Pakistan in State of Delusion with its Strategic Assets Taliban

Policy Makers of Pakistan. 

Pakistan False History taught in Schools and false Notions of Islamic Nationalism created via a false Ideology of Pakistan , that are created by a Few Incompetent bureaucrats and Generals in Pakistan Army from Punjab .

who themselves are sons of Hindu Punjabi Sikhs but fail to Acknowledge it as they call themselves sons of Arabs as Mian and Syeds , Abbasis, and Qureshi linking them with Arab Pedigree is root of Problem for Pakistan.

it is Presenting Punjabi nationalism as Islamic Nationalism to Rest of Pakistan. 

They use the Taliban and Islamic Parties like Jammat Islami , JUI and all these lashkars and Jaishes Militants as their Ideological Guardians and also Guardians of Pakistan State and its Objectives like " Strategic Depth, to conquer the Central Asia and Afghanistan for Making it Mini Super Power with Nuclear Power .

While the world thinks Pakistan as Trouble Maker of the World as Pariah State , with No control over Taliban  which it Made in Pakistan, although they Kill in Pakhtunkhwa , Baluchistan , Sindh and FATA only Leaving the Punjab as its safety Zone where there families reside cosily with All Goodies of Earth Provided to them and their families .  

by Mr. Husain Haqqani

The murder by the Taliban of more than 130 schoolchildren in Peshawar on December 16 has stunned Pakistan, and indeed the world. But the incident marks only an escalation in the brutality of jihadis, not its beginning. Over the years, Pakistan’s homegrown terrorists have bombed Shia and Ahmadi mosques, Sunni shrines, Christian churches and Hindu temples. Over a thousand attacks on schools by the Taliban have been reported since 2009, mainly in the northwestern Pakhtunkhwa province. Jihadi targets over the years have included localISI offices in several cities, naval and air force bases in Karachi and Kamra, the Karachi International Airport and even the army’s General Headquarters. If the breadth of attrition has not cured Pakistan’s jihadi addiction, would the death of innocent children and the burning alive of their teachers in a Peshawar school result in a fundamental change of heart?

Soon after the Peshawar carnage, Maulana Abdul Aziz of the infamous Islamabad Lal Masjid, or Red Mosque, refused to condemn the Taliban’s action, indicating the stubbornness of the jihadi worldview. Taliban apologist Imran Khan parsed his words to condemn the act but not its perpetrators by name. Another Pakistani establishment favourite, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed of Lashkar-e-Toiba/Jamaat-ud-Dawa, went on television to blame India for the Taliban’s school attack and vowed revenge inside India.

Taliban Assets of Pakistan Mullah Military Alliance 

The roots of Pakistan’s jihadism lie in its establishment’s obsession with India, which goes back to partition, the twonation theory and the fear that powerful forces want the dismemberment of Pakistan. The break-up of Pakistan in 1971, and the emergence of an independent Bangladesh in erstwhile East Pakistan, has reinforced national paranoia instead of convincing the country’s Punjabi elite of the need to come to terms with Pakistan’s size and power and finding security within the parameters of reality.

Pakistan’s constructed identity emphasises religion and ideology at the expense of ethnic, linguistic and sectarian diversity of a complex society. As a result, the country’s approach to national security has been driven by ideological rather than pragmatic considerations. Although Pakistan’s military and civil bureaucracy both originated from institutions created under the British, their approach and attitudes have progressively been driven more by the ‘ideology of Pakistan’ than the professionalism that they often project to outsiders.

The relationship between Pakistan and jihadism cannot be understood without understanding the country’s ideological dimension, the fact that it was created as a result of an idea. Pakistan has a national narrative, a national milieu and a national identity all built around Islam. For the first 30 years of Pakistan’s existence the clamour was for religiosity within and Pan-Islamism in foreign policy. For the next 30 years global jihadism has been the overarching security and foreign policy idea that has advanced the Pakistani ideology.

Even though three successive commanders of the Pakistani army-Gen Pervez Musharraf, Gen Ashfaq Kayani and now Gen Raheel Sharif-have sought to curtail the jihadis’ influence within Pakistan, including through military operations, their efforts have always fallen short because of the nation’s ideological compulsions. The ideology of Pakistan, and the falsified historic narrative taught in schools to justify it, produces sympathy in society for Sharia rule, for an Islamic caliphate and an Islamic state. This works in favour of more than 33 militant groups that operate out of Pakistan. Pakistan’s strategic planners may see no difficulty in eliminating global terrorists and fighting local jihadis while supporting regional ones. But the general public is conflicted in its attitude towards jihadi groups. Unfortunately for those who want to stop the Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan, their rhetoric about Sharia and against western values resonates with supporters of other, ostensibly ‘more palatable’, jihadi groups even if their methods are abhorred by Pakistanis.

