By Syed Qamar.
In his latest piece(Why Are We Sending This Attack Helicopter To Pakistan?)published in The Wall Street Journal, Mr Hussian Haqqani, Pakistan’s ex ambassador to America, seems to have been crafting his ‘self-popular criticism’ against Pakistani military vis-à-vis the Obama government’s decision of selling 15 AH-1Z viper helicopters and 1000-Hellfire missiles to Pakistan.
Mr Haqqani (a reputed teacher and writer based in the US) has leveled his doubts that the US’s sending equipment would likely be used against ‘insurgents’ in Pakistan(the Bloch insurgents in Baluchistan and those secular activists involved in such activities along the disputed Kashmiri border).He is of the view that the American military weapons would not be used against ‘tribal terrorists’ in the ‘Fata region’ but be used against India.
That’s a gross oversimplification ; Pakistan’s military has been performing a great mission of fighting (an ‘extrinsically waged- turned an ‘internal war’)against the most dangerous militants– in the world– who are well-equipped with ‘modern arms’ both in ‘South and North’ Waziristan. But Haqqani has suggested that the Obama administration should verify the ‘deployments’ of the selling armament to Pakistan.
Mr Haqqani’s argument–that being a nuclear state,Pakistan should have no fear against India’s big conventional army–bears no moral,legal and logical justification since there are ‘numerous precedents’ that the nuclear states do sell and purchase the arms to and from other states.Both Washington and Islamabad are mutually engaged in a strategic deal-binding the two states in countering the terrorism. The current initiative– of the US government as regard the selling of Hellfire missiles and the viper helicopters– is a part of the deal. (The US state department has correctly clarified that the terms of the selling arms to Pakistan remain ‘unchanged’.)
Mr Haqqani’s assertion is merely based on ‘speculations and misapprehensions’. By expressing this kind of criticism against Pakistan and its military, Mr Haqqani has shown nothing but depiction of his ‘polarization’ against Pakistan’s army.The fact of the matter is that Mr Haqqani’s perception is ‘foggy and unrealistic’. He seems to have developed a ‘biased approach’ towards Pakistan since his conduct is seen ‘ both doubtful’ and mysterious in the eye of many governmental agencies in Pakistan(in the aftermaths of the Raymond Davis case in Feb 2011 and the US Navy SEALs operation against Osama Bin Laden in Abbottabad Pakistan in May 2011) and therefore, he remains unable to visit Pakistan since 2011.
