The US and China in Pakistan - their respective roles

[JE Menon]

And when the crap hits the fan, as the picking apart of US policy on Pakistan starts in earnest, be sure that every tom, dick and harry will say that the real reason for the irrational pandering towards Pakistan was Iran, you see, not India.

Be sure of it.

When did the US become the bad guy? Did anybody see it happening? What happened to the US that at least had some measure of legitimacy in its claim to morality in its conduct, as opposed to the plain barefaced diplomacy of hypocrisy that it practices today? Power has corrupted absolutely.

[Virupaksha]

previously it was US vs the russia. US was simply the better bully.

Now US is the only bully which matters.

viru uvacha: Crap gets distributed according to the percentage of bullying power one owns.

Guess who gets the crap for the sh*t which goes on around the world.

It never had never has never will have any ethics. You have better chances of finding Yeti than finding ethics in US behavior.

[ramana]

X-posting....

Despite Beijing Bonhomie, China stalls India's move on Salahuddin: Officials - Suhasini Haidar, The Hindu

Despite commitments on fighting terror in the joint statement between India and China during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Beijing, officials say they are “concerned” over a series of moves by the Chinese government to stall India’s proposals at the United Nations.

Since December 2014, India’s Permanent Mission to the UN has filed at least three separate proposals on Pakistan-based terrorists, each of which has been reportedly delayed or stopped by China at the United Nations Security Council sanctions committee on Al-Qaida and associated entities. “We are concerned about China’s persistent opposition to our terror proposals,” a government official said.

Official sources also confirmed to The Hindu that China has put a “technical hold” on India’s request to list Hizbul Mujahideen chief and head of the ‘United Jihad Council’, Syed Salahuddin. The “technical hold” amounts to a veto on going ahead with the listing process for at least three months, as the UN Committee on al-Qaeda and associated entities, (also called the ‘1267 Committee’ for the UN Security Council resolution of 1999 that banned Al-Qaida and Taliban leaders), as the committee can only decide by “consensus”. All 1267 committee meetings are “closed-door sessions” between the 15 Security Council members, so officials depend on other diplomats to tell them which country opposes and supports a proposal.

Sources said the hold was put on Salahuddin’s listing during a meeting of the committee in April this year, but even the discussion on India’s proposal had been delayed for months after the original request was made in September last year. During that time, the 1267 committee met more than 15 times, and agreed to add about 30 new names to the sanctioned list. The listing means all member States must cut off the entity’s finances, travel and access to arms.

The request is a part of an Indian government initiative for years against Salahuddin, who is wanted for several Hizbul Mujahideen attacks. The United Jihad Council that he heads includes the Lashkar-e-Taiba and Jaish-e-Mohammad. In 2008, just two weeks after the Mumbai terror attacks, Salahuddin was photographed praying along with 26/11 key accused Zaki-Ur-Rehman Lakhvi. The Indian request to list him came after a public speech by Salahuddin in Muzaffarabad in July 2014, where he called on al-Qaeda and Taliban cadres “to fight Indian security forces in Kashmir”. Diplomats said they are puzzled by China’s move in the case as it has asked for more proof of Salahuddin’s links with the Al-Qaida. “Why should China have any opinion in the Salahuddin case, if it isn’t to help Pakistan,” one official asked, while speaking to The Hindu.

While Chinese officials seldom speak directly on the issue, the Chinese government has long maintained its close ties with Pakistan and coordination at the UN. In an interview last September, Chinese Ambassador to India Le Yucheng had told an agency, “Pakistan is also a victim of terrorism… China, India and Pakistan ought to work together to deal with the problem of terrorism and root out the cause of terrorism.”

Meanwhile, Salahuddin’s case is not the only one in which Indian proposals have faced resistance from China, sources said. In December 2014, India had issued several letters both to the UN and to the Pakistani government asking how LeT and Jamaat-ud-Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed, who is on the 1267 list, was able to fund massive rallies in Lahore and Karachi. Most recently, last month, India’s Permanent Representative Asoke Mukerji had written a letter to the then Chairman of the Committee James McLay (since replaced), asking the 1267 committee to investigate who had paid or stood guarantee for Zaki-Ur-Rehman Lakhvi’s bail, as he too is on the sanctions list, and can have no recourse to funds. The issue is also pending with the 1267 committee, which has met twice already in May, without taking up the Indian proposals, allegedly after interventions by the Chinese Permanent Representative.

