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Soldiers drive toward North Waziristan during a 2014 military offensive against the Pakistani Taliban.
As Pakistan confronts the Taliban, Washington backs Islamabad — kind of
Afghanistan and Pakistan are on the brink of direct conflict.
Terror attacks from the Pakistani Taliban — aka the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan or the TTP, who are ideologically affiliated with and politically backed by the Afghan Taliban — are increasing across Pakistan. In the last two weeks, Pakistani intelligence operatives have been gunned down in the country’s biggest province, and a detention facility has been overtaken and officials held hostage.
To defend itself, Islamabad has hinted that it might attack TTP hideouts in Afghanistan … with Washington’s blessing.
Indeed, in a rare show of direct support for Islamabad, the US publicly backed Pakistan’s position. What does this mean, and what might happen next?
Violence is escalating. There has been an uptick in terrorist attacks in Pakistan since the Taliban decided to release many TTP members from prison upon returning to power in Afghanistan in August 2021.
Many of those insurgents have since pivoted to Pakistan or staged attacks against the country from launchpads in Afghanistan. While much of the fighting has been limited to the border, the last few weeks have seen brazen attacks in Pakistan’s heartland, including a suicide bombing in the capital.
Pakistan-Taliban tensions have been compounded by increased US-Pakistan cooperation. While the Americans have no boots on the ground in Afghanistan, they have been conducting over-the-horizon counterterrorist operations in the country, most notably killing former al-Qaida chief, Ayman al-Zawahri in Aug. 2022 (it is believed that Pakistani help was vital for that operation).
The top US military commander in the region recently spent three days in Pakistan, discussing enhancing counter-terrorism cooperation as well as touring the violent border area. America may have left the region, but it’s still watching this part of the world — and despite its pro-China leaning, Pakistan seems willing to play partner again.
“The stakes are high for Washington,” says Michael Kugelman, deputy director of the Asia Program at the Wilson Center. “Its interests are best served by an Afghanistan that doesn’t house domestic, regional, or international terrorists. The US and Pakistan are both threatened by terrorists on Afghan soil that the Taliban are unable or unwilling to curb.”
While Pakistan damaged its relationship with Washington by supporting segments of the Taliban for much of the 20 years of the US occupation of Afghanistan, it broke 75 years of precedent by conducting air strikes inside Afghanistan last April against what it claimed were TTP safe havens.
The responses from Kabul and Washington showed where they stand now vis-à-vis Islamabad. While the Taliban threatened Pakistan with retaliation if Afghanistan’s sovereignty was breached again, they continued to harbor TTP elements. Meanwhile, considering those strikes were conducted with US-supplied F-16 fighter jets, the Pentagon announced an aircraft upgrade for Pakistan over the protests of India, Pakistan’s archrival and Washington’s strategic partner.
“The US, to the extent that Afghanistan figures in its policy considerations, looks at Afghanistan through the lens of counterterrorism,” says Kugelman. “So this all means the US would want to see a Pakistani counterterrorist mission succeed.”
But this time, the US isn’t going all in when it comes to fighting terrorism in Afghanistan. So far, assistance to Islamabad has been limited, and Kugelman predicts that further assistance to Pakistan for a potential counterterrorism mission will likely be modest. He assesses that some intelligence sharing and public messages of support should be expected, but not much beyond that.
However, Pakistan’s security is only deteriorating. The weekend saw thousands protest for better policing in Pakistan’s terror-struck town of Wana, near the Afghan border. Moreover, Pakistan’s military, police, and civilians haven’t just been attacked at home, but also targeted in Afghanistan.
There’s a larger problem, too: Pakistan is dead broke. Nearing default, the country isn’t in a position to launch a large-scale military campaign or even carry out an extensive counterterrorist mission at home. If pushed into war, it will need help to finance such an operation, too. Kugelman thinks that it’s more likely to get that from Beijing or the Gulf states than from Washington.
“Let’s be clear: The US has left Afghanistan. Its foreign policy interests and strategic priorities lie elsewhere,” says Kugelman.
Although Washington worries about what the local offshoot of the Taliban might do to Pakistan — a nation that US President Joe Biden has called one of the “most dangerous” in the world — it does not consider it a direct threat for America. Not yet, anyway.
The upshot: Yes, the TTP is a problem. But for the most part, it’s a Pakistani problem.US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and India's Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar hold a news conference in Washington, DC.
