religious dictates.

The events in the Arab world actually carry a negative message for change in Pakistan. Until now, religious parties in Pakistan have not been able to win more than a handful of seats in elections, though outside the formal electoral system they exert considerably more influence on politics. With open confrontation between the Pakistani Taliban and the country’s military and the spread of domestic terrorism, Islamic groups in Pakistan have become anti-state, not because the state has traditionally suppressed them or projected a secular face but because of cooperation with the US to control the extremist groups targeting Afghanistan from Pakistani soil. If the ousted autocratic Arab regimes were seen to be working with the US to suppress domestic dissent and prevent any form of political destabilization that could endanger Israel’s security, Pakistan’s quandary is that it is under pressure to cooperate with the US for external reasons and oppose its interests for internal reasons.

All in all, the overthrow of secular regimes in North Africa and their replacement by Islamist forces, the pressures building up on President Assad’s secular regime in Syria by the West as well as Islamist forces, the sectarian political activism of the authoritarian Gulf regimes, with whom Pakistan is close, does not augur well for democratic change in Pakistan. To expect Pakistan to swim against the tide in the Islamic world would be wishful thinking.

The author is a former foreign secretary of India.

This statement places in perspective the reasons behind the deterioration of relations between the US and Pakistan.

Underlying Bin Laden’s death is a raft of more serious questions. One is the report that the government commission constituted to uncover the facts about the May 2 incident has recommended the institution of a case of treason against Dr Afridi by the government.

Yet the UN Security Council, vide resolution 1390 of 2002, defined Bin Laden as a proscribed person who was not to be allowed within the territory of any member state. His detection within Pakistan could therefore lead to serious repercussions that could isolate the country further.

In October 2008, Gen Petraeus said that “There is no question … that Osama bin Laden is in the tribal areas of Pakistan bordering Afghanistan”. Therefore, Pakistani officials’ repeated denials — that they had not known of his whereabouts — is considered by US officials as disingenuous at best.

To revive the credibility of the Pakistani interlocutors it has become necessary to use regular institutions such as the Foreign Office and parliament to define the country’s foreign and security policies. The current de-institutionalised approach to the formulation of policy is harmful.

One can speculate that many of the events that have since transpired between Pakistan and the US, including the tragic episode of Salala and the upheaval caused by ‘memogate’, are part of this sad interaction between the two countries’ national security goals and the dynamics of interpersonal relationships: the breach of trust between the military leaders of the two sides plays a major role in the existing tussle. It has isolated Pakistan in terms of the Afghan peace process.

It is possible to conclude, therefore, that it was the breakdown in inter-institutional communications that was responsible for the Salala attack. The Pakistan military believes that excessive and disproportionate force was used and the attack lasted till the last soldier was killed, despite GHQ’s communication with Isaf.

It may be thus fair to presume that behind the worsening US-Pakistani bilateral relations is the differing negotiating style of the representatives of the two countries.

This difference arises out of the different cultural backgrounds of the two nations, the asymmetry of the US-Pakistan relationship and Pakistan’s assumption that the US will leave it to pick up the pieces after its own strategic purpose is fulfilled.

A recent review regarding the negotiating style of the two nations, Howard and Terresta Schaffer’s How Pakistan Negotiates with the United States, throws light on this complex world where national, cultural and realpolitik concerns coincide.

Some of their important findings regarding the stance of Pakistani military officers in this matter are: Pakistanis insist that they will not be dictated to by India or the US, yet at the same time demand top-of-the line US military equipment; US civilian negotiators know nothing of military matters; Pakistanis begin negotiations, blame the army’s problems on the US and make their American counterparts feel guilty about Pakistan’s difficulties.

The authors: “When [Pakistani] military officers are leading the government, they also play hardball, insisting that unless all their demands are met disaster of one sort or another will follow.” US officials observed that the ISI routinely deceived them, and this led the CIA to develop independent links with the Afghan insurgents. Furthermore, “US negotiators should expect that inconvenient truths will be kept from them”, according to the researchers.

It is thus clear that the asymmetric relationship, differing styles of negotiation and divergent strategic goals in Afghanistan has caused the US-Pakistan alliance to become dysfunctional. It would be correct to conclude that most of the divergence comes from different outcomes expected in Afghanistan after 2014.

Pakistan would like to have in place an Afghan government that is soft towards Pakistan, is Pakhtun-dominated and keeps India marginalised. The US, on the other hand, would want an effective Afghan government that rules the country well and has a strong counterterrorism capacity. The US is not committed to bringing in a Pakhtun-dominated government or one that is pro-Pakistan.

