But when will US act?

The US State Department's annual ‘Country Reports on Terrorism’ is out and, as expected, it has an insipid section on Pakistan (and South Asia in general) that regurgitates old observations. We are told, yet again, that Pakistan did not take any action against groups such as the lashkar-e-Tayyeba, which continues to “operate, train, rally, propagandise, and fundraise” in that country, and that “UN-designated terrorist organisations continued to skirt sanctions by reconstituting themselves under different names”. We are also reminded that parts of “Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Province, and Balochistan Province remained a safe haven for terrorist groups” such as Al Qaeda, the Haqqani Network, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan and the lashkar-e-Jhangvi. The question now, as it has been for years, is: Will the US Government act on this report and make any substantial change in its benevolent policy towards PakistanIJ Will it slash the military aid that it sends to that nationIJ Will it take the Pakistani Government to task for the latter's innumerable transgressions and double-talk on terrorismIJ Will it ask the international community to take a stronger stance against PakistanIJ The answer to all these questions is in the negative. Earlier this year, the US Government proposed a billion-dollar aid to Pakistan. This included a more than six-fold increase in military assistance, from $42.2 million in 2014 to $265 million this year. Additionally, the Obama Administration also proposed more than $143 million specifically for counter-terrorism and non-proliferation efforts. That these monies, especially those earmarked for military purposes, are almost always used to fund subversive campaigns against India, is well-known. It is also public knowledge that funds for counter-terrorism initiatives are wasted, as Pakistan nurtures jihadi networks that work not just against India, but also against Afghanistan. 

In this context, the US Government's take on Pakistan's anti-militancy campaign in Northern Waziristan and the Khyber Agency is interesting. Named Zarb-e-Azb, the campaign was launched in June last year to wipe out terror havens. The report says that, even though terror groups still operate in the region, Zarb-e-Azb has had a “significant impact” on the Pakistani Taliban. Since there is no independent verification of the campaign, how is the US so sureIJ Access to Northern Waziristan and the Khyber Agency, which are parts of Fata, is severely restricted. Forget foreign journalists, even Pakistani locals need special permission to travel there. Fata has always been an information black hole and, for Zarb-e-Azb, the only source of news has been the Pakistani military itself. This is not to say that the campaign is a complete charade — the Pakistani Government has a genuine self-interest in containing at least the Pakistani Taliban which seeks to topple the civilian administration. But the offensive's effectiveness is very much suspect. Not a single senior militant leader has been either killed or captured, for example. In sum, the US Government is willing to take the Pakistani military's word on the so-called success, even though the latter has a record of duplicity which Washington, DC, knows well. let’s see when the US wakes up, if at all.