South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz joins Al Jazeera English to discuss the release of seventy-two prisoners in Afghanistan that have been deemed a security threat by the United States:

In the coming year, the greater South Asia region will be under enormous pressure. The 2013 elections in Iran and Pakistan ushered in new administrations that are now expected to deliver, particularly on the economic front.  Meanwhile, Afghanistan, India, and Bangladesh face their own elections in 2014.  In the midst of the ongoing transitions, the South Asia Center invited experts to share their predictions for the region in the coming year as well as offer advice on how to move relations forward between South Asian countries, and the US and greater South Asia.

Looking Ahead to 2014 Shuja Nawaz Sunjoy Joshi Samir Saran Moeed Yusuf Barbara Slavin Bharath Gopalaswamy Mohan Guruswamy Jonathan Paris

2014: A Year of Transitions

Shuja Nawaz, Director, South Asia Center
This will be an important year of transition in the region. Pakistan and Iran will see the results of their 2013 elections bear fruit. Iran may solidify its initial efforts to reach agreement with the United States and the West on nuclear enrichment, leaving till later the issue of nuclear weapons per se. Pakistan will run into headwinds in stabilizing its economy and in its relations with its neighbors. The polity remains divided for now between the civil and the military. The Indian elections spell change at the top  but the economy will remain struggling for most of 2014. Bangladesh will remain unstable and the economy will suffer major setbacks, even if there is a fresh election planned for this year or  next. Ashraf Ghani has the best chances of cobbling together an acceptable alliance in the Kabul elections to ensure Western support beyond 2014.

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Regional Dynamics in 2014

Sunjoy Joshi, Director, Observer Research Foundation
As the US is set to withdraw from Afghanistan in 2014, regional countries such as India, Iran, China and Pakistan are expected to fill the vacuum and step up constructive engagement with Afghanistan. The new Afghan President will initiate dialogues with his regional counterparts soon after elections in an attempt to shore up external support for his country. In particular, the Afghanistan-India-Iran trilateral transit agreement will be signed.
 
Afghanistan will demand Pakistan to release more Taliban prisoners and Rawalpindi will provide access to the Afghan Government to Mullah Baradar. However, neither will lead to a breakthrough in the peace talks. On the contrary, the Taliban will intensify its military campaign this spring in the hope of inflicting as much damage on the ANSF and foreign forces as possible. This will prove to be a thorn in Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, which along with frequent cross-border firing, will derail not only bilateral relations but even the peace process.

Pakistan’s relations with its other neighbour – India – are unlikely to change significantly in 2014. Irrespective of who comes to power in New Delhi, it will continue to link a rapprochement with Pakistan with the latter’s efforts against the terror infrastructure on its soil and the 26/11 perpetrators. However, Nawaz Sharif may find it dificult to deliver on both these accounts as this would involve far greater assertiveness vis-à-vis the new military chief. However, the two countries will continue to focus more on improving trade and economic relations . While this by itself may not fully satisfy India, a government led by the BJP with the support of the Akali Dal (the leading party in Indian Punjab) will probably be in a position to respond more favourably to these overtures.

Finally, while cross-border firings between the two cannot be ruled out completely, Rawalpindi will take stricter measures to ensure that no such incident is started from its side keeping in mind the turmoil that is likely to erupt on its western frontiers as the US drawdown begins.

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India and the Region in 2014

Samir Saran, Senior Fellow and Vice President, Observer Research Foundation
2013 was a year of foreign policy successes for India. It can be satisfied with the developments in Nepal as also in Bangladesh (though the government has reduced credibility) and it ensured a smooth succession in the Maldives. India deftly dealt with China – managing a border incursion effectively as well as concluding successful visits by the Prime Minister and the Dalai Lama to Arunachal Pradesh despite protests from Beijing. The relation with Pakistan remained volatile with several flare-ups. 2014 must see a greater effort at normalising this key relationship – but will it happen? No. If anything one will see familiar uncertainty, and possibly in the wake of the Afghan drawdown, an exacerbation of tensions as the two nations will invariably get drawn into the proverbial zero-sum game.

