The Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center hosted an off-the-record discussion with Frank J. Ruggiero, Acting Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan in the US Department of State, and Vali Nasr, Senior Advisor to the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Having recently returned from meetings in the region with government counterparts in Pakistan, they discussed the prospects for improved cooperation between the US and Pakistan in the coming year. Shuja Nawaz, Director of the South Asia Center, moderated the discussion.

While the United States and Pakistan continue to work toward achieving shared objectives in South Asia, recent events underscore the gravity of Pakistan’s internal struggle for stability and security. The assassination of the Governor of Punjab province, political turmoil in the coalition government, and the country’s fragile economy present increased challenges for the United States as it aims to collaborate with Pakistan on a variety of issues in the region.

Frank J. Ruggiero, Senior Deputy Special Representative and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Afghanistan and Pakistan since July 2010, became Acting SRAP when Ambassador Richard C. Holbrooke passed away on December 13, 2010. Prior to that, from July 2009, Mr. Ruggiero was the Senior US Civilian Representative for Southern Afghanistan. From January to June 2009, he was the Acting Assistant Secretary for Political-Military Affairs (PM) and served previously as the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary in the PM Bureau and PM Deputy Assistant Secretary for Defense Trade and Regional Security. Mr. Ruggiero has been a leading figure in the State Department on US security strategy in the Middle East and South Asia. He is a career civil servant and has served in several positions in the Department of State and Commerce. He holds an MA in Middle Eastern Affairs from American University and has completed all requirements for a Ph.D. (but the dissertation) in US Foreign Policy in Asia from the University of Virginia.

Vali Nasr, Professor of International Politics in the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University, has served as a Senior Advisor to the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan in the US Department of State since 2009. He is a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center at Harvard University, a Life Member at the Council on Foreign Relations. Previously, he was an Adjunct Senior Fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations (2006-2009), served as the Chair of Research in the Department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey (2003-2007), and was the Director of Islamic Educational Reform in South Asia Project of the National Bureau of Asian Research (2005-2007). Dr. Nasr holds a BA from Tufts University, an MALD from the Fletcher School, and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

We have seen this movie before, under civilian and military governments‚ and it does not have a happy ending. Pakistan again stands at a precipice. While there is much to be said for the indomitable spirit of the Pakistani people‚ our leadership appears blindfolded and unworthy‚ focused only on the short-term.
 
In 2010‚ we came through one of the world’s worst disasters—unprecedented floods that affected 20 million people‚ mainly the rural poor—with the help of ordinary citizens‚ the Army‚ and our friends abroad. Our leaders were AWOL during the crisis‚ and the federal and provincial governments flatfooted. Almost six months later‚ many of the affected are still awaiting aid‚ according to a senior international relief worker. Standing water makes life impossible in parts of Sindh. The floods have fallen off the news cycle‚ and donations for relief work have dried up. The floods will be remembered come the next elections.
 
Most politicians want the government to complete its full five-year term‚ as if there is something holy about that period‚ but good politicians need to have a plan that extends beyond a term in office. Today‚ there does not appear to be either the vision or the political will to take tough decisions. Instead‚ tactical moves dominate the political scene with individual parties trying to blackmail the Pakistan Peoples Party for an immediate edge.
 
The International Monetary Fund program is effectively dead. Our government failed to keep most of its promises of reform and‚ technically‚ the IMF could demand repayment at any time. Politically weak despite its legislative wins, the government could not persuade Parliament to accept farreaching reforms. It failed to muster support from coalition members and to bring aboard the loyal opposition in support of its economic policy. Pakistan now faces uncertainty‚ a growing circular debt and rising fiscal deficit‚ inflation‚ and money flight. Yet there is no expenditure control. There may soon be undue pressure on the State Bank of Pakistan to print more money. If Islamabad does not act firmly and fast enough‚ growth will continue to tumble and the pie may start shrinking. The resulting storm will affect everyone.
 
The military is fighting a life and death struggle against an internal militancy and insurgency. Yet‚ it looks to India as a persistent‚ overbearing threat. And there is no sign of a rethink of that relationship. An entente cordiale with India modeled along the U.K.-French 1904 Agreement would allow Pakistan to redirect resources for development‚ which will help the fight against the insurgency.
 
Recent research by the IMF’s Mohsin Khan indicates that trade with India could leap from under $2 billion a year to as high as $100 billion if peace were achieved. In his upcoming book‚ Parvez Hassan says Pakistan could have added two percentage points to its annual growth rates‚ effectively doubling the size of the economy‚ if it had cut defense spending in the last 40 years. That growth would have made a large defense establishment affordable and reduced the need for foreign assistance. Defense cuts can only come about if India and Pakistan end their hostility and if the military takes a sharp razor to its own spending and commercial activities. The core strength of Pakistan lies in its economy and society. The military can bolster that strength but is no substitute for stable and strong political structures and selfless leadership.
 
