Has the Impact of 9/11 Been Baneful or Beneficial?

2013-02-0108 Bilal Syed Critical Issues in Pakistans outside insurance policy 13th October 2012 Has the shock absorber of 9/11 been baneful or respectable to Pakistans bail environs? Analyze. The second year of the unused millenary was witness to an event which talent project perhaps altered the geo- semipolitical structure of the realness and gave brook to a whole wise phenomenon, unmatched, which has been directing opposed policy personal business of the serviceman for al most(prenominal) a decennary now.This event comprised the four dreadist attacks on united States soil, on September the eleventh, 2001, in which hijacked planes crashed into the repeat towers of the cosmea trade centre, the Pentagon and one knock down short of its target in Shanksfield Pennsylvania. These events gave birth to the contendfargon on timidity, which has non only affected the get together States only when a lot of an some other(prenominal) countries as well, especi whatsoe very Pakistan, who had a prominent geo strategic location in the vicinity of the employment grounds for this contend. This war has had both positivistic and negative effects on the security and general perceptual constancy of Pakistan.This essay allow try to discern these effects and lay out whether in the persistent run, the equal of 9/11 has been baneful or beneficial to Pakistans security environment. Firstly, the collateral impacts of the war on terror willing be considered. Since the perpetrators of the attacks were considered to be hiding in Afghanistaniistan, all the surrounding countries in the voice became salient strategic partners of the United States and its allies. Pakistan, perhaps the most influential since it had a long tale of dealing with the Taliban and had in depth knowledge of the terrain and surrounding area.Chairperson, Department of Political Science, the Islamia University of Bahawalpur, prof Razia Musarrat packs that Pakistans geographica l location, its nearness with Afghanistan, its tight fitting traffic with the Taliban regime, its deep knowledge of the broken terrain of Afghanistan, and its history of Cold War alinement made Pakistan obviously the most of the essence(p) strategic asset for the United States. Pakistan offered its set up to the United States including airbases and military