Pak Tea House » Great game, Pakistan » Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers
Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers
‘Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers’
Britain is spending millions bolstering Pakistan, but it is a nation in thrall to radical Islam and is using its instability to blackmail the West
Christina Lamb
Published: 10 April 2011 (Sunday Times)
An injured child is carried from a Peshawar mosque hit by a suicide bomber
W hen David Cameron announced £650m in education aid for Pakistan last week, I guess the same thought occurred to many British people as it did to me: why are we doing this?
While we are slashing our social services and making our children pay hefty university fees, why should we be giving all this money to a country that has reduced its education budget to 1.5% of GDP while spending several times as much on defence? A country where only 1.7m of a population of 180m pay tax? A country that is stepping up its production of nuclear weapons so much that its arsenal will soon outnumber Britain’s? A country so corrupt that when its embassy in Washington held an auction to raise money for flood victims, and a phone rang, one Pakistani said loudly: “That’s the president calling for his cut”? A country which has so alienated powerful friends in America that they now want to abandon it?
As someone who has spent almost as much time in Pakistan as in Britain over the past 24 years, I feel particularly conflicted, as I have long argued we should be investing more in education there.
That there is a crisis in Pakistan’s education system is beyond doubt. A report out last month by the Pakistan education taskforce, a non-partisan body, shows that at least 7m children are not in school. Indeed, one-tenth of the world’s children not in school are in Pakistan. The first time I went to Pakistan in 1987 I was astonished to see that while billions of pounds’ worth of weapons from the West were going to Pakistan’s intelligence service to distribute to the Afghan mujaheddin, there was nothing for schools.
The Saudis filled the gap by opening religious schools, some of which became breeding grounds for militants and trained the Taliban. Cameron hopes that investing in secular education will provide Pakistan’s children with an alternative to radicalism and reduce the flow of young men who want to come and bomb the West.
“I would struggle to find a country that it is more in Britain’s interests to see progress and succeed than Pakistan,” he said. “If Pakistan is a success, we will have a good friend to trade with and deal with in the future … If we fail, we will have all the problems of migration and extremism that we don’t want to see.”
As the sixth most populous country, with an arsenal of between 100 and 120 nuclear weapons, as the base of both Osama Bin Laden and the Taliban leadership, and as homeland to a large population in Britain, Pakistan is far more important to our security than Afghanistan. But after spending two weeks travelling in Pakistan last month, I feel the situation has gone far beyond anything that a long-term strategy of building schools and training teachers can hope to restrain.
The Pakistani crisis has reached the point where Washington — its paymaster to the tune of billions of dollars over the past 10 years — is being urged to tear up the strategic alliance underpinning the war in Afghanistan.
Dana Rohrabacher, a Republican congressman from California who sits on the House foreign affairs committee and has been dealing with Pakistan since working in the Reagan White House, says he now realises “they were playing us for suckers all along”.
“I used to be Pakistan’s best friend on the Hill but I now consider Pakistan to be an unfriendly country to the US,” he said. “Pakistan has literally been getting away with murder and when you tie that with the realisation that they went ahead and used their scarce resources to build nuclear weapons, it is perhaps the most frightening of all the things that have been going on over the last few years.
“We were snookered. For a long time we bought into this vision that Pakistan’s military was a moderate force and we were supporting moderates by supporting the military. In fact the military is in alliance with radical militants. Just because they shave their beards and look western they fooled a lot of people.”
Christine Fair, assistant professor at the centre for peace and security studies at Georgetown University in Washington, is equally scathing. “Pakistan’s development strategy is to rent out its strategic scariness and not pay taxes itself,” she said. “We should let them fail.”The Pakistani crisis has reached the point where Washington is being urged to tear up the strategic alliance underpinning the war in Afghanistan
Pakistan’s prime minister, Yousuf Gilani, comes from one of Punjab’s largest land-owning families. Watching Cameron sign over the £650m, he said: “I think the root cause of terrorism and extremism is illiteracy. Therefore we are giving a lot of importance to education.”
If that were the case one might expect Lahore University of Management Sciences, one of the most elite universities in the country, to be a bastion of liberalism. Yet in the physics department Pervez Hoodbhoy, professor of nuclear physics, sits with his head in his hands staring out at a sea of burqas. “People used to imagine there was only a lunatic fringe in Pakistan society of these ultra-religious people,” he said. “Now we’re learning that this is not a fringe but a majority.”
