Pakistan at a Crossroads (Full Session)

here now that Jeff Goldberg and Richard Haass are here we can solve Pakistan so we're ready to start this is not only going to be the most important paddle but it's also the most interesting paddle because if you could figure out Pakistan we could save the world and there are no three better people to do it than those on stage general Stan McChrystal of course needs no introduction about his understanding of Pakistan I will say he has also become a great friend of the Aspen Institute and has helped us start a program on national service Thank You general McChrystal they say the kadhi is a problem they say the county has been a great ambassador from Pakistan but also has a book that's going to explain it to us all coming out in September October and I just told them that's the thing we most need in life is understanding the relationship with Pakistan for those of us want to study it we look really forward to your book and as for David Ignatius I've learned more from his novels about the Middle East that most people's nonfiction and the good thing about David as you can tell his fiction from his nonfiction so it's my friend David Ignatius of the Washington Post oh thank you Thank You Walter somebody said to me once David the only time you really tell tell the truth is in your novels so I do I'm afraid I'm stuck with that this is a fascinating opportunity for me as a journalist who follows Pakistan to talk to really the two people I'd most like to quiz on where that country is going so I'm really grateful for the opportunity to do that and I want to start with in a sense the fundamental question that makes all of us care deeply anxiously about Pakistan and I'd sum it up with a phrase that many Americans use that this is potentially the most dangerous country on earth in terms of the potential risk of nuclear weapons getting out of of absolutely catastrophic events and so I want to ask you to start and we'll get to some what you know more detailed questions later but I'd ask you gentlemen crystal to start in saying first do you think that assessment of Pakistan is correct and second how over time would you see US policy reducing that danger what would what would a relationship or Pakistan ten years from now look like what we wouldn't say that we wouldn't say Pakistan and and an existential threat in the same sentence thanks David and thanks for letting me be here I had grown up when I was a young officer reading David's novels and I I took great comfort in the fact that when we actually went into the real world it couldn't be that hard and he understated it I think the question of whether Pakistan is maybe the most dangerous place for the world the answer is yes in my view at least right now but it's not all Pakistan's fault it's not a series of bad decisions part of it is geography and part of its history if you look at its location particularly go back to the days of a great game and then you looked at its post 1947 as a as a independent nation its relationship with India has been difficult but then its neighbors aren't particularly easy to be around either Afghanistan Iran and then where it fits in the world so that's difficult then there are a number of underlying problems that are there no matter what there are economic problems there are problems with water there are problems with electricity that can be fixed but they still are difficult problems they would be for any government in any country and similar there are newer problems an internal set of insurgencies then there are more than one there is the existence of al Qaeda there which is brought all the attention but there's the Bellucci insurgency there's the Pakistani Taliban and then there's internal political challenges that Pakistan faces sitting at this critical position with about a hundred eighty million people the nexus between obviously India and in much of the rest of the region and so I think that and then of course you throw nuclear weapons on top of it even if you took nuclear weapons away I think my answer would probably still be yes but what we need to do is make sure we look at all the factors Pakistan is like a complex system or a very complex equation that I could never solve at West Point too many variables and so if you try to grab one and say the problem is the army the problem is al-qaeda you weigh oversimplify it so I think that as we go forward as Americans to David's point what we need to do is deal with Pakistan in a very complex way one of the things that used to disappoint me is we would go in 2004/2005 to deal with President Musharraf or whatever and we would go in with talking points that said al Qaeda al Qaeda al Qaeda that's the big problem and Pakistanis who I would deal with on the side very close friends of mine would say we've got a bunch of problems Pak al Qaeda is about tenth helped us with all of them so we can help you with that one so let me turn to ambassador Connie who's thought as deeply about this country as anybody I know and ask you first when you hear Americans say as they so often do this is the most dangerous country on earth what do you think as a Pakistani do you share that evaluation and I'd ask you and maybe general McChrystal could come back in on this it's sometimes said that Pakistan's nuclear weapons are under much greater control much better command and control than Americans realize and that to that extent we should Ratchet back our anxiety a little bit that this is a better controlled system and structure than we think my answer to your first question is that yes I do believe that Pakistan is a dangerous place but my second part of that answer is that not for the reasons the Americans think it is the Americans do not get Pakistan Jarrell McChrystal and many other generals in fact American diplomats going back to John Foster Dulles go to Pakistan and hear one side and and and they sometimes believe when Pakistani officials specially general say well America must help us solve our problems it's not America's problem to solve Pakistan's problem it's Pakistan's problem to solve Pakistan's problems and why is Pakistan a problem here's the reason it was a country that was created with very little prior discussion and analysis people forget there's been an Egypt for 5000 years there's been an Iran for several centuries for for millennia there's been an India familiar Pakistan is only 66 years old so therefore it has essentially a lot of psychosis more than it has actual threats and challenges India for example I understand that pay package Lani's are concerned about India but as a Pakistani I look at history and of course I know that the American relationship to history is very unusual it's the only country in the world where when somebody says that's history he means that's irrelevant but but but in case of India and Pakistan it is important to understand yes India has never philosophically accepted the idea of Pakistan but it has not been responsible for initiating any of the wars with Pakistan let's be real about that Afghanistan is too weak and too poor to attack Pakistan so most of the