By Dr Masooda Bano
There is a lot that Obama will have to address. First of all, the economic crisis within the US will demand his party's attention. One would like to hope that the Bush administration's failure in Iraq had some role to play in the current electoral success of the Democratic Party, but it is more likely that it is the economic crisis during the last years of the Bush administration that really contributed to the fall of the Republican Party. Either way, the Democratic government will have many issues to address on the domestic front in the immediate future. At the same time, it is clear that US foreign policy needs a major rethink. If Obama actually believes in the interventionist approach that he has been arguing for in election campaigns, and it was not just talk designed for electoral success, then there is need for serious lobbying by the Pakistani government, as well as civil society groups, in the coming months.
We now have a man in the Oval Office who is intelligent and dynamic, and, having already made history by being the first black American to become president of the United States, is likely to look for opportunities to make historically significant decisions. He is thus a man who can potentially be convinced with logic about the failure of pursuing military strategies in countries like Pakistan, when such policies have only increased militancy in the last eight years. However, he is also coming with the baggage that of his half-Muslim background. This makes him vulnerable to criticism that he is being pro-Muslim if he is seen to shift dramatically away from the current "war on terror" which is aimed at Muslim militants. Thus, there is a strong possibility that he might actually feel the pressure to come out with even more militarily interventionist policies towards countries like Pakistan, in a bid to persuade the American voter of his loyalty to secular US interests.
Despite this potential limitation, there is strong probability that Obama will record some shift in international policy, provided he himself gets persuaded that use of military force is not a solution or a means to stopping international terrorism. It is therefore very important that the Pakistani government captures the opportunity to launch a lobbying campaign in the US vis-a-vis the new US administration as well as civil society groups and the media to convince the American government and people that force is not a solution to checking militancy in Pakistan. There is enough evidence in Pakistan that policies of "war on terror" have increased militancy. They have not decreased it. Pakistan did not have suicide bombings prior to the September 11 attacks, yet now they are a norm. Similarly, the recruitment of fighters for resistance in the tribal belt has continued despite all the military operations.
Checking militancy requires skilful negotiations and provision of appropriate incentives to the militants to stop their actions. Above all, it requires good intelligence. Progress on all these counts has been surprisingly slow especially on the intelligence front. Today there is no clear understanding of the profile or motives of the fighters fighting the Pakistani army in the tribal belt or the Swat region. What is required from the Pakistani government is development of a strong case supported with evidence that random military operations by the Pakistani army or strikes by US jets cannot be the solution to the rising militancy in Pakistan.
The US public itself is realising that its interventionist policies are failing to deliver. Therefore, the change of government in the US provides the perfect opportunity to push for a shift in policy. The problem, however, is that the PPP government itself seems to prefer the use of military options over other solutions. But if Pakistan ends up having to pursue the same military options in the tribal belt in the coming years, then the responsibility for that will be on the PPP, not on the US administration.
The writer is a research fellow at the Oxford University. Email: mb294@ hotmail.com