Dr. Manoj Kumar Mishra 13 February 2019
Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Mohammad Faisal’s response to a question pertaining to US President Donald Trump’s remarks about India playing a role in the conflict-ridden South Asian country in the recent past that “India has no role in Afghanistan” raises serious doubts whether Islamabad would ever allow New Delhi a meaningful role in the peace-making and political processes of the war-torn country. https://www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/centre-slams-pakistan-after-it-says-india-has-no-role-to-play-in-afghanistan/story-xIaDjD7ZT3ThmMYJ9scgMM.html
In this light, interests and role of Pakistan need to be examined vis-à-vis India and the oft-repeated concept of ‘strategic depth’ must be vetted. The argument that Pakistan pursues a policy of securing military depth against India by expanding its influence into Afghanistan has been substantiated by the viewpoint that military planners in Pakistan had struggled over the years to overcome the deficiencies of Pakistan’s geographic narrowness and the presence of important cities such as Lahore and Karachi and communication networks within short striking distance of India. This strategic concern was first appreciated and expressed in February 1946 by General Arthur F. Smith, then Chief of General Staff in India. It was henceforth argued that a pro-Pakistani government in Kabul was necessary to give Islamabad the much required strategic depth to launch a counter-offensive from Afghan territory. (J, Ayesha, The State of Martial Rule: The Origins of Pakistan’s Political Economy of Defence, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1990, p. 50).
However, in contrast to such a viewpoint, Mirza Aslam Beg – a retired General of Pakistani army – who had first-hand knowledge about Pakistan’s military and strategic policies, argues that “the strategic depth concept was developed to gain territorial space in case of war with India has no military logic, nor does it conform to the operational policy of Pakistan, which is to defend its borders and defeat the enemy if it attempts to violate Pakistan’s territory” (A. B. Mirza, “Afghanistan Turmoil and Regional Security Imperatives,” paper presented at the second international conference at Tehran, Iran, December 22, 2002. (http://www.friends.org.pk/Beg/afghan%20turmoil.htm). Analyzed broadly, Pakistan’s definition of strategic depth is more comprehensive. It is related to Pakistan’s spread of influence towards Afghanistan and Central Asia rather than ensuring military depth exclusively. The influence has been exercised allegedly through promotion of radical Islamic groups as well as spread of the ideology of Islam. Further, ensuring aid and arms by facilitating the presence and operation of the US to prosecute the war against terrorism and throwing weight to sideline India in the peace-making process were considered important to maintain this influence. Pakistan has been accused of lending continuous support to the Afghan Taliban to promote its own interests even while it was engaged in the Afghan peace process and assisted in the American effort of taking on terrorism so long as these did not impede Pakistani interests in Afghanistan. https://www.bbc.com/news/10302946. Islamabad considered blocking its territory for the transfer of goods from Afghanistan and Central Asia towards India and vice versa and invigorating a strategy of linking itself with Central Asia through communication networks important as well to undercut Indian influence in Afghanistan.
From Indian perspective, Pakistani actions suggested that it has been pursuing proactive policies towards Afghanistan to secure a pliable government in Kabul to acquire military depth against New Delhi by overcoming the limitations of its small size as well as enabling it to forge a common strategic front. However, its actions also pointed to its persistent interests in expanding its sway into the Central Asian region to acquire economic depth against India using Afghanistan as a bridge.
Islamabad’s geopolitical interest in the Central Asian region was expressed soon after the states of the Central Asian region emerged as independent republics and the government of Benazir Bhutto, under its Interior Minister General Naseerullah Babur initiated steps at utilizing the Taliban in an effort to bring stability to southern and eastern Afghanistan and open routes and trade links to different resource rich Central Asian states. https://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6a6c0c.html
Pakistan, meanwhile, kept on alleging India’s involvement in fomenting insurgency in Baluchistan to weaken Pakistan and undercutting Pakistani influence in Afghanistan by enhancing diplomatic presence, using its intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and anti-Pakistani elements to undercut Pakistani influence in Afghanistan. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-32604137
Pakistan’s role in defusing the demand for independent Pashtunistan comprising the Pashtuns straddling the Af-Pak border areas is reflective of its desire to maintain economic influence in Afghanistan. The demand for Pashtunistan, if conceded, would have granted Afghanistan the most desired route to the Indian Ocean. Afghanistan for long has been in the look out of routes in its to reach out to the world market. However, Pakistan’s policy was geared toward making Afghanistan overly dependent on it for market so that its influence in the country did not get diluted. (Jafri Hasan Ali Shah, Indo-Afghan Relations 1947-67, Sterling Publication, New Delhi, 1976, p. 69).