Looking back‚ 2010 gave us much to be concerned about: the rise of Islamic extremism evident in the recent attack on Sherry Rehman for trying to move Parliament to discuss the blasphemy laws‚ the lack of results from the promised investigation by the Army of the Swat killings‚ the unsolved mystery of the alleged kidnapping of journalist Umar Cheema. But there’s cause to celebrate‚ too‚ over the growing power of the courts‚ the ability of the media to shine a light on the hidden corridors of power‚ the successful clearance of the insurgency from most of the tribal badlands‚ and the success of our players— especially our women cricketers—at the Asian Games.
 
We leave behind a year of confusion and broken promises longing to start anew. Here’s to hoping we can step back from the brink‚ step up to the moment‚ and rewrite the script.

Shuja Nawaz is the director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council. This article originally appeared in Newsweek Pakistan. This piece is part of the Atlantic Council web forum “South Asia in 2011,”  a collection of contributors’ reflections on events in the greater South Asia region in 2010 as well as their predictions for the year ahead.

The South Asia Center of the Atlantic Council invited contributors to offer their reflections on events in the greater South Asia region in 2010 as well as their predictions for the year ahead.  The “South Asia in 2011” web forum is a collection of these thoughts and analyses.

New Atlanticist Analysis:

• Pakistan: Living on the Edge – Maleeha Lodhi
• Pakistan Futures – Raja Menon
• Déjà Vu, Again – Shuja Nawaz
• Continuing Instability in South Asia is in the Cards – Gurmeet Kanwal

Following Defense Secretary Robert Gates’ announcement of cuts to the US defense budget, Shuja Nawaz, Director of the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center, appeared on Al Jazeera’s Inside Story to discuss the impact of the cuts in relation to US global force posture.

In the aftermath of the assassination of Punjab Province Governor Salman Taseer, Shuja Nawaz, Director of the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center, appeared on Australia’s ABC National Radio and Canada’s CBC Radio to offer his thoughts on the situation in Pakistan. Nawaz was also featured in print media, linked below.

Click here to listen to Nawaz’s interview on Australian Broadcasting Corporation’s “Breakfast” program

Click here to listen to Nawaz’s interview on CBC’s show “The Current” (Segment begins at 15:43)

Related Press Coverage:

• Analysis: Blasphemy law reveals Pakistan’s bitter divide – Olivia Ward, Toronto Star
• Pakistan governor buried as clerics warn against grief – Michael Georgy, swissinfo.ch
• A Pakistani assassin’s long reach – David E. Sanger, New York Times
• Shadow over Pakistan security grows – Asif Shahzad and Sebastian Abbot, AP Enterprise (Huffington Post)

On Wednesday, December 22, the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center held a discussion with Gilles Dorronsoro, Visiting Scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and Ikram Sehgal, Chairman of Pathfinder G4S. Shuja Nawaz, the South Asia Center’s Director, moderated the session.

With nearly twenty percent of the world’s population living in India and Pakistan alone, events in the greater South Asia region exert an enormous impact on the international sytem. India’s rising economic strength has been accompanied by increasing political influence, as evidenced by President Obama’s recent visit to the country in November. Pakistan, devastated this summer by the worst flooding in the country in decades, continues to play a complex strategic role in the security of the region. What were the major challenges and triumphs in South Asia over the past year? What will shape the India-Pakistan relationship in 2011? What are the prospects for a positive outcome in Afghanistan as the US and NATO begin to reevaluate their objectives for the coming year?

Gilles Dorronsoro, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment, is an expert on Afghanistan, Turkey, and South Asia. His research focuses on security and political development in Afghanistan, particularly the role fo the International Security Assistance Force, the necessary steps for a viable government in Kabul, and the conditions necessary for withdrawal scenarios. Previously, Dr. Dorronsoro was a professor of political science at the Sorbonne, Paris and the Institute of Political Studies of Rennes. He is the co-founder and editor of South Asian Multidisciplinary Academic Journal and is the author of Revolution Unending: Afghanistan, 1979 to the Present (2005).

 Ikram Sehgal is a defense and strategic analyst from Pakistan. He is Chairman of Pathfinder G4S, Pakistan’s largest private security firm. A former army officer who served in the 1971 war against Bangladesh and India, he is also publisher and editor of the Defence Journal and writes a syndicated weekly column that appears in six countries in fifteen newspapers and magazines.

Press Coverage:

• The Afghan state is losing ground – Ikram Sehgal, The News

The untimely passage of Ambassador Richard Holbrooke leaves big shoes to fill in the AfPak region. It may take two men to replace him.

Over decades, Washington has usually sent mixed signals to Pakistan. This time the message should be clear and consistent: democracy, reconciliation, the military out of politics, a new policy for the tribal areas — and more democracy.

On Monday, December 13, the South Asia Center held a discussion relating to US policy in the South Asia region with Derek Leebaert, author of “Magic and Mayhem: The Delusions of American Foreign Policy from Korea to Afghanistan.”

Shuja Nawaz, South Asia Center Director, moderated the discussion. In the aftermath of the release of thousands of American diplomatic memoranda by Wikileaks, a variety of issues in US foreign policy are under scrutiny at home and abroad, including in South Asia, where there continues to be uncertainty about the success of US and NATO efforts to establish a secure and stable environment in Afghanistan, and the US still struggles to a strike a balance in its relationships with Pakistan and India. Problems also persist in neighboring Iran, where American officials remain wary of the country’s nuclear ambitions.