problems that Pakistan sees itself in inside are psychological rather than real and the real problems are we have not only 180 million people we are a 210 million according to this morning's estimates based on the population growth highest population growth rate in that region half the population is below the age of 21 one-third of them will never see the inside of any school forget about madrasahs religious school any school they won't even go to a madrasah one third of that young population one-third of the population lives below the poverty line another one-third lives just above it and yet the country has nuclear weapons and and I am the only Pakistani who has had the guts in my opinion to say that look the nuclear weapons should have finally made us secure about India we have mutually assured destruction so India will never invade us if we really believe India is going to invade us well guess what we are now like the guy who keeps buying guns to try and protect himself and then say oh gosh I can't sleep because I am afraid somebody will steal my guns and so now Pakistan has created this new psychosis that the Americans are going to come and take our nukes away so the real threat to Pakistan essentially is from a failure to come to terms with its geography with its history and with having a direction for it as a nation benazir bhutto before she was assassinated had a new vision for Pakistan and her vision was we will focus inwards we will put the kids into schools we will keep the nukes but we will eventually sign up with some kind of international agreement that will make sure that we are not looked upon as a pariah we will join globalization and if American aid is available to us we will use it like Korea did or Taiwan did we are not going to live as an insecure nation because that insecurity then makes people think al-qaida well how can we use them against our enemy India instead of considering them the enemy and that is why we have these interrelated problems in Pakistan so yes dangerous place but Americans sometimes don't really get so I was I was worried before now I'm really worried I mean you ambassador Connie just described a country with a deep psychosis about itself that has nuclear weapons and general crystal look the question that a generation of American policymakers have been asking is how do we talk to a country that has this kind of psychosis this anxiety about its relationship with America its relationship with India so many different ways have been tried Admiral Mullen tried you know kind of embracing General Kayani and making him his best friend forever BFF Mullen Hart kayani that ended up blowing up other kind of tough talk approaches have been tried you've watched all of them the last decade what what do you come out thinking is the right way for the United States to address what ambassador Connie rightly said is a country with this psychosis yeah let me talk about national service No yeah no this is great here's here's what I don't think we should do I think that we have engaged with Pakistan in a spasmodic way so what happens is 1971 well we have a relationship earlier during the Cold War because Pakistan's geography and and fact that they were essentially on our side made them very good partners there when we wanted when Henry Kissinger want to go into China they were very useful to help him get into China secretly but then we pull back whenever we've got something else to do or we encounter frustration and so it's spasmodic and when we go back in each time we go back in with a fairly narrow temporal set of objectives and we try to engage on that without understanding or trying to build the wider rob relationship we've done a few really painful things the Pressler amendment when it was implemented after the Pakistanis win publicly nuclear stopped the interaction between militaries essentially and so there was about a decade when Pakistani military leaders didn't come to the United States for training now how big a deal is that well I would go to Pakistan when I dealt with Pakistani military leaders they ran in they were Laird those who had engaged with the Americans had one view and comfort level then there was a whole group that had just incredible suspicion and frustration I don't believe that what we should do is immediately put our arms around them and say whatever you do is fine nor do I believe we should recoil and say because you're dangerous and because you're frustrating our way to not deal with you is to ignore you it's kind of like covering our eyes and and hoping Pakistan goes away because when you take your eyes your hands off whatever's there still is so I think a longer-term more consistent very realistic policy is ambassador said we can't solve Pakistan's problems but we are a part we are an enabler sometimes we can be a confidence builder to them to help their confidence with their relationship with India and whatnot so I think we can play a significant role and an ambassador Connie I'm remembering in the period when you were ambassador it seemed like Pakistan was on the front page every day and part of that was that you had a kind of you know livewire very high visibility Pakistani ambassador in Washington who was entering me well you know so I want you to talk about that but but my question really is is this as we think about a stable enduring less dangerous less neurotic us-pakistan relationship is turning the heat down a good idea if you had to do it again would you turn the heat down be more remote from from the Pakistani and US news media what do you think about the right way to play that role of ambassador well first of all I think that I didn't do anything wrong Pakistan's point-of-view and Pakistan's concerns and American concerns about Pakistan had to be put out there what we need is an honest discussion for example Pakistanis have a legitimate question when they say why has American policy towards Pakistan being so spa's matic Pakistanis have a legitimate question when they say that you know you sometimes give us private assurances that you do not keep on the nuclear question let us be very honest the Reagan administration turned a blind eye deliberately and then at the end when Pakistan assumed that that blind eye meant we could go ahead with it they immediately imposed all the sanctions they usually the many administration's allow Congress to regulate the relationship rather than being up front and saying hey why are you doing this this is not right between us because they needed by a general zia so they kind of you know a finesse things with him and then in the end when Afghanistan was over the congressional legislation had to be implemented hence Pressler so have an honest dialogue but then Pakistan also has to have some honest answers I'm we can't say you know we are not making a bomb and then say and by the way we just tested the bomb we were not making we can't say we can't say some up in LA then never heard of him and then have him found in Pakistan and I think what we need is more Kanda in the relationship and I think as ambassador I did bring that Kanda we didn't sit well