SIX REASONS WHY PAKISTAN WANTS TO SEE THE KARZAI GOVERNMENT IN AFGHANISTAN FAIL AND BE REPLACED BY THE TALIBAN

The news from Iraq continues to be bad.

But because of our pre-occupation with Iraq, if we take our eye off the ball in Afghanistan, we may be in for a nasty surprise .

Make no mistake, just as Iran has a hand behind the insurgency in Iraq, Pakistan has a hand behind the revival of the Taliban in Afghanistan.

What we need to understand and don’t seem to, is that America and Pakistan have a conflict of interest in Afghanistan.

President Hamid Karzai has tried repeatedly to draw attention to this matter, but rather than paying attention to what President Karzai is saying, the Bush administration has chosen to muzzle him so as not to embarrass Parvez Musharraf, whom Washington erroneously perceive as a friend.

When General Musharraf turned his back on the Taliban, after the 9/11attack on the World Trade Center in 2001, it was neither because the Taliban ran the most brutal regime in Afghanistan, nor because they harbored terrorists like Osama bin Laden .

Musharraf turned his back on the Taliban because Richard Armitage, the U.S. Under Secretary of State, put a gun to his head and threatened to bomb him if he did not stop backing the Taliban.

The Pakistani President, according to his own confession, decided to do what Armitage asked him to do because he felt that to defy America would bring more trouble to his Country than he could handle. But to confuse that tactical move on the part of Gen. Musharraf with a change of heart would be a mistake.

It would be useful to remember that the reasons for which Pakistan first created the Taliban and then helped them gain power in Kabul by defeating the Northern Alliance ten years ago, are still valid. There is ample evidence to show that Musharraf is presently engaged in making a serious attempt to mend fences with the Taliban and to revive them.

His recent agreement with pro-Taliban tribal leaders in Waziristan is a case in point. Despite Musharraf’s claims to the contrary, incidence of Taliban attacks on coalition forces in Afghanistan has increased dramatically since the agreement.

Every time Musharraf feels pressure from Washington in this matter he catches a couple of Al Qaeda operatives, of which he has ample supply, and hands them over to the U.S., and he is home free for another six months or so or until he is caught again with his hand in the cookie jar. The extent of his action against the Taliban is in direct proportion to the pressure he feels from Washington.

Musharraf even bombarded a terrorist training camp in Waziristan recently because Karzai was complaining too much and he needed to do something dramatic to ease the pressure on him.

Here are six reasons why the Taliban’s success in Afghanistan is vital to Pakistan’s national interest .

1. With a powerful and hostile neighbor like India on its Eastern border, Pakistan desperately needs a friendly regime on its Western front. It cannot afford to have unfriendly neighbors on both sides; and, who can be friendlier to Pakistan than the Taliban who are Pakistan’s own creation. "Our boys," is how the Pakistani generals describe the Taliban.

2. Since its very inception, Pakistan has been obsessed with the complex that the Country lacks "strategic depth " i.e, in case of an armed conflict with India, Pakistan has nowhere to retreat and re-group, if it needs to. But with the Taliban in power in Afghanistan, Islamabad can sleep easy. When the Taliban first took power in Kabul, the Pakistanis called Afghanistan ‘the fifth province of Pakistan.’

3. A friendly regime in Afghanistan would open a very profitable trade route for Pakistan to Central Asia; besides many of the countries of Central Asia have a sizable Muslim population and that fits into Musharraf’s dream of creating a Pan-Islamic block..

4. A Taliban regime in Afghanistan had ensured for Pakistan a constant supply of trained terrorists for its proxy war with India in Kashmir. In fact, for many years Al Qaeda ran a special training camp for Pakistan at Khost in Afghanistan. With the fall of the Taliban that source dried up.

5.The Karzai government contains strong elements of Northern Alliance who helped the U.S. oust the Taliban from power and who are friendly to India. This situation is intolerable for Pakistan. If the Taliban come back in power, that would assure Islamabad of complete eradication of Indian influence from Afghanistan.

6. Since its very birth, the Pak-Afghan border has been an open sore because no Afghan government to this date has ever recognized the Durand Line, which divides the two countries.

This line runs right through Pashtun heartland and was drawn by the British in 1893, when they ruled India. Successive governments in Afghanistan have refused to recognize or ratify that line. A Taliban government in Kabul is Islamabad’s last and only hope in this matter of vital importance to Pakistan.

.

The bottom line is that Musharraf perceives Karzai as a thorn in his side and an obstacle to realizing his goals and is trying to do whatever he can to destabilize Afghanistan so that the Taliban can regain control of Kabul. Can Washington afford to let him do this ?