Ambassador Cameron Munter, you will agree that you are neither an angel nor Mr Know All so that whatever you say should be believed and obeyed. You have claimed: “There is evidence linking the Haqqani network to the Pakistan government. This is something that must stop.” You have said that you can prove such a linkage. How credible is this information? After all, this is not for the first time that such an allegation has been levelled against Pakistan. Mr Ambassador, even your President claimed that Raymond Davis was a diplomat; he turned out to be a CIA operative! It would not be too difficult to distinguish between truth and falsehood. We passed on the intelligence about Osama bin Laden’s presence nine months before the Americans raided his compound. And did your government not lie when they promised they would carry out a joint operation and yet acted unilaterally?
Your government received all the money for F-16s, but would neither supply the aircraft nor return the money; Mr Ambassador, would you not call it an act of robbery? In response to our hue and cry raising questions about your reliability in the eyes of the world, your government offered wheat instead, out of its surplus stock! What a shame for a superpower that goes lecturing the world on the noble values the Americans cherish! Besides, would you care to read a bit of history to know that the Americans lied to us in 1971, saying that the 6th Fleet was on its way to protect the integrity of the country? You should have taken the wider canvas into consideration before accusing Pakistan of facilitating the attack on USZ embassy and ISAF headquarters in Kabul. You are fully aware that there are no less than 150,000 USZ and NATO soldiers, who are in Afghanistan and are supposed to ensure that nothing unauthorised enters into Afghanistan from the Pak-Afghan border, along with 40,000 Afghan policemen and security personnel.
Yet, if Haqqani activists could break all security tiers and reach as deep as the heart of Afghan capital, then it is time for you to pack up and leave Afghanistan. What do you say about the 20-hour-long siege of vital and strongly defended installations? Have you not perverted the truth about your forces’ failure and hollow defences of sensitive buildings? The world now knows that to achieve their nefarious designs, the Americans could lie to any extent about anything. Have they not been denying the Palestinians their right to have an independent state where they can live in peace and harmony? They have not lied long on every occasion before using veto against any resolution presented in the UN Security Council for Palestinian statehood. Well Mr Munter, do you remember with what conviction and authority the then USZ Administration claimed that Iraq had weapons of mass destructions (WMDs)? It was also claimed by President George W. Bush and senior military commanders that there was ample evidence available based on satellite pictures showing launching stations of missiles carrying nuclear warheads. ( Read: Donald Rumsfeld accepts his lies about WMDs in Iraq )
Do you also remember that on the basis of this baseless ‘information’, USZ invaded Iraq bypassing the United Nations? Will you enlighten the world what the 165,000 American soldiers found there? Has the USZ not lied using the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General, Mohamed El-Baradei and inspector Hans Blix to provide it fake and baseless documents confirming that Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs? The USZ also lied extensively about the 9/11 twin-tower tragedy. Has it spoken the truth how security tiers at four international airports could be breached almost at the same time? Have it revealed to the world any action taken against those responsible for such a terrible lapse where hijackers could take four airliners into the skies and hit the World Trade Center and Pentagon headquarters? The USZ administration has also failed to bring facts before the world as to what was CIA doing when all this was happening. It also lied about an airliner striking into the Pentagon headquarters building and then disappearing because it would not show the real wreckage.
Mr Munter, the world has become wiser and it is not possible for the USZ to hoodwink all the people all the time. They have realised that American leadership, civil and military, can lie blatantly to serve their objectives. History is full of such examples. Let me now take you to Afghanistan again. Has the USZ administration not been lying to its own Congress and Senate on its achievements against the Taliban in Afghanistan despite the fact that 80 per cent of its area is still being governed by different groups of the Taliban? Mr Munter, if America wants a strong and lasting relationship with Pakistan, the two sides must be truthful to each other. Diplomacy yes, but it should not be based on fake premises. If the USZ has India as a new-found friend in South Asia, which it wants to build up as a counterweight against China, the USZ administration would only be sowing the seeds of turmoil and disharmony in the region. Let Indian vengeance against Pakistan not influence our bilateral and military relations. Don’t forget that when the USZ decided to launch international war against terror, it was Pakistan that stood with it and not India. New Delhi is a lateral entrant to the Afghan arena, only with the single objective of destabilising Pakistan.
If the Americans befriend India, we have the right to ask them to pressurise it to honour its commitments on Kashmir. It is an issue, Ambassador Munter, that cries out for justice! Mr Ambassador, assigning India a larger-than-life role in Afghanistan without taking us into confidence is yet another mischief. Afghanistan is Pakistan’s immediate neighbour and we have made unparalleled sacrifices for peace in that war-torn country. By trying to reach an agreement with President Hamid Karzai to station your troops beyond 2014 and not sharing this with Pakistan is a worst kind of betrayal. It is about time we learnt lessons from our past mistakes, we must be on the same page without which your efforts in Afghanistan would be in vain and you will have to leave this part of the world in the same disgraceful way you left Vietnam. Would the USZ like the same fate in its war against terror?