What brought this home to him was the murder earlier this year of Salman Taseer, the half-British governor of Punjab who had called for the pardoning of a Christian woman sentenced to death under the blasphemy law. The woman, Aasia Bibi, had been convicted after a mullah had accused her of impugning Islam when she shouted at two girls who refused to drink water after she had touched it because they said it was unclean.
Taseer had been a key figure in Pakistan’s politics for decades and had suffered prison and torture, yet when he said the Aasia case showed the law needed reforming, he was vilified by the mullahs and the media. In January he was shot 27 times by one of his own guards. His murderer, Mumtaz Qadri, became a hero, showered with rose petals by lawyers when he appeared in public.
After the killing, Hoodbhoy was asked to take part in a televised debate at the Islamabad Press Club in front of students. His fellow panellists were Farid Piracha, spokesman for the country’s biggest religious party, Jamaat-e-Islami, and Maulana Sialvi, a supposed moderate mullah from the Barelvi sect. Both began by saying that the governor brought the killing on himself, as “he who blasphemes his prophet shall be killed”. The students clapped.
Hoodbhoy then took the microphone. “Even as the mullahs frothed and screamed I managed to say that the culture of religious extremism was resulting in a bloodbath in which the majority of victims were Muslims; that non-Muslims were fleeing Pakistan. I said I’m not an Islamic scholar but I know there are Muslim countries that don’t think the Koran says blasphemy carries the death sentence, such as Indonesia, Malaysia and Egypt.
“I didn’t get a single clap. When I directly addressed Sialvi and said you have Salman Taseer’s blood on your hands, he looked at them and exclaimed: how I wish I had done it! He got thunderous applause.”
Afterwards, “I came back and wanted to dig a hole in the ground,” he said. “I can’t figure out why this country has gone so mad. I’ve seen my department change and change and change. There wasn’t one burqa-clad woman in the 1980s but today the non-hijabi, non-burqa student is an exception. As for the male students, they all come in turbans and beards with these fierce looks on their faces.”
Yet, he points out, these students are the super-elite, paying high fees to attend the university: “It’s nothing to do with causes normally associated with radicalism; it’s that the mullah is allowed complete freedom to spread the message of hate and liberals are bunkering down. Those who speak out are gone and the government has abdicated its responsibility and doesn’t even pretend to protect life and property.”
Raza Rumi, a young development worker and artist who blogs regularly, agrees. As we sat in a lively coffee bar in Lahore that could have been in the West until the lights went off in one of the frequent power cuts, he said: “Radicalism in Pakistan isn’t equated with poverty and backwardness — we’re seeing more radicalisation of the urban middle and upper class. I look at my own extended family. When I was growing up, maybe one or two people had a beard. Last time I went to a family wedding I was shell-shocked. All these uncles and aunts who were regular Pakistanis watching cricket and Indian movies now all have beards or are in hijabs.
“I think we’re in an existential crisis. The moderate political parties have taken a back seat and chickened out as they just want to protect their positions. What is Pakistan’s identity? Is it an Islamist identity as defined by Salman Taseer’s murder, ISI [the intelligence service], the jihadists? Is that really what we want to be?”
He does not know how much longer he will write about such things. “I’ve been getting repeated emails that I should leave the country or shut up,” he said.
When I left the cafe I was followed for the rest of the day by a small yellow car.
Filed under: Great game, Pakistan · Tags: Islam, nation, Pakistan, West
30 Responses to "Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers"
Leave a Reply
Recent Comments
- Rex Minor
said Tajender commentry on many aspects of Indian commu... - ahem
said tajender = haywire brain
He is like a drunk man... - Rex Minor said AKB proposes a stop to name calling, and Kaalchakr...
- tajender
said the more educated states are less caste prone
k... - Fingolfin
said Tajender
ya they are not a trading community b... - tajender said reverse is ture,bjp and congress lost power in up...
- tajender said what i wrote about kayasth is right they have brhm...
- RajTOO
said tajender,
you're more of a cartoon than a serious... - no-communal
said BM,
.
I read parts of your debate on slavery. I... - tajender said Fingolfin
kayasth are illegetimate off spring...
Good article for the West. In Pakistan we all know these things and, despite our regrets and fears, there is little that can be done to change them. Many groups are trying, though.
BTW, Pervez teaches in Islamabad, not at LUMS … or has he moved?
George, this is all a result of your “War On Terror”, peddled by Bush and his little poodle, Blair. It has killed millions of people in the middle-east, Asia and now under a similar false pretense, Libya.