US warns India on dealing with Russia: “Pakistan is Plan B”
After years of favoring New Delhi, the US is now back to balancing between India and Pakistan.
The decade-long deterioration of ties with Islamabad, propelled by Pakistan’s support for the Taliban in Afghanistan and tilt toward China, had shaped Washington’s conventional thinking into a neat binary: that a democratic, anti-China India is ‘in’ and an autocratic, pro-China Pakistan is ‘out’ of the American camp.
That’s no longer the case in America’s response to India’s consistent hedging and betting on Russia, as well as Pakistan’s diplomatic overtures and counterterrorism cooperation. Indeed, the future of US positioning in South Asia seems to be shifting, as Washington resumes playing ball with both nuclear-armed rivals like it’s done for decades.
America’s pal, but Russia’s BFF. On Saturday, India abstained from voting for a US-sponsored UN Security Council resolution slamming Russia’s illegal annexation of Ukrainian territory. This wasn’t the first time the Indians have refused to back the Americans — every UN resolution tabled against Russian aggression in Ukraine since the beginning of the war has seen India walk away from the crime scene.
For India watchers who acknowledge New Delhi’s stated policy of strategic autonomy — basically a we-will-do-the-right-thing-but-in-our-own-way approach to a values-based order — the latest abstention was a disappointment, coming just days after PM Narendra Modi was praised by Washington for lecturing Vladimir Putin about this not being “an era of war.”
Although Indian diplomats insist that dialogue is the only answer to settling disputes, Modi’s government is now being criticized even at home for speaking from both sides of its mouth, especially as the war takes on a nuclear dimension.
The frustration is premised on a contradiction. Though it is still counted as a strategic partner of the US and an important teammate on the Quad, India’s decades-long defense ties with Moscow continue to thrive.
The Indians are shoring up the Russian economy by buying more fossil fuels (albeit at steep discounts). This year, oil imports are up thirty-fold from 2021, and coal purchases have quadrupled. Meanwhile, the Indians remain Moscow’s biggest arms customer and continue buying sophisticated Russian weapons despite the risk of triggering US sanctions.
This attitude of sacrifice-rules-for-money by India shows that “since Russia invaded Ukraine, Modi and his government have become ultra-realist on foreign policy,” says Derek Grossman, a senior defense analyst at the RAND Corporation.
The Indians, he explains, “have refused to condemn Russian aggression and its undermining of the rules-based international order, which New Delhi claims to uphold along with like-minded democratic states,” he said. Rather, India has prioritized discounted Russian oil — a business over values approach — which doesn't say much about India’s commitment to the rules-based system that it claims to support.
Pakistan as Plan B? But Washington isn’t just sitting pretty watching India play both sides. Responding to New Delhi’s hedging through its own, the US is gearing up to balance the military relationship with Islamabad.
After suspending all military aid in 2018 due to Pakistan’s support for the Taliban in Afghanistan, the US State Department reversed course last month, resuming critical military assistance to Islamabad. India, of course, is up in arms. After all, the F-16 fighter-bomber — which the Americans are servicing for the Pakistanis — was used to shoot down at least one Indian Air Force MiG-21 in 2019.
While the State Department has pushed back against India’s protests by saying it values its relations with both sides, Pakistan seems to have been let out of Washington’s doghouse. Last week, State fêted Pakistan’s foreign minister for a week-long sojourn, topped with a ceremony commemorating 75 years of diplomatic ties at the Museum of American Diplomacy. (His Indian counterpart — who was in town around the same time complaining about the Pakistani weapons deal — was also given the royal treatment, with a dinner at Blinken’s home.)
As far as the Pakistanis are concerned, the boys are back in town. This week, the Pentagon is hosting Pakistan’s all-powerful army chief, Gen. Qamar Javed Bajwa, who played a crucial role in the ousting of former prime minister Imran Khan, an anti-American populist. On Gen. Bajwa’s agenda: Pakistani support for Washington’s over-the-horizon counterterrorism operations in Afghanistan, as well as grappling with the Taliban, ISIS-K and al-Qaida.
“The US seems to be finally recognizing that despite the full-throated pronouncements from New Delhi about a rules-based international order, India’s need for cheap Russian oil and Russian weapons override everything else,” says Uzair Younis, director of the Pakistan Initiative at the Atlantic Council.