with those in Islamabad who think that keeping this relationship in the realm of shadows a CIA to isi relationship a military-to-military relationship more functional relationship rather than a understanding or what are we all about now look Korea has received a lot less American bilateral aid than Pakistan has Pakistan is the second largest recipient of American aid since 1947 40 billion dollars but what does Pakistan have to show for it the Koreans have built an economy with that aid because they open their economy Pakistan neat and efficient American officials need to say this to Pakistan every American general who meets the Pakistani general has to say to them you know what the reason why our investors don't come to your country is not because the American government stops them your conspiracy theories are wrong what is right is you haven't created the enabling environment for them to come you open up you become less insecure in your way of thinking and you will reap the benefits and that Kenda has been missing because of the need-based relationship we need them for a sort of having basis against the souvenir ironically the Pakistanis never gave the basis they just gave you one CIA base in butterbeer and the big bases that the American military had been hoping for you never got them so you never get that little thing you are going after and you let the big picture actually get spoiled in the process general crystal we do now have a moment where the page has been turned in Pakistan we have a new government under Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif which has a whole new set of personnel a new party a new way of looking at the us-pakistan relationship we think some new ideas about about India and I'd be interested in your first year sense of Nawaz Sharif as a Pakistani leader I'm going to ask ambassador Haqqani the same thing and then your thoughts about where the particular opportunities are in this next period with new leadership in terms of the u.s. sure I do think we're at a pretty important inflection point driven by a number of circumstances to include the recent election which was the first election in Pakistan in history from a civilian government to a civilian government they have never been able to complete a term before and so being able to start a tradition of civilian leadership is critical Pakistan in my view cannot continue with on-again off-again military taking over leadership at the country I think it's an important inflection point and I think that if the role of the military can be shaped into something more appropriate Pakistan's military became viewed by many Pakistanis with great respect but within the military it became viewed as the essential organization we think of George Washington is the essential man the Pakistani military internally views themselves as the essential bulwark of Pakistani sovereignty Pakistani pride Pakistani freedom and there's much less regard for the effectiveness of civilian Pakistani government than we would like in a good balance now part of that's because Pakistani civilian government has not been impressive but now I think shall know why Sharif has the opportunity to potentially like air Dhawan has done in Turkey or other leaders have done to reshape that balance a bit now he's going to have to do it not just by controlling the military he's also than a hat because I believe and I may have a different view from the Ambassador when I deal with General Kayani or other military leaders in Pakistan I don't see a bunch of duplicitous dishonorable people I see Patriots who see the world through their lens and are trying to do what's right for their country it might be different it might then what might be viewed by others but I view it as pretty genuine so he's going to have to shape that in a way that brings those two in better connection now the question is I don't know whether or not why Sharif can do it I don't know him personally I have read the hist of him when I was spending a lot of time in Pakistan he was not in a position to to be around but we're asking an awful lot of a guy who's got a questionable background so Master Cudi one great thing about Americana is he knows everybody in Pakistani politics and that the chances are that he worked for them at one point in the past so I want to ask you you you know a lot about Nawaz Sharif what thoughts would you offer about how he can develop civilian government make it work and in particular what advice would you have about how to deal with the problem gentlemen crystal set how does he speak to the Chief of Army Staff General Kayani or his successor and make clear this Pakistani military isn't going to call the shots now we have a civilian government how does he do that not with any ease first of all we must understand that American generals look at Pakistani generals and see fellow soldiers Pakistanis especially those who've been imprisoned by generals at one point or another look at them as politicians in uniform so it's a very different perspective Nawaz Sharif has to move very carefully now on the one hand he wants to establish civilian supremacy presence of the ADI was a lot sort of slower on that front he used to move two steps forward two and a half steps backwards sometimes because he understood that the military does have far more influence for example the Pakistani military runs businesses which the American military does not Pakistan military runs media and has influence over media that the American military probably does not and and then and wait wait for Snowden next week and that and and and and so and and the Pakistani military tells Pakistan's Parliament and parliamentarians and politicians what Pakistan's national interest is the American military is part of the process of defining American national interest but all of you are part of that process as well your politicians are your media is in Pakistan the military wants to belies the definition of national interest and that's my problem with them that's all other than that they're very decent people my brother served in the military my father served in the Pakistani military so generals who think that they can actually determine national interest and they alone can determine it are going to be Nawaz Sharif's biggest problem and that problem is going to start very soon as he tries to put General Musharraf on trial which personally I think is not necessarily a priority shouldn't have been a priority but he wants to do it when he does that he will run into some problems with the Pakistani military and so he has to move carefully on that front I just a story I think that I mean what you know that's a kind of classic revenge play you know the man who kicked me out is yeah I'm going to go after him and put him on trial for treason why'd he do that because he's neva Sharif I mean that's that soon Allah Sharif is I worked with him and when I did not agree with him and left his side he had a little black mark against my name and then when he got a chance he tried to get even with me on that as well look he's a provincial politician who became national just because