The killing of Osama bin Laden has left a section of the Indian strategic community deeply worried about its likely fallout on Afghanistan. Washington, it is feared, will now be under tremendous domestic pressure to quit Afghanistan. In the absence of the United States military, Pakistan would get unfettered access to Afghanistan, a development that could only undermine India’s strategic interests.
A smaller subset of Indian security experts also believe that the Osama bin Laden operation involved a covert deal or understanding between the United States and Pakistan. They fear that the payoff for Pakistan would be the control of Afghanistan and increased pressure on India on Kashmir.
Both these views seem to reflect a somewhat paranoid mindset. For one, the theory that US military helicopters could not have penetrated Pakistani airspace without the knowledge of the Pakistani military is not entirely tenable. Some reports have suggested that the US Navy used specially-modified stealth helicopters that were quiet and capable of flying at tree top level at top speed to evade radar.
Pakistan’s foreign secretary Salman Bashir, three days after the raid, disclosed in a statement that two Pakistani F-16 fighters had been scrambled to intercept the US helicopters but by the time the jets reached the compound, the raid was over.
Official pronouncements from Washington DC and Islamabad also suggest that there was no secret accord. According to the official version, the Osama operation was a hundred per cent American effort and the Pakistanis were only informed later. Everything seems to validate this position.
The Americans had several reasons to avoid involving Pakistan, the first being secrecy. Explaining why the Pakistani military could not have been kept in the loop, Maj. Gen. (Vinod Saighal Retd.), a New Delhi-based writer on strategic issues, pointed out that the CIA and White House have an “institutional memory” of Pakistani duplicity and, therefore, they would not have taken any chances. CIA director Leon Panetta later admitted that they had decided not to alert Pakistan fear that officials may have alerted the Al Qaeda chief.
“Recall that when the Tomahawks were launched toward the end of the 1990s during the Bill Clinton administration against a training camp in Afghanistan where Bin Laden was known to be present. They sent the Centcom commander just a short time before the launch to warn General Musharraf that the missiles were not being launched by the Indians,” Gen. Saighal said. “Minutes after receiving the news, Gen. Musharraf had the information conveyed to Bin Laden through the ISI and he was able to flee the camp. As they say ‘once bitten, twice shy’.”
The tenor of the official exchanges between Islamabad and Washington after the successful assassination suggests great discord. Pakistan’s foreign secretary Salman Bashir called the successful assassination “an unauthorised unilateral action” that would be not be tolerated in the future.
A day later, a Pakistan Army press statement threatened that “any similar action violating the sovereignty of Pakistan will warrant a review on the level of military/intelligence cooperation with the United States.” The statement also listed a number of curbs imposed on US intelligence and military operations in Pakistan.
Instead of adopting a conciliatory tone, Washington made it clear that there would be no apology and countered the Pakistani bluster by declaring that US President Barack Obama reserves the right to act again against top terror suspects inside Pakistan.
All this does not amount to a total rupture in ties. For, the United States still cannot do without the Pakistan Army. The US Navy team that killed Bin Laden is also reported to have taken away a pile of CDs, hard drives, tapes and documents. They might find proof of the Pakistan Army’s complicity, but even if they do, Washington will not act at this stage.
This was reiterated by US secretary of state Hillary Clinton, who said that the United States and its allies must keep working with Pakistan to fight Al Qaeda after the death of Osama bin Laden. Rachel Ehrendfel, director of the American Centre for Democracy added: “The Coalition forces are still in Afghanistan, and the decisionmakers, for some reason, think the US needs Pakistan. The Pakistanis know that and take as much advantage of it as possible.”
What the Osama killing has changed, however, is the level of trust in the US-Pakistan relationship, which can never be the same again. The fact that Osama was living for years in the heart of a secure Pakistani military area has effectively destroyed whatever remaining faith Washington had in Islamabad’s generals.
Washington will certainly have to drastically scale down its forces in Afghanistan but not its involvement. Strategists in Washington will now be forced to rethink their AfPak strategy, especially the medium and long term scenarios. Contrary to what some Indian strategists fear, Washington is unlikely to consider scenarios favouring the Pakistan Army or augmenting its role in the region. If anything, it will plan against such a contingency.
India will be need to be pro-active in securing its Afghan interests rather than constantly fretting about what the Americans will or will not do.
The author is an independent security and political risk consultant