More on Derek Leebaert:

Derek Leebaert, who has taught foreign policy at Georgetown for fifteen years, is a partner in the Swiss management consulting firm, MAP AG. His previous books include The Fifty-Year Wound: How America’s Cold War Victory Shapes Our World (2002) and To Dare and to Conquer: Special Operations and the Destiny of Nations from Achilles to Al Qaeda (2006). He is also a coauthor of the MIT Press trilogy on the information technology revolution, and a founding editor of International Security and The International Economy, as well as editorial board member of European Security. He served in the US Marine Corps Reserve and is a director of the US Army Historical Foundation, Providence Hospital in Washington, DC, and of other public service institutions.

Shuja Nawaz, Director of the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center, appeared on the weekly WUSA9 show This Week in Defense News. The interview with Vago Muradian focused on the fragile relationship between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and Coalition leaders following Karzai’s calling for an end to Coalition special forces operations that target Taliban fighters.

Nawaz also commented on Pakistan’s war against extremists. 

Shuja Nawaz, Director of the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center, assessed the U.S.-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue in an article titled “The Mountain Yields a Mouse” for the November 8, 2010 issue of Newsweek Pakistan.

The article can be found on the Newsweek Pakistan website and below:

The Mountain Yields a Mouse

It’s time to reassess the Strategic Dialogue.

By Shuja Nawaz From the Nov. 8, 2010, issue

The latest episode of the U.S.-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue ended on Oct. 22, following weeklong discussions featuring 13 working groups on different sectors of the Pakistani economy. There were the usual platitudes. “The United States has no stronger partner, when it comes to counterterrorism efforts against the extremists who threaten us both, than Pakistan,” said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. But she also admonished Pakistan to get its fiscal policies on track.

This third round of talks produced only one notable result: the provision of a fresh, $2 billion, five-year aid program for the Pakistan military, subject to approval from the U.S. Congress. This was just one of the major items that Pakistan had on its 150-page pa-per of demands from its ally. The civilian side got short shrift. There was no word on a civil nuclear deal (relegated to “private discussions”); improved access of Pakistani exports to the U.S. market; or on India and Kashmir, which Pakistani foreign minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi raised in his concluding remarks.
 
U.S. officials continued to put the best face on the “useful” discussions. Pakistan’s representatives have trumpeted the promise of President Barack Obama’s visit next year to Pakistan—after he will have been to India first—and a potential invitation to President Asif Ali Zardari to visit Washington. But privately, Pakistani observers and some delegates have expressed their disappointment with the results, and the inability of the U.S. to gauge Pakistan’s needs and deliver appropriate aid. Except for minor amounts devoted to flood relief, most of the Kerry-Lugar-Berman funds have yet to hit the ground in Pakistan. As price takers, Pakistanis appear to have little left to do but carp.
 
The trust gap between the allies remains. And it will remain so long as the U.S. continues with its policy of carrots and sticks. The Dialogue was preceded by border violations by ISAF helicopters, causing a serious rift that led to the closure of NATO supply routes through Pakistan. Then, the evening before the final high-level meeting, The New York Times reported that the U.S. had decided to invoke the Leahy Amendment and block aid and training for any Pakistani units involved in extrajudicial killings. This preemptive move, despite Pakistan Army chief Gen. Kayani’s public denunciation of such acts and initiation of an internal investigation, rankled the Pakistanis.
 
Little does Washington realize that its carrots-and-sticks mantra may produce short-term gains, but it also solidifies the view among Pakistanis in general and Pakistan’s generals in particular that the talk of a long-term relationship may be just that, talk. The closed door sessions produced hard talk from the U.S. side, but the Pakistanis did not give way. If this behavior continues, the fourth round of the Dialogue may well be the last unless clear results emerge. Pakistan needs to clearly define its goals and “red lines” for the Americans. Similarly, the U.S. needs to be open about what it can and will do to help Pakistan, and it must recognize Pakistan’s regional position and role. Lingering hope is not the solution for this ailing relationship.
 
Time is running out on both sides. A faltering civilian government in Pakistan is caught up in debilitating political and judicial battles. The Army lurks in the shadows and affects all political players, both by what it does and does not do. Meanwhile, in the U.S., the administration will likely be weakened considerably after the midterm elections. The mood on Capitol Hill is not in favor of more or larger aid packages for anyone, especially allies considered twofaced. By the time the travelling circus meets in Islamabad next spring, the U.S. presidential campaign will have begun, and the July 2011 deadline for withdrawal of forces from Afghanistan will be looming. Even if all else remains stable, Pakistan will face an uphill task to persuade the U.S. to deliver what it seeks.
 
Beware too the wild cards in this game of political poker. If there is one more exogenous shock—another U.S. attack in North Waziristan, a Lashkar-e-Taiba attack in India, or a successful terrorist attack on the U.S. mainland emanating from Pakistan—all bets are off.