Explain the Nature and Extent of Pakistan's International Conflict - Essay Example

Pakistans International Conflict between Secularism and Islamic Militancy (How this may or may not influence the insurgency in Afghanistan) Pakistan,a relatively young country, was carved out of the Indian subcontinent in the year 1947, when Britain decided that it was not feasible to sustain its worldwide reign anymore. The Second World War had strained British economy to an extent that it needed to consolidate and rebuild from within and the administration of its colonies was becoming absolutely unsustainable. The strident independence struggle in the Indian sub-continent was too much to bear and Britain was forced to give up the reign to indigenous, majority population. However, the Indian population had its own cultural characteristics with the original Hindu majority interspersed with a large population of Muslims, a remnant of the country’s bygone Mughal era. The Muslim population feared dominance in a vastly Hindu populated region and this fear prompted its leaders to suggest a separate state for the Muslims. The British rulers, who had handled such issues in their two centuries old reign in the region, recognized this factionalism in Indian society and with the perception that the demand was reasonable, acceded to the creation of a separate country for the Muslims. With the Muslim higher intensity of Muslim population in the Northern region of Punjab and the Eastern state of Bengal, it was decided that East and West Pakistan were two entities that would suit the purpose. Accordingly, the Sub-Continent was carved into two states, the independent republic of India and Pakistan, the latter with its two landmasses separated from each other. West Pakistan lay in the north west of the subcontinent with majority population being Punjabis, and East Pakistan at the extreme east of the subcontinent, the majority population being Bengalis. Thus as the very basis of the inception of Pakistan was on the grounds of monotheism, the idea of secularism in the country sounds absurd and this has been demonstrated in the country’s chequered history. The idea of Pakistan soon dwindled into a non performing, military ruled and strife torn country which had to forsake its Eastern province in 1971 due to civil war and unrest leading to the creation of Bangladesh. The remaining Pakistan in the West was the only surviving Muslim dominated region in the Indian sub-continent which has been driven by hatred for its neighbours, India and Afghanistan, rather than being an independent, progressive state as was envisaged by its creators. The country has been through numerous coups, alternating with short periods of a semblance of democracy, the latter being throttled ruthlessly by military rulers through assassinations, murder and mayhem. The Cold War era saw attempts of domination in the region by the then two superpowers, the United States and the former USSR (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics). Afghanistan had its own internal problems and remained occupied by Soviet forces for almost ten years during the Cold War. This prompted the United States to pump in economic and arms aid to Pakistan, which gleefully accepted the alms to fuel its hatred and threat to India. Although claiming to be a Muslim country, the Pakistani rulers did not hesitate to ally with China, an atheist state, taking advantage of its border dispute with India. The United States assisted Pakistan to form the Taliban, a radical Muslim organization, with an aim to cripple the USSR presence in Afghanistan, which it did with some degree of success. However, after designs of the west and internal economic and political unrest forced the dismantling of USSR, it lost interest in Afghanistan. The Taliban was left without any purpose, or the need for its existence as an entity. But the large number of youth who were recruited into the organization rebelled and trained their guns on the very creators of their organization, the United States of America. Muslim radical organizations like the now famous Al Qaida grew from West Asia and expanded into the Muslim world through integration with the Taliban and other such organizations in the world. The rest is history. The killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan proves the connections between such radical organizations and the role Pakistan had played surreptitiously all along the latter half of the twentieth century. It is only now, that the West has recognized the extent of their folly and the threat to humanity, the Muslim dominated terrorist organizations’ hold. Pakistan has thus become a rogue nation besotted with internal conflict, economic stagnation and with no future to look forward to. It is a country at the mercy of the West and at risk of being reduced to a defunct state. The Islamic radical organizations within the country are under a misconception that they can survive by remaining aloof from the international mainstream. The average Pakistani psyche has been shaped by the ethnic profile of its population, the influence of regional politics and the cultural peculiarities existing within the confines of its borders. The current Pakistani population, including its immediate regional states in India, still nurse the scars of the murder and mayhem experienced during partition of the sub-continent in 1947. By rough estimates, between 200,000 to 3,60,000 people, including Hindus, Muslims, Bengalis and Sikhs were massacred during mass transfer of populations’ to respective countries, 10-12 million of them being rendered refugees (Web, PeaceDirect, 2012). Besides the Bangladesh incident in 1971, the country has experienced regional unrest in its South-Western province, Baluchistan, bordering with Iran. A festering civil war continued in the region from 1973 to 1977. Clashes still continue in the region and saw escalations in the years 2004 and 2009. Similar problems have always existed in the Sindh province of Pakistan where the Muslim population which migrated from India has been labelled as ‘Muhajirs’ and despite its success in business and representation in bureaucracy, is considered ‘foreign’ by the local population, giving rise to armed conflicts. Besides this Pakistan continues to be embroiled in a controversy with India about the northern State of Kashmir, with a majority population of Muslims, who chose to stay within the confines of the Indian Republic at partition. Kashmiri population has swayed all along during these years for their inclination either towards Pakistan, or India, although the clamour for an independent Kashmir as a unique