For most countries, nuclear weapons are the ultimate guarantee against invasion or territorial extinction. But to the disciples of the ‘ideology of Pakistan’, security is not enough. Built in into the two-nation theory is the notion of parity between Muslim Pakistan and Hindu India. The events of the last 67 years may have rendered the two nation theory redundant. The number of Muslims living in Pakistan, India and Bangladesh is now roughly equal and there are more Muslims in the subcontinent that live outside Pakistan than in it. But the ideological conception of Pakistan requires that it claim the mantle of Muslim nationhood and pursue equivalence to India in status, power and international standing.

Pakistan’s size and economy does not allow it to be on a par with a much larger and increasingly wealthier India. The machinations of the Cold War that enabled Pakistani leaders to punch beyond their weight through alliance with the West, especially the United States, is also over. That leaves asymmetric warfare through jihadis as the only strategic option for Pakistan’s ideologues. The other course, that of pursuing security and prosperity of geographic Pakistan and its people without insisting on the ideology of Pakistan, has simply not found sufficient resonance among Islamabad’s powerful quarters.

STRAINS OF IDEOLOGICAL NATIONALISM

The case made by Pakistan’s ideologues is appealing to Pakistanis even as it drags the country down the road of tragedies similar to the recent one in Peshawar. In 1947, the country inherited few resources and feared strangulation at birth. The partition riots and the exclusion of Jammu and Kashmir scarred Pakistan’s founding generation. The country survived because of its people’s resilience and its leaders’ adept Cold War alliances.

As early as 1948, Pakistan’s first military foray into Kashmir involved lashkars from the tribal areas along the border with Afghanistan. The irregular fighter added to the Pakistani military’s muscle. Engaging the tribesmen in jihad across the Indus, in Kashmir, pre-empted the possibility of their becoming involved in schemes for Pashtunistan-the land of the Pashtuns-advocated at the time by Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and the government of Afghanistan. Thus began Pakistan’s tolerance and support for non-state actors tied by ideological nationalism to the strategic vision of Pakistan’s military establishment.

In the 1980s, Pakistan’s policy received a shot in the arm with the US decision to support the mujahideen in Afghanistan in order to combat the Soviet Union. As substantial amounts of money, weapons and fighters flowed in, Pakistan’s security establishment began setting up camps to not only train fighters to battle in Afghanistan, but also in Jammu and Kashmir. Today, a wide array of militant organisations operate in Pakistan with safe havens in urban and rural areas. Some of these include sectarian organisations that target religious minorities and Muslim sects (Sipah-e-Sahaba), anti-India outfits (Lashkar-e-Toiba and Jaish-e-Mohammed), anti-Afghanistan groups (Mullah Omar’s Taliban and the Haqqani network), and militants waging war against the Pakistani military (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan).

The 9/11 attacks and the subsequent invasion of Afghanistan was the first turning point in the nature of militancy in Pakistan. General Musharraf was quick to sever ties with the Taliban government in Kabul and supported American operations in Afghanistan. To give the peace process with India some traction, he put a temporary halt on militant flow into Jammu and Kashmir. In April 1999, Musharraf had told a group of retired military officers that “Taliban are my strategic reserve and I can unleash them in tens of thousands against India when I want”. By 2002, he had changed his tune, nominally banning groups such as the Lashkar-e-Toiba. But the banned organisations and their leadership were allowed to operate under new names.

Under Musharraf, Pakistan began differentiating between jihadi groups. While foreign terrorists with links to al-Qaeda were handed over to the United States, local and regional militants (sectarian, anti-India and anti-Afghan groups) were left alone. Some militants built capacity to challenge the writ of the state right under the nose of Pakistani security forces. They have inflicted huge casualties on security forces in Pakistan and Afghanistan over the years. Other groups such as the Haqqani network were ‘managed’ by intelligence agencies in a bid to exert influence on events in Afghanistan.

The current Pakistani problem of increasing terrorism at home is the result of that policy. While the state might differentiate among terrorists, the jihadis often tend to be sympathetic and supportive towards one another. The jihadis supported by the establishment end up supporting terrorists attacking Pakistan’s army and civilians. As is often the case with ideologically motivated militants, ideology takes precedence over strategy and, in the case of jihadis, even those accepting Pakistani state support see the value of some fighters using force to Islamise Pakistan further even at the cost of undermining the country’s stability. According to the South Asia Terrorism Portal, 19,152 civilians and 5,839 security force personnel lost their lives in terrorismrelated violence between 2003 and 2014, excluding the casualties of the latest massacre in Peshawar.