Given this context, he adds, Washington is finally realizing that it must also pursue “a parallel diplomatic path with Pakistan, especially given that New Delhi is unlikely to be weaned off its addiction to Russian energy and weapons any time soon.”
However, India will remain important for America. Surely, this maneuvering hasn’t ruptured the proximity between Washington and New Delhi – China remains their common rival, after all — but it is being seen as a tactical response to India’s dealing with the Russians.
Plus, after years of increasing dependency on China, the Pakistanis are only too eager to balance their interests with Washington, but only till the Chinese come back to them with a better offer for their rentier state.
Also, the resumption of US military aid to Pakistan — still paltry compared to America’s broad defense, economic, and tech ties with India — has not disturbed India’s standing as a “strategic partner." Though we are not back to hyphenating India with Pakistan — a Cold War-era Washingtonian trait that irritated New Delhi for decades — recent moves by the US have clearly irked the Indians. But are they going to reset US priorities in South Asia?
“One of the enduring challenges for the US-India relationship is that each country insists on maintaining cordial ties with the other’s key rival,” says Michael Kugelman, director of the South Asia Institute at the Wilson Center.
This problem appeared to be working itself out in recent years, as India reduced its share of Russian arms imports and the US cut off security aid to Pakistan. But now we are seeing a return to what Kugelman calls the “old normal” — India reasserting its friendship with Russia and the US restarting security ties with Pakistan.
“At the end of the day, neither New Delhi nor Washington are willing to let go of these longstanding relationships,” he explains.
Still, what the Americans are doing to the Indians — a diplomatic tit-for-tat, really — makes the long-term trajectory of India-Russia and US-Pakistan relations more unsettled than that of US-India relations.
For Kugmelman, “they’re still realities in the here and now. It’s little more than a nuisance for US-India relations, but a nuisance nonetheless.”
Bottom line: The Pakistanis might be back in play in Washington, but India’s not getting on any American blacklist anytime soon. Regardless, the US has put on its Great Power suit, and sent New Delhi a bill about the cost of doing business with the Russians.This article comes to you from the Signal newsletter team of GZERO Media. Sign up today.
A shopkeeper tunes a television screen to watch the speech of Pakistani PM Imran Khan in Islamabad.
Captain vs. America: Pakistan’s Khan drags US into regime change
Pakistan’s flamboyant cricketer-turned-PM Imran Khan is known by his followers as “Kaptaan” (Captain) for his against-all-odds brand of leadership. On Sunday, he pulled the pin from the only political grenade he had left in his arsenal of populism by dissolving parliament and pushing for a snap election to avoid being ousted in a no-confidence vote he was set to lose.
Using a cricket term to explain his defense of the political challenge he faces, Khan had vowed last week to defend his government till the “last ball” against so-called foreign conspirators and their local assets. Who was he referring to? Right-wing Pakistan’s go-to foe: the United States.
Pakistan’s leader claims that Washington was pushing for regime change in Islamabad. “The move to oust me is (a) blatant interference in domestic politics by the United States,” he said. The White House denied the charge. This latest maneuver – seen as desperate by the opposition – came in response to Khan not having the numbers to keep his job in parliament, where the opposition had tabled a vote of no confidence against him. Critics had recommended he take an honorable exit and resign gracefully.
But by pulling a fast one, Khan has denied the opposition (and coalition partners and party dissidents who recently ditched him) the opportunity to have his scalp. In short, he has moved the nuclear-armed nation from a leadership crisis to an all-out constitutional emergency.
Still, as the Supreme Court weighs whether his move was legal and Pakistanis get ready to head to the polls within 90 days, alleged US interference has become front and center in the national political conversation.
“Being pro-American in the Pakistani drawing room or boardroom is key to success, but not on the street. There, being anti-American is politically advantageous,” says Brig Muhammad Zeeshan, a retired Pakistani intelligence officer and currently the director general of the Center for Peace, Security and Developmental Studies in Islamabad. “As the election looms, Imran Khan will take to the streets with that message. But the US and Europe are our biggest markets, and we have to be mindful of the approach to Washington.”