In the joint statement between Mr. Modi and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang issued on May 15, both sides committed to fighting terror and “urged all countries and entities to work sincerely to disrupt terrorist networks and their financing, and stop cross-border movement of terrorists”. The words gave hope, one official said to The Hindu: “But we are yet to see China’s words translating on the ground in the UN.”

Point to be noted PRC is using its P-5 seat to stall Indian moves to use UN to chastise TSP for harboring terrorists against India.

China has at least on two earlier (2006 & 2008) occasions blocked the UNSC’s Taliban-Al Qaeda group from declaring Jama’at-ud-Dawah and its Emir, Hafeez Saeed from being included in the list of entities and persons proscribed under Resolution 1267. It put a technical hold on all these occasions demanding to see ‘more evidence’. In May 2009, after JuD and Hafeez Saeed were eventually placed on the list in Dec. 2008, China blocked Indian move to place Maulana Masood Azhar of Jaish-e-Mohammed on the same UN 1267 Committee list. Later, when India engaged China in counter-terrorism talks in July, 2011 and presented evidence about JeM and Maulana Masood Azhar, it summarily refused to re-visit that issue. It also rejected Indian requests to place Azzam Cheema and Abdul Rehman Makki of the LeT under the Al-Qaeda and Taliban sanctions list. In the UNSC, China remained the only country not to accede to this Indian request. The usual Chinese excuse has been “there is no single definition of terrorism” and hence China has avoided taking a clarified stand on it. Because of its close proximity to Pakistan, China has been non-cooperating in counter terrorism issues even though the bilateral dialogue has been going on annually since c. 2002. It was during the Indian Foreign Minister Ms. Sushma Swaraj’s visit to Beijing in February 2015 that some change was visible in the Chinese stand. A joint statement issued by the three foreign ministers of Russia, India and China (RIC meeting) “underlined the need to bring to justice perpetrators, organizers, financiers and sponsors of terrorist acts. The ministers reiterated that there can be no ideological, religious, political, racial, ethnic, or any other justification for acts of terrorism,”. China and Russia also decided to back India for moving a proposal at the United Nations that essentially goes against Pakistan on the issue of terrorism. The three foreign ministers called for early conclusion of negotiations on the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism, a resolution passed by India in 1986 but which has been languishing since then. And, now the Betal has once again climbed the tree.

Internal terrorism is a matter of internal security. When terrorism is used against other countries it comes under the accepted definition of terrorism.
What PRC is doing is shielding Pak use of terrorists against India.
This will continue as long as PRC has upper hand in UNSC. We can blame Nehru and do nothing or stop trying to use UN to prevent PRC the satisfaction. Besides UN resolutions have not done anything useful and are not worth the paper on which they are written unless they are enforced. TSP will simply rename the terrorist organization as they have done many times and/or claim the individual does not live in TSP.
So this repeated begging PRC indulgence to condemn TSP who is a minion is futile and MEA should stop this Tantalus act.

Analysis: http://www.huffingtonpost.in/jhinuk-cho ... 18840.html
"How 'Act East' Can Be India's Key To Managing China".

Quite evidently Beijing's insistence about common points of convergence between the two countries is to spare China of any friction with India in its Act East policy. This is perhaps a point India should leverage. China is working with Pakistan to construct a Sino-Pakistan Economic Corridor across the Karakoram ranges into Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and connecting with the Arabian Sea at Gwadar.

But read the whole piece.

Not really. The key is the terrorist nature of TSP that allows PRC to keep India in check. As enqyoob said many times "Give peace a chance, destroy Pakistan!"

The terror apparatus in TSP is the key useful tool for PRC and US against India.

As TSP abounds in terrorists of different hues and ilk the answer lies there.
Not is diplomatic fumbles.