Pakistan’s adherence to an ideological nationalism based on Islam has allowed radical groups to propagate their message and raise large sums of money without much hindrance. Further, while the military and intelligence coercive apparatus has been strong, the local police has never been provided the political support, resources and skills required to be able to combat these radical outfits. Faced with a poorly trained and demoralised police force, some groups run extortion and kidnapping rackets in urban centres. They also raise money through narcotics trafficking and trade of smuggled goods. The militant organisations have thus a sophisticated system of raising funds to support their activities that would enable them to operate even after the Pakistani state has made a final decision to cut them off. So far, unfortunately, that decision itself seems elusive. For years, Pakistan has been living in denial. For years, Pakistan denied support for the Afghan Taliban or the existence of Kashmiri jihadi training camps. The presence of al Qaeda leaders, including Osama bin Laden, was attributed to the inadvertent consequences of Pakistan’s involvement in the anti-Soviet jihad of the 1980s. But denial does not offer a way forward. Pakistan’s Islamo-nationalism has bred radicalism, diminished economic growth and weakened its international standing. Also unknown is the extent of ideological radicalisation within Pakistan’s armed forces, which remain the country’s dominant institution.

A FAILING STATE?

Catastrophic Failures of Pakistan Army 

There have been numerous instances of military officers, non-commissioned officers and enlisted men co-operating with jihadists or deserting their service to join jihadist ranks. But the Pakistani military tends to hold back information on the matter, making an assessment of the extent of this problem difficult. Incidents such as the attacks on the Pakistani naval base ‘Mehran’ in 2011, air force base Kamra in 2012 and the 2014 foiled attempt by Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS) to take over a navy frigate in Karachi harbour point to the persistence of jihadi influence within the ranks of the armed forces.

TALIBAN PUNJAB WING IN FRONT OS ISI HQ IN ISLAMABAD 

Jamat-ud-Dawaleader Hafiz Saeed during Arallyin Islamabad In May, Courtesy: AFPAs US and NATO forces withdraw from Afghanistan, it is unlikely that the Pakistani establishment would want to give up its decades-long pursuit of paramountcy over Afghanistan. Faced with international pressure as well as growing threats from the Pakistani Taliban, Pakistan has cleared out the known jihadist sanctuaries in North Waziristan. This has deprived Afghan groups such as the Haqqani network of their former headquarters. But Pakistan has neither acted against nor militarily confronted the Afghan Taliban leaders and the Haqqani network is believed to have relocated to other parts ofFATA.

Pakistan’s policy in the immediate future would likely be to engage with the government of Afghanistan and the US in negotiations, with the stated objective of finding a negotiated settlement with the Taliban. At the same time Pakistan will most likely continue to try and militarily change the ground situation in Afghanistan in an effort to force the world to deal with de facto Taliban control of parts of Afghanistan as fait accompli. In Islamabad’s view, this would enable it to determine the final terms of an Afghan settlement, resulting in India’s exclusion from Afghanistan and the northwestern neighbour being acknowledged as Pakistan’s sphere of influence.

But are fantasies of parity with India and paramountcy over Afghanistan realistic policies? For 67 years, Pakistan has developed one element of national power-the military one-at the cost of all other elements of national power. The country’s institutions, ranging from schools and universities to the judiciary, are in a state of general decline. The economy’s stuttering growth is dependent largely on the flow of concessional flows of external resources. Pakistan’s GDP stands at $245 billion in absolute terms and $845 billion in purchasing price parity-the smallest economy of any country that has so far tested nuclear weapons.

Twenty-two per cent of the population lives below the poverty line and another 21 per cent lives just above it, resulting in almost half the people of Pakistan being very poor. It is little comfort for Pakistanis living in poverty when they are told that poverty across the border in India or Afghanistan is even starker.

Soon after independence, 16.4 per cent of Pakistan’s population was literate compared with 18.3 per cent of the much larger population in India. By 2011 India had managed to attain 74.04 per cent literacy while Pakistan’s literacy rate stood at 57 per cent. What was atwo percentage points difference in literacy rates has expanded into a nearly 20 percentage points difference in 67 years. In 2009, Pakistan allocated 2.7 per cent of its budget for education-the school life expectancy is seven years.

A staggering 38 per cent of Pakistanis between the school-going age of five and 15 are completely out of school. With a population of 180-190 million out of which 60 per cent fall in the working age category of 15-64 and another 35 per cent under 14 years of age, Pakistan has a demographic dividend which can also turn into a demographic nightmare. The low literacy rate and inadequate investment in education has led to a decline in Pakistan’s technological base, which in turn hampers economic modernisation. Textiles is the country’s major industry but despite being a major cotton-producer, Pakistan has been unable to become a leader in value-added textile products.

With one of the lowest tax-to-GDP ratios in the world of around 9 per cent, a GDP growth rate of 1.7-2.4 per cent and population growth rate of 1.5 per cent, Pakistan needs foreign as well as domestic investment in addition to drastic changes in local laws, all of which need broad political consensus and stability, both of which are lacking.

With almost 40 per cent of its population urbanised, the Pakistan government spends around 2.6 per cent on public healthcare. As a result, social services are also in a state of decline. On the other hand, Pakistan spends almost 6 per cent of its GDP on defence and is still unable to match the conventional forces of India, which outspends Pakistan 3 to 1 while allocating less than 3 per cent of GDP to military spending.

