Pakistani
Village Pays for Washington’s Erratic Conduct
By Siddique Malik
US
In its efforts to ‘eliminate’ terrorism,
the US government is getting side-tracked because
policy makers’ personal feelings are replacing
thoroughly debated options. Consequently, innocent
people are getting killed or hurt, and American
security interests are being jeopardized.
Washington has wrongly concluded that killing
Osama bin Laden and/or his comrade Ayman al-Zawahiri
will bring the menace of terrorism to an immediate
end. There will always be a few hundred hardcore
terrorists bent upon harming humanity. We should
always remain on alert against them and keep these
fanatics under pressure. However, the option of
killing them should be considered in conjunction
with other factors, main among which should be
the possible loss of innocent life.
When the leader of the free world walks into the
citadel of freedom (the halls of Congress) and
mentions the names of the world’s notorious
terrorists (I am not just referring to the 2006
State of the Union address), then these terrorists
automatically become the focal point of a hype.
Pretty soon, every one, including the policy makers,
end up in the bubble of illusion. Killing these
terrorists becomes the only objective, while it
will hardly serve the objective of eradicating
terrorism.
One day during Bill Clinton’s presidency,
America’s missile firing apparatus locked
on the world’s ‘terrorist-in-chief’,
Osama bin Laden. One nod from the president, and
freedom’s avowed enemy would have been blown
into bits. Lucky for bin Laden that at the time
he was entertaining a group of visiting Arab tycoons
related to the United Arab Emirates oligarchy,
and a strike on him would have killed all his
guests, too. The thought of antagonizing our Middle-Eastern
‘oil-relatives’ (oil is thicker than
blood) caused President Clinton to withhold the
nod. Bin Laden lived and his corpulent guests,
stuffed with lamb roast, left Afghanistan, safe
and sound.
Fast forward to the early morning of Friday, the
13th of January, 2006. In the Pakistani village
of Damadola, not far from the Pakistan-Afghanistan
border, people are deep asleep. The last day of
the three-day Eid ul-Adha feast is about to rise.
Somewhere in this world, someone in an American
military operations control room presses a button
and a stream of missiles falls on a residential
mud compound in Damadola, killing 18 people, among
which are 14 members of the same family, including
small children.
Al-Zawahiri was expected to be in the compound
but as it turned out, it was not the first instance
of American intelligence having gone awry. However,
those who died in the volley were guilty of an
‘unforgivable’ crime: none of them
belonged to a rich, powerful Arab family, or owned
an oil reserve. America’s ‘great friend
in the war on terrorism’, Pakistan’s
military government, moved into action to mitigate
its masters’ embarrassment.
At first, the Pakistani government said that no
terrorist died in this pre-dawn strike. Shortly
afterwards, it said that 2 terrorists were in
fact killed, then raising this number to 3, then
to 4, and finally to 5. It even gave the name
of one of the terrorists supposedly killed in
this raid. But did he really die in this strike,
or was he killed long ago and his death was kept
a secret to be made public on a ‘rainy day’
like this Friday, the 13th? A few days later,
Pakistan’s army chief cum president (this
is not a joke), General Pervez Musharraf said
that the Damadola episode indeed constituted a
violation by America of Pakistan’s territorial
sovereignty. In his bizarre logic he went on to
imply that this was not really a problem because
terrorists who were hiding in Pakistan were also
violating Pakistan’s sovereignty. Only he
understands this line of thought. Did he mean
to equate terrorists’ actions with what
American government did in Damadola?
Are the DNA results going to be made public to
prove that some of those killed were indeed terrorists?
Are impartial entities going to verify these results?
Such questions are raised in true democracies,
and conveniently (for the American government)
Pakistan hardly falls under this category. Therefore,
for now, all our efforts to bring democracy to
the Muslim world will remain focused on Iraq.
Even one of the world’s most suppressive
regimes, the oligarchy of Saudi Arabia will remain
an exception. Hummers and SUVs consume a lot of
gasoline.
