Pakistan’s foreign policy — an agonising reappraisal

Foreign policy of a nation is always predicated on where you want to go as a sovereign nation and an independent state. This is the basic determinant of a country’s foreign policy. In our case, at the time of our independence, like Alice in Wonderland, we just did not know which way to go and this turned out to be the first ‘dilemma’ of our foreign policy. In June 1949, our acceptance of Stalin’s invitation to our prime minister to visit Moscow was quickly matched with a similar invitation for Liaquat Ali Khan to visit Washington.

Thanks to the old imperial connections at the civil-military level, we immediately got sucked into the Cold War struggle. In the process, we encountered unbroken series of crises and challenges that perhaps, no other country in the world has ever experienced. We still have not been able to come out of our ‘dilemma’ and are facing one crisis after another. Even today, we are living in a hostile environment. No wonder, the outgoing year was no different from the earlier years of our life in terms of challenges to our foreign policy.

For any country, it is important who its neighbours are, as their attitude, irrespective of their size or power, has a direct bearing on its personality and character, and on issues of its security, development and resource allocation. We could not change our geography nor choose our neighbours. We had to live with geopolitical realities no matter how challenging they were. In doing so, our sole consideration had to be how to safeguard and preserve our independence and territorial integrity. Geography thus placed on Pakistan the onerous responsibility of consistent vigilance and careful conduct of its relations not only with its immediate neighbours but also with the rest of the world.

Pakistan’s strategic location was pivotal to the global dynamics of the Cold War era and remained crucial to the post-9/11 murky scenario. The events of 9/11 represented a critical threshold in Pakistan’s foreign policy. In the blinking of an eye, we became a pivotal player in another US-led long war in our region. The Afghan crisis both during and post-Soviet era has had a direct impact on Pakistan’s socio-cultural, political, economic and strategic interests. The post-9/11 Pakistan came to be known as the ‘breeding ground’ of religion-based extremism and terrorism. It was treated both as a partner and a target while playing its critical role in the global ‘war on terror’.

This sordid reality has seriously hurt Pakistan, domestically as well as externally, limiting its policy options. Its negative global image has not only made it the focus of world attention and anxiety but also forced it to make difficult choices in its perennial struggle for security and survival as an independent state. Today, we are the only country in the world waging a full-scale war on its own soil and against its own people. We have staked everything in this war and are constantly paying a heavy price in terms of material and human losses. The gruesome Peshawar tragedy was the limit any nation could take.

The foreign policy of a country, and the way it is made and pursued, is inextricably linked to its domestic policies, governance issues and political situation. A country’s standing in the international community always corresponds directly to its political, social, economic and strategic strength. No country has ever succeeded externally if it is weak and crippled domestically. And domestically, the tally of our woes includes loss of half the country, leadership miscarriages, governance failures, politico-economic debacles, societal disarrays and militant perversities. This indeed is the sum total of our post-independence history.

It is against this dreary backdrop that we enter the year 2015. For nearly 67 years, we have followed a foreign policy that we thought was based on globally recognised principles of inter-state relations and which, in our view, responded realistically to the exceptional challenges of our times. But never did we realise that for a perilously located country, domestically as unstable and unpredictable as ours, there could be not many choices in terms of external relations. Our domestic failures have not only seriously constricted our foreign policy options but also exacerbated Pakistan’s external image and standing.

At this painful year-end, it is time we did some soul-searching no matter how agonising it may be to look upon ourselves and see what we have done to our country in our own lifetime. It’s a hazy and tainted picture. We see a mastless country looted and plundered by its own rulers, left with no dignity or pride. We also see a nation debilitating itself spiritually and physically. We are not even ashamed of what we have done to ourselves. We have become a suicidal nation. We have devised ingenuities to kill ourselves. No wonder, the world now calls us the “most dangerous place” on earth.

Foreign policy of a nation is nothing but an external reflection of what you are from within. Terrorism is our sole identity now. We are seen both as the problem and the key to its solution. Whether we accept it or not, in other countries, Pakistan’s name instantly raises fear and concern. We need to change the world’s perception of our country, which surely has many reasons and assets other than terrorism and violence to be recognised as a responsible member of the international community. To do so, we will have to free ourselves of the forces of extremism, obscurantism, intolerance, militancy and violence.

No country has ever succeeded externally if it is weak and crippled domestically. Even a superpower, the former Soviet Union, could not survive as a superpower because domestically it was weak and crippled. Our problems today are also domestic, rooted in governance failures. Even our external difficulties are extensions of our domestic failures. We need domestic consolidation, politically, economically and socially. To be at peace with the world, we need to be at peace with ourselves.

To be treated with respect and dignity by others, Pakistan has to be stable politically and strong economically so that it can be self-reliant and immune to external constraints and exploitation. For us at this critical phase in our history, what is important is not what we are required to do for others; it is what we ought to do in our own national interests. We must convert our pivotal location into an asset rather than a liability.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 26^th,  2014.

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