Better relations with the US?

This is the 25th year of my involvement in Pakistan-US relations. For these twenty-five years, I’ve worked for better relations between our two countries, explaining Pakistan to people who are pretty ignorant about it, but now I’ve decided to stop – for Pakistan’s sake.
Something happened recently that slapped me into reality. I was making a deposit at a bank. As I am a Pakistan Cricket supporter, and have a friend with the PCB, I was wearing a Pakistan Cricket jersey and a hat with a Pakistani flag on it.
“You don’t see much apparel with ‘Pakistan’ on it in Washington,” the teller said. He was actually from Pakistan and mentioned that Pakistan wasn’t very popular in the States.
I really didn’t need to be told that. Every year, a survey comes out showing the most and least popular countries among Americans. Every year, Pakistan is the third least-popular country, behind only North Korea and Cuba. I have a sneaking suspicion that due to the thaw in relations with Cuba, Pakistan will be second from the bottom this year.
It finally dawned on me that this is no accident. This is the result of a concerted slander campaign by the US government and the think tanks who feed off of it. That campaign has been effective. Ask any American the first thing that pops into his head when he hears ‘Pakistan’ and it will usually be either ‘terrorist supporter’ or ‘double game’.
The ‘double game’ slander is particularly offensive, coming, as it does, from functionaries of a government that itself has been playing a double game. Since 9/11, US officials have been flying to Islamabad and talking about how much the United States values the alliance. As soon as their planes touch down in Washington, they tell everyone who will listen that Pakistan cannot be trusted.
A lot of this is just plain bigotry. Whether they admit it or not, most officials seem to see their mission as bringing the benefit of white civilisation to the little brown people. The fact that government offices in Islamabad are full of people with degrees from Oxford, Cambridge, or the London School of Economics does not shake their belief that they need to civiliwe Pakistan. The chief difference between Americans and Pakistan’s former British rulers is that at least the British respected the culture and the people – Americans don’t. Most Americans don’t respect any Muslim culture.
And that’s the rub. No matter how westernised a Pakistani might be, to most Americans, he’ll never be anything more than a wog. US government officials constantly wring their hands about the Islamisation of Pakistan’s officer corps. What they are really seeing is proud, patriotic men who are done trying to be more Western just to please people who are never going to respect them anyway. They are Pakistanis now, with all that means. The Americans can like it or lump it.
The rest of Pakistan should take a cue from that, because, let’s face it, all Pakistan gets out of this ‘alliance’, in addition to the scorn referred to above, is disastrous advice and grief. Yes, there is USAID, but it should just leave Pakistan for all the good it does. Pakistan also had its soldiers bombed by the US Air Force and there have been at least two military incursions by American forces onto Pakistani soil without government permission, the first resulting in the deaths of sixteen innocent, unarmed civilians shot at close range. Pakistan’s ‘ally’, having gotten it into a war, and, having pulled its troops out of that war, now stands ready to fight the War on Terror to the last Pakistani.
The alliance with the United States is just too one-sided and too expensive in blood and treasure for Pakistan. It isn’t worth wasting time and effort courting goodwill from a bad-faith ‘partner’ that is never going to give it. And, Pakistan doesn’t need better relations with the United States. It has China, and the Chinese seem to like Pakistan just the way it is. No demands. No unwanted advice. No racism. China has been a real, all-weather ally. Pakistan needs American goodwill the way a snake needs a set of golf clubs.
The writer is an associate at the Center for Security and Science. He has served in the New Hampshire legislature and as an election monitor in Pakistan.
Email: TGHatCSS@gmail.com