2014 is India’s year of the voter, and a change of government seems a foregone conclusion. The interesting thing to see will be if any side gets a majority or will India be saddled with a hung parliament. The big question obviously is how does this affect India’s regional and foreign policies. If the BJP gets the nod from the electorate India’s policy is likely to be more of the same, as the BJP and Congress hardly differ in their approach on key bi-lateral engagements. Despite the rhetoric of difference, policy will coast along. However if a third front government eventuates, one may see diminishing attention towards foreign policy. The important players in such a government will be regional politicians like Jayalalitha, Mamata and the Badal(s) who will influence India’s approach towards Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Pakistan respectively.

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Three Trends in South Asia

Moeed Yusuf, Director, South Asia Programs, US Institute of Peace 
First, virtually all South Asian countries are having a difficult time remaining inclusive. Some exclusion is driven by politics and some by lack of state capacity to tackle violent onslaughts against peoples of certain faiths, ethnicities, or ideological leanings. From Afghanistan to Bangladesh, minorities in one or more of these categories have had a terrible 2013. And there seems little reason to believe that leaders in South Asia will muster the political will or capacity to reverse the trends.

Second, and linked to the above, nearly all South Asian states would have gone through a general election between the spring of 2013 and Fall of 2014. However, save India, all countries have seemed unable to make the jump from being ‘electocracies’ to true democracies. Bangladesh is burning thanks to political bickering as we welcome 2014; Pakistan’s first peaceful democratic transition has yet to translate into more inclusive governance styles; the majoritarian democracy in Sri Lanka is becoming even less compromising; and we continue to see tactical political agendas overburden any consociational spirit in Nepal, Maldives, and Afghanistan.

Of course, elections are better than no elections. But the history of post-colonial South Asia suggests that prolonged period of electocracy is more likely to give way to a breakdown of the system rather than to maturing democracies. South Asian leaders need to prove their democratic credentials not by winning elections but by behaving democratically once in power. Again, unlikely in the near term.

Third, the two beasts – India and Pakistan – are still stuck, unable to move forward. One suspects proponents of the flawed conventional wisdom that “nothing can move till the Indian elections” may be winning out. In reality, if things have to move, now is the most promising time: there is a fresh popular government in Pakistan and a Prime Minister on his way out and with little to lose in India. Fingers crossed on whether they can defy the odds and make a modest breakthrough in the next few months.

So South Asia of 2014: exclusionary, violent, prevalence of electocracy without democracy; and still long way away from genuine progress between the two giants in the region.

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US and Iran Engagement

Barbara Slavin, Senior Fellow, South Asia Center
The United States and Iran will implement the Nov. 24 Geneva agreement despite attempted interference from hardliners in both countries. The deal should hold – assuming President Obama keeps his pledge to veto any new sanctions legislation. Iranian and American officials will begin conversations about regional issues, including Syria, and there will be greater receptivity in Iran to US-Iran academic, scientific and athletic exchanges.

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South Asia’s Year of Elections

Bharath Gopalaswamy, Deputy Director, South Asia Center
It will be a year of elections in South Asia! India will  experience a hung parliament. Expect many new faces in the parliament and a good chance that Narendra Modi will become the Prime Minister.  Protests, unrest and uncertainty in Bangladesh will rise. Martial law will likely be imposed. The U.S withdrawal from Afghanistan will result in increase in violence and will be an increasingly concerning factor for India and Pakistan. Finally, the Indian economy will recover, albeit slowly around 5%

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The more things change, the more they stay the same

Huma Haque, Associate Director, South Asia Center
Despite the several important transitions in 2013 in Pakistan (the first democratic transition of power, the appointment of a new army chief, and selection of a new chief justice), the problems of the common man will remain.  Sectarian violence and target killings will continue to rise, efforts to improve the energy crisis will lead to nowhere, the rupee will continue to ail, and Pakistan will not be prepared to handle the spillover from the proxy war from next door.