Over the decades, Pakistan has managed to evade crises and failure status primarily because the international community has bailed it out. But now the rest of the world sees Pakistan as ‘jihad central.’ Training camps nestled in the tribal areas have trained and equipped militants who have gone on to fight in the name of Allah in different regions of the world. Foreign fighters trained in Pakistan have reportedly been in action in Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Mali, Nigeria and China’s Xinjiang region. It is no longer possible to keep Pakistani jihadis as a strategic reserve only to cause damage to India.

Instead of securing parity with India and paramountcy over Afghanistan, jihadis have only created greater internal crises and disruption within Pakistan. It might be a difficult decision but Pakistan must recognise the heavy cost being exacted by its pursuit of regional influence through asymmetric warfare. Fighting some jihadis while embracing others is self-defeating. Thirty years of escalated jihadism since the anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan has caused erosion of the writ of the Pakistani state and decline in capacity of state institutions, especially the coercive apparatus.

Even with sporadic military operations, Pakistan’s tribal areas will remain host for some time to a wide range of militant organisations with local, regional and global agendas. Pakistan’s most populous area, Punjab, is now the main recruitment area not only for the Pakistani army but also for assorted jihadi groups. The growing presence of jihadis in south Punjab and northern Sind and even Pakistan’s financial hub, Karachi, does not augur well for Pakistan’s economy.

Pakistan’s jihadis are already exercising virtual veto over Pakistan’s relations with India. The Mumbai attack proved Lashkar-e-Toiba’s ability to undermine the initiatives of a civilian government for normalisation of India-Pakistan relations. They could, in future, force the Pakistani military’s hand in a similar manner. Pakistan needs to get out of denial that there are any jihadi groups that can be trusted or considered allies of the state. However useful they might have been for external purposes, non-state actors will always be a danger for the state internally. Instead of increasing Pakistan’s strategic options, as they were designed to do, the jihadis are now limiting Pakistan’s foreign policy choices.

Instead of doubling down on its jihadist misadventure, Pakistan could plot its course out of the disaster. To do so, it would have to change the defensive national narrative about Pakistan’s creation, raison d’etre and prospects of survival. So far, any discussion of the nation’s origins that does not conform to the ‘ideology of Pakistan’ has been treated not as history but as an attack on the country’s foundation.

A LOOK BACK TO LOOK AHEAD

After mobilising support for the demand for Pakistan, and establishing it as an independent country, successive Pakistani leaders have chosen to keep alive the divisive frenzy that led to Partition. If Pakistan was attained with the slogan ‘Islam in danger’, it has been built on the slogan ‘Pakistan in danger’, creating a constant sense of insecurity among its people, especially in relation to India and internal demands for ethnic identity or pluralism. This might be the time to revisit the ideas of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan and Bengal’s Huseyn Shaheed Suhrawardy, who had opposed the conjuring of this ‘ideology of Pakistan’.

Suhrawardy had told Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly in March 1948 against building Pakistani nationalism around the notion of Islam being under threat. According to him, the rhetoric used to mobilise Muslims for the creation of Pakistan was no longer needed after independence. “You are raising the cry,” he said, “of Pakistan in danger for the purpose of arousing Muslim sentiments and binding them together in order to maintain you in power.” Suhrawardy warned against transforming Pakistan into a state “founded on sentiments, namely that of Islam in danger or of Pakistan in danger”. He declared that “a state which will be held together by raising the bogey of attacks” and “friction” with enemies “will be full of alarms and excursions”. Suhrawardy’s words seem almost prophetic today. He said, “You think that you will get away with it but in that state there will be no commerce, no business and no trade. There will be lawlessness and those lawless elements that may be turned today against non-Muslims will be turned later on, once those fratricidal tendencies have been aroused, against the Muslim gentry and I want you to be warned in time.” He also defined the two key issues for the new country.The “fundamental aspect of the foundations of Pakistan”, he asserted, should be “the goodwill of the people and of the citizens of Pakistan within the state” and “the mutual relationship between the Dominion of Pakistan and the sister dominion, Indian Union”.

If the Pakistani establishment decides to turn the corner, it would have to stop treating Pakistan’s anti-jihadists as its enemies and gradually embrace a new national narrative for the country. Confronting the jihadists comprehensively would make Pakistan more secure, paving the way for greater prosperity and a place under the sun. Refusing to confront and marginalise them will only lead to recurrent tragedies like the one in Peshawar, followed by grief and outrage.

source: http://www.hudson.org/research/10885-state-of-delusion

Who’s killing Pakistan’s Shia and why?

BY Professor C. Christine Fair

According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, in 2013 nearly 700 Shia were killed and more than 1,000 were injured in more than 200 sectarian terrorist attacks. Over 90 percent of those attacks occurred in Quetta, Karachi, Kangu, Parachinar, Islamabad and Rawalpindi. Since the beginning of 2000, nearly 4,000 persons have been killed and 6,800 injured (see figure below).  Who is hunting Pakistan’s Shia and, most importantly, why?