Khan’s anti-American argument is fuzzy. He says he’s been punished by Washington for trying to follow an independent (pro-China, pro-Russia) foreign policy. To back up this argument, he has been touting a diplomatic cable from the outgoing Pakistani ambassador to the US that says (premised on a meeting with US Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Donald Lu) the US isn’t too happy with Khan’s government.
Furthermore, Khan claims that his party dissidents have been in increasing contact with the US embassy in Islamabad. Over the weekend, in multiple speeches, interviews, and tweets, Khan continued to hammer home the narrative that the US was out to get him.
“Imran Khan’s claim of the United States engineering his ouster is outlandish,” said Asfandyar Mir, a senior expert at the United States Institute of Peace. “US and Pakistan have several issues, but Imran Khan and his so-called ‘independent foreign foreign policy’ are not their cause. So I don’t see anyone getting behind the bizarre notion of removing Khan — let alone the manner in which Khan claims he was threatened.”
Khan will now likely elevate the claim of a US conspiracy before the Supreme Court to argue that the rejection of the no-confidence bid and the dissolution of the assemblies is constitutional, says Mir, who thinks Khan will lean strongly into anti-American rhetoric to make up for the lack of constitutional and legal grounds for his moves.
“Imran Khan is trying to effect regime change at home by leveraging the conspiracy theory narrative of the U.S. trying to effect regime-change against his government,” says Kamran Bokhari, director of analytical development at the New Lines Institute for Strategy and Policy in Washington, DC. “On one level, I think this claim by the prime minister is hilarious, but at the same time it is extremely dangerous because people in the tens of millions believe it, given the poverty of thought in the country.”
Hina Khar: Pakistan must solve its domestic problems and step back from a global role
With Washington ready to downgrade its relationship with Islamabad, Pakistan's PM Imran Khan, looking to form new friendships to protect Pakistan's strategic interests visited Moscow as Russian forces invaded Ukraine. In a GZERO World interview, Ian Bremmer talks to Pakistan’s former Foreign Minister, Hina Khar, about Afghanistan, Pakistan’s future choices, and India.
Khar argues that the West needs to accept its responsibility for starving Afghans. Military interventions like the US-led war in Afghanistan, she adds, cast a “deep shadow on the entire democratic value system.” She also thinks that the best way to help end the humanitarian crisis is to talk to the Taliban.
Pakistan's former top diplomat believes Pakistan should focus on its domestic problems like reducing Pakistan's huge dependence on foreign aid, build on its strengths, and secure its borders from threats from Afghanistan. “Our first role should be to our own people,” she states.
Khar, who previously called India a “rogue state” and a bully in the neighborhood, elaborates on India’s undemocratic gestures like the Citizenship Amendment Act and the end of autonomy for Indian-controlled Kashmir, a Muslim majority region long claimed by Pakistan.
The former Foreign Minister further explains that India's anti-deomocratic trends are ignored by the West because "everything that is happening in our part of the world has to do with containment of China."
Watch the GZERO World episode: As democracy erodes: Pakistan’s Hina Khar on “supremely dangerous” global trends
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Pakistan suffered from global role; should focus domestically, says former top diplomat
Pakistan has long punched above its weight in global politics. Yet, former Foreign Minister Hina Khar said her country has gained little from it.
That's why she'd like to see Pakistan taking a step back from the global stage to focus on its mounting domestic challenges.
“Our first role should be to our own people,” Khar told Ian Bremmer in a GZERO World interview at the 2022 Munich Security Conference.
For instance, she thinks it's time to concentrate on issues like reducing Pakistan's huge dependence on foreign aid.
“You know a country which is dependent on the IMF largesse does not really want to have an over-projected role in the world,” Khar said. "Our first role should be to our own people.”
Watch the GZERO World episode: As democracy erodes: Pakistan’s Hina Khar on “supremely dangerous” global trends
The Graphic Truth: The US can't buy Pakistanis' love
The longstanding US-Pakistan relationship is not an easy one. Despite the billions of dollars the US doles out to Islamabad in economic and military assistance, Pakistanis hold extremely unfavorable views of America and its leadership. After 9/11, Pakistanis held more positive views of the US, but that changed in the 2010s, when the killing of bin Laden inside Pakistan's territory and deadly US drone strikes that killed Pakistani civilians sparked deep animosity against Washington. President Trump then made things worse by playing favorites with India, Pakistan's nemesis. We compare US aid flows to Pakistan with Pakistani views on American leadership over the past two decades.