entity has always persisted. Nevertheless, both India and Pakistan lay claim to the region and have fought three major wars, in the years 1947-48, 1965, 1971 and more recently, a relatively minor conflict in the Kargil region of Kashmir in 1999 (Web, PeaceDirect, 2012). As if the above conflicts were not enough, Pakistan continues to be at daggers with Afghanistan, despite the latter being a Muslim country, on its northern borders. The bone of contention between the two is the Pashtun territory, with the latter’s residents claiming independence from Pakistan, supported by political activists from Afghanistan. As a result, the former North Western Frontier Province, popular for so long as its abbreviated form, NWFP, had to be renamed Khyber Pakhtunkhwa due to political compulsions (Web, PeaceDirect, 2012). The present Afghanistan regime is weak, besotted with problems of internal rebellion by the Taliban presence, and is being assisted by the West, primarily the United States of America, to root out terrorism from the region. The western forces regularly carry out raids within the borders of Pakistan, as encountered in the recent killing of the dreaded Al Qaida Chief, Osama bin Laden, who despite being a Saudi Arabian, was living in a secretive, safe haven within the confines of Pakistan. During the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan, Pakistan had utilized the opportunity, with American backing, to support the rebellious ‘Jehadis’ or religious fighters in order to weaken the then rulers of Afghanistan (Grare, 2006). This laid the foundation to the continued support since then to the rebels, now collectively labelled as the ‘Taliban’. The present Afghan regime under Hamid Karzai is wary and suspicious of Pakistani elements which they openly claim are being trained, supported and sent as insurgents to create terrorism in Afghanistan as well as India. Afghanistan was the only country which voted against the accession of Pakistan to the United Nations immediately following the latter country’s independence (Grare, 2006). Although Pakistan accuses Afghanistan equally of supporting terrorists in their Waziristan province, the image of Pakistan has suffered serious damage especially after the 9/11 tragedy in the United States, the Mumbai hotel attack in the year 2008 in India, the final nail in the coffin of Pakistan’s self claimed innocence being the slaying of Osama bin Laden within its territory. The stark proximity of Osama’s residence to the military headquarters of Pakistan is a further proof of their complicity in harbouring him. Although recently the Pakistan government has tried to redeem itself in curtailing such activities by banishing the former Al Qaida leader’s family from their country, this was done solely under the threat of further attacks by the United States, in case Pakistan continued to support and harbour terrorist organizations’ within its borders. The present Afghanistan government which has been recognized by the United States of America as an ally to the war against the Taliban and terrorism in the region has added further woes to the already ailing Pakistan regime (Grare, 2006). Some scholars believe that the present crisis-laden state of relations between Pakistan and Afghanistan have historical antecedents, going back to the turmoil in the region for supremacy between the former British rulers in India & the Russians, the unique geographical location of the region where interests of the major global powers in the latter half of the Twentieth Century intersected and an imposition of external hegemonic agenda on the region (Siddiqi, 2008). The Anglo-Afghan war led to the demarcation of afghan territory by the Durand line, which the present government does not agree with, because it was imposed by former British colonizers of the sub-continent (Grare, 2006). Skirmishes along the Afghan-Pakistan border have therefore continued despite counter claims by both nations regarding the identity of the perpetrators. Pakistan in its present state harbours a collection of people divided in political belief and trust. Those educated in the West are moderate and believe that the state can exist as an independent, secular democratic state while the radicals believe that ‘Sharia’ should be enforced in the region, the latter being the only recourse to social ills present in the country. ‘Sharia’ is a system of religious doctrine wherein the Islamic laws described in the Quran prevail (Johnson, 2010). The temporary democratic governments in Pakistan, such as the one that exists now under Prime Minister however, are more in tune with the western ideas of democracy and secularism. Some learned Muslim scholars believe that secularism in itself is viewed and comprehended under the Christian perspective, which sought to separate religion from the socio-political fabric while framing the word, which makes it difficult to incorporate its actual meaning into an Islamic model (Mahmood, 2006). Pakistan’s history however shows that for majority of the period it has thrived under military regimes and democratic governments have been short-lived. Pakistan now faces a unique dilemma, as it is being distanced by Western powers, with America threatening to withhold previously promised financial and military support, the immediate neighbours India and Afghanistan clamouring for the country to be declared a terrorist state, and the utter failure of its economy. Only time will tell, how Pakistan manages to survive in a world besotted by its own troubles enforced by the current recessionary trends worldwide. References Grare, F., 2006, Pakistan-Afghanistan relations in the Post-9/11 Era, South Asia Project, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Carnegie Paper No. 72, pp. 1-24, Accessed May 7, 2012 at: http://carnegieendowment.org/files/cp72_grare_final.pdf Johnson, T. (2010)."Sharia and Militancy", Retrieved May 7, 2012 at: http://www.cfr.org/religion-and-politics/sharia-militancy/p19155 Mahmood, S. (2006). Secularism, Hermeneutics, and Empire: The Politics of Islamic Reformation, Public Culture, Vol. 18(2), pp. 323-347, Retrieved May 7, 2012 at: http://iiss.berkeley.edu/files/2011/06/mahmood.secularism.pdf Pakistan: Conflict Profile, Accessed May 7, 2012 at: http://www.insightonconflict.org/conflicts/pakistan/conflict-profile/?gclid=CMiQiq3k668CFcsa6wodmArwzg Siddiqi, S. (2008). Afghanistan‐Pakistan Relations: History and Geopolitics in a Regional and International Context, Implications for Canadian Foreign Policy, pp. 1-55, Accessed May 7, 2012 online at: http://gordonfoundation.ca/sites/default/files/images/siddiqi_final%20report.pdf Read More