The explanation for Pakistan’s deadly sectarian present lies in the communal politics of Pakistan’s pre-history and the subsequent decisions that Pakistani elites made in the early years about nation building in the new state.  The current path of violence and intolerance may have been paved well before Pakistan became independent in 1947.

Pakistan: Born to Other

As the British appetite for maintaining the Raj declined after World Wars I and II, it became increasingly clear that the declining imperial power would accede to mounting Indian nationalist demands to quit the subcontinent. However, it was not clear what political order would rise from the detritus of the erstwhile Raj.  Some Muslims associated with the All India Muslim League feared that, in a Hindu-majority state, Muslims would be subjected to separate and unequal status.  The Congress Party, which claimed to represent all groups in India and which enjoyed a pan-Indian presence, challenged these claims. However, some within the Congress Party increasingly began to evidence communal sentiments which further discomfited some Muslims in India.

Muhammad Ali Jinnah, who is widely considered to be the founder of Pakistan, propounded a minoritarian and communal discourse called the “Two Nation Theory.”  Jinnah’s dual claims that he was the “sole spokesman” for India’s Muslims and that his Muslim League best aggregated their interests were contested. In the 1937 elections, the League suffered a thrashing. The Muslim-majority areas that are now a part of today’s Pakistan either voted for the Congress or provincial parties. By the 1940s, Jinnah and the League gained traction and in the 1946 provincial elections, the Muslim League redeemed itself by winning 425 out of 496 seats reserved for Muslims.

However, the idea that the Two Nation Theory ineluctably meant partition is flawed. Jinnah explained the lineaments of the Two Nation Theory in a March 23, 1940 speech in Lahore.  He argued that Muslims and Hindus comprised equal nations. That Muslims were a numerical minority was immaterial because they were a nation on par with the nation of Hindus. Jinnah explained that “If the British Government are [sic] really in earnest and sincere to secure [the] peace and happiness of the people of this sub-continent, the only course open to us all is to allow the major nations separate homelands by dividing India into  ‘autonomous national states.’” Historians note that this expression is ambiguous and left open the possibility of a federal solution. Nowhere did the address mention the word Pakistan or partition. (Despite these facts, Pakistanis refer to this speech as the “Pakistan Resolution” and celebrate March 23 as a national holiday to commemorate its passage.)

In fact, the Two Nation Theory was a rhetorical and political argument through which Jinnah sought first to receive equal representation in the national parliament of an independent India. In the end, the Congress party refused to acquiesce to this demand, insisting upon a one-person, one-vote scheme. Congress feared that a failure to reach an agreement with the League would delay Britain’s departure. In the end, Congress and the League decided that it would be best if an independent Pakistan was carved from the Raj. And that is what happened. Jinnah was not prepared for the creation of a new state in large part because for so many years, this was never the goal of his negotiations.

The Objectives Resolution

Pakistan came into being through the bloody process of partition. The Punjab, which became the western wing of Pakistan, bore the brunt of this bloodshed in which Hindus and Sikhs engaged in barbaric communal savagery in an effort to cleanse Muslims from Muslim minority areas, and Muslims slaughtered Sikhs and Hindus in areas where those groups were a minority for the same goal of communal cleansing. The butchers won. Violence also happened in Bengal, which became the eastern wing of Pakistan, but on a lesser scale.

Once Pakistan had its bloodied borders, the long process of state and nation-building began. One of the most contentious issues was the nature of the state itself.  Was it to be an Islamic state or was it to be a state for South Asia’s Muslims? If it were to be an Islamic state, what Islamic tradition would comprise the foundations of the fledgling state? This was a non-trivial question because the territory was home to numerous Sunni as well as Shia interpretative traditions. What would be the political standing of Pakistan’s substantial non-Muslim minority?  At the time of Partition, about one fourth of Pakistan’s citizens were non-Muslim. While most of these were Hindus concentrated in East Pakistan (present day Bangladesh), the west also had substantial Hindu, Christian, Parsee and even Sikh populations.  To garner the most support possible for the notion of Pakistan, Jinnah said contradictory things to different people.  This enabled proponents of one vision or another to use and arrange his various speeches selectively like pieces of plastic in a kaleidoscope. In any event, Jinnah died shortly after partition, taking whatever vision of the state he had with him.

Pakistan took the first and irreversible step towards an Islamist state with the Objectives Resolution of March 1949, which declared that sovereignty belonged to Allah alone and that “the Muslims of Pakistan shall be enabled individually and collectively to order their lives in accordance with the teachings and requirements of Islam as set out in the Holy Quran and Sunnah.”  The resolution was passed over the objections of Pakistani secularist and minorities. The Objectives Resolution was, in turn, incorporated into Pakistan’s constitution and has since become a fixed feature of Pakistani constitutional law.