The elections will be the main hurdle for India in 2014, where the BJP’s Narendra Modi is likely to be India’s next prime minister.  Google envisioned India-Pakistan harmony in less than 4 minutes – politicians haven’t been able to accomplish this in 60+ years.  With every forward step, two more are taken backwards.  As our optimism for opening the India-Pakistan border for trade increases, new hurdles will continue to surface.

This will be a critical year for Afghanistan with the ISAF drawdown and elections in April.  Afghan troops can barely secure the country on their own so expect an escalation of violence.  Whether a new government is the answer to Afghanistan’s stability waits to be seen.

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India in 2014 – as in 1996?

Mohan Guruswamy, Senior Fellow, South Asia Center
We in India can make one safe prediction about how 2014 will unfold. That is Dr. Manmohan Singh will not be Prime Minister after the elections, most probably in May this year. Till a few weeks ago few were willing to hazard a guess that someone else other than Narendra Modi, the BJP’s anointed standard-bearer, would be Prime Minister. But after the spectacular debut of the Aam Admi Party, literally the common people’s party, in the recent elections to the Delhi Legislative Assembly, all bets are off. The AAP won 29.3% of the vote pulling the Congress down from 40.3% to 25.01% and the much-favored BJP from 36.3% to 34.37%. What was more galling for the BJP was that Narendra Modi campaigned extensively in Delhi and the BJP, responding to the anti-corruption impulses unleashed by the AAP, even changed its chosen candidate for Chief Minister mid-stream. Other political parties like the former UP CM’s dalit (lower caste Hindus) based Bahujan Samaj Party, which were making inroads into Delhi in the previous elections, were practically wiped out.

The Times of India today carries a summary of a commissioned opinion poll in India’s top eight cities, bearing bad tidings for both the major parties, the Congress and the BJP. The Times survey reveals that 44% of those polled have expressed an intention to vote for the AAP in the forthcoming parliamentary elections, if the party can put up a candidate in their constituency.  Since the BJP is generally considered stronger in urban areas, this poll has not surprisingly sent shock waves among its leadership. Ironically this apparent weakening of the BJP has brought some cheer to the badly battered Congress Party. While it expects a substantially reduced number of MP’s in the Lok Sabha, the lower house of Parliament, it enhances the hitherto almost written off chances of the Congress being a part of the ruling dispensation. The Congress Party is already supporting the AAP in Delhi, where despite its spectacular electoral debut, the AAP fell well short of a majority and is in office due to the vanquished Congress Party’s support.

Despite this, the poll also reveals that Narendra Modi is still by far the most preferred as PM. But Modi too has been badly battered in recent weeks. His general ignorance of Indian history was on display when he told an audience in Bihar that Alexander the Great died on the banks of the Ganges after being defeated by a great army of the Gupta kings, who had their capital in modern day Bihar. The only problem with this formulation was that the Gupta dynasty came into being several centuries later, and Alexander died closer to his home than Mr.Modi would like to think. He has shown himself to be gaffe prone and his handlers have studiously avoided press conferences and interviews. Can one win an election only on sound bites? Sound bites are only good in the attack mode, but cannot elaborate or outline a vision. This seems to have become Mr. Modi’s problem now. All attack but no vision.

Since yesterday his knowledge of economics too has come under question when he associated himself with a move initiated by a Yoga guru, Baba Ramdev, to have a completely tax free regime in India and have a system based on expenditure taxes. The problem with this is that only 37% of all Indians have bank accounts, and almost four-fifths of all transactions are by cash. India has a Tax/GDP of just 17.7%, the lowest among the top ten economies and less than half of the developed countries such as the USA, Japan, UK, Germany and France. In raw terms the amount of money with a government has a direct relationship with its power, to do good for its people and to make itself felt outside. Now the BJP talks relentlessly about making India a super-power, whatever that means and entails. Clearly this ambition calls for a higher Tax/GDP ratio as well as a higher GDP. How this new scheme will dovetail with the BJP’s aspirations for India? Meanwhile the party is tying itself up in knots explaining this. The Columbia University economics professor, Jagdish Bhagwati who now a Modi supporter, a few years ago famously remarked that if the BJP has an economist, then he is a Bharata Natyam dancer! A few weeks ago I saw him walking down Manhattan’s Amsterdam Avenue. He didn’t look like he was taking any dance classes.