Thus, besides the strategic divergence that exists between the US and Pakistan, there is also now a severe trust deficit in terms of statement by Pakistan, particularly after the discovery of Bin Laden and the denial of our alleged role in other occurrences inside Afghanistan. That this relationship is unravelling at this critical juncture as far as Afghanistan is concerned is unfortunate.

Although the Pakistani security narrative does not perhaps agree with this view — neither did I, till some time ago — the metrics in Afghanistan don’t look too bad from the US perspective.

The surge approved by President Obama in 2009 and the night operations against the Taliban ordered by Gen McChrystal and Gen Petraeus have successfully eliminated many of the Taliban mid-level commanders and have forced the top Taliban leadership to accept negotiations in Qatar.

However, as the last chapter of the Afghan war unfolds with the spring offensive in the eastern districts alongside Fata, it will cause Pakistan more headaches. It could result in cross-border incursions by Isaf. Ending hostilities is often more difficult than starting a war. This is yet another reason to resolve the crisis between the two nations.

Khalid Aziz is the chairman of the Regional Institute of Policy Research and Training (RIPORT), based in Peshawar, Pakistan.

The feudal mindset is conditioned to accept defeat militarily, never in sports and/or politics. The sportsmen’s spirit rhetoric that the British endlessly spout is just that, rhetoric. Casting aspersions of the nasty kind after being “Aj-mauled” and “Rah-mmed” was certainly not cricket. Two of Pakistan’s world-best young fast bowlers were successfully framed for “spot-fixing,” and subsequent humiliation at the hands of our spinners four times in a row must be frustrating and painful.

During the traditional “Pakistan Lunch” at the World Economic Forum (WEF) Annual Summit 2012 at Davos two days earlier Imran Khan was emphatic about cricket: “We will win.” He confidently predicted a similar sweep in politics for Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) in the next elections. Nearly 250 WEF participants crammed “Lounge East” of the “Steigenberger Belvedere” to hear Imran Khan in his element. 

In sharp contrast Prime Minister Gilani was being his usual bland-faced evasive self across town. Except for Jahangir Tareen, none of the speakers preceding Imran Khan in presenting the positives in Pakistan that the world is deaf, dumb and blind to, belonged to the PTI. Tareen was very impressive and eloquent about the necessity of good governance to really tap Pakistan’s potential. The speakers provided Imran the perfect platform to expound upon his vision despite the country being plagued by perennial bad governance complicated by the “war on terror.” 

Industrial tycoon Husain Dawood spoke about massive opportunities in business and industry, banking titan Zakar Mahmood eloquently laid out the amazing stability in our banking and finance industry while public health expert Dr Sania Nishtar was articulate about possible reforms in Pakistan. No words can really describe Dubai-based expatriate Yum International and “Mera Passion Pakistan’s” Irfan Mustafa doing what he is best at besides his job, being passionate about Pakistan!

One is indeed fortunate to have witnessed the charisma that Ms Benazir Bhutto exuded at the WEF in 1994. Another Pakistani’s charisma was on display 18 years later to the day. Davos-ians are a hard-bitten lot, the heads of state and/or government, academics, business and industry potentates, media giants, political figures, etc., are no gullible pushovers. Well received at Davos in January 2011, Imran Khan at his brilliant best in 2012. The instant feedback from virtually a world’s “who’s who” was elevating, despite our current problems force-multiplied by adverse and motivated media vibes, the message of Pakistan’s rising political phenomenon radiated hope. 

With entire groups of political activists at every layer, from the PPP to the PML-N, joining at the grassroots level, Imran Khan will sweep any free and fair elections as he confidently predicts, a management team for transition into good governance will be much harder to craft. The ANP and the PML-Q are in virtual disarray, and their cadres are defecting wholesale to PTI. When so many expectations are placed by so many on one human being alone, the danger is that while political weaknesses can be overcome, human failings can be exploited by friend and foe alike for their own selfish interests.

One cannot discount the tremendous contribution made by the Rangers in Karachi. By instilling a modicum of political stability with active help from the intelligence agencies, they have raised aspirations for massive economic emancipation. Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and fellow justices in the Supreme Court deserve the ultimate kudos. The law enforcement agencies got the judicial cover badly needed to enforce the rule of law that the government intentionally and criminally abdicated to protect their “target killers.” Time to replicate the “Karachi Model” for Pakistan?