there was no alternative to benazir bhutto on the Popular Front at that time the Pakistani military and the ISI there's a case pending in the Supreme Court still because the Supreme Court supports them they don't let that case we decided but the fact is that he ran for office in 1990 with ISI funding I mean that's like a presidential candidate in the United States running for office with CIA funding you would never you know let that happen easily or at least not easily and so and so this guy so this guy was was the military the military propped him up and then he wanted to secure Authority from the military which made him and General Musharraf and Arrivals so I think he is doing that I think it's a mistake I think he should pay his priority should be solving Pakistan's internal problems the economy the educational system scaling down the hatred that Pakistan is learned from their schools hatred against Jews hatred against Hindus India as in existence there is no such thing as an existent shell threat there are threats there are lasting threats there are longer threats but you know what nations change their perception of threats I mean they might have been a time when the Mexicans and the Americans were fighting well guess what now the Americans are figuring out how to have more Mexicans work in America I mean that's how the world moves and so Pakistan's this this view that somehow India will always be our enemy is a wrong view we need to open up on that and those are the things we on our show you should focus rather than on settling scores with Musharraf or the army it's just a quick question to both of you Nawaz Sharif is associated with in the past with the idea of opening to India's famous diplomatic opening and the visit to Lahore and so a lot of people have thought that's the area where you might see really significant movement the relationship between India and Pakistan already is better than I think most Americans realize what do you think about that is there an opportunity to quickly try to do something what do you think doing crystal I let the Ambassador my quick answer to that is that there is a lot that can be done but for that what is most needed is narrative change in Pakistan as long as the narrative is that these guys never wanted us to be a country they'll never let us be a country and there are existing and existential enemies there won't be move there won't be a move forward Nawaz Sharif will be pulled back just as President Zardari well if you remember that he opened up to India in a big way in the beginning and and the way it works as rumors start floating conspiracy theories start coming I mean look it's sad that a overwhelming majority of Pakistanis to this day in opinion polls do not accept the official version of what happened on 9/11 they are conspiracy theorists they believe that 9/11 was an inside job and there are people who don't believe the Americans actually killed bin Laden they think they brought the dead body with it I mean you know when you have and I'm not talking about 15-20 percent of conspiracy theorists that you have in this country as well I'm talking about larger numbers 60% 70% that needs to be changed so narrative change will have to precede policy change in relation to India otherwise we will have a lot of shaking of hands hugging some policy decisions and then they will all fall apart within a couple of years a little incident on the border some guy gets shot a bombing incident in India and then it all falls apart and this time it needs to be built on more solid footing I would probably flip it I agree with the ambassador but I probably think you need to do the steps first because I think the attitude in the narrative is going to follow that I think forcing increased trade there been some talk recently about lowering our tariffs on textiles for India and Pakistan on the condition that they increase their trade between the two countries I think if you force interaction I don't think you first convince somebody to like somebody else and then they're going to hang around them I think you force them out to deal with them and then I think you've changed attitudes over time so I want to change gears just a little bit and I want to ask general McChrystal to step back to the time that he was the IAF commander in Kabul in 2009 as we know general McChrystal put together a comprehensive strategy that we call the coin counter intelligence strategy for dealing with the Taliban insurgency and stabilizing Afghanistan and part of the what drove the policy was that if we can get Afghanistan right will stabilize Pakistan as well and I'd like to ask you gentlemen to look back at that honestly and critically we've now had four years of experience with that strategy and I think we'd all be really interested in your evaluation of what went the way you thought it would what as you look back would you do differently and obviously where do you think we are now as we head toward 2014 and the and the departure of American combat troops from that country and you know Afghanistan flying on its own sure first on the Cameron insurgency strategy I had been in Afghanistan for part of every year from 9/11 from 2001 on and I had been commanding special operating forces going after al-qaeda before I took over in 2009 and I'd spent but I'd spent most of my time in Iraq I had come to the conclusion for my Iraq experience and the years in Afghanistan that the only way to be successful was not to be just enemy focused and killing people because at the Russians killed 1.2 million Afghans and that didn't work and so I became convinced that we had to get something that won the confidence in support of the Afghan people and I had studied it for years but it was proven right in front of my eyes in Iraq I came in in the summer of 2009 and the the psychological situation in Afghanistan was devastating philosophically we had been there for eight years in these huge expectations which many Afghans had had that we were going to help sort things out had not been met now some of them were unrealistic but the reality was what the West had been able to do was not very effective but what the Afghans had done for themselves was not as effective and so by 2009 they've grown cynical they were losing hope and the Taliban were leveraging that to say look this thing's not going to work and we're about to be back the Taliban were not popular they're still not but the very weak sense of government and weak other institutions the police in the military gave this sense of gloom and doom so when I took over in summer 2009 I thought we had to do several things I think the first we had to do was change our strategy so that we could implement counterinsurgency we could start getting the support of the people actually protecting them because it can't protect them everything else to them is irrelevant we needed to change people's confidence we needed to start making people believe that we could and should pull this off but the great question mark for me was what did we have enough time America was already tired of it our NATO allies were tired of it Pakistan had