The economy however is moving slowly back to the dominant trends of the past decade. Industrial production is showing signs of reviving. The agricultural sector is poised for another good year primed by a bumper harvest. Exports have been increasing. The worrying increase of the current account deficit has been reversed and the depreciation of the rupee has been arrested. The Reserve Bank of India has projected a GDP growth of just over 6% next year. What India needs most now is a regime that does not rock the boat? That might seem a tall order, but the Indian political system has always exhibited a penchant to clamber out of a crisis. So the big question that needs to be asked is what kind of a government will India get?

One thing is certain. The era of one party government’s is long gone.  Another things that is just as certain is that there is now a broad consensus on economic policy, liberalization and the need for foreign investment, Indian or otherwise. Except for the infantile ranting from the extreme left internationalists and extreme right ultra-nationalists few challenge this major consensus. India’s heterogeneity and the rise of regional and decentralizing aspirations, and its democratic system have now found expression by the growth of regional parties. One thing most observers here are agreed here is that the strength of regional parties will once again increase at the cost of one or the other national parties. Under Narendra Modi’s leadership, with him being tainted with being responsible for the massacre of Gujarati Muslims, the BJP will be unacceptable to all the regional parties, except the Sikh party- the Akali Dal, as they profess to be secular (non-sectarian) and derive support from the not inconsiderable Muslim minority. If it requires the support of these parties, the BJP may dump Narendra Modi after the elections for somebody less angular. But it is unlikely to work. In all probability the Congress Party is not expected to get more seats than the regional parties together, with AAP too adding its numbers to these ranks. The regional parties will be in a good position to bargain for a government headed by one of their own, with the Congress supporting it. As they did in 1996.

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Moving Forward in 2014

Jonathan Paris, associate fellow, International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation (ICSR) at King’s College London
Pakistan will muddle through in 2014. As I concluded in my Prospects for Pakistan Report in 2010, the US will have an increasingly difficult time getting Pakistan to promote US interests. The US is and will continue to be unpopular in the Pakistan street, and Imran Khan’s anti-drone campaign will continue to gain domestic support. Nawaz Sharif will, however, keep US-Pakistan relations on a steady course. In some respects, Pakistan-US relations may be more stable than US-India relations in 2014.

Pakistan’s neighbor, Afghanistan, will be in steady turmoil as the post-Karzai and post-ISAF era approach. Things may not deteriorate to the extent that Afghan and Pakistani troops start clashing along the border, but expect the Taliban to score some significant hits against Afghan government institutions.

Iran-US relations should continue to improve as President Rouhani gains stature internally from being seen as ending Iran’s political and economic isolation. Iran and the US are likely to start working together to try to bring the Syrian civil war to an end. Iran needs help in extricating it from the ‘black hole’ that Iranian support for Assad has become. The US appears more concerned about rising Al Qaeda and Sunni extremists in Syria and Iraq than with supporting its Gulf and moderate Sunni allies and Israel against the Iran-led Shiite axis. Does this sound confusing? Welcome to US policy in the Middle East 2014.  

The P5+1 and Iran will likely reach another interim deal or extend the current agreement for another six months, as is permitted under the November 2013 agreement. But a final agreement over Iran’s nuclear program will not be reached in 2014.

