Obama win: Bad news for Pakistan

6 Nov 2008, 0311 hrs IST, Sachin Parashar,TNN

NEW DELHI: After its initial lack of enthusiasm for Barack Obama, India was pleasantly surprised when the Senator from Illinois, now the president-elect of US, slammed Pakistan for its nudge-nudge, wink-wink policy on terrorism.

In the first week of August, Obama had follow this up by declaring that, if elected, he would not shy away from striking inside Pakistan to take out Al-Qaida and Taliban terrorist camps. Tough words that would please New Delhi. But for Pakistan, this can only be bad news.

There is no doubt that the US under Obama is likely to crack the whip, much more sharply than what the Bush administration has done in the past few months, even as it dangles the carrot.

The carrot was, of course, non-military aid. Obama's veep nominee Joe Biden, as chairman of House Foreign Affairs Committee, had proposed non military aid worth $15 billion for Pakistan in the next 10 years. Indian analysts are sceptical whether this would actually ameliorate the depressing situation in Pakistan if the US targets Pakistan territory even on the basis of "actionable intelligence". In short, they are doubtful if the carrot-and-stick policy will work.

"Whatever the nature of financial help, it would be very difficult for a nationalist Pakistan government to accept such violations of its sovereignty. There are chances that people in the NWFP would go against the government and we will see more instability in Pakistan," says retired IFS officer Rajendra Rai who also served as India's consul-general in New York.

Possibly, for Obama democratization of Pakistan is linked inseparably with the war against terror, but many believe that this is meaningless because Obama's threats only mirror the Bush administration's current policy. And that hasn't helped.

Pakistan itself is rather nervous about the Democrats. While the government is positively inclined towards Biden, who has constantly advocated more aid for Pakistan, many in the country look upon Obama with suspicion because of his threats to strike inside Pakistan.

Obama's comments about militants, and not India, being Pakistan's main enemy is also evoking scepticism in Islamabad. While Biden is not bad news for Pakistan, the problem is that Obama is likely to be a hands-on President and the foreign policy will veer around his line of thought.

Besides, Biden's economic bailout will not come without a price. The US under Obama is likely to force Pakistan to go slow on the dispute in J&K, hitherto the country's main weapon against India. "While we may not see this happening out in the open, chances are that the US will, behind the scenes, force Pakistan not to foment more trouble in the state denying it what its military and ISI believe is the country's leverage against India," says a senior government official.

As for Afghanistan, Obama has announced that he will pull out troops from Iraq and deploy two more brigades in Afghanistan. While the decision to pull out troops from Iraq is seen as a positive sign, deploying more troops in Afghanistan can be read both ways.

The real war on terror is now taking place on the Afghanistan-Pakistan border and more troops can be of help. However, as some experts argue, the US ought to have realized that there cannot be just a military solution in Afghanistan.

"Obama has also announced increasing non-military aid but it doesn't serve the purpose unless the local Pashtuns are engaged in a dialogue. They hold the key to any solution and the government of Hamid Karzai, himself a Pashtun, has lost all credibility," says a security analyst.

The Pashtuns are chary of the Karzai administration and Obama's decision to deploy more troops in the country can only stoke the fires there. It would, in all likelihood, give a greater sense of righteous purpose to the Taliban that has regrouped in Afghanistan.