grown convinced that we were likely to fail in the region so we were trying to do this against this big wall of skepticism and so as I dealt with Afghans it was really a case can we get people to believe can the Mets win the 69 pennant that's the question you got to believe and we had to first prove we could do things on the ground in certain areas and we had to try to engage people particularly people like the Pakistanis say listen we can do this it is in your interest that we succeed because a Taliban run Afghanistan is a worst possible outcome for Pakistan stability I don't think any of that was wrong I still believe that that assessment was absolutely accurate now what do we do we went in we pushed we went I spent a lot of time in Pakistan with General Kayani and other leaders to try to get them to believe I think maybe I'm Pollyanna I think I had them moving to where they believed that we had a chance to be successful but went in one one-on-one moment General Kayani looked at me and I laid out my strategy laid out his and I laid up this is what I'm trying to do and he said Stan I think it's right but I don't think you've enough time I think it's the only thing to do but I don't think you're going to succeed because I don't think you get the time to do it you know what other option that I have except I'd been given the mission so it pushed it where did I think that it did it fell short one I think a heck of a lot of it has succeeded I think actually Afghanistan is much better placed than a lot of people think their big problem is political now they can solve their other problems but their big problem is credibility of politics and they're going to have to do that themselves we can't do that but we did make some mistakes I made some mistake we pushed forward one thing is the American people and others like quick successes so if you're come in and you say you got to believe I get a call the next day and say did you do it yet okay so now you just have to believe I can do it we will do it not that it's done but so there was an expectation that if it didn't happen very quickly that it wasn't going to work and that's one of the weaknesses it's sort of the way we look at things that was a problem we also I personally didn't navigate DC very well as we win and ask for additional forces when I first got there I didn't want additional forces I didn't think we needed them we did this big assessment and my staff when we played it in in all kinds of computer games and everything and we laid it down and said the only way you can pull this off is you've got to have enough additional foreign forces read us to be a bridge force until you can pull up build the Afghan military up there's no other way and so I knew going to DC for additional forces wasn't going to make me mr. popular but I did that and as we did that that was very difficult political time fall of 2009 as you know new administration all kinds of reasons wasn't a popular war we push that through but as we push that through and and were successful in making that argument I think that there were already people who were skeptical about here we go again we're going to have another Iraq we're going to another Vietnam whatever they wanted and so there was I don't think that we were as convincing to all the other constituents and supporters that were as important as we needed to be so I think that I think it's got a great chance right now I'm unfortunately I'm still an absolute believer but I'm probably by yeah I want to turn to a sane but I just want to push back on one thing which which I think many people who like me visited Afghanistan often in this period would say to you which is that there was a way in which you were building on quicksand yeah because of the corruption and incompetence of the Karzai government and building on quicksand is just isn't isn't a viable strategy and I how would you respond to that my favorite movie is Monty Python and the Holy Grail and do you remember the scene where they go up in the tower and he says we built this castle and sank into the swamp so we built another castle on sank in this WAMP in a six Castle burned down then sank in the south we built the seven castle in it stayed I guess what I respond to you David is I don't have a choice it would it was you couldn't fix every problem at once we were trying to fix corruption we're trying to fix government but we didn't have a lot of time so I thought what we had to do was first convince the Afghan people it was going to get better provide enough security to convince people hey it's different this time I absolutely knew we were standing on quicksand because if people believed money's going out the back door as fast you put it in the front door but at the same time it takes a long time to fix those problems those are cultural as well as physical so we were Dave Rodrigues and I who's one of the officers I admire most commands Africa come now we used to get in my office and we'd look at each other and say can we do this and he was an old West Point football players he says we are going to have to pass on every down and then we got a 50-50 chance and then we looked at each other said but this is our mission and I think we can so that was the mindset that I had up it's powerful is or not represented here I have to I have to rise to the defense of President Karzai the part of the problem is also the expectation of American liberals in particular that Afghan democracy should be like Scandinavian democracy instead of accepting the fact that it's probably going to be more like Chicago and Amir Daly and so and so just cut them a little slack I mean here is here is a tribal society that has come out of so many and it's still at war look can you imagine any state in the United States that's been at war for 30 years it's been at worse than 79 one-third of their population was driven into refugee hood you know they were refugees and so coming back and rebuilding and then rebuilding political organization and getting people together you know you have to do it in many ways now I'm not supporting corruption I have never supported corruption but I think sometimes the standards by which Afghanistan is measured are a little too high and I think that in that sense of understand I mean if I was running Afghanistan I wouldn't take money for myself but I would probably also turn a blind eye to some of the dealings that are happening because I need the support of this tribe or that ethnic group or that political faction I am personal two quick stories one because I agree with the ambassador we we went on a trip one time down to Kandahar and the place where we met was the building wasn't in good shape and as we're flying back President Karzai just a small group of us in this plane President Karzai says well you led wailing wasn't in good shape Galaga who had been the previous governor there and pretty well known to have a fair amount of corruption he said he would have never let it be like that and one of his ministers said yes sir but he would have stolen the money from the federal government to do that and the president looked him