[Tuvaluan]

The geniuses in the Indian MEA are still not done with their push for a UNSC seat, and in the recent Indian Express article Bruce Riedel states that is the US carrot to get India to cooperate with it. As long as the Indian govt. gives legitimacy to the UN, India will continue to get screwed by China and the USA in the P-5. Buggers must think everyone in India is an idiot, using the MEA as the sample set.

http://indianexpress.com/article/opinio ... rsus-them/

Apparently, the US will always and forever be committed to India being in the US, though India is never going to get anywhere near the UNSC, but that is all china's fault, you see. The cretins in the Indian establishment who continue to push for the UNSC need to be taken out and shot for their unwavering stupidity for decades, even in the face of all available evidence that the UN works against Indian interests for the most part. During the MMS/UPA regime they even spent all their scarce diplomatic resources "drumming up support" for their entry into the UN...unable to even understand that power politics will allow no such thing.

In contrast, Obama promised Washington’s backing to India for a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council, a commitment unlikely to ever come to fruition while China has a veto. Nonetheless, it is statement heavily symbolic of the president’s worldview. It is also a commitment no future president can easily walk away from.

The likes of Bruce Riedel think that the current administration still consists of the same bunch of morons who would anything for faint praise from the US or UK govt., like the MMS regime. It is good that the likes of Bruce Riedel do not recognize the change that has taken place. very good indeed.

[Tuvaluan]

http://thewire.in/2015/05/25/isi-facili ... overnment/

ISI facilitates Taliban-china meeting -- US set up taliban office in Qatar a couple of years ago and handed over control of the project to ISI to pass the baton to China. And now the likes of Riedel write loads of bullsh!t about how US and India are on the same side. isn't that cute.

Such a meeting was held to discuss the possibility of talks between the Taliban and the elected Afghan government.

“People familiar with the meeting said Chinese officials and representatives of Pakistan’s spy agency — the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate or ISI — also attended the talks on May 19 and 20 in Urumqi, the capital of China’s western Xinjiang region,” the report said.

Chinese and Pakistani officials were not immediately reachable for comment, it said.

According to the daily, the Afghan delegation in China was led by Mohammad Masoom Stanikzai, who until last week was the most prominent member of the High Peace Council, the country’s peace-negotiating body.

Chinese trying to keep the jihadis out of Xinjiang/Urumqi it looks like. Let's see how that works out.

[A_Gupta]

http://www.indiapost.com/concerned-over ... -to-lanka/
Concerned over calamitous Pak security, China looks to Lanka

BEIJING: Sri Lanka is of great importance to China’s strategic interests in the Indian Ocean as Pakistan cannot provide a strong foothold due to its “calamitous state” of security, state media here said today, underlining Beijing’s concern in this regard for the first time.

“Currently, the China-funded constructions in Pakistan cannot serve as a strong foothold for China, given the calamitous state of Pakistan’s security,” said one of the two articles in the state-run Global Times coinciding with the visit of Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe here.

“Sri Lanka can be of great importance for China in the security strategic layout in Indian Ocean. It will not only provide security assurances for nearby navigation channels, but will also promote the 21st Maritime Silk Road,” it said.

Above-mentioned Global Times article:
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/977523.shtml

[SSridhar]

http://www.indiapost.com/concerned-over ... -to-lanka/
Concerned over calamitous Pak security, China looks to Lanka

“Currently, the China-funded constructions in Pakistan cannot serve as a strong foothold for China, given the calamitous state of Pakistan’s security,” said one of the two articles in the state-run Global Times coinciding with the visit of Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickramasinghe here.

“Sri Lanka can be of great importance for China in the security strategic layout in Indian Ocean. It will not only provide security assurances for nearby navigation channels, but will also promote the 21st Maritime Silk Road,” it said.

Gwadar is currently only a commercial port. Pakistan has asked China to build a naval base, but apparently, Pakistan is under pressure from the US on this issue not to go ahead with that. But, sooner or later this will happen especially as CPEC takes shape. Gwadar is one of the 18 foreign naval bases that PLAN is acquiring/building and it is the *only one*, among the eighteen, to have facilities for Logistics Supply, Rest & Recreation and Repairing.