However, the Objectives Resolution opened a sluice gate for Islamists who vied to define who qualified as a Muslim and whose interpretation of Sharia was superior. Naturally, Pakistan’s religious minorities became the first casualty of the emerging constitutional disposition. (Pakistan’s constitution stipulates that the president and prime minister must be Muslims. Moreover, all senior officials—including members of parliament—are required to take an oath to “protect the country’s Islamic identity.”)

Islamists next targeted Pakistan’s Ahmedi community and mobilized to have them declared non-Muslim.  Islamists in Pakistan and elsewhere do not accept the Ahmedis as Muslims because they do not accept Muhammad as the final prophet.  This was ironic: many of the key leaders of the Muslim League were Ahmedi, as were many of Pakistan’s high-profile civilian and military personnel.  After decades of agitation by anti-Ahmedi Islamists, Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto acquiesced and declared them to be constitutionally non-Muslim in 1974.  The effects of this legislation have been profound for the Ahmedis. Because Ahmedis consider themselves to be Muslim, offer Muslim prayers, recognize the Quran as their holy book and congregate in facilities they call masjids (mosques), Pakistan’s extremists view them as apostates and even blasphemers.  With this law, the state of Pakistan now permitted and even encouraged persecution as well as prosecution of Ahmedis.  They were no longer allowed to call their places of worship “masjids” or even recite the Quran, among other practices Ahmedis view as fundamental to their faith.  Persecution of Ahmedis even continues beyond death: Pakistan’s police have been involved in defacing Ahmedi graves buried in Muslim cemeteries ostensibly to “prevent clashes.” Pakistan’s only Nobel Prize winner, Abdul Salaam, had his grave defaced.  Where it previously read that Salaam became “the first Muslim Nobel Laureate,” it now reads that he became “the first Nobel Laureate.”

With this victory under their belts, Islamists—particularly led by those associated with the Deobandi interpretative tradition—aimed to have Pakistan’s Shia declared non-Muslim.

Shia: Caught in the Regional Cross Hairs

In 1974, under Zulfiqar ali Bhutto, Pakistan set up a cell within Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Directorate (ISI) to undertake covert operations.  Mohammed Daoud Khan had just ousted King Zahir Shah in Afghanistan and begun a liberalization program under Soviet patronage.  Afghan Islamists opposed this, and Daoud violently repressed them.  Many of these Islamists fled to Pakistan, where the ISI developed them for covert operations in Afghanistan.  Once Zia ul Haq seized the Pakistani government in a coup in 1977, he began to shape Pakistan into a Sunni Islamist state.  Some of his efforts, such as imposing the payment of zakat, were specifically antagonistic to Pakistan’s Shia who do not accept Sunni interpretations of zakat.  As Shia came under pressure, they began to mobilize.

Next door, Iran was convulsing into its Shia Islamic Revolution. Not only did Iran seek to export its revolution, it also saw itself as the key protector of Shia across the world.  Iran began supporting Shia militant groups fighting Zia’s efforts to render Pakistan a Sunni Islamic state.  When Iran and Iraq fell into war, Iraq involved itself in Pakistan’s emerging sectarian conflict.  As rival Sunni militant groups—most of which wereDeobandi—began to mobilize against Shia in Pakistan, Iraq began resourcing anti-Shia militant organizations.  Soon the Arab Gulf states joined in to help marginalize Pakistan’s Shia, who were seen as Iran’s pawn in the region.  Thus Pakistan soon became the site of an elaborate sectarian proxy war between Shia Iran and its Sunni strategic competitors.

The Christmas day Soviet invasion of Afghanistan further catalyzed events that cultivated Pakistan’s sectarian killing fields.  Zia’s efforts to make Pakistan a Sunni Islamist state dovetailed with the growing need for (mostly) Sunni militants in Afghanistan.  (Zia preferred Sunni Islamist militants to fight a “jihad” in Afghanistan rather than an ethno-national insurgency against Soviet occupation.  He feared that the latter would precipitate renewed ethnic conflict in Pakistan, principally among its restive Pashtun populations who lived on the border with Afghanistan.)  Once President Carter left office, U.S. and Pakistani policy aligned.  President Reagan threw the weight of his government behind the Zia regime.  The Saudis also funded the manufacturing of jihadis by matching the U.S. contribution dollar for dollar.

When the Soviets finally left Afghanistan in 1989, the United States withdrew from the region.  However, Pakistan continued to use its well-developed stock of Sunni militants to help forge a pro-Pakistan disposition in Afghanistan.  At the same time, Indian mismanagement and malfeasance in Kashmir gave rise to an indigenous insurgency there.  Pakistan deployed the battle-hardened militants from the Afghan theatre to Kashmir.  By the early 1990s, Pakistani militants had overtaken the local insurgency and transformed the conflict from a local insurgent movement into one of international terror.

9/11: Disorientation of the Mullah, Militant and Military Alliance

Throughout the 1990s and up until 2001, Pakistan’s military and intelligence agency supported, armed, and trained numerous Islamist militants for operations in Afghanistan and India.