and said well we had just wasted it so yep yeah the other story on democracy is I took senator Levin down to Helmand shortly after the elections in the summer of o.9 and everybody was upset because they thought it was huge corruption what President Karzai was going to win anyway there was he could stuff the ballot boxes but the the the Pashtun candidate was going to win and it was going to be him but we went to a village and senator Levin and I sat in this room with about 50 elders big bearded guys everybody sitting on the floor and at one point when he's pretty confident senator Levin says you know I got reports that everyone in this village voted for President Karzai how was that democracy and that was translated and they looked at each other and then one guy stood up and he said I don't get it we all got together we talked about it we decided that President Karzai was the best person for us why would we split our vote we're not stupid he said okay so so let me before turn into the audience for for your questions ask you the the the baseline issue that we're all going to be struggling with which is as American combat forces leave next year what's Afghanistan going to look like and by extension what's Pakistan gonna look like you hear a lot of people who say that for all that we've done for all of the planning effort the intense struggle loss of life that general McChrystal and his forces put in that Afghanistan is going to go back into a civil war you hear a lot of people ambassador Connie who say whatever Nawaz Sharif is saying the Pakistanis are going to go back to kind of gaming Afghanistan and using it as a buffer in dealing with India and we're going to have the same crazy stuff we had before so I want to ask each of you separately to you know let's think out you know five to ten years give me your honest word picture of what that country looks like yeah I reserve the right to be wrong I I think and we sometimes use the word muddled along I actually think that it's not going to break apart into civil war I think there are enough things linking that country together now that they will hold together it's critical that President Karzai give up power in 2014 to a an elected replacement and it's critical that guy's last name not be Karzai I think that they will probably be a posh tune just because of that the breakdown of the country but I think that what happens is some of the institutions that have been built still immature some still very flawed I think there's enough strength the other thing I would and and this I can't support with metrics but the women that I dealt with in Afghanistan have a tough row to hoe but they are incredibly strong and I don't think they have any interest in going back and the ones that I met are not gonna the young people the Millennials yeah they deserve a hand the Millennials are disdainful of my generation of our generation they think that people at our generation have made huge mistakes been corrupt etc and they want this generation to move on and they're probably right that assertive got to move this generation out so that young people who have gotten a different view on things now they'll make a lot of mistakes but I think that what happens I think Afghanistan holds together I think it probably still suffers from periodic internal insurgencies little Taliban you know truncated parts of it I don't think if we're smart that al-qaeda goes back there in significant numbers but if they are in Afghanistan holds together I think will be easier to address so that their challenge of course is politics and in the very long term economic I must reckoning III think I share the view of general McChrystal about Afghanistan I think that in any case the Taliban are now restricted to the southeast and-and-and the eastern provinces bordering Pakistan and so basically they're I think we should stop worrying so much about the fire and pay more attention to dealing with arsonist and I think I've already said what I wanted to say in that one sentence the Taliban I mean to think that the Taliban are a popular of gone phenomena and that'll research is a wrong idea somebody supports the Taliban in Afghanistan because they want to have some influence in of gana politics because of the view that they think that India will have influence if we don't and that's what needs to be dealt with Pakistan is going to be more complex I think that there are many fault lines in Pakistan there's an ethnic fault line I mean if you look at the election results Nawaz Sharif as one but he has one purely by Punjabi vote she hasn't had the support in any other part any group of Pakistan has supported him the military civilian fault line will still remain and then the bigger fault line that nobody wants to pay attention to is the Islamist versus the modernist fault line so that is something that needs to be worked out I think that Pakistan will have problems it will have difficulty if it remains on the Democratic course most probably there may be a democratic alternative that will emerge after Nawaz Sharif in the next election that may say enough of beating about the bush these are our real problems this is what we are going to do we are not going to try and conquer Afghanistan we are going to make friends with whoever is it the government in Afghanistan we will stop worrying about Kashmiri right now yes we have a right to it but we will not try to get it right now we will start dealing with India we will grow our economy put those kids that are not in school into school and move forward that may happen five years later but the next five years we will have a mixture of bad news and worse news well what so I'm gonna ask me for analysis I did and that is that is honest and and helpful let me close this out just by by offering a brief comment from from the the moderator I mean master Akane was careful to speak of the arsonist without being specific as to who that might possibly be but if you assume that what we're talking about here is whether the ISI the Pakistani intelligence service will continue to meddle in Afghanistan so as to protect its security interests it's interesting that the ISI from what I report has been working pretty intensively and effectively with the Taliban negotiators who have come to Doha Qatar to begin yesterday negotiations with the u.s. representative it's a broad group it is representative of the breadth of the Taliban it has members of the Haqqani network who were really the scariest people of all who seem to be included so that is the work of the ISI and you know if you looked at that take you'd say that they are at least now trying to give this peace process a chance and I'm a question that I put to the two panelists the idea that Afghanistan is just going to fall back in time which so many Americans have there's this idea that this pre-modern country will just fall back into the dark ages don't believe that you know in the in the years that we've been in Afghanistan it has become a largely urban society the size of Kabul kondeh har Herat all these cities have doubled and tripled that you know the electrical connections