Finance Minister Dr Abdul Hafeez Shaikh (on John Defterios’ CNN Debate about Emerging Markets) and Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar (on the South Asia panel with Young Global Leaders, YGL, and Imran Khan) did extremely well. Khar politely fobbed off Imran Khan’s public offer to her to emulate three other former Foreign Ministers Shah Mehmood Qureshi, Khurshid Kasuri and Sardar Assef Ali and join the PTI. What political party or leaning any Pakistani who comes to Davos belongs to does not matter, that he (or she) represents the country in good light is all that counts.

My fellow panellists in the “Global Security Context” Session were Richard Haas of the Council of Foreign Relations, John Chipman of the IISS, Yan Xuetong of China’s Tsinghua University and Moon Chung-In of Korea’s Yonsei University. William T Davell’s WEF Summary reflected my views. “The US withdrawal from Afghanistan promises to be troubling for Pakistan, which currently hosts three million refugees. The Afghan army is likely to collapse if the US stops footing the bill. With troubled relations with the US falling below the level of a partnership or alliance, Pakistan can be expected to rely more heavily on China for help, although the Chinese are making it clear they do not want to become involved militarily.” 

Pakistan has been receiving economic help for decades, even when the Chinese could not really afford to give it. The ongoing joint production of modern fighter aircraft and tanks is a credible military reality for which one must commend all previous governments, Nawaz Sharif’s, Benazir Bhutto’s Musharraf’s. 

Richard Haas could not resist taking a pot shot at Pakistan’s “agenda.” Every country has an agenda about its core interests. Anybody who claims otherwise is a hypocrite. Our “agenda” is real: the three million refugees on our soil and the long difficult border we share with Afghanistan. The US can walk away at will whenever they are militarily and/or economically and/or emotionally exhausted and the US public cannot bear further loss of US lives fighting a war with no crucial interest or strategic meaning for the US. 

To quote then Senator Barack Obama in an anti-war rally in Chicago in 2002, “I am not opposed to wars, I am opposed to a dumb war.” A decade later his presidency is bogged down trying to extricate the US military with honour from a really dumb war. The US can still “declare victory and go home,” but Pakistan does not have the luxury of walking away, we will have to cope with the bloody aftermath and clear their mess like we have done previously.

“Experts” in different sectors from all over the world confidently give diverse predictions every year at Davos of what is likely to happen in the future. Why is it that they are mostly wrong? One was witness in Davos on the first day of the “Arab Spring” in Egypt in January 2011 coinciding with Muammar Gadhafi’s son Saif al-Islam being contemptuously dismissive of the movement as being of no real significance. Before the year was out Saif’s father was dead, captured on the run he himself has an uncertain future awaiting trial for atrocities committed on the people. Destiny is unforgiving when the masses are aroused. You can run with your money, you cannot hide!

Our land reforms being a total farce, the feudal mindset inherited from the British is alive and well in Pakistan, camouflaged under the garb of a democracy it allows our rulers to run riot. What does destiny have in store for Pakistan and our corrupt leaders? Constitution or no Constitution, the equation is simple: either they go or the nation does!

In a speech on U.S. foreign policy in October 2011, Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney outlined an aggressive agenda for American leadership in the world. “In an American century, America has the strongest economy and the strongest military in the world. If you do not want America to be the strongest nation on Earth, I am not your president. You have that president today.” Like Mitt Romney, many pundits lament the diminishing influence of the United States in the world. In international politics, influence is linked directly to power, the sum of components such as the threat of force, economic magnitude, cultural vibrancy and effective diplomacy. In the case of the United States, however, influence in international politics is especially dependent on military operations.

Neither trade nor traditional diplomacy explains U.S. influence over foreign governments. China is the second-biggest trading partner of the United States, yet its influence over China is relatively small. The United States entertains its biggest diplomatic mission in Iraq, more than sixteen thousand strong, yet it fails to influence Prime Minister Maliki’s sectarian politics. That leaves only the military to act as both stick and carrot. U.S influence is strongest in countries that actively need military support—and Washington will increasingly have trouble gaining leverage in countries with little or no need of U.S. military assistance. A prosperous Western-style democracy facing no direct threats and not interested in joining interventions “in search of monsters to destroy” has little use for the superpower’s militarized diplomacy.

