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American military action against terrorist bases exposes Pakistani bluster

A frequently aired piece of government propaganda on state-controlled television shows Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharief brandishing an open palm, and proclaiming that as a nuclear power, Pakistan will not toady to anyone.

''We would never allow our airspace to be violated,'' he declares.

Sharief's government denies that Pakistani airspace was used to launch the US attacks against ''terrorist bases'' in Taliban- controlled parts of neighbouring Afghanistan last week, in retaliation for the bombings of American embassies in East Africa this month.

Official sources have admitted that Pakistan's airspace had indeed been violated. But on the question of whether Islamabad gave permission, there has only been speculation, denied by officials.

To his critics just the same, Sharief's bluster is as unconvincing as his belief that possessing nuclear weapons is enough to obtain a bargaining position for this floundering South Asian nation.

The prime minister had to take a tough position, treading the line between its nurturing of the Taliban and wariness toward angering militant Islamist groups at home, and a desire to avoid further alienating the US and the West.

The Taliban has said it is providing security to Osama bin Laden, a Saudi-born millionaire that the US says was behind the embassy attacks.

Pakistan is already hard put to deal with multiple economic, social and political problems, and can ill-afford worsening already tenuous ties with its long-time ally America in the wake of its May nuclear tests. Not least, Pakistan needs US backing to prevent a default on its $ 30 billion foreign debt.

Just the same, all of its woes are likely to be compounded by fallout from the US missile attacks last week.

The US has predictably earned widespread condemnation in Pakistan for its strikes against what US President Bill Clinton called ''one of the most active terrorist bases in the world''.

But political analysts say Pakistan is as much to blame as the US for nurturing Islamic militants over the last couple of decades, when they were needed for the so-called jihad or holy war in Afghanistan against Soviet forces.

The militants, strengthened with weaponry, arsenal and financial assistance from the US, and training and other support from Pakistan during the Afghan war, are now trying to bite the very hands that fed them.

''The US walked away from its moral responsibilities in Afghanistan as soon as its own strategic objective of driving the Russians out of that country was achieved, at a horrific cost to Afghan lives,'' said former foreign secretary Tanvir Ahmed Khan.

''Washington has put moderate Muslim governments and liberal Muslims all over the world in a quandary, rather than the extremists,'' he added.

Dr Samina Ahmed, a strategic studies researcher based in Islamabad, calls this the ''hour of reckoning'' for Pakistan.

''The US attacks revealed a disturbing fact from Pakistan's point of view, considering the large number of Pakistani citizens being trained at guerrilla bases patronised by the Saudi dissident millionaire (bin Laden),'' she said.

She cited reports that one Pakistan trainee said he was engaged in ''religious studies'' at a camp in Khost when the attack took place.

''The fact that students were being trained in bin Laden's camp to use explosives against targets is sufficient evidence of the nature of the education imparted at such guerrilla bases across Pakistan's porous border with Afghanistan,'' she added.

But ''the use of terror as an instrument to attain political goals'' is an issue deliberately ignored by Pakistani religious leaders and organisations in their vociferous demonstrations against the US air strikes, Ahmed noted.

''If the US is obsessed with bin Laden as 'enemy number one', Pakistani authorities should also rethink their reaction to the activities carried out under his patronage in Afghan territory controlled by their Taliban allies,'' Ahmed said.

''If Pakistan continues to turn a blind eye to the presence of its own nationals in Afghan training camps, dangers to our own internal security will increase,'' she explained.

Pakistan's internal security is already threatened, not just by Pakistanis being trained in Afghan camps, but also in camps set up by religious organisations along sectarian lines.

These trained militants from one religious sect or the other are believed to be behind such a long list of terrorist acts, mostly in retaliation against members of rival sects.

Last year, five people were massacred at the Iran Cultural Centre in the southern Punjab (in Pakistan) town of Multan on February 20, three weeks after a bomb ripped through a sessions court at Lahore, killing 29 people including the head of a militant Sunni party.

Analysts warn that Pakistan's own sectarian fabric may be affected by anti-American and anti-Western sentiments that the missile attacks are unleashing.

But former army captain and political linguist, Dr Tariq Rehman, believes that US attempts and methods of stopping terrorism are bound to backfire.

Its actions are contributing to dangerous levels in anti- American sentiment that are disastrous not only to ordinary Americans but also in Pakistan, where the ''small, liberal elite that serves as a bridge between the west and civil society here is already under tremendous pressure'', he said.

He says if the US wants security, it should begin with confidence-building measures like ensuring that the Palestinians get their state and Israel allows Arabs to live peacefully, helping create peace in Kashmir, and making efforts to redistribute wealth.

''Throwing bombs at terrorists, even proven terrorists, will only create hatred against the US, militant actions will only strengthen the extremists. The United States should try peace instead of war,'' Rehman contended.

He also says Islamabad cannot afford to be seen as less than co-operative by Washington. ''If the Pakistani government is seen to be unfriendly by the US, they will not help us financially,'' he said bluntly.

''And at this stage, this would be disastrous. But if the government is seen as being friendly to the US, it will have to face the combined wrath of the Taliban, as well as the extremist, volatile parties at home. In either case, fundamentalism will rise in Pakistan,'' he explained.

UNI

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