Will Pakistan uphold its end of the clear-and-hold effort?

Map here

Pakistani member of parliament via Times of India via Our Man in Kabul.

I quote at length:

There is a saying in Pakistan that if you can’t defeat your enemy, befriend him. This is particularly true in the tribal areas that border Afghanistan, where, in six agencies, there’s an unprecedented military offensive against militants. Despite many tactical alliances and ceasefire pacts in Waziristan, Pakistan has gone in with firepower backed by US drones. The cornerstone of the security policy here is to attack militants close to the al-Qaida, but spare armed syndicates that protect Pakistan’s flanks. 

The turbulence in the Af-Pak border zone has led Washington to put out strategic leaks about possible military intervention inside Pakistan. The heart of the problem is what could alter the dynamics of declining US-Nato successes in the Afghan theatre. North Waziristan agency (NWA), and what the Pakistan army is able to do there, seems to have become the litmus test for US-Pakistan relations. After Faisal Shahzad’s attempted bomb attack in Times Square, the pressure on Islamabad to act against anti-US Taliban in NWA has increased. Islamabad pleads capacity constraints; the US cites commitment gaps. 

The stakes are high. After failing to build institutional structures in Afghanistan, the test for Washington is linking US-Nato ground offensives in the south and Loya Paktiya to Pakistan’s push on the militant Haqqani-led groups from NWA. The Obama presidency needs a game-changer in a theatre where success is elusive despite a COIN (counter-insurgency) strategy that focuses on population safety. The expected Taliban reversals have not happened despite a massive offensive in Marjah. In Washington’s view, Pakistan is pulling its punches as it may need the Taliban when the US exits Afghanistan. 

For Pakistan, this is a battle for its stability and survival. Action is overdue against terrorist and sectarian groups in Punjab, Balochistan and Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. There is a compelling need to act against extremist groups after the massacre of nearly a hundred Ahmadiyas in Lahore recently. The Punjab government needs to do a counter-terror sweep of its cities . . . 

The challenge in NWA is that Islamabad does not have the military or civilian capacity to open all fronts at the same time. Enmeshed in a blighted strategic endgame, with a growing terrorist threat, tanking economy and India posturing to the east, the military option in NWA cannot be a hair-trigger decision . . .  Islamabad’s fear is that if it shoves a fist into this hornet’s nest, maintaining the fragile consensus against terrorists at home would be difficult, as well as protecting its cities from further attacks. 

This can be no “shock and awe” exercise that can be switched off by remote control. Pakistan has already lost over 3,000 people in two years as a result of the terrorist backlash; the economy has taken a $35 billion hit. The question is, will the US be around to help hold down Pakistan’s fist when its army swoops on al-Qaida strongholds such as Mir Ali? The military’s tactic in any counterinsurgency initiative in mountainous terrain is ‘pincer and choke’ the enemies’ escape routes . . . If the NWA is grand central for terrorists, then the Afghan border provinces provide strategic depth. While the US-Nato forces in Afghanistan need to do their bit, Pakistan will have to step up border checks and review unwritten peace deals with tribal leaders who change sides too often. 

The other question is: how long can the Pakistani army stay in the agencies it has secured? Is there a civilian ‘build, hold and transition’ component to the project? Once again, before putting pressure Pakistan with an escalating war, huge governance commitments such as ROZ (reconstruction opportunity zones) assistance will have to roll off the US machine . . .

What will help is a phase-by-phase plan for securing the area, holding it until the tribes that have been terrorized by the Taliban are able to return and do business. Second, though the elites in Waziristan’s tribal areas have been marginalized by the Taliban, they will resist governance models that diminish their pre-Taliban political powers. The military will have to stay in Waziristan until the police and frontier corps in that area is strengthened, and the tribal leadership prepares for critical reforms and political activity by mainstream parties. FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas) reform will only work if introduced incrementally, and the government’s recent announcements, if implemented, will be a brave start . . .

A glass-half-full take in the near-term, in the sense that Pakistan's serious efforts are acknowledged.  The usual doubts expressed about US staying power--sensible.

But what depresses is the realization that unless the two efforts match up, most of this will have been a complete waste of time--the same old, same old effort.

Most telling, none of this seems like it can credibly wrap up by the summer of 2011, when Obama wants to start leaving.

Comments

[Brent Grace]

I think the last, best hope for our efforts in Afghanistan is if Petraeus got a deal where he gets to quietly handpick the diplomats that will be working India and Pakistan while he works security on the ground in Afghanistan. Because whatever his title - CETCOM chief - ISAF commander - General David Petraus is now our first secretary of systems administration.

[Stuart O'Neill]

This is the sit rep that the American people is not being given. I agree with the first comment that the new leadership will be critical in creating an effective team. Have the civilian leaders been working at odds with one another? That's doesn't seem to be the case with me. I would be more concerned with DoD buy-in to the COIN concept.

Just as important is to insure the buy in of the American people to the effort itself. Already we have seen the failure of the civilian side of Sys Admin in Marjah simply because there was no civilian presence in Marjah.

If security has to be established as a predicate to the Dept of Everything Else effort then it is difficult to see how we are to establish a security presence that would allow the DEE to take the field and begin building infrastructure.

Are we in a part of the world, AF-Pak that has no effective controls of many regions of their countries and doesn't have the the central government to assert that control? Are we, again, in a series of civil wars where the populous doesn't support the government? Can COIN work without a a popular, or at least accepted, central government? No answers. Just questions.