Even Afghanistan is no longer a hot democracy
project for the American government. Afghanistan
is now replete with criminal warlords. Recently,
an Afghan journalist was sentenced to death for
writing in favor of women’s rights. The
Afghan judiciary consists of hard-core, ultra
conservative, pre-disposed clerics from the Taliban
days. These so-called judges have long lost their
ability to judge to their rigid extremist agendas.
Meanwhile, American officials are pretending that
Afghanistan is on the verge of announcing its
bill of rights. Looks like, agendas exist everywhere.
Lopsided series of post-Damadola statements from
Islamabad were quickly followed by a statement
from a State Department official that a terrorist
WMD strike on America was a real possibility.
Such frightening news would naturally sap any
one’s energy or will to raise questions
over debacles like Damadola. But we must raise
questions; after all, we are still a free nation.
What is the basis of this grim statement from
the State official? Was a terrorist recently arrested
with a cache of useful information, or was this
just an opportune academic statement?
The Damadola incident has bruised America’s
already precarious image in Pakistan and the rest
of the Muslim world. An important plank of our
anti-terror strategy is the operation WHAM (win
hearts and minds) in the Muslim world. The Damadola
incident has caused this operation serious damage,
and will be manipulated by the extremists in soliciting
sympathy on the street. Moreover, it will send
America’s well-wishers in the Middle East
and Pakistan running for cover, hardly an encouraging
scenario. This attack has thus done a big service
to bin Laden and his fellow gangsters.
By the way, how would we Americans feel if Canadian
or Mexican military jets crossed into America
without her permission, dropped a lethal load
on a farmhouse killing innocent people, and Ottawa
or Mexico City issued a statement not only justifying
this absurd act but stating that it would repeat
it if it suspected that there were fugitives in
a compound in America?
People of Pakistan’s northern areas that
border with Afghanistan are not criminals. They
have their customs, traditions, poverty, and nothing
else; certainly, no education. Any one who knocks
at their door is extended hospitality; whether
the visitor is a saint or the Satan, he will be
protected and fed, no question asked. These people
don’t fathom the concept of the ‘war
on terrorism’, the limits of international
borders, or the vagaries of international relations.
Terrorists are exploiting these simpleminded people
in the name of religion, and the best way to counter
this exploitation is to stimulate economic viability
and spread education and knowledge. But the lessons
must not be delivered by deadly drones.
Moreover, there is a crying need to convince Islamabad
to stop treating its areas adjoining Afghanistan
as its colonies. These areas have no autonomy,
have no access to any type of resources, and are
administered by bureaucrats appointed by Islamabad
rather than locally elected leaders. Hence the
seemingly endless animosity of the locals towards
Islamabad and whoever represents or is associated
with it, be it Pakistani soldiers or American
marines. This exploitative and manipulative system
was established by British colonialists, and over
the decades, Pakistani governments have found
it too convenient to relinquish. Naturally, religious
fanatics thrive in this suffocating atmosphere.
Freedom must be introduced to these areas before
their inhabitants will fathom projects launched
in its name.
Imagine if instead of attacking the Damadola compound,
America had revealed that despite the fact that
al-Zawahiri was expected to be in it, a plan to
attack it was aborted in the last minute because
there were civilians and children in the compound.
A few details about the compound and its inhabitants
would have made the announcement look genuine
and convincing. This would have brought America
immense respect and adoration worldwide. America
used to do this sort of thing all the time. What
has happened to us?
Victory for civilization will not come on the
day bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are simply killed.
It will come on the day when these terrorists
knock at a mud house in Pakistan’s rugged
border terrain and the person answering the door
contacts the authorities because he feels that
he owes this to humanity. Such attitudinal transformation
will not happen overnight, but will happen if
the message of friendship, democracy and freedom
is coupled with compassionate matching deeds.
Freedom indeed is the antidote to suppression,
while the antidote to ignorance (of which terrorism
is the advanced stage) is knowledge.
However, if a rugged mountaineer raises a question
over America’s seemingly endless support
of dictators, we better have a straight answer.
Simple people don’t have the stamina for
convoluted logic or fancy spin control.
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