Pakistan and U.S. Move from ‘Relationship’ to ‘Partnership’

                            “Today, I am a happy man and a satisfied man,” Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said in a news conference with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Secretary Clinton’s remarks at the same conference “We have listened, and we will continue to listen.”

                                 This is what Pakistan is celebrating as a movement from relationship to partnership. Semantics in diplomacy can be a great face safer and Minister Qureshi seems to realize this fact.

 [Picture Courtesy: Jim Young/Reuters]

In 1954 Pakistan and U.S. signed a mutual defense agreement and military aid to Pakistan between 1953 and 1961 was $508 million. In the 1950s Pakistan also joined U.S. sponsored SEATO and CENTO. In 1981 US offered Pakistan a $3.2 billion, five-year economic and military aid package. Pakistan emerged as a key ally of the US in the effort to counter Soviet forces in Afghanistan. In 2002 US cobbled together a $350 million package for Pakistan, earmarking $512 million for military financing. In 2004 Pakistan is declared to be a major ‘non-NATO ally’ of the U.S. In 2009 the Kerry-Lugar Bill, technically referred to as the Enhanced Partnership with Pakistan Act, authorized $7.5 billion as non-military aid to Pakistan. For Minister Qureshi these are (to name a few) symbols of a casual relationship. Pakistan-U.S. interactions (for lack of a better word) have graduated from the ‘relationship’ status to a ‘partnership’. Most Pakistani delegations go home with promises and pledges; Minister Qureshi is convincing the world that he going home with something more than a promise: a partnership.
And what exactly is he taking home? Here is what the Washington Post reports: Most of the agreements announced after the one-day meeting had been decided earlier, including disbursement of a new $7.5-billion, five-year U.S. aid package for Pakistan’s energy, water, agricultural and education sectors. Long-standing Pakistani complaints about nearly $1 billion in promised but unpaid U.S. reimbursements for Pakistan’s counterinsurgency operations had been largely resolved, with the remaining money to be paid by the end of June. The administration said that it would improve on what Pakistan has described as slow delivery of military hardware and that it would keep trying to facilitate better Pakistani access to U.S. markets and a transit trade arrangement with Afghanistan.
Pakistan’s concerns on civilian nuclear deal, J&K and relations with India on issues of water sharing and Afghanistan may not have received the desired response. This can however, not be judged as a failure for Pakistan. The fact that General Kiyani would attend this strategic dialogue and that the Pakistani delegation came armed with a fifty six page document ostensibly referred to as the ‘wish-list’ was played out in the public domain shrewdly. Publicity of ‘wish-list’ is usually preceded by tacit agreement between concerned parties behind the scenes. There is little doubt that the Pakistani delegation was aware of the U.S. response on most items constituting the ‘wish-list’. Then why was there so much talk of the Pakistani delegation coming to Washington with a ‘wish-list’?
To demonstrate that the U.S. cannot always lecture and make demands on Pakistan; the latter could also do the same. The movement from relationship to partnership that Minister Qureshi refers to is the movement from ‘requests’ to ‘wish-lists’. Semantics and posturing do matter in international diplomacy. Pakistan is talking, U.S. is listening and this makes Minister Qureshi happy and satisfied.
U.S. diplomacy has been equally deft. Daniel Markey rightly concludes: “Yet senior Obama administration officials have gamely entertained this [civil nuclear deal] and other Pakistani requests, avoiding “no” when “let’s keep talking” might do.”
India was greatly concerned about this round of U.S.-Pakistan strategic dialogue. More than financial aid packages, there was apprehension over U.S. response to issues of bilateral relations with Pakistan and its regional fall-out. C. Raja Mohan had cautioned against bothering too much about General Kiyani’s visit to the U.S. First day of talks seems to have proved Raja Mohan’s point.
India must have been relieved, Minister Qureshi is satisfied, Secretary Clinton has displayed skillful diplomacy and General Kiyani is getting a good ego massage. For once everyone appears to be happy; a temporary but very rare moment in South Asia.