between people and and media the education when I look at the numbers the one thing I know is it's not going to be the same as it was I don't know what it will be but so let's turn the audience for your questions we have microphones rather than ask recognized people I'd ask you Bob and everybody else if you just go back to those microphones and we'll call on on people in turn there's one here and one here and yes yes ma'am hi Shelley Porges Washington DC I'm the National Finance co-chair for the ready for Hillary PAC I would like to you know you've presented on one hand some optimistic viewpoints on the other hand some perhaps not so optimistic ones but if you had a chance to ask the president current or future for one thing in terms of moving you know making progress in the region what would that be do you want to direct that one progress I don't have to hear from either one because they represent such interesting diverse points of view of the American at the table at the podium I think a strategy I think what we have not done well enough is to be able to articulate how we would like this to come out and I think we have to be very realistic you can't make a river go 90 degrees different from where it's flowing and we have to be very humble about the changes and the impact we have in a region but I'm not sure we sit down ever and for the American people as well as for people we're dealing with paint a picture of how we'd like it to come out then the pieces start to have logic I think sometimes we execute pieces without that larger picture so that's what I would love to see a screen my quick one liner is don't look so don't give the impression that you're too desperate to get out even if you are because when you do that then you are encouraging the enemy I mean the Taliban have always said we have the time and the Americans have the watches so when you start saying and that's and that's and that's that's an American it's a political problem here I mean the administration didn't have to announce a date for its final withdrawal etcetera because then you're just telling them to how long they have to wait and that the AIA size role can also be just not to actually get the peace process to bring about a result but to get the peace process going so that while you are redrawing you don't pay attention to anything else it could be like the Vietcong who engage in a peace process for a very long time while they were sitting and planning with the North Vietnamese how to actually take over Saigon so so so don't always sort of you know optimism is a great thing but since I moved to this country I have realized that there's optimism and then there is optimism that is based on realism and I think the latter is a lot better here sir hi my name is Amir Shaikh I am a American of Pakistani and Indian descent and I do a lot of traveling and when I travel sometimes it's more convenient for me to be Pakistani than it is to be American because there's a big trust deficit in the Muslim world against Americans now my questions related to this what's the growing role of China in Pakistan I feel like Pakistan is looking for alternatives than engaging with the US and China one of its neighbors is starting to increase its engagement and if we're talking about economic development and different pathways to resolving some of the conflicts what role is taina playing and what's the US perception on that issue great question so my short answer to that is that China and Pakistan have been closed since 1950 actually and but but but the fact remains that the real thing that Pakistan needs is large capital input and Chinese businessmen make decisions just like American businessmen do so I don't see large amounts of Chinese money coming just because of I mean it's a great fantasy that you find in the Pakistani press a lot that the Chinese will somehow come and bail us out nobody will bail Pakistan out except Pakistan is making the right economic and other decisions China does remain engaged with Pakistan much more closely but very frankly the Chinese have been advising Pakistan for almost 15 years now to put down the jihadis and move on and also to make peace with India so I think that there is the Chinese policy and then there is this little romance that Pakistanis have about China being the great Redeemer that will come and help them and I don't think that the latter is all that realistic stand you have that Bob general ambassador would you address more fully Pakistan al Qaeda and Pakistan Taliban Pakistan Taliban is quite obvious most people understand it I think because Pakistan is always wanted influence in Afghanistan first they had certain jihad my Mujahideen groups that they supported when those Mujahideen groups failed in the Civil War they ended up supporting the Taliban so that's the Pakistan Taliban connection officially Pakistan says we have contacts with them but we do not control them which may be true but if that's the case then Pakistan should not support them at all because if you have contacts with people who don't listen to you then why they take the responsibility for their actions when then you have no control over them but most Taliban leaders are based in Pakistan everybody knows that and that's how the they have been brought to Doha for the peace process so so that is easy to understand Pakistan al Qaeda more complicated but there are too many religious and fundamentalist in jihadi groups in Pakistan that the Pakistani state encourages accepts and tolerates in different degrees and could they be the ones who have been supporting al Qaeda and not the government of Pakistan possibly but Pakistan needs to deal with al Qaeda otherwise the fact that almost all major al Qaeda leaders that have ever been found have always been found in Pakistan is something that really does cast a shadow on my country and I think that that shadow needs to be removed I think I add I don't think Pakistan I don't think al Qaeda has ever been Pakistani in nature the leadership has never been Pakistani and background it is a foreign entity now they've been there a long time so their relationships marriages and whatnot that make it a little stickier than just somebody outside but they are still a foreign entity that that can be done away with there are multiple Taliban's there's a Afghan Taliban there's a Pakistani Taliban instead Pakistan the TTP the Pakistani Taliban is focused really against the government of Pakistan the Afghan Taliban are focused and they're largely Afghan in ethnicity they're focused against the government of Afghanistan the ISI when we talk about the relationship with the Taliban that's largely with the Afghan Taliban now we captured a lot of people I was in a lot of detainee interrogations and whatnot and the least popular people to the Afghan Taliban or ISI so when you think about it there is an unholy relationship there is help there is David's exactly right they are but it's not one of these things where they are best buddies and they watch sports together and drink beer it is very much one of using each other and coercion and threats and whatnot so it's