I wrote two years ago for the South Asia Center that ‘Turkey’s regional leadership aspirations will come down a notch or two as Erdogan’s health problems, Kurdish problems and economic problems dent his popularity and that the West will become increasingly disenchanted with Erdogan’s brinksmanship and mercurial personality’.   Things are going to get worse for Erdogan than I predicted for 2012, though one can never count him or the ruling AKP out given the absence of dynamic leaders from the other political parties. I expect Abdullah Gul, co-founder of AKP, to emerge as an alternative power pole to Erdogan, particularly if the corruption charges against Erdogan and his cronies gain traction.

South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz is quoted in the Wall Street Journal‘s India Real Time blog on the Pakistani reaction to the execution of Abdul Quader Molla in Bangladesh:

“Most Pakistanis remain ill-informed about 1971 and what happened in the east,” says Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center at the Washington D.C.-based Atlantic Council, an international affairs thinktank. “Textbooks continue to blame Hindus and India. Curriculum reform is happening now but slowly. Most Pakistanis now see Bangladesh as a friendly country,” Mr. Nawaz said.

At the  memorial for Mr. Molla, many blamed the war on the political leadership at the time.

Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center, is quoted by BBC World News on India’s outrage over the arrest of diplomat Devyani Khobragade in New York:

Ms Khobragade is part of India’s foreign service, said Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council in Washington. She belongs to the mid-level part of the bureaucracy, not the top.

Yet the arrest of Ms Khobragade has become a sore point between the US and India. “It’s a symbolic issue of the way she was treated,” he said.

Daily Beast/Newsweek quotes South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz on the revelation that the United States paid a top aide to Afghan President Hamid Karzai:

Regardless, outside experts said that an independent media organization paying the salary of a high-ranking Afghan government official presented at the very least an appearance of impropriety.

“In this particular case, because it involved Internews, this is going to hurt the credibility of other independent organizations operating in this very dangerous environment,” said Shuja Nawaz, director of the Atlantic Council’s South Asia Center.

South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz is quoted by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on who will follow Hakimullah Mehsud as leader of Tehrik-e Taliban Pakistan:

Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council of the United States in Washington, sees Said as the most viable candidate for the leadership.

“Going back to someone who is from South Waziristan and who belongs to the Mehsud tribe may clear difficulties with some of the TTP’s far-flung operations, which are under local commanders,” he says. “Somebody who is prepared to talk without preconditions would also be preferred.”

Since it was announced last month that Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, would be retiring, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has kept the country dangling on his choice, creating a new parlor game for the chattering classes in the process. General Kayani has been characteristically mum, except for an unusual press release that said he was leaving the office on November 29, without closing out other options, even as he accepted the concurrent role of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Mr. Sharif could begin consolidating his power by making an early and firm choice to replace General Kayani. Explaining the reason behind the choice would end speculation about the process. Currently, the only certainty appears to be the fact that there will be a new army chief come the end of November 2013 and whoever gets the prime minister’s nod will be a changed person after that, for the office in many ways makes the man.

The top five in order of seniority all are highly trained professionals, each with certain proven qualities and different backgrounds. All except one are Punjabis, an unusual coincidence in a military that has a substantial Pakhtun presence and at a time when the army is fighting a war inside its borders in the Pakhtun territories.

The prime minister should be looking for a leader who will inspire the army’s rank and file, bruised by a seemingly never-ending conflict against their own countrymen. Someone who has war-fighting experience or has been part of the transformation of the Pakistan Army from a conventional army to one trained also for asymmetrical warfare. Someone who will not necessarily agree with the prime minister on everything but will be discreet in offering frank advice and let the prime minister make the policy decisions after that. Someone who will keep the army away from politics and not be a counterweight to civil power. Someone who will remain in the background and allow the transition to civilian supremacy occur over time.

General Kayani, who took over from Gen. Pervez Musharraf, was a soldier at heart. He immediately headed to the forward lines of the war inside the Federally Administered Tribal Areas and made many such trips to see and to be seen with his soldiers and officers who were fighting and dying in alarming numbers. Why didn’t General Musharraf make such trips? Why didn’t the civilian leadership also do the same? That mystery remains.