China believes that these ports will take care of the three crucial chokepoints for marine trade namely, Bab-el-Mandeb (oil transport from South Sudan on the Red Sea), Hormuz Strait (almost 40% of China’s total crude oil) and the Malacca Straits (37% of Chinese LNG imports, 46% of gas imports and 59% of oil imports).

While Gwadar is the most essential for the Straits of Hormuz, Sri Lanka would play a crucial role for the Malacca Dilemma. In the Galle Dialogue 2014, Vice Admiral Su Zhiqian of the PLAN’s East China Sea Fleet said, “The freedom and safety of navigation in the Indian Ocean play an important role in the recovery and development of global economy and the Chinese navy will actively maintain the peace and stability of the Indian Ocean”.

China’s intrusion into Indian sphere of influence is very visible in Sri Lanka where it has entered into a deep defence and financial engagement with that country. In March, 2012, the two countries further pledged to deepen the ties when the Sri Lankan Defence Secretary Gotabaya Rajapaksa visited Beijing. The relationship got further cemented when India voted against Sri Lanka for the US-sponsored resolution in the UN Human Rights Commission on March 22, 2012. China strongly supported Sri Lanka and voted against the resolution as India remained the only Asian country to support the resolution. The Indian Foreign Minister S.M.Krishna made the following observation: “China is taking more than normal interest in the Indian Ocean and we are monitoring it carefully.” In c. 2014, India had tointervene and ask Sri Lanka to drop the contract to a PLA-owned construction company to build an ammunition storage dump. We have to now await what the latest Sri Lankan Prime Minister's visit to Beijing has to offer in defence matters.

During September and October, 2014, two Chinese SSNs docked at the Colombo port which raised concerns in India. India called the Sri Lankan Defence Minister, Gothabaya Rajapakse (brother of President Mahinda Rajapakse) to New Delhi and voiced a strong protest. A senior Indian official said “Even after our repeated requests for prior information, Colombo informed the Indian Mission only after the vessel was docked at the port,” China had been claiming that its SSNs are involved in the anti-piracy operation in the Arabian Sea, a proposition that alarms India. In November 2014, the noted TNA (Tamil National Alliance), R. Sampanthan parliamentarian asked pointed questions in the Lankan Parliament. “Is a position sought to be created where India will not be able to play any role in Sri Lanka in keeping with India’s role over the past three decades and consistent with India’s historical, geographical and cultural links with Sri Lanka?”, he asked.

Hambanatota, Colombo will turn out to be big PLAN bases irrespective of the defeat of Rajapakse.

[RajeshA]

US, China and Pakistan are a menage à trois

[ramana]

From STFU thread....

http://tribune.com.pk/story/1299748/us- ... nt-truths/

For reasons right or wrong Pakistan will likely be in the news as the Trump administration settles in. This may lead to an increased focus on US-Pakistan relations in the Pakistan media. To contribute to a good debate I thought I would share with the readers my own modest knowledge of the relationship based on long years of experience as a policy practitioner in Pakistan and now for the past decade as an academic in the US. Indeed a view from both ends in two different roles and from two different perspectives.


Not all relationships end up serving all the interests of any two sides. Yet often in an important relationship there is a larger conceptual framework embracing some commonality of interests and a shared vision that holds good over a period of time. And that helps them to see issues in a larger perspective with a sense of continuity and overcome or manage their differences. But this has not been the case with the US-Pakistan relationship.



In each of their three close alliances: during the early years of the Cold War, the 1980s Afghan Jihad and the post-9/11 war on terrorism, the two countries were allies in one issue and antagonists in another. Each was using the other to advance interests of its own that were not quite compatible with those of the other side. Even on their shared interests their perceptions and policies were not the same. That did not make for an enduring relationship.

Frankly the US-Pakistan relationship has not been a normal one. It has historically been driven by certain politico-military needs of the two countries conducted by a narrow band of leadership at the top assisted by the military and intelligence community. And there has been an underworld of the relationship not fully transparent or accessible to regular diplomats, at least in Pakistan, making it difficult to manage the relationship. Besides, it has not enjoyed a consistent public support in both countries.