The largest cluster of militant groups was Deobandi in orientation.  Deobandi groups included the Afghan Taliban, anti-Shia groups such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ)/Sipah-e-Sahaba-e-Pakistan (SSP) (which now go by the name of Ahle Sunnat Wal Jamaat (ASWJ)), and several that were ostensibly fighting the Indians (e.g. Jaish-e-Mohammad).  These Deobandi groups share a vast infrastructure of madrassahs and mosques and have overlapping membership with each other and with the Deobandi Islamist political groups, most notably the factions of the Jamiat-e-Ulema-Islam (JUI).

Throughout the 1990s, sectarian attacks continued.  However, by the 1990s, the Pakistani state crushed the anti-Sunni militias, leaving the anti-Shia Sunni militants intact.  During the mid-1990s, groups such as LeJ/SSP also fought alongside the Taliban in Afghanistan, illustrating their utility to the state.

With the terror attacks of 9/11, Pakistan was forced to cooperate with the United States in its war in Afghanistan.  The militant groups that were most aggrieved by this were the Deobandi groups, as they had the closest relations with the Afghan Taliban.  Moreover, because they often fought with the Taliban in Afghanistan and shared militant training infrastructure with al-Qaeda, they were also most loyal to Osama bin Laden.  By late 2001, some Deobandi militants, under a break-away faction of Jaish-e-Mohammad named Jamaat ul Furqan, began targeting the Pakistani state. They believed the Musharraf government had joined the infidel forces in ousting the Taliban and threating al Qaeda.  They began a series of suicide attacks against the Pakistan military.

As the Pakistan military began moving in the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA), where numerous local, regional and international militants are ensconced, Pakistan’s internal militant situation continued to change.  Local militant commanders in the FATA began targeting the Pakistani military, paramilitary and intelligence agency. By 2007, a suite of anti-state militias coalesced under the banner of the Tehreek-e-Taliban-e-Pakistan (TTP, also known as the Pakistan Taliban). While many viewed the TTP as a largely Pashtun phenomenon because it emerged in the tribal areas, in fact, the movement had a very strong backbone of Punjab-based Deobandi militants.  The most vicious TTP activists were those associated with the anti-Shia terror groups (LeJ/SSP/ASWJ).

No One Is Safe Now

When Hakimullah Mehsood assumed command of the TTP, Pakistan’s sectarian killings became more frequent.  Hakimullah had a long history of association with the ASWJ.  Under him, the TTP began targeting any sect of Islam that these Deobandi militants considered to be “munafaqeen” (those who spread discord).  Not only were Pakistan’s Shia under attack (in addition to Ahmedi and Pakistan’s religious minorities), so were Pakistan’s massive Sufi population, frequently referred to as Barelvis.  The TTP began openly attacking Sufi shrines.

Pakistan’s military and civilian leaders have yet to come to any consensus on a political strategy to contend with these militants who have claimed tens of thousands of Pakistani lives since 2001.  The military, for its part, is reluctant to take them on for several reasons. First, parts of the military still see Islamist militants as important tools of foreign policy in India and Afghanistan.  In fact, for some, the loyal Islamist militants will become even more important as the United States withdraws from Afghanistan and as Pakistan needs militants that are loyal to the Pakistani project.  Second, because these Deobandi militant groups share overlapping membership with each other and with the JUI, the JUI provide their militant allies with political cover. Third, the military is unwilling to eliminate them in entirety because it believes that some of them can be rehabilitated and persuaded to aim their guns, suicide vests, and vehicle-born IEDS away from the Pakistani state and towards Afghanistan or India. (Yes. This does mean the Pakistan army—which has received some $27 billion from Washington for being a “partner in the Global War on Terrorism”—is encouraging its militants to kill Americans and their allies in Afghanistan.)  Fourth, the army’s will is no doubt conditioned by its ability.  While the army could certainly do more, its record at combating Pakistan’s domestic enemies is mixed at best and has come at a high human cost in terms of civilian casualties and massive internal displacement.  This is why Pakistan’s security and intelligence agencies rely upon the U.S. drone program to take out the terrorists it cannot.  Finally, for national counter-terrorism efforts, Pakistan’s police should take the lead.  But it is well-known that Pakistan’s police are not up to that task.

As for the civilian government, it is likely amenable to some sort of a political compromise with the TTP.  Even if Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif, who is himself a right-of-center politician, prefers more coercive solutions, he fears the TTP. He also relies upon those voters in the Punjab who support the agenda of the TTP and their anti-Shia sectarian allies.  Sharif fears that, should he muster the testicularity to support military actions against the militants, his chief rival, Imran Khan, would strip away some of his electoral base.  Like Sharif, Khan contested the 2013 general election under the banner of reconciling with the TTP, opposing military actions against them, and denouncing the drone program which has killed many TTP leaders.