Pakistan allegedly lent support to various radical religious groups to create an overarching Islamic identity in order to displace the Pashtun ethnic nationalism. Islamabad made efforts to create such an identity by raising jihad against Soviet Union following its intervention in 1979 and propping up the Taliban during the civil war period in Afghanistan. Afghan governments tried to undercut Pashtun nationalism even before the jihad in the 1980s. For example, it was in 1973 that the then Pakistani Prime Minister Zulifikar Ali Bhutto provided sanctuary to Islamist leader Gulbuddin Hekmatyar with a view to undermining the established government in Kabul (It was said in the speech delivered by M. K. Bhadrakumar at the international conference, “The Age of Obama: From the Mediterranean to the Greater Middle East” organised by the Foundation for European Progressive Studies and Fondazione Italianieuropei, Rome, November 30, 2009).
Pakistani aspirations of keeping Afghanistan and Central Asia away from Indian sphere of influence and to keep them under its own influence as much as possible were evident in its use of the Afghan Trade and Transit Agreement of 1965 to deny overland route to India to supply goods to Afghanistan let alone Central Asia which could be construed as Islamabad’s attempts at gaining economic depth versus New Delhi. Since 2015, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani reportedly continued to warn that his government would close Pakistan’s transit route to Central Asia if Afghanistan’s entrepreneurs were not allowed to trade with India through the Wagah border crossing.https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/opinion/a-game-of-trade-and-balance/article10051622.ece
Further, Afghanistan’s membership in South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) provided India with an opportunity in its reach out to Central Asia. But such prospects were doomed as Islamabad was reluctant to allow its territory being used as a conduit for Indo-Afghan or Indo-Central Asian trade. Pakistan was seen opposing Afghanistan’s membership in SAARC and taking advantage of its geo-strategic position in blocking the transfer of goods through its territory. Pakistan perceived India’s non-military and developmental role in Afghanistan as a policy of New Delhi’s strategic encirclement and viewed India’s enhanced diplomatic presence in the country with suspicion and alleged it with involvement in promoting anti-Pakistani elements. India, on the other hand, in efforts to enhance its influence in Afghanistan was involved in building a 218 km Zaranj-Delaram road link with Iran, with an objective to provide Afghanistan access to sea-ports like Chabahar. India looked for other alternative connectivity projects such as North-South corridor linking India with Iran, Afghanistan, Central Asia and Russia.
American reliance on Pakistan also determined Indian role in Afghanistan to a large extent given Islamabad’s sensitivities towards an enhanced role of New Delhi had to be taken care of by Washington. The US, China and Russia and other regional powers perceived threats from different terror groups and therefore lacked a common threat perception and sought Pakistani cooperation to manage their national security concerns particularly for the twin reasons of Islamabad’s geographical contiguity with Afghanistan and its control over radical Islamic groups operating within and from Afghanistan and Pakistan. These countries believed that Pakistan could use its influence over specific terror groups to desist from posing threat to these countries. For example, China expressed its concerns over the Uighur-separatist group East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) being trained, armed and sheltered by Al-Qaeda and the Tehrik-I Taliban Pakistan (TTP). Beijing was also wary of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU), the principal host to this group making significant advances in the northern Afghanistan. Similarly, the US has been worried about the resurgence of the terror groups like Al-Qaeda and continued armed attacks on the NATO and US forces by the militant shades of the Afghan Taliban. Even though the Trump Administration of US began with a tough approach to coerce Pakistan into a desired role in the fight against terror, the approach began to change as the war dragged on and the Taliban remained resilient. Islamabad’s significance in Washington’s eyes is understood in the light of the latter’s dependence on the former to take the peace process ahead and maintain supplies to foreign troops in Afghanistan (through Pakistani routes) as long as any sustainable political solution to the Afghan predicament is not available.
The Pakistani conception of strategic depth in Afghanistan is much broader than mere military depth and has been related to expansion of its economic and political influence towards Central Asia while maintaining significant influence in Afghanistan. Pakistan’s search for natural resources and market and denial of the same to India is intertwined with the idea of deepening its strategic depth towards its north and west while keeping Afghanistan dependent on it for trade.