(Image source from: Former Pakistani diplomat Husain Haqqani says)

Former Pakistani Ambassador to the US has warned the Congress that fighter jets which are to be sold to Pakistan would end up being used against India and not against terrorists. Director of South & Central Asia at the Hudson Institute, Haqqani had said that the competition with India remains the overriding consideration in Pakistan's foreign and domestic policies.

“The Obama administration’s consideration of a nuclear deal with Pakistan, just like its decision a few months ago to sell almost USD 1 billion in US-made attack helicopters, missiles and other equipment to Pakistan will fuel conflict in South Asia without fulfilling the objective of helping the country to fight Islamist extremists or limit its nuclear arsenal,” said Husain Haqqani, the former Pakistani Ambassador to the US.

In a prepared remark submitted ahead of a Congressional hearing on 'Civil Nuclear Cooperation with Pakistan: Prospects and Consequences to the Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade Subcommittee of the Committee on Foreign Affairs', Haqqani said Pakistan's failure to tackle its jihadist challenge is not the result of a lack of arms but reflects an absence of will.

“Unless Pakistan changes its world view and its compulsive competition with its much larger neighbour even in violation of international commitments, American weapons will end up being used to fight or menace India and perceived domestic enemies instead of being deployed against jihadists,” he said.

“By aiding Pakistan over the years— some USD 40 billion since 1950, according to the Congressional Research Service —the US has fed Pakistan’s delusion of being India’s regional military equal. Seeking security against a much larger neighbour is a rational objective but seeking parity with it on a constant basis is not,” he said.

“Instead of discussing civil nuclear deals and selling more military equipment to Pakistan, US officials should convince Pakistan that its ambitions of rivalling India are akin to Belgium trying to rival France or Germany,” Haqqani wrote.

India's population is six times as large as Pakistan's while India's economy is 10 times bigger and India's USD two trillion economy has managed consistent growth, whereas Pakistan's USD 245 billion economy has grown sporadically and is undermined by jihadist terrorism and domestic political chaos, Haqqani wrote.

Haqqani said unlike other countries, Pakistan did not raise an army to match the threats it faces. Pakistan inherited 33 percent of British India's army, raised for the Second World War, at independence in 1947 and has sought to identify threats that match the size of that army.

“The US government has given the signal that Pakistan is too important for the US to ignore, which reinforces all of Pakistan’s wrong policies. These are policies that both the US and a significant section of the Pakistani intelligentsia would like to be changed,” Haqqani said.

By Premji