Your British troops are marching all over Afghanistan, killing civilians for kicks. Pakistanis had not even heard of Suicide Bombing, until you guys came along. Thanks to you, tens of thousands of Pakistanis are now in graves. Their blood, on your hands, Fulton.
As for your palty aids/alms, Pakistan has lost between $50 billion to a $100 billion fighting your war.
So thanks Fulton, for coming over and crapping all over us, and then complaining about the smell. Please, stop killing brown people and go home.
I really do not see the connection between keeping a beard or doning the hijab and subscribing to some form of religious obscurantism. The way some one outwardly appears to others is not any ones business weather Hoodhboy or a Sarkozy.
I’ll bet 1 Lakh rupees that it is Kashifiat and Dr Jawad sending threatening emails to Raza Rumi.
Also add a few Indians to the list who impersonate Pakistani’s and send Mr Rumi threatening messages.
@ Adna Khan,
Chutiya, what has george got to do with this article?
It clearly says Christina Lamb on top.
Btw, what happened to YLH.
I haven’t seen him around, I hope nothing has happened to him.
He was the last and only supporter of Ahmadi’s in all of Pakistan.
Wahid aadmi tha jo bolta tha, pata nahin bechare ke saath kya huwa.
I blame Kashifiat.
I am appalled at you George!!
You came to Pakistan everyone welcomed you, and now that you’ve left, you are like the rest of the goras who criticise Pakistan as a whole nation and ignore why this happened in the first place. You came to Pakistan, used it for your own reasons and left when you couldn’t get anything more.
Disgusted.
Money can buy lot of things but it can’t buy love.
Just because they shave their beards and look western they fooled a lot of people.
Dunno about the beards of pakteahousers, but they fooled a lot of people too.
[...] Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers [...]
west loves pakistan when it wants to fight war against Russia,which destroyed our country,brought klashinkov and heroin culture to pakistan,and our gernerals got richer and richer.west loved pakistan when it was fighting this mindless war against terror,and it has completely destroyed our country this time round,and only benefited generals and politicians again,and our people are suffering as usual.which country has fought some body else’s war for more than 3o years?yes its pakistan,and still we are bad,dont know what else w should do to get a good name.
It’s not to west but the RAPE are doing worst to the aam abduls and alahrakhis:
“Insecurity of Muslim Elite, yes, to which I will add, their short sightedness. I agree that it was not a mass Hindu Muslim issue in 1947, that is why I called two nation theory a fiction in 1947, but once Partition happened, the population in Pakistan was subjected to a mass propaganda that still goes on, to justify the existence of this state based on a false theory.
“
The insecurities were not imaginary but real ones. In their heart , they knew about the inhuman crime committed against Indians and feared bloody revenge as its the norm among islamic people. They also knew that as weak minded converts living among the inheritor and protector of ancient civilization , they were/ are /will remain simply incapable of making any intellectual, moral or spiritual , philosophical challenge thus onlee usual propoganda fed , delusional recourse of violence was tried but the whole bluff was called by Indian sons of soil. Rest as they say is history. They are still running away , away from indians, themselves and whole civilized world fearing epidemic is trying to quarantine them. Just say i am Paki at any airport and watch how parents run to protect their children fearing suicide bomber and how immigration, security folks get alert by just looking at the flight manfiest.
Amin Jan Naim (former Ambassador of Pakistan.)
writes in the 21.04.2011 (News/Jang)
A culture lacking beauty and reason
Quote
“Our culture lacks reasoning. Precise reasoning based on measures, measurability and numeracy is the basis for modern science. An exposure to modern science and the scientific method will be especially valuable to the young.
Freedom of religion and artistic and intellectual freedom are now the core basis of any modern society. In addition, there is a need to spread the virtues of tolerance, courage and politeness in our populace.
We need to remove malignant values and shun xenophobia and obscurantism. It is sad that Pakistan is becoming increasingly xenophobic. One desirable way forward would be to imbibe the Hellenic tradition.
It is to the pristine influence of ancient Greek thought that the gigantic structure of western civilization owes its splendour and achievements. Western influence through technology, industry, communications as well as scientific, juridical and political ideas is profound everywhere.
But since the west does not have all the answers, we can also gain by imbibing some of the traditions of China, Japan and Korea.
The legacy, mores and aesthetics of the Confucian societies are remarkable in human history. That legacy is now predisposing them towards healthy modernisation based on their own values as well as the acceptance of the best of the western ones.”