Your government received all the money for F-16s, but would neither supply the aircraft nor return the money; Mr Ambassador, would you not call it an act of robbery? In response to our hue and cry raising questions about your reliability in the eyes of the world, your government offered wheat instead, out of its surplus stock! What a shame for a superpower that goes lecturing the world on the noble values the Americans cherish! Besides, would you care to read a bit of history to know that the Americans lied to us in 1971, saying that the 6th Fleet was on its way to protect the integrity of the country? You should have taken the wider canvas into consideration before accusing Pakistan of facilitating the attack on USZ embassy and ISAF headquarters in Kabul. You are fully aware that there are no less than 150,000 USZ and NATO soldiers, who are in Afghanistan and are supposed to ensure that nothing unauthorised enters into Afghanistan from the Pak-Afghan border, along with 40,000 Afghan policemen and security personnel.
Yet, if Haqqani activists could break all security tiers and reach as deep as the heart of Afghan capital, then it is time for you to pack up and leave Afghanistan. What do you say about the 20-hour-long siege of vital and strongly defended installations? Have you not perverted the truth about your forces’ failure and hollow defences of sensitive buildings? The world now knows that to achieve their nefarious designs, the Americans could lie to any extent about anything. Have they not been denying the Palestinians their right to have an independent state where they can live in peace and harmony? They have not lied long on every occasion before using veto against any resolution presented in the UN Security Council for Palestinian statehood. Well Mr Munter, do you remember with what conviction and authority the then USZ Administration claimed that Iraq had weapons of mass destructions (WMDs)? It was also claimed by President George W. Bush and senior military commanders that there was ample evidence available based on satellite pictures showing launching stations of missiles carrying nuclear warheads. ( Read: Donald Rumsfeld accepts his lies about WMDs in Iraq )
Do you also remember that on the basis of this baseless ‘information’, USZ invaded Iraq bypassing the United Nations? Will you enlighten the world what the 165,000 American soldiers found there? Has the USZ not lied using the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General, Mohamed El-Baradei and inspector Hans Blix to provide it fake and baseless documents confirming that Saddam Hussein possessed WMDs? The USZ also lied extensively about the 9/11 twin-tower tragedy. Has it spoken the truth how security tiers at four international airports could be breached almost at the same time? Have it revealed to the world any action taken against those responsible for such a terrible lapse where hijackers could take four airliners into the skies and hit the World Trade Center and Pentagon headquarters? The USZ administration has also failed to bring facts before the world as to what was CIA doing when all this was happening. It also lied about an airliner striking into the Pentagon headquarters building and then disappearing because it would not show the real wreckage.
Mr Munter, the world has become wiser and it is not possible for the USZ to hoodwink all the people all the time. They have realised that American leadership, civil and military, can lie blatantly to serve their objectives. History is full of such examples. Let me now take you to Afghanistan again. Has the USZ administration not been lying to its own Congress and Senate on its achievements against the Taliban in Afghanistan despite the fact that 80 per cent of its area is still being governed by different groups of the Taliban? Mr Munter, if America wants a strong and lasting relationship with Pakistan, the two sides must be truthful to each other. Diplomacy yes, but it should not be based on fake premises. If the USZ has India as a new-found friend in South Asia, which it wants to build up as a counterweight against China, the USZ administration would only be sowing the seeds of turmoil and disharmony in the region. Let Indian vengeance against Pakistan not influence our bilateral and military relations. Don’t forget that when the USZ decided to launch international war against terror, it was Pakistan that stood with it and not India. New Delhi is a lateral entrant to the Afghan arena, only with the single objective of destabilising Pakistan.
If the Americans befriend India, we have the right to ask them to pressurise it to honour its commitments on Kashmir. It is an issue, Ambassador Munter, that cries out for justice! Mr Ambassador, assigning India a larger-than-life role in Afghanistan without taking us into confidence is yet another mischief. Afghanistan is Pakistan’s immediate neighbour and we have made unparalleled sacrifices for peace in that war-torn country. By trying to reach an agreement with President Hamid Karzai to station your troops beyond 2014 and not sharing this with Pakistan is a worst kind of betrayal. It is about time we learnt lessons from our past mistakes, we must be on the same page without which your efforts in Afghanistan would be in vain and you will have to leave this part of the world in the same disgraceful way you left Vietnam. Would the USZ like the same fate in its war against terror?
( Written by Salim Bokhari for The Nation )
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