General Kayani also designated his first year as the Year of the Soldier and the second year of his first term to be the Year of Training. The latter was an uphill battle since an army at war has little time for training. He kept foreign relationships alive but played his cards close to his chest and surprised his American interlocutors by acting in what he perceived to be Pakistani interests, especially on the Afghan conflict. He also encouraged opening discussions with India on a broad range of issues, though his innate caution led him to tug back the government when it seemed to be moving too quickly on some fronts.

His decision in 2010 to accept the three-year extension that President Asif Ali Zardari offered left a question mark on his tenure since it created a sense of indispensability and broke the career trajectory of a number of deserving generals, one of whom would have succeeded him. One day, we hope he will share his thoughts on that process and the reason it happened.

By the time his second term ended, there was a huge gap between him and his newest corps commanders: some 16 courses at least at the Pakistan Military Academy; a lifetime in military circles. This gap was similar to the ones that faced General Mohammad Zia ul-Haq and General Musharraf earlier. It creates a negative dynamic, not just by making collegial decision-making difficult between such a senior chief and his corps commanders but also by stunting independent thinking as group think takes root in an organization that is colored by one man’s thought processes and preferences over time. Such a situation creates a culture where a request for comments is often marked by many a “Yes” and some “Of course!”

During his tenure, General Kayani tried to alter the outlook of the army on the true enemy of the nation. His speech at the Pakistan Military Academy on Aug. 14, 2012, reflected his views and was seen as a shift away from what was called an Indo-centric view to fighting a war within Pakistan:

The war against extremism and terrorism is not only the army’s war, but that of the whole nation. We as a nation must stand united against this threat. The army’s success is dependent on the will and support of the people.

Under General Kayani, the new army doctrine finally came out, and though written in the opaque hybridized language of academia and the military –an odd combination — for the first time, it spoke of Pakistan facing a “multifaceted threat.” Instead of naming India as the only threat to Pakistan, it talked of multiple threats and tried to focus attention on the internal war being fought by the Pakistan Army.

For some reason, General Kayani chose not to pursue that tack in his public utterances, allowing the civilian government to open dialogue with India on a host of issues, including trade, but demanding that progress needed to be on a broad front. His approach seemed to be “all or nothing at all.” This effectively put the brakes on any breakthrough between the two countries, given the weak coalition government of the Peoples Party on the one hand and the weak coalition led by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in India.

Mr. Sharif allowed that drift to continue. General Kayani’s offer to demilitarize Siachen Glacier after the April 2012 avalanche killed 140 Pakistani soldiers and civilians met with a brusque rebuff by India and provoked a bitter debate inside India on why it needed to protect that frozen wasteland from Pakistan and potentially China. The flare-up of firings across the Line of Control in Kashmir in 2013 added to a growing mistrust between India and Pakistan.

A thoughtful man, who read whenever he had the time, General Kayani was an unusual autodidact, quite unlike his predecessor, who was not known to read much and relied mainly on oral briefings and conversations to formulate his views. General Kayani used private conversations to test his ideas but only after reading up on the subject matter. He believed strongly in his ability to present a logic and structure to his ideas, although it is unclear how effective that was in changing minds of his interlocutors, especially in the White House.

There, his unsolicited and unusual presentation of his white paper on the pitfalls facing the American strategy in Afghanistan and Pakistan’s role in that situation met a cool reception after he handed the document over directly to President Obama. One American official harshly characterized the paper as “sophomoric.” Yet, President Obama, who also relies on academic and logical frameworks for his own presentations, may have found some use in the paper, which opened a window into General Kayani’s thinking. Whether General Kayani changed any minds in Washington remains an open question.

General Kayani’s abiding legacy will remain one of a general who resisted the temptation to directly intervene in politics, choosing instead to stay in the shadows – not surprising, given his background as former head of the Inter-Services Intelligence directorate, and despite the call to intervene from many in the political system. For that, he will be remembered kindly.