———
Comment
At last a pakistani looks to the hellenic civilization and not to Makkah and Madinah. That is positive deveopment.
Enough people above have called this BS out so I don’t have to do it now. Just a thought. She claims 24 years association with Pakistan and then writes, “Taseer had been a key figure in Pakistan’s politics for decades”. Taseer a key figure in Pakistan’s politics?
Did she sleep walk 24 years in Pakistan?
The article is all about $50 million distribution to media channels and nothing else.
“Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers”
I just needed to say one more thing about the title.
If Pakistan, a third world country with very limited economic independence, can play the West for suckers then isn’t about time, all westerners move out of their idiotic countries and call their leaders super idiots?
The glorious three stooges(Cameron, Obama and Sarkozy) who are currently bombing Libya should really be ridiculed out of their offices.
@Rehmat: Awesome reply! The only reply on this entire post worth reading!
Ofcourse the other ones calling this stupid article typical idiotic western propoganda were also good.
If anything the united states has stabbed us in the back a million times and its we who have been played at by the West. This article is false propoganda showing that we have self hating pakistanis who just will do whatever it takesto please the west.
mustafa wrote:
“If anything the united states has stabbed us in the back a million times..”
And Pakistan has stabbed everyone in the back a 100 million times.
To BJ Kumar
Everything good (even humanitarian aid) that non-muslims gave to the muslims ended up strengthening the fascists and the haters/slanderers of non-muslims among the muslims. I don’t like to say that, but all our hopes of a better islam are false hopes. Let us not mislead and weaken and then disappoint each other (especially the hard-pressed non-muslims) in a show-off-competition of naive-humanitarian sentiments.
The West, particularly the US, spent millions in 1980s to support ‘Mujahideen’ in the war against former Soviet Union. The crop of what we are reaping today was sowed in those years when we had “Rambo and Mujahideen” defeating Russian troops. This is so naive of the West to say that Pakistan was hoodwinking them. They knew all the way what was Pakistan up to. Now that the West is taking part in more than one armed conflicts and its own financial situation is worsening, it is trying to show itself as ‘victim’. No that is not acceptable. Only 30 years back the West was making heroes out of the people fighting Russians and today those heroes’ next generation is terrorists.
Pakistanis are paying much more than the money the elite get from the West. Miss Lamb may coming to Pakistan for the last 24 years, but she seems to be suffering from forgetfulness when she discusses the country.
Pakistan has come a full circle from the high days of Mujahideen as saviours of the free world to saving it again from them as terrorists.
Fight against “godless commies” was also part of Pakistan’s own enthusiastic allah-centred ideology (also to flatter Saudi Arabia and other arab-supremacy racists). The god-flatterers of the world were all eager to show-off their “love” for their gods by dubbing someone godless and pouncing upon him. The christian fascists and capitalist fascists who own and control USA (esp. through the republican party) and the islamic allah-lovers were hugging each other for this “god-sent” opportunity in Afghanistan. Furthermore Pakistan wasn’t in Afghanistan for charity. They wanted to bring and misuse Afghanistan and its fierce people under the hegemony of their hate-India ideology.
Not once has Pakistan admitted that violence was introduced massively and religiously into the Kashmir question unilaterally by Pakistan on the 21st Oct. 1947. (West)Pakistan exterminated the hindu minority of 25% to <2% in the very first few weeks of its existence and gloated over it.
So don't try to portray Pakistan as an innocent lamb. Pakistan was and is always a wolf in sheep's skin. They (esp. the pak armymen) know how to play the innocent victim and blackmail the world for money and weapons. Besides that, as an overpopulated land the human beings in Pakistan have low value and are regarded by pak leaders as expendable bodies. Hence the huge jihadi "culture" and export of terrorists and the careless attitude towards victims of terror (inland or outland).
If capitalist fascists, christian fascists and islamic fascists make a coalition then violence and lies and more unending violence – that is the natural outcome. Is that surprising?
Pakistan is not an innocent land. Take this criticism seriously and try to get out of it through honest self-criticism (instead of blaming/vilifying others). It is getting too late.
The communist party was wiped out physically and ideologically in Pakistan (something which even ultra-capitalist USA did not do on its own territory) long before “godless” communism and SU came to Afghanistan. So pakistanis should not pretend innocence and weep about having been misused by USA in Afghanistan against the SU.