The truth is it has been a substantial relationship with little substance. In its heydays the American aid to Pakistan rivalled those to Egypt and Turkey just behind Israel but the quality of relationship with Pakistan was nowhere near Washington’s ties with the others. The reality is aid levels and quality of relationship are not always connected.

All the same the relationship has served some important interests of the two countries over the past six decades. There is no denying the US had strengthened Pakistan’s defence capabilities and potential for economic development that gave critical help in stabilising the emergent state. But that was a long time ago and indeed the last time the US really helped Pakistan. And the only time the relationship enjoyed a broad based public support. The relationship since then has been of a different nature. It has been between Washington and Pakistan’s ruling elite principally the army.

{IOW as long as jiziya was coming it enjoyed popular support.}


With its capacity enhanced by American patronage and failing politicians providing it space and the excuse, the army became a dominant player in Pakistan’s political life and largely remains so. The army and politicians competed for power, but cooperated in the defence of the ruling elite’s class and institutional interests underpinned by support from external benefactors that became Pakistan’s organising idea.

The US, a principal benefactor, hired the leadership from time to time for the advancement of its strategic interests. And in exchange for its support Pakistan hired Washington for military aid and economic assistance to bankroll poor governance. The US-Pakistan relationship became cliental on both sides and increasingly transactional (and will become more so under Trump). Washington used Pakistan for its own strategic purposes by taking advantage of and indeed playing into its power imbalances and structural weakness, strengthening Pakistan’s flawed body politic, an expediency for which not only America itself but Pakistan also came to pay a high price. And the cost has kept escalating.

In the Ayub era Pakistan’s democracy suffered. And for the US, its relationship with India was hurt. During the Zia period there was further blow to democracy. And the US lost too as Pakistan went on to complete its nuclear programme under the umbrella of the Afghanistan war. And both were losers as their alliance during the Afghan war helped Washington win the Cold War but under the darkening shadow of sinister forces of radicalism that would later come to haunt both the countries.

In essence the relationship has had some serious side effects. That is why there have been reservations about them in both countries among sections of public opinion, political institutions and the strategic community. To overcome that, both sides oversold the relationship. Pakistan erroneously billed it as an alliance against India. And the US disingenuously played up Pakistan value as an ally to gain public support and Congressional approval for the high levels of aid. When the need for close relationship ended Pakistan came under stricter scrutiny by media and Congress and the reality dawned. And then came the sanctions, essentially as a political balancing act. As for Pakistan it could only react with anti-Americanism accusing Washington of all sorts of things fair and unfair.

While the US has often treated Pakistan unfairly, even in a high-handed manner, it must be said that the public grudge against America for not supporting Pakistan against India in 1965 and 1971 is misplaced. A close scrutiny of the US treaty obligations to Pakistan leave no doubt that the historical US commitments were essentially in the context of Communist threat to Pakistan’s security. The US therefore did not really break any treaty commitments by not coming to Pakistan’s help in 1965 and 1971.

{What was the USN Task Force 74 and USS Enterprise all about!}

What lies ahead for the two countries under the Trump administration? More on it in a later article but for now one can briefly say it depends on what approach he brings to the war on terrorism and to the Afghanistan war. Pakistan’s importance will remain as long as Afghanistan remains unresolved but it will come under increasing pressure to either bring the Taliban to the negotiating table or expel them. With China at its back and the option of developing ties with Russia and Pakistan’s cockiness that it is too dangerous to fail Islamabad has withstood the pressure so far. But for how long?

My advice. Do what is in your national interest. And if you think supporting Haqqani Network and the Afghan Taliban is in your interest, think again. By all means strengthen ties with China but don’t fall from one dependency into another. Relations with both China and the US are important for different reasons. It is an era in global politics where everybody is trying to multiply its relations. Pakistan has great strengths including among others a good professional army and a skilled Foreign Service. Come up with some bold moves to get on board rather than just make statements.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 19th, 2017.

Essentially he is suggesting gubo to Trump and survive the Trumponami.