Consider the small West European republic of Austria. Bella gerant alii, tu, felix Austria, nube! “Let others wage war, you, fortunate Austria, be content to marry!” goes the fifteenth-century maxim by Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus, who mocked the Austrian Hapsburgs on their path to European ascendancy. Substitute the word “marry” with “invest” in King Corvinus’s statement, and you have Austria’s unofficial foreign-policy doctrine. Almost 72 percent of Austrian trade is with other EU countries. Fifty percent of Austria's foreign direct investment is concentrated in Europe. Austria does not care about much more. The United States is only Austria's sixth-largest trading partner worldwide, and it is outside Austria’s economic interests and strategic calculations. Austria never hosted U.S. bases or joined NATO. With the incentive for military cooperation gone and no fear of U.S. intervention in Austria, how do U.S. policy makers fare in influencing little Austria?

As cables from the U.S. embassy reveal, the United States has little to no influence on Austrian policies. For example, Austria rebuked a proposal to expand participation in the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) from two to a larger number. The January 2009 cable reads: “On Afghanistan, ISAF's UN mandate has still not overcome Austrian resistance to anything more than a symbolic presence or prevented some politicians from characterizing the fight as an ‘American war.’” Austria refused to accept any former Guantanamo detainees.

Austrians do not hesitate to do business with America’s declared enemies. The Austrian Bank Creditanstalt was involved in financial transactions supporting the Iranian nuclear program and has business ties with North Korea, according to Der Spiegel. The Austrian Raiffeisenbank also entertains transactions with Iran despite numerous protests by the U.S. embassy in Vienna. "In recent years, our leverage over Austrian policy has been extremely limited by the reality that there were very few things Vienna wanted from Washington, "emphasizes the cable. None of this should come as a surprise. With declining military influence and the ongoing economic crisis, the United States increasingly has less to offer the developed world.

The United States fares a little (but not much) better with Austria’s neighbor, Switzerland. According to the former U.S. Ambassador to Switzerland, the country is “a very successful but frequently frustrating alpine democracy”. In 2007, Switzerland ended its four-year cooperation with the ISAF in Afghanistan, recalling its military personnel. Due to Switzerland’s armed neutrality, it never relied heavily on U.S. military assistance during the Cold War and built a formidable citizen army by itself. The result is limited bilateral diplomatic contact. (The exception would be U.S.-Iran policy where Switzerland acts as the U.S. representative in Tehran.) The United States wants more active engagement in counterterrorism activities, particularly on the bank-secrecy laws of the Swiss Federation. But despite the fact that the United States is the largest outside investor in Switzerland and the largest destination for Swiss foreign investment, Swiss officials apparently see little incentive to cooperate.

Two other prospering European democracies, Sweden and Finland, are somewhat different cases, maintaining ties to the U.S. military. Since March 2006, Sweden has led a Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) of the ISAF in Afghanistan, with five hundred troops deployed in Mazar-e-Sharif. There are 195 Finnish soldiers who are also part of the Swedish-led PRT. Finnish-U.S. relations have been characterized by both nations as “warm.” Indeed, it was revealed recently that Finland and the United States shared military intelligence during the Cold War. Close military ties persist, and the Finnish Foreign Ministry emphasizes that “U.S.’s commitments to Europe through NATO . . . are of central importance for Europe's stability.”

U.S.-Swedish military relations during the Cold War also were much deeper than previously thought. A researcher at the Swedish National Defence College concluded that the “U.S. saw Sweden as the guardian of the Western world in northern Europe.” The United States subsidized the Swedish military-aircraft industry, including the Saab 37 Viggen, with a strong Swedish air force seen as a deterrent to Soviet aggression. Sweden also participated in the NATO-led mission in Libya, and the Swedish defense industry still enjoys close ties with its American counterparts.

As a result of stronger military ties, Finnish and Swedish policies have been more accommodating to U.S. demands than the Swiss and especially the Austrian hands-off approach. There is virtually no reason for a small Western democracy to deploy troops to Afghanistan unless it desires better relations with the United States.

Has militarized diplomacy become the norm in the conduct of U.S. foreign policy? Such an approach distorts assessments of U.S. influence and obscures the national interest. Short of historic military ties, there is now little the United States can do to influence small Western democracies at the heart of Europe. As military budgets decline, Washington may find itself more isolated than it might have imagined. Threats toward Iran and North Korea are the waning echoes of America’s post-9/11 buildup. Mitt Romney’s “American Century” may be a century too late.

Franz-Stefan Gady is an associate at the EastWest Institute.