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THE March 25 announcement by the Bush administration on the sale of F-16 jet fighters to Pakistan, reversing a 15-year-old ban, did not come as a surprise to anyone. The planes will be newer and fancier versions of the multi-role aircraft and not the ones sitting in air-conditioned hangars in a desert strip in Arizona. But the best part of the announcement was how the administration sought to rationalise the sale in terms of the need to have a feel for strategy. As a senior administration official put it, the American strategy for South Asia had to be viewed in a "broader conceptual framework as a strategy for the region as a whole" and it was imperative that all the players involved, including the media, looked beyond the F-16s.
The American strategy for South Asia, at least as explained on March 25, had different elements to be factored in: India; Pakistan, the only Muslim country to have nuclear weapons; Afghanistan; China; West Asia, specifically Iran; and the "turbulent" region of Central Asia. And in an age of diplomacy and international relations when words like security and strategy have taken on an esoteric dimension and are bandied about loosely, the Bush administration sought to drive home the point that the sale of F-16s had only to do with long-term American commitments and strategic calculations for South Asia.
"So it's important for the United States government to see how the strategies towards all these countries actually inter-connect and it's important for you to see that because the decision was to try to pull a number of these different threads together to weave something that would build long-term foundations of security and friendship for this vital subcontinent with the United States," remarked a senior official in the course of a background briefing on March 25.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was more specific in an interview to The Washington Post. She remarked: "What we are trying to do is solidify and extend relations with both India and Pakistan, at a time when we have good relations with both of them - something that most people didn't think could be done - and at a time when they have been improving relationships with one another."
She added: "If you look at it in terms of the region, what we are trying to do is to break out of the notion that this is a hyphenated relationship... that anything that happens that is good for Pakistan is bad for India and vice versa."
The administration was adamant, even while making these nice-sounding statements, that the sale of F-16s to Pakistan would not alter the overall balance of power in South Asia and moreover the jets "are vital to Pakistan's security as President [Pervez] Musharraf takes numerous risks prosecuting the war on terror".
Hence in Washington's non-hyphenated strategy, if it has decided to "help India become a major world power in the 21st century", the implications are manifold and are in the realm of politics, strategic dialogue, issues of common interest pertaining to weapons of mass destruction and economics.
On the framework of the so-called strategic dialogue, the administration emphasised that it went beyond the discussion of global and regional security issues, to include issues of defence requirements, cooperation in high-tech areas, expansion of the existing High Technology Cooperation Group, and manufacturing licences and perhaps even working towards bilateral defence co-production.
The sop to India came by way of a statement that if New Delhi had a problem with the sale of F-16s to Islamabad, it too could have them and perhaps more. "That's not just F-16s. It could be F-18s. But beyond that the U.S. is ready to discuss even more fundamental issues of defence transformation with India, including transformative systems in areas such as command and control, early warning and missile defence," a senior official remarked.
The notion that the F-16s to Pakistan was in the larger context of the war on terror was laughed out of court in many quarters, but the Bush administration insisted that pegging the jets in this context "really misses a large point" and that it was in the interests of India, Pakistan and the United States to make sure that Pakistan felt secure. "We are trying to move forward in a way where both countries are able to sustain the sense of security they're going to need to build on the diplomatic openings that you're seeing on the subcontinent," the official said.
In the context of Pakistan, it was argued that one ought to see where the country was on September 11, 2001, and since then - a reference to the so-called profound changes in the polity and the economy. Above all, the administration conveniently latched on to the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, which said that Washington should be "willing to make hard choices" as Gen. Musharraf had done "and make the difficult, long-term commitment to the future of Pakistan". In the view of the Republican administration, the $3 billion economic/military assistance and the F-16s were a part of this commitment.
However, many in the U.S. and elsewhere reminded the Bush administration that the announcement of the F-16 sale could not have come at a worse time. While Washington said the decision came on the back of improvements in the relationship between India and Pakistan, its critics pointed out that that was precisely why the decision should not have been announced. One view was that the sale of the jets would embolden the hardliners in the Pakistani establishment and prolong the settlement of vital problems between India and Pakistan, especially the Kashmir issue.
It is not clear how many jets Pakistan will eventually get. One figure puts it at 24 and another at around 70, with a price tag of about $3 billion or more. In fact, on March 25, officials said no determination had been made on the specific number.
THE sale of F-16s to Pakistan is only in line with the developing relationship between the U.S. and Pakistan since Musharraf became an invaluable ally in the fight against terror. In the last three years Washington opened up the spare parts route to keep Islamabad's planes flying. It announced a five-year $3 billion economic/military deal in 2003 and a separate $1.3 billion arms package last year. The lifting of the ban on the sale of F-16s was perhaps the next logical step.
The timing of the sale aside, the strategic rationalisations of the Bush administration are the least convincing. In fact, the F-16s issue has more politics written on it than matters of security and strategy. It is seen as a pathetic attempt by Washington to humour Islamabad and Musharraf in the faint hope that he will not only deliver Osama bin Laden one of these days, but also keep his promise to crack down on extremism in his country and take positive steps on the democracy front.
There is a domestic economic component as well, pertaining to the Lockheed plant that makes the planes, in Texas. Without more orders it would have to make further job cuts in the production line. In January the plant shed 800 of its 5,800 workers and was due to retrench another 1,000 by next January. But the larger issue for Lockheed is that it now has the potential to bid and get orders from India as well if New Delhi goes for this line of jets.
While some lawmakers have sharply criticised the sale of F-16s to Pakistan even in the face of Musharraf's track record on nuclear proliferation or allowing a face-to-face chat with A.Q. Khan, it has also been suggested that the administration hopes to use the F-16s to get closer to the father of the Pakistani nuclear bomb. "No doubt the U.S. also hopes the gesture will lead Islamabad to allow U.S. agents to question Pakistani nuclear scientist A.Q. Khan...," wrote The Wall Street Journal in an editorial.
"The United States wants several things from Pakistan and the sale of F-16s could more tightly bind the two nations. In particular, Washington wants more help in unravelling the Khan nuclear network, particularly its assistance to Iran and North Korea," wrote The New York Times in a report. The State Department, for its part, denied the existence of a quid pro quo, and the Pakistani Ambassador to Washington, Jehangir Karamat, shot down the suggestion saying that only alternatives to a direct quizzing of Khan are being discussed.
The bottom line in the F-16 hoopla is that New Delhi could have done nothing to prevent the sale. It was simply a matter of time for the reason that this Republican administration has travelled a long way from the earlier thinking that Islamabad was playing both sides of the field on the issue of terrorism. The Bush administration, thrilled at the distance Pakistan has travelled in the last three years or in the aftermath of 9/11, has not only described Islamabad as a key ally in the war against terror but also ignored some dubious and dangerous moves by the Musharraf regime, be it on the proliferation of nuclear weapons or on a return to democracy.
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