F OCUS - American Foreign Service Association

Durand Line broke the region’s dominant Pashtun ethnic
group in two, creating a Pashtun-majority Afghanistan and
assigning a large portion of the Pashtun-populated areas
to what was then British India.
Kabul refuses to recognize such a border and maintains
a longstanding claim to the Pashtun territories within
Pakistan (the North West Frontier Province, the Federally
Administered Tribal Areas and parts of Baluchistan).
Islamabad, for its part, denounces Afghan claims as unacceptable:
not only would they deprive Pakistan of part of its
territory, but could also open a Pandora’s box of competing
ethnic identities and nationalisms.
This so-called “Pashtunistan issue” becomes even
more crucial for Islamabad when seen within the context
of the larger South Asian security complex, in particular
Pakistan-India relations. Since partition of the subcontinent
in 1947, the disputed Kashmir border has been the
source of three wars and nearly uninterrupted tension
between Pakistan and its larger neighbor. The perceived
threat from India has been an important driver of
Pakistan’s policy toward Afghanistan.
New Delhi enjoyed good relations with all Afghan governments,
irrespective of their political affiliations, from
1947 until the fall of the Burhanuddin Rabbani government
in September 1996. In light of this, from 1947 to
1979 Pakistan was essentially on the defensive, and relations
between Islamabad and Kabul experienced several
severe crises. Diplomatic relations were even severed for
a brief period, and were resumed only when the shah of
Iran mediated a rapprochement.
In 1979, however, the Soviet invasion provided
Islamabad with an opportunity to reverse Afghan claims to
the Pashtun territories inside Pakistan and, with the support
of the international community, try to install a more
friendly government in Kabul. Thus, as part and parcel of
the jihad against the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan,
began Islamabad’s use of the border region for asymmetric
warfare, the preference given to the Pashtun resistance
groups and later, in the vacuum left after the Soviets’ 1989
defeat, Pakistan’s support to the Taliban.
In 1996, when the Taliban assumed power in Kabul,
and India declined to recognize the new government,
Delhi’s influence was marginalized. But after the Taliban’s
overthrow in 2001 and India’s return to the Afghan scene,
Pakistan began to fear that New Delhi’s renewed presence
would reactivate the Afghan claim to “Greater
Pashtunistan.”
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Islamabad and New Delhi soon began trading accusations
of sabotage and terrorism. Pakistan, in particular,
accused India of fomenting trouble in Waziristan and
Baluchistan from its consulates placed along the border
and of placing troops in Afghanistan. As late as July 2006,
fully five years after the formation of the International
Security Assistance Force, the Pakistani press was still
speaking of “unconfirmed reports” that New Delhi was
ready to send troops to join the peacekeeping effort in
Afghanistan at the request of the U.S., NATO and the
European Union.
If the rhetoric about the Indian consulates in
Afghanistan and their supposed role in covert destabilization
operations in Pakistan has diminished, the mistrust
between the two countries persists. Given Islamabad’s
continued refusal to grant India the transit rights that
would allow Afghanistan to benefit from trade and assistance
from India, it is reasonable to assume that Pakistan
is not ready to accept an Indian presence on both its western
and eastern borders.
The U.S. Factor
Ironically, the continuation of a U.S. role and, more
generally, an international presence in Afghanistan is a
major Pakistani objective. And this helps explain Islamabad’s
continued support of the Taliban. Because it was
never able to secure automatic American protection in
case of a conflict with India and is, moreover, convinced
that the U.S. will leave Afghanistan as soon as the situation
allows, Pakistan has to preserve its status as a front-line
state for as long as possible, while at the same time minimizing
the risks inherent in such a situation.
Perpetuation of a low-intensity conflict in Afghanistan,
coupled with maintenance of indigenous Pakistani terrorist
organizations with an international reach, gives
Islamabad long-term bargaining power with the U.S. and
its allies. As long as American and NATO forces are present
in Afghanistan, no regional power, in particular India,
can develop a significant influence in the country. This is
not Pakistan’s sole motivation; nor does it make Islamabad
the only party responsible for the current impasse in
Afghanistan. It is, nevertheless, an obvious consequence
of Pakistan’s involvement in Afghan affairs and part of
Islamabad’s strategic calculations in the region.
Washington’s attempts to promote confidence-building
measures between Pakistan and Afghanistan — in particular,
the Tripartite Commission, composed of senior mili-