very important to understand that and so it's it's again it's so complex that it it doesn't allow a very short answer a question where I'm going to ask you knowing I won't get it for a one-word answer do you believe that Osama bin Laden hid for five years in a body bod Pakistan without anyone in the Pakistani military and our intelligence knowing about it no I don't believe it okay then I'm going to ask you for a ten word yeah they don't believe it I I don't think now this is my opinion I'm not backing this up with hard facts I don't think general kyani knew that I don't think that the leadership I don't think there was a plan of where he was but this was 700 meters from the gates of West Point now who knows what 700 meters from the gates of our West Point but the reality is it was a very distinct compound it was like that funny house at the end of the street where people didn't act the same as everybody else in the neighborhood in an area where people are not naturally trusting so somebody facilitated something now I sort of buy into the idea that the Ambassador and I were talking it probably was not official but it could be someone who's got relationship with official who's actually providing the help and there is a failure to ask questions that needed to be asked there's a failure diligence short answer if you read President Pervez Musharraf book he talks about al Libi Abu Faraj al Libi being found in Abbottabad and he says at that time there were three houses that were al Qaeda houses that that we discovered well if this was one of those houses why didn't they keep monitoring it subsequently is a big question that said it is it is not conducive to my health and well-being and well-being to answer this question American professor now hey but I'm still a Pakistani citizen you know they can and that's the only citizenship I have so III think I think I've said enough sir yes please John devs Palo Alto general McChrystal thank you for your service and ambassador thank you for your great sense of humor and insight into Pakistan my question is you brought it up at the start hundred nuclear weapons in Pakistan I did I did I'm still scared that that it's an in 100 nukes in a pretty unstable Society can you give me any scare me more or give me any confidence or any insights at all I think I think you're right I think an unstable society should not have that many nuclear weapons and and Pakistan's nuclear deterrence needs a better concept and better practice and last but not least the real bad scenario for Pakistan would be age Islamist takeover of Pakistan it that that would be the worst right now in the hands of the Pakistani military and general McChrystal knows many of Pakistan generals they have a I mean there's no loose nukes in Pakistan that that you need to understand Pakistan does have a command and control system and it's a pretty stable one but is the country stable enough perhaps no but then people would argue that is that the only criterion for countries possessing nuclear weapons and what are your alternatives you can't go and take them away you couldn't take them away from the Soviet Union you couldn't take them away from China how will you take them away from Pakistan so in the end the best course for Pakistan on the nuclear question is for Pakistan developing the trust of the rest of the world whereby Pakistan can have a minimum nuclear deterrent which is which ensures that security but takes away the fears that you and I and everybody else has about an unstable country having nuclear weapons general question do you want to speak to them that's absolutely the case good answer so we have time for one last question sir Stefan hitless my question is much broader and directed to the general it seems to me that presidents come presidents go we still have the same policy call it robust call it the continuation of the British Empire where the Sun never sets where in view in the bowels of this government in Washington do algebra where where is this continuous streak of military warfare etc etc coming from where exactly are the power levers that can continue our robust approach I think I know where you stand based upon the way you word your question it's it's in the first floor on the e-ring of the Pentagon and no it it lies in the fact that America has defined certain interests and certain interest in the world be at the flow of oil be at the protection or the the the security of certain allies and whatnot we have a unique role in the world and we have identified certain interests we then make decisions to either use or not use military force in that case now sometimes we get it wrong sometimes we think that I'm not sure we get the interest wrong it's kind of hard to argue with some of the big broad interests but the way we go after them you know you can pick up the poster child for this the invasion of Iraq you can ask yourself whether that furthered American interests or didn't and people come down both sides but I don't think that it was a Kabul of evil people trying to to do world hegemony I think it was a bunch of good people who did an assessment that came out with a different conclusion than you might or I might or anyone else that that's what I saw I never buy into the conspiracy theory in DC because I never got in a room where the conspirators were there just plus four people in Washington DC each one is advancing their own career so then conspiring to do something together to change the world is very difficult to expect but here's what I think you see the problem does not lie in America having all this power and being able to use it in some cases for a lot of good and I'm giving you an on Americans perspective the problem lies in the fact that Americans as a nation just do not know how to do things on a small scale so for example when you go to Afghanistan then you're you know you're not just you're trying to change everything and so how they run their schools and and and so isin present eisenhower used to talk about the military-industrial complex now you also have an NGO development complex you know that comes up with I mean when I was ambassador one of my favorite complaints used to be that the aid to Pakistan includes Studies on how to run schools in Pakistan which are conducted by Americans called the Beltway bandits why should they do that why can't you let me be the judge of how to run a school my own country and if that was the case then you would need a lesser footprint abroad you would have more friends abroad and you would be using your military power a lot more shall we say and methodically but with with less of the fallout that you complain about and everybody feels strongly about so one problem in having a discussion with former officials is that I always end up often end up wishing they were current officials and so I want to thank them for this

Channel: The Aspen Institute

Views: 78,451

Rating: 4.6531792 out of 5

Keywords: Husain Haqqani, David Ignatius, mcchrystal, afghanistan, Pakistan (Country), Aif2013

Id: SE0x8KCcBfc

Length: 61min 3sec (3663 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 27 2013