The pakistanis used to boast in front of the USA: “Look how we eradicated the commies in our land. Why don’t you do it too? We are ahead of you in this. And this hindu-heathen India is going socialist. We will help you (=USA) give them a bloody nose too. Just give us money and weapons. We pakistanis will be your loyal watchdogs.”
Pakistan has been playing us all for suckers (since 63 years)
———————–is the result of———————————–
Islam has been playing us all for suckers (since 1400 years)
BJ Kumar
April 21, 2011 at 9:48 am
After a long time I have seen a somewhat lucid post from an Indian. Usually what I see is ignorance and utter lack of objectivity. It might have something to do with the Indian education system, like in Pakistan, is only designed to keep the number of illiterate lower. Raza Habib’s articles show similar lack of objectivity and he can never really fathom the underlying facts that surround many situations.
I disagree with this: “One can make even the conclusion that top decisionmakers knew all along what the Pakistani game plan was but played along because (a) it was politically expedient, and (b) they hoped on the inside that over time the Pakistani decisionmakers will change their thinking.”
Since when saints run the states and believe in things in good faith? That is contrary to the basics of how the political games are played. Most of the countries involved here have hundreds or years of experience in managing and colonizing many small and large countries for centuries, do you really think that they are so naive that a few barely matriculate generals would take them for a ride without conscious acquiescence?
All along, the anti Soviet collaboration between the Anglo-Americans and Pakistan was a evil nexus driven by self interest. While the Anglo-Americans had the single agenda of defeating and breaking down the Soviets, Pakistan remained focused on India, milking the unholy nexus to maximum benefit in terms of tens of billions of dollars in military and economic aid only to be used against India, and most importantly laying hands on the nukes while the Reagan administration looked the other way.
What is going on now, is basically a struggle between two evils, each having its own reasons to justify its position. The struggle would end in no time by the stronger decimating the weaker, but this is more complicated than that. The Anglo-Americans need Pakistan, as Pakistan is perhaps the only nation on earth that would do any dirty work in exchange of the dollars. More over the Anglo-Americans know quite well that sooner or later a Pakistan scorned would allow its nukes to fall in the hands of the Islamic terrorists, which would eventually find their way into the mainland US and the UK.
@ Rehmat,
It is not rocket science to figure out why the ” glorious three stooges (Cameron, Obama and Sarkozy) ” are clueless about how to deal with this ” wolf in sheep’s skin” Pakistan ……… !!!
Everyone has the right to work for its interests. Pakistanis should do what is good for pakistan.
Dear Pakistanis,
Do not blame the US alone for the rise of the Taliban. After the fall of the Soviets in Afghanistan, Pakistan became the ideological and material supplier of the Afghan Taliban. So the rise of the ‘Taliban’ is strongly a result of the Pakistani policy to raise a Islamist regime in Afghanistan.
As for the raising of the Mujahideen fighters, please do not kid yourselves. Pakistan was truly worried about the implications of a Soviet backed ‘godless’ regime in Afghanistan. So do not fake innocence by saying that there was no Pakistani self interest in raising the Mujahideen and that Pakistan did so purely to satisfy American ‘imperialistic’ ambitions.
logic writes:
“Everyone has the right to work for its interests. Pakistanis should do what is good for pakistan.”
1) Pakistan was created for islam’s interests – islamic imperialism and expansionism are the raison d etre. It is a quisling state.
2) Pakistanis are taught that it is in their interest (both pre- and post-mortem) to hate, slander and bleed India and exterminate the hindu identity and bootlick arabs and turks.
Pakistan eagerly joined the US capitalist-fascist imperialism in order to get weapons to use against India. Was maoist China less “godless” than SU? But Pakistan eagerly started bootlicking the Chinese. Why? Because China had inflicted a military defeat on India and was going to make use of Pakistan for the pupose of intimidating India.
“Use me if anyone can, but only help me hate India” that is Pakistani politics.
Good but a bit reactionary like her book Waiting for Allah.
To all the commenters criticizing the West: Your criticisms are welcome. The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are a disgrace. But. If you believe that the aid financed by our taxpayer dollars is a conspiracy to keep your country down, if your people are going to provide a sanctuary for terrorists, if you want to turn your country into a theocracy, then please do us a favor and don’t take our money. We have plenty of problems at home that need immediate attention. Please don’t apply for any type of visa to enter our countries. Please remain in Pakistan, wallowing in self-pity and blaming the rest of the world for the problems you’ve created.