Repudiating realpolitik: A 21st century Great Game is a foolish idea says US scholar

Brian Katulis explains why the US and Pakistan are stuck with each other.

KARACHI:

For all the frustrations that the United States and Pakistan feel about their relationship, neither Washington nor Islamabad has any choice but to continue engaging with each other, said Brian Katulis, a senior fellow at the Centre for American Progress, a liberal think-tank based in Washington, DC.

“I don’t see anybody walking away from this relationship,” said Katulis at a roundtable conversation at the Marriott Hotel in Karachi, organised by the US Consulate.

Katulis began the conversation by mildly chastising the Pakistani media for its hyperbolic presentation of the recent spike in tensions between the two countries. “There is a manufactured hysteria above and beyond the real levels of tension between the US and Pakistan.”

The self-confessed Broadway fan said that much as he enjoyed political theatre, it was important to keep sight of the fact that the US and Pakistan need each other and that, for all the rhetoric coming out of Washington about potentially suspending all aid to Islamabad, there was a real desire in the United States to remain engaged with Pakistan.

Katulis should know: he works for arguably the most influential liberal think-tank in Washington DC, one that has produced several senior advisers to US President Barack Obama. Amanda Cauldwell, the US press attaché in Karachi, however, was keen to emphasise upfront that Katulis’s views were his own and did not necessarily represent those of the United States government. As he opened up to questions, the scholar remained as witty and eloquent as he was during his prepared remarks. A graduate of Villanova and Princeton University in the United States, he tried to explain to his somewhat sceptical audience why the US and Pakistan could remain allies despite strong and stark differences.

“We may not agree on every point, but we agree on the endpoint,” said Katulis, specifically referring to Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar’s speech at the United Nations where she highlighted the direction that the Pakistani government wanted to take the country. He continued to hammer home the point about engagement, saying that a final political settlement in Afghanistan would be impossible without getting at least some elements of the Taliban on board. He even did not rule out the possibility of the US continuing to engage with the Haqqani network, pointing out that “US policy in Afghanistan seems to be that ‘we can talk and fight at the same time.”

Yet Katulis’s assertion that US goals in the region were aligned with those of Pakistan over the long run was met with scepticism by his audience of Pakistani journalists, most of whom insisted on asking him questions about whether the US had failed in Afghanistan or lost the war. One gentleman even asked if the US was hatching conspiracy theories to break up Pakistan. About the conspiracy theory, Katulis’s answer was deadpan: “We [Americans] wouldn’t be able to do it.”

That said, he was somewhat critical of the US approach to Pakistan and Afghanistan (and thankfully avoided using the word “AfPak” throughout his talk). He pointed out, for instance, that despite all the talk by the United States of using ‘smart power’ - the integration of political and economic tools with its military muscle - the US government had yet to put its money where its mouth is, with 12 times more money being spent on the military than on the diplomatic corps and aid missions. He criticised what he described was a view that emphasised realpolitik over a more economics-focused approach to foreign policy - both on the part of the United States and Pakistan.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 2^nd, 2011.