Prime Minister Sharif’s choice of the new army chief will help define his third tenure. He has selected four army chiefs in the past, some of whom viscerally shunned politics but found themselves at odds with all for different reasons. One, Gen. Asif Nawaz, died in office in 1993; another, Gen. Abdul Waheed, persuaded Mr. Sharif and then-President Ghulam Ishaq Khan to resign simultaneously in 1993. A third, Gen. Jehangir Karamat, resigned in 1996. The fourth, General Musharraf, upended Mr. Sharif’s government in 1999 after the Kargil War debacle and after Mr. Sharif sought American help to end that conflict with India.

The prime minister will have another shot at naming an army chief three years hence, if he completes his own five-year term. In that sense, the choice this month is important to continue the trajectory of civilian control of the military and must be matched by civilian competence and responsibility. If all this were to happen and Mr. Sharif selects the professional of his choosing and two consecutive military transitions occur on his watch, without any extensions or back-room deals, Mr. Sharif will have put his stamp on governance, and Pakistan wins.

Shuja Nawaz is director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council in Washington D.C. and is author of “Crossed Swords: Pakistan, Its Army, and the Wars Within.”

Shuja Nawaz, director of the South Asia Center, writes for the New York Times‘ India Ink on replacing Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani:

Since it was announced last month that Pakistan’s army chief, Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, would be retiring, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has kept the country dangling on his choice, creating a new parlor game for the chattering classes in the process. General Kayani has been characteristically mum, except for an unusual press release that said he was leaving the office on Nov. 29, without closing out other options, even as he accepted the concurrent role of chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

Mr. Sharif could begin consolidating his power by making an early and firm choice to replace General Kayani. Explaining the reason behind the choice would end speculation about the process. Currently, the only certainty appears to be the fact that there will be a new army chief come the end of November 2013 and whoever gets the prime minister’s nod will be a changed person after that, for the office in many ways makes the man.

India is quickly becoming the second-largest victim of cyberattacks after the United States and earlier this year released its first national Cyber Security Policy, which aims to ensure a secure and resilient cyberspace for citizens, businesses, and the government. Ambassador Latha Reddy, former deputy National Security Advisor of India, emphasized that the intent of India’s Cybersecurity Policy is to strengthen the role of its Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-In) in coordination with crisis management efforts and awareness-raising activities on cybersecurity during an event kicked off with an introduction by South Asia Center Director Shuja Nawaz and moderated by Cyber Statecraft Initiative Director Jason Healey. Alongside protecting the country’s cyber infrastructure, the policy strengthens the significant role IT has played in transforming India’s image to that of a global player in providing IT solutions of the highest standards.

The realization that cybersecurity should be at the forefront of national security efforts came to India after the 2010 Commonwealth Games, which exposed numerous potential vulnerabilities within the country’s national critical infrastructure. India desires to address the goal of achieving a safe and stable cyber environment in a comprehensive manner. Current focus centers on capacity and infrastructure building which will enable establishment of secure and resilient cyberspace that will not only protect the country’s networks from criminal activity and espionage but ultimately also from acts of cyber warfare. As Ambassador Reddy pointed out, building consensus around the need to secure cyberspace comes from understanding of threats to common users and extending educational efforts to services not typically associated with cyber arena, such as law enforcement and judiciary.

Government plays a crucial role in securing cyberspaces, but only an approach inclusive of civil society, academia, and private sector will yield practical and comprehensive solutions to cyber challenges. There are multiple benefits, extending beyond the inclusiveness of policies, gained from involvement of private sector in decisions regarding cyber security. Ambassador Reddy emphasized the example of India now being one of the nations authorized to certify IT products, which greatly empowers the country’s IT industry. India’s ultimate goal is to raise itself to the level of cybersecurity “power house,” a role to which the country has solid predispositions for as it has an extensive number of IT professionals.

