Bruce Riedel strikes again

After Bruce Riedel's May 30 irrational Op-Ed Pakistan and the bomb in Wall Street Journal, which was cogently refuted by this scribe and Naeem Salik, separately for its conjectures, it would have been fair to assume that Mr Riedel would have let the matter rest. However, Naeem Salik explains Riedel's grouse against Pakistan in his Op-Ed Riedel and the Pakistani bomb: "He came to Pakistan as part of Strobe Talbott's team in an emotionally charged atmosphere after the Indian nuclear tests in May 1998 on an impossible mission to persuade Pakistan from following suit. Unfortunately for him and his team, they were meted out very roughshod treatment by senior Pakistani diplomats and he still carries the scar of that experience." Apparently Mr Riedel's agenda is beyond settling personal scores with Pakistan. His lure for India is expressed in his Op-Ed Breaking more naan with Delhi: the next stage in US-India relations. Like a teenage lover smitten by the charms and guile's of a brazen paramour, he blurts out: "We are now at the cusp of another great Western adventure with India. Visions of fabulous new markets for everything imaginable are again entrancing businessmen and entrepreneurs around the globe. Some of the statistics are indeed amazing. With a population of over a billion, Indians are a sixth of mankind. More than half are under 25 years of age. India has enjoyed growth rates of 9 percent and 9.4 percent in the last two fiscal years, and its economy is now the third largest in the world in terms of purchasing power parity. Moreover, the lure of the Indian marketplace is complemented by the attraction of its politics. India is the
largest democracy in the world and since independence has had a history of freedom almost unique in the post-colonial world." Now it is clear why Mr Riedel has become India's spokesperson. Thus his 4,374 words long tirade Armageddon in Islamabad carried by July/August 2009 issue of The National Interest should not come as a surprise. Its editorial gist is: "Don't be fooled by the recent positive news from Islamabad. We face the potential of a nuclear-armed state run by Islamic extremists. The head of Obama's AfPak policy review shows us the devastating consequences of a Taliban-led takeover of Islamabad."

Riedel compares the situation in Pakistan to Armageddon; which is mentioned in the Bible's Book of Revelation in the New Testament at Rev 20:1-3, 7-10; Rev 19:11-20. According to traditional interpretations, the Messiah will return to earth and destroy the Antichrist at the Battle of Armageddon. Like a "fire and brimstone" preacher, using a misplaced quote from Pakistan's martyred former PM, Riedel paints a gloomy picture of the Taliban taking over the reigns of the government in Islamabad. He talks about the terrorist leaders tapping into the "deep anger among the landless peasants" and anti-landlord agitation sweeping the government from power. Mr Riedel's blinkers have prevented him from observing that such a movement is prevalent in India at the hands of Maoists/Naxalites and not in Pakistan. He goes on to infer that since many in the Pak Army favour jihadists, "a deal with an Islamist movement would be attractive." He further conjectures that disaffected parts of PML-N and PPP along with LET and Taliban would form the new government. Bin Laden, Mullah Omar and Al-Zawahiri would be welcomed to come out of hiding. "Large numbers of educated and Westernised Pakistanis would try to
flee a new Islamic Emirate of Pakistan. They would find it difficult to find a port to take them..." Mr Riedel's fertile imagination maliciously postulates purging the army and ISI of secularists and setting up "a new military force to act as a counterweight to the regular army, akin to the role of the SS in Nazi Germany or the Revolutionary Guard in Iran."

The "erudite" scholar's flight of fancy comes to nightmarish conclusions: "In the end, we would be left with an extremist-controlled Pakistan, infested with violence, an almost completely dysfunctional economy, harsh laws and even-harsher methods for imposing them, and above all a nuclear-armed nation controlled by terrorist sympathisers." He then depicts a doomsday scenario of the terror unleashed by the use of nuclear weapons, with Israel "coming into the Emirates crosshairs as a major target." He warns that since Pakistan does not have delivery systems capable of its nuclear weapons reaching America, it could certainly destroy cities and bases in Afghanistan, India, the Gulf States and, if smuggled out ahead of time, perhaps the US.

The remainder of the Robert Ludlum/Frederick Forsyth/Heather Graham/Brad Thor style thriller is dedicated to recommending actions by USA to preempt/deal with such a grim situation. He rules out engagement as nearly impossible under the plea that "Islamabad would have no faith and little interest in any dialogue with Crusaders and Zionists." The options recommended are far-fetched and harsh ranging from regime change by a coup or naval blockade to outright invasion. Of course he does present the pros and cons of each option but leads to the ultimate coup de grâce: "Our goal should be to convince Pakistanis that the existential threat to their liberty come not from the CIA or India, but from Al-Qaeda."

Let me borrow from Euripides (480-406 BC), the Greek playwright whom Aristotle called the most tragic of the Greek poets, who said: "Whom the Gods destroy, they first make mad." Surely the terrorists, who are targeting Pakistan have gone stark raving mad, but the response of the Pakistani military, under the guidance of the democratically elected government is anything but "reluctant" which Riedel suggests. The people of Pakistan, its government and the Parliament are in unison for rooting out the evil of obscurantism, extremism and terrorism.
Surely good will triumph over evil, not in the way outlined by Riedel with reference to Armageddon but in accordance to the Qurànic injunction: "Despair is anathema for the righteous!"

S M Hali
(sm_hali@yahoo.com)