(NSI News Source Info) WASHINGTON - April 6, 2009: In its new strategy for the Pak-Afghan region, the US administration seems to have undertaken an ambitious plan for Pakistan which entails political restructuring as well as changing perceptions. 
The restructuring involves bringing the ISI effectively under civilian control. To achieve the other goal, the Americans are seeking to change Pakistan’s perception of India as an enemy.
The restructuring involves bringing the ISI effectively, and not just technically, under civilian control. To achieve the other goal, the Americans are seeking to change Pakistan’s perception of India as an enemy.
As a replacement, they are offering a new enemy: the militants operating along the Pak-Afghan border.
Since March 27, when President Barack Obama unveiled the new US strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, a number of US officials — including at least three senior generals — have publicly acknowledged seeking to change both the ISI and Pakistan’s perception of India.
Pakistan’s former ambassador to the US and the UK, Dr Maleeha Lodhi, currently visiting North America on a lecture tour, pointed out that recent statements by US officials blaming the ISI for backing the militants were ‘unprecedented’.
‘Such complaints are dealt with in private meetings, not in the media,’ she said.
But the first indication that the Americans, as well as some of their Pakistani allies, want to go public with their complaints against the ISI came in July when Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani visited Washington. During the visit, his adviser for interior affairs, Rahman Malik, surprised the media by saying that the Americans wanted them to take on the ISI.
Just before the visit, the Gilani government made a move to bring the ISI under Mr Malik but had to withdraw after a hostile reaction both in the media and by the defence establishment.
Other observers noted that the move was causing new political alignments in Pakistan. Two important political figures, Prime Minister Gilani and Nawaz Sharif, are openly defending the ISI while President Asif Ali Zardari and those close to him appear to be weighing their options.
Diplomatic observers in Washington say that at least some elements in the current Pakistani government are quietly watching if the Americans are only interested in severing the agency’s alleged ties to the militants or would help them reduce ISI’s domestic influence as well. If they are assured that the Americans can also help reduce the agency’s influence in domestic politics, they will support the American move,” one such observer said.
The observers pointed out that in the last week of March President Zardari had a secret meeting in Dubai with US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke. Pakistan’s Ambassador to the US Hussain Haqqani and the US Ambassador in the UAE Richard G. Olson Jr also attended this meeting.
While the contents of the meeting were never made public, the observers believe that sensitive issues like the ISI’s alleged links to the militants must have been discussed.
The US complaints, however, are not confined to the ISI. Lisa Curtis, a senior scholar attached with a Washington think-tank, the Heritage Foundation, recently wrote that the Americans had complaints against other senior officials of the Pakistani military as well.
‘Last spring … US intelligence agencies apparently intercepted messages in which Pakistani army chief General Kayani referred to Afghan militant commander Jalaluddin Haqqani as a ‘strategic asset,’ she wrote.
Observers believe that the current American ‘pressure tactics’ is meant only to convince Pakistan not to retain its links to the militants. So, there is no desire to reconfigure Washington’s relations with the Pakistani military.
The restructuring involves bringing the ISI effectively under civilian control. To achieve the other goal, the Americans are seeking to change Pakistan’s perception of India as an enemy.
The restructuring involves bringing the ISI effectively, and not just technically, under civilian control. To achieve the other goal, the Americans are seeking to change Pakistan’s perception of India as an enemy.
As a replacement, they are offering a new enemy: the militants operating along the Pak-Afghan border.
Since March 27, when President Barack Obama unveiled the new US strategy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, a number of US officials — including at least three senior generals — have publicly acknowledged seeking to change both the ISI and Pakistan’s perception of India.
Pakistan’s former ambassador to the US and the UK, Dr Maleeha Lodhi, currently visiting North America on a lecture tour, pointed out that recent statements by US officials blaming the ISI for backing the militants were ‘unprecedented’.
‘Such complaints are dealt with in private meetings, not in the media,’ she said.
But the first indication that the Americans, as well as some of their Pakistani allies, want to go public with their complaints against the ISI came in July when Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani visited Washington. During the visit, his adviser for interior affairs, Rahman Malik, surprised the media by saying that the Americans wanted them to take on the ISI.
Just before the visit, the Gilani government made a move to bring the ISI under Mr Malik but had to withdraw after a hostile reaction both in the media and by the defence establishment.
Other observers noted that the move was causing new political alignments in Pakistan. Two important political figures, Prime Minister Gilani and Nawaz Sharif, are openly defending the ISI while President Asif Ali Zardari and those close to him appear to be weighing their options.
Diplomatic observers in Washington say that at least some elements in the current Pakistani government are quietly watching if the Americans are only interested in severing the agency’s alleged ties to the militants or would help them reduce ISI’s domestic influence as well. If they are assured that the Americans can also help reduce the agency’s influence in domestic politics, they will support the American move,” one such observer said.
The observers pointed out that in the last week of March President Zardari had a secret meeting in Dubai with US special envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke. Pakistan’s Ambassador to the US Hussain Haqqani and the US Ambassador in the UAE Richard G. Olson Jr also attended this meeting.
While the contents of the meeting were never made public, the observers believe that sensitive issues like the ISI’s alleged links to the militants must have been discussed.
The US complaints, however, are not confined to the ISI. Lisa Curtis, a senior scholar attached with a Washington think-tank, the Heritage Foundation, recently wrote that the Americans had complaints against other senior officials of the Pakistani military as well.
‘Last spring … US intelligence agencies apparently intercepted messages in which Pakistani army chief General Kayani referred to Afghan militant commander Jalaluddin Haqqani as a ‘strategic asset,’ she wrote.
Observers believe that the current American ‘pressure tactics’ is meant only to convince Pakistan not to retain its links to the militants. So, there is no desire to reconfigure Washington’s relations with the Pakistani military.
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