Another element of a comprehensive cyber strategy is finding the balance between individual freedoms and imperatives of national security. Ambassador Reddy stated that there is an inherent tension between the right to free speech, and the government’s role in protecting the public from harmful misinformation in India. This challenge is of a global character touching on issues ranging from individual and national security to internet governance. The issue is, Ambassador Reddy stressed, that national paradigms are imposed on something that is essentially an international space. In case of India, there is a realization and acceptance of certain level of intrusion in the privacy sphere given the past experiences with terrorist attacks. It is paramount that the nature of the Internet as the general commons be reflected in the way its architecture is set up and the mode of its governance.

The Ambassador stressed that there is a need to make existing systems of governance, including the management of core internet resources more democratic, more transparent and more representative. India is committed to global, regional, and bilateral dialogue on these issues. Another area where balancing diverging interest occurs in India is e-governance. The country embraced the opportunities that electronic devices offer in conducting elections while assuming risks from cyber attacks, acknowledging the role of e-governance in improvement of overall governance in the country.

A relationship that has been described as a rollercoaster ride or tagged as a deal between “frenemies” appears to have been rejuvenated with a fresh infusion of bonhomie. Some might describe it similar to the Liz Taylor-Richard Burton marriages: shouting and screaming matches followed by a quiet make-up. Is there another honeymoon in the making now between the United States and Pakistan?

After the recently concluded visit of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif to Washington DC, the atmospherics appear to have changed from a cold balancing act to a slightly warmer embrace. There were the ritualistic rhetorical flourishes aimed at domestic audiences. Sharif decried drone strikes as infringing on Pakistani sovereignty. The Washington Post put paid to that by running a story the day after he left about Pakistan’s complicity in US drone attacks. Noticeably, his government remained mum about that situation.

Senior government officials later pointed to the progress made on many fronts, including the revival of the Strategic Dialogue that was last conducted in late 2010 before relations fell into an abyss in 2011 (remember Raymond Davis, who was involved in the killing of two Pakistanis in the streets of Lahore? The raid on Abbottabad to kill Osama bin Laden? The attack on the Pakistani border post of Salala?). Sharif met the entire A-team of the US government. A number of working groups are being revived–most immediately, the energy group that will meet in Washington in early November, followed by a visit of the Pakistani team to Houston.

The unusually long 200 word joint statement released by the White House went out of its way to paint a rosy picture, characterizing the relationship as:

… built on a foundation of mutual interest and respect.  …The President and the Prime Minister affirmed U.S.-Pakistan friendship and close cooperation and recalled our positive contributions to international peace and security at crucial junctures during the Cold War and in the post-9/11 period.

On-the-ground realities inside Pakistan will not change dramatically in the short run, limiting Sharif’s ability to focus all his attention on mending ties with the United States. Militancy and sectarian and religious violence is on the rise and there does not seem to be a clear plan to counter it in the borderlands with Afghanistan or in the hinterland, especially Sharif’s stronghold of the Punjab. His plans to reboot relations with India, including an important trade deal and granting India Most Favored Nation designation, are on hold until after Indian elections in the spring. Afghanistan will continue to throw curveballs at Pakistan. The economy continues to tank for now. Foreign exchange reserves continue to tumble from a high of $16 billion to around $4 billion and past payments owed to the International Monetary Fund are now coming due at an alarming pace.

Sharif has made a good start with the United States. His election was greeted with questions from Americans, but the visit may alter the earlier negative perception for some time. Still, it will take more than words to create a new basis for the US-Pakistan relationship, and the hardest work will need to be done inside Pakistan, by the Pakistanis, for their own sake.

The United States can continue to use moral suasion to keep Pakistan on the right path for reform and good governance and keep alive the hope of civilian supremacy, but Sharif must do the heavy lifting himself if this latest honeymoon is to end in a settled relationship and not another splitsville.

Shuja Nawaz is the director of the South Asia Center at the Atlantic Council in Washington DC.