Blast from the past

President of the Afghanistan Foreign Press Association Vanni Cappelli writes about an American diplomat raising questions about the threat of the Pakistani military – almost 40 years ago. Cappelli digs up a 1970 New York Times op-ed by Chester Bowles who predicted that Pakistani military would be the strategic threat of the future, not the then-burning Vietnam.

With virtuosic insight and prescience, (Bowles) outlined the salient features of America's alliance with Pakistan, a relationship whose dynamics have remained constant from the early days of the Cold War to the war on terror. And he prophesied that the contradictions underlying this alliance would harm vital American interests.

"American military assistance to Pakistan in the last 15 years will, I believe, be listed by historians as among our most costly blunders," Bowles wrote. Its continuation, he concluded, would serve the interests of no one except the Pakistani military. "Certainly not the interests of the American people in Asia. Or the cause of world peace. Or the welfare of the people of Pakistan, who need tractors, not tanks."

On a related but different note, the Council on Foreign Relations has a useful resource compiling the stances of all the presidential candidates on U.S.-Pakistan policy.

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[Adil]

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