D is for drones

Raymond Davis has succeeded where parliamentarians have failed — securing a temporary halt in the drone programme.

Poor old Raymond Davis. The hapless chap has managed to successfully leave Pakistanis shaken and stirred. This double-whammy faux pas — of less James Bond and more Austin Powers proportions — has rendered him the new brand ambassador for anti-Americanism in today’s Pakistan. And for this, we ought to really feel just a smidgeon of sympathy.

Groupies of the all-knowing pundit and political party types have been quick to decry the January 27 Lahore shooting, that has ultimately left four Pakistanis dead, as underscoring how terribly cheap Washington views Pakistani lives.

Without wishing to callously dismiss the loss of any life, it must be pointed out that if these pantomime dames of the he’s-behind-you variety were truly serious about bringing down the house with their repeated woe-is-us performances, they would do better to go back to the drawing board of the ramped up CIA drone programme that has reportedly seen 213 strikes claim 1,285-2,077 lives on Pakistani territory since the vanguards of vengeful democracy swept the popular vote in 2008.

This is not simply a question of the dramatic increase from the nine strikes that took place between 2004-2007 under the watchful eye of that hero combatant, General (retd) Pervez Musharraf. His regime never publicly admitted to the programme, let alone put the matter before parliament. Indeed, even members of his government, like former interior minister Aftab Sherpao, today insist that they were never privy to the exact terms and conditions negotiated.

Many US experts believe that the ratcheting up of these remote-controlled lethal operations was a necessary evil; a belated recognition of Washington’s egregious error in “outsourcing security concerns and politics to Musharraf before it went off and invaded Iraq”, as put to me by Steve Coll, author of Ghost Wars: The secret History of the CIA, Afghanistan and Bin Laden. Others have stressed that if only Islamabad had gone after all militant groups with equal gusto, the US would never have moved to own Pakistan’s skies. Yet the majority agrees that this government’s private endorsement of the programme, while publicly posturing against territorial infringements has fuelled anti-Americanism in the country. It has conveniently fed into the al Qaeda narrative that seeks to project the programme as another US war of aggression to subjugate and humiliate the Muslim world. While, simultaneously, presenting Pakistanis as paying the ultimate price for Washington’s failure to secure the Afghan quagmire.

Today, however, the biggest controversy surrounding the drones is that we now know that the prime minister gave a green light to their increase just months after the government was voted in. This has exposed the regime’s utter betrayal of its democracy mandate before the ink was even dry. In addition, Washington’s quiet complicity from the very beginning has demonstrated that support for a democratic Pakistan will always be subject to immediate American interests.

Thus, many now see the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act of 2009, which earmarks a hefty $7.5 billion in civilian aid to the Pakistani government as being less of a much-touted democracy dividend and more of an under-the-table drone dividend. Cash in hand.

So, no, the US does not view Pakistani lives as cheap. It considers them for sale, since the Pakistani government has made it clear that it is always he who bids the highest, who gets his bidding done. And Raymond Davis has succeeded where Pakistani parliamentarians and other political players have failed — securing a temporary halt in the drone programme. There has not been a single strike since he was remanded in Pakistani custody. And maybe for that reason alone, he should become a brand ambassador of a different kind. For better or for worse.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 19^th, 2011.