Pakistan’s Shia: Caught in Strategic Crosshairs

(LUBP’s note: The Iran-Saudi proxy war theory does not explain that Deobandi terrorists who are killing Shias are also killing Sunni Sufis/Barelvis in Pakistan. It also does not explain that persecution of Shia Muslims is more than 1400 years old in the history of Islam.)

With the U.S. ouster of Saddam Hussein and the removal of the Taliban from Afghanistan, Iran’s position in the region has improved since 2001.  Both Saudis and Pakistanis fear a rising Iran in Afghanistan.  For Pakistan’s part, Iran has partnered with India for its work in Afghanistan.  For Saudi Arabia’s part, a rising Shia Iran threatens to undermine the status that Saudi Arabia has arrogated to itself: leader of the Muslim world in general and protector of Sunni interests in particular.  Some Pakistanis in and out of government have often suspected that Iran can manipulate Pakistan’s Shia to achieve Tehran’s varied national and ideological interests, many of which are at odds with those of Pakistan.  Because of fears that Iran can work through these Shia to undermine Pakistan’s interests, no Pakistani government has seriously sought to completely extirpate those Deobandi groups that slaughter Shia.  In contrast, Pakistan’s government vigorously worked to eliminate Shia militias that targeted Sunnis.

Iran and Pakistan share a sensitive border in Balochistan.  In Iran’s Sistan-o-Balochistan province, many residents are Sunni Baloch.  Iran has suffered ethno-sectarian violence there because the residents believe they are second-class citizens owing to their ethnicity and their sectarian beliefs. Iran has often looked apprehensively towards Pakistan, suspecting that it is a source of support for these Sunni Baloch militants. Pakistan, for its part, has problems with its own Baloch, some of whom have waged an ethnic separatist struggle against the Pakistan state.  The Baloch nationalist insurgents have enjoyed support from India and Afghanistan.  This brings to the fore the most vulnerable of all Shia in Pakistan right now: the Hazaras of Quetta.

The Hazaras, who live in Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, are easily recognized by their “Mongolian” facial features.  Hazaras of Balochistan are in danger due to a toxic mix of domestic developments, which have resulted in rising ethnic and sectarian intolerance, as well as regional political factors pertaining to fraught Iran-Pakistan relations.  While Pakistanis tend to view Shia generally with suspicion because of their presumed ties with Iran, Hazaras are viewed with even greater dubiety.  Unlike other Shia in Pakistan who speak Urdu and other vernacular languages, Hazaras speak Farsi and its variants.  This fosters suspicion that they are Iranian spies or even that they are trying to fulminate a Shia revolution in Pakistan.  (The Hazaras in Afghanistan receive support from Iran, and they were frequently the victims of violence in Afghanistan when the Taliban ruled uncontested.)  The Hazaras draw the ire of Deobandis and Pakistan’s military and intelligence agencies because they oppose the Afghan Taliban, whose allies include the sectarian killers of the SSP/LeJ/ASWJ, and because they refuse to fight the ethnic Baloch separatists in the province.  The Hazaras and ethnic Baloch separatists may indeed be allies of sorts because both reject the multi-pronged efforts of the state and militants to make Pakistan a Sunni Islamist state.

Sadly, at some point it becomes difficult to discern whether persons are killed by the state or by the terrorists, because in some cases the state outsources its domestic violence to terrorists such as LeJ/SSP/ASWJ.

Should the United States Care and Why?

While it may be tempting to dismiss the senseless slaughter of Shia in Pakistan as an internal Pakistani matter, this is short-sighted for several reasons apart from humanitarian concerns.

First, these anti-Shia Deobandi groups have been the organizations to which al-Qaeda has outsourced its attacks in Pakistan, whether against Pakistani or international targets.

Second, these groups have long had a presence in Afghanistan where they have helped erect a Sunni Islamist regime in Afghanistan with Pakistani overt and covert support.

Third, Pakistan’s sectarian terrorists share overlapping membership with those groups that ostensibly focus upon India (e.g. Jaish-e-Mohammad).  It is very likely that Rawalpindi would like to woo some of these sectarian killers to battlefields in Afghanistan or India.  A terrorist attack in India or against Indian assets in Afghanistan may well be the precipitant of the next Indo-Pakistan crisis.  India’s recent general elections hoisted up the notorious Hindu nationalist, Narendra Modi, as India’s prime minister.  Modi may be more assertive in dealing with Pakistan-based terrorism aggressive than was the previous prime minister, Manmohan Singh.

Finally, it is inherently in the U.S. interest that Pakistan retains some modicum of stability.  The anti-sectarian groups, with their Punjab base, and their track record of successfully hitting high value military and civilian targets and even infiltrating the military, may well be a bigger concern to Washington than they are to either the civilian government in Islamabad or the army headquartered in Rawalpindi.

C. Christine Fair is an assistant professor in the Security Studies Program within Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. She is the author of Fighting to the End: The Pakistan Army’s Way of War (Oxford University Press, 2014).

Source: War on the Rocks

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