After Pakistan vote, U.S. eyes options

Some White House officials want to embrace victors in parliament; others don't want to abandon Musharraf.

from the February 29, 2008 edition

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But even a quick embrace by the US of the parliamentary victors and an overt distancing from Musharraf would not have meant a smooth ride for the US. Polls of Pakistanis show a large majority do not consider the US war on Islamic extremists to be their war. A democratically elected government is expected to be even more sensitive to sovereignty issues and to questions about US military operations in the country.

For example, the new leaders could be tempted to sign a "separate peace" with militants in Pakistan's northwest provinces along the border with Afghanistan, says Robert Grenier, a former head of the Counter Terrorism Center at the Central Intelligence Agency. That might yield a "respite" from the bombings and other violence Pakistan has experienced over the past year, he says, but it would not be sustainable.

What's needed, Mr. Grenier says, is a long-term counterinsurgency effort giving priority to improving services and economic conditions and building a government presence in isolated and lawless areas. A plan reflecting that thinking was proposed earlier this week by Sen. Joseph Biden (D) of Delaware, who is calling for nonmilitary aid to Pakistan to be tripled to $1.5 billion. Foreseeing a decade-long project, Senator Biden says the program should emphasize education, employment, and health.

The problem for the US, Grenier says, is that successful counterinsurgency work is a long process, as Biden's call for a long project points up. And that portends a conflict between short-term military action against militants and long-term programs that many consider more fruitful but can be easily set back by unpopular use of force. "We're asking [the Pakistanis] to square the circle, to undertake these two contradictory things at the same time," says Grenier, now a managing director at Kroll, a global-security consulting firm.

Markey says the postelection moment is "an opportunity to strike a different balance" between military and civilian assistance, but Weinbaum says the years of a US focus on Musharraf are not going to make that easy.

"It makes sense," he says, "but it's very late, and the Pakistanis are very cynical about anything we do at this point."

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