Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar, speaking at the Council of Foreign Relations, New York, on Wednesday, criticised the US plan for the transfer of military command to Afghan security forces by the end of 2014 on the ground that the Pak-Afghan border had become “less well managed”. Probably, she had an increased risk of terrorist raids into Pakistan’s tribal region in mind. She was of the view that the Americans were withdrawing troops before they had accomplished the job for which they had set out. It was, therefore, necessary for Washington to determine whether they had achieved the desired goal. She said that one purpose of sending troops to Afghanistan was to “reduce the ideological space” for militancy; instead, in the case of Pakistan it has increased exponentially. From one terrorist attack before 9/11, the Foreign Minister told the audience, suicide bombers, only in the past two to three years, had struck Pakistan over 300 times, causing a massive loss of 30,000 civilian lives. While Ms Hina Khar did not indicate when she thought would be the right time for the US forces to leave, she felt that they were being taken out of Afghanistan because the Americans were determined to do so and not because they had achieved a set of minimal objectives. She was looking for a “responsible transition” in keeping with ground realities.
It seems the Pakistan government has not given sufficient thought to the dreadful consequences of a prolonged foreign presence in the next door western neighbour, where the people have been known throughout history to be fiercely opposed to an outsider trying to meddle in their internal affairs. Even the major drawdown that is on the cards is not enough for their liking. We should be welcoming the US departure and urging Washington for a full and complete withdrawal as soon as possible; for any military bases, whether large or small, would keep the country in turmoil. The US stay would continue to provoke the Afghans to react in the form of guerrilla attacks and that would keep the country unstable, providing the Americans a viable excuse to stay. And it needs little reasoning to realise that it would have an adverse spillover effect on Pakistan. The reality that the militant groups have pointed out several times is that their grievance against Islamabad is facilitating Nato's prolonged stay in Afganistan. Now that a drawdown is on the cards, Pakistan should be claiming some relief as well.
The argument that the departure of US forces from the scene would result in an intra-Afghan conflict like the one Afghanistan experienced after the Soviet exit is not without merit. But on this assumption there would never be a good time for foreign troops to get out. Let the Afghans decide between themselves whether through a process of negotiations and reconciliation, as some Taliban leaders have said, or through conflict. They would ultimately succeed in finding an equilibrium.