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By Javed I. Chaudry
20 November, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Today,
one can pick up almost any paper or watch any tv news channel, one cannot
escape from the news on the current Pakistani situation revolving around
the imposed emergency in that country. I interpret and explain it to be
the direct consequence of knee deep American involvement and its control,
which is leveraged through the financial aid in order to derive long term
geo-political benefits from the region.
Many developing countries like
Pakistan are unable to get out of the American shadow and its sphere of
financial aid and political influence as they have not yet acquired
economical and technological independence to refrain from American aid.
Looking at the other side of the picture, America would not allow these
countries to develop to a level at which they could walk without the aid
crutches - the very crutches which almost always becomes a noose around
the poor countries’ political neck.
Through its foreign policies, the US
deliberately creates complex and convoluted political conditions and then
forces the involvement of the developing countries such that their
involvement becomes a long term disability and often an unrecoverable
disaster for them. They are then systematically abandoned to scramble only
to survive on day to day basis with no ability to exploit their available
resources and assets to plan and develop for their own national future. As
a result, they are always looking up to receiving the American handout in
the form of financial and military aid. This vicious circle has been
crafted to ensure that the poor countries will never get out of the rut.
As a direct result of the US policies,
Benefiting from and using 9/11 as an excuse, it has created a permanent
geo-political and socio-economic chaos in the Middle East and
Pakistan-Afghan-Iran regions. Due to this deliberate disorder created in
these regions, the affected societies are growing weaker by the day.
The emergency imposed in Pakistan on
November 3 seems to be the hot news in the international diplomatic
circles. Although Gen. Musharraf was not installed by the US, but
unfortunately, just after 2 years of his coup, he got sucked into American
influence. Right after 9/11, he was told to cooperate and carry out the
American wishes in the region to save Pakistan from the American wrath.
Poor Gen. Musharraf had no choice but to comply at the cost of his own
popularity and a civil disruption in Pakistan. Under the pretext of war on
terror, Gen. Musharraf was forced to act in a manner which was not
appropriate for Pakistan, its people and for the General himself. The
American war on terror is nothing but an excuse to create political
disorder in the world and manipulate developing and poor nations to the
extent that they will never have a chance to recover from its ill effects
for a long time to come.
It was American money and Gen. Zia’s
cooperation that had created a Jihadi mindset in Pakistan during the 1980s
to fight against the Soviets in Afghanistan. It is rather strange that not
many in the world are aware of the fact that the Soviets had sent their
forces to Afghanistan on Afghani government’s request to fight against the
CIA masterminded covert activities in that country in anticipation of
Soviet involvement. Following the Soviet-Afghan struggle and the resulting
civil war that raged on for 5 years, the group called Talibans were
victorious who managed to restore peace in the country. The six year
period of the Taliban rule was the only period when Pakistan and
Afghanistan has friendly relationship. The Bush administration, after
9/11, took care of that. A puppet was installed in Afghanistan, and forced
Pakistan to fight against the Afghanis, most of whom do not accept the
American installed puppets.
Ever since the Bush administration has
signed up Gen. Musharraf for the war on terror, the General has been
between a rock and a hard place. The Americans know it full well, in fact
it is exactly what they had planned. The whole plan was made to make the
General loose the popularity and eventually his grip on power, opening a
door for an American puppet who in return for CIA assisted power, would
handover the nuclear technology to America – losing for ever, any hope for
Pakistan to develop nuclear power to generate electricity for Pakistan’s
current and future needs.
Pakistan is suffering from an extreme
shortage of electric power. The cost is so high that the industry cannot
compete with imports from China and other developing countries. Without a
sizable industrial output and exports, the future of Pakistan would be
very bleak. Other sources of power generation such as wind power and solar
energy are still extremely expensive. Pakistan is also facing a serious
shortage of water, another reason for lack of hydro-electric plants for
electricity generation. Against all odds, the nuclear power is the only
viable solution for Pakistan’s power shortage problems but only if Uncle
Sam would allow that. On the contrary, Uncle Sam would do every thing that
it can to remove the nuclear technology from Pakistan.
At the present time, the world seems
to be talking about the need of democracy in Pakistan. Under the American
influence; would this democracy be of the type that currently exists in
Iraq and Afghanistan? These kinds of democracies exist only for the
duration while enforcing powers are around; once the Americans pull out of
Iraq and the NATO forces out of Afghanistan, the political picture will
completely change, most likely within days.
Democracy is like a tree, that needs a
suitable environment to grow and take root. It cannot be forced on a
society where lawlessness is rampant, religious extremism is at its
climax, most people are unemployed and have no reliable and permanent
source of consistent income for their survival. A society needs, peaceful
environment and a grasp on socio-economic problems in order to create a
suitable political culture to appreciate and enhance the struggle of the
leaders to put the country on the right path for the future.
During the last few years, it has been
fashionable to refer to India as the world’s largest democracy. Has any
one inquired from the Kashmiris or the Muslims of Gujarat State as to how
are they fairing in the largest democracy in the world? Americans never
stop reminding us about their own democratic values, have they asked the
Iraqis as to what benefit are they deriving from American democratic
values? China is doing extremely well economically, so much so, they are
propping up the American economy with Chinese loans, but China is not a
democratic country and yet its economy is flourishing by leaps and bounds.
The Chinese leadership is doing all the right things to make that country
a strong and affluent society, which is an important ingredient for moving
towards democracy. In due time, one can expect that China will acquire and
implement democracy.
At this juncture, Pakistan cannot be
expected to have democracy overnight. It will be nothing but a wishful
dream. The Pakistani society needs peace, freedom from feudal lords,
socio-economic problems, religious extremism and most importantly, the
interference from the US. It cannot be expected to see peace in Pakistan,
as long as its army is being used to help the American puppets installed
in Kabul. Similar to many other hotspots in the world, most of the
Pakistani problems are the direct consequence of selfish and brutal
American foreign policies.
As long as America is the only superpower on earth, the current hotbeds of
poverty, war and extremism will stay the same without any positive change
during a foreseeable future. The external interference in developing
countries both in Asia as well as in South America is one of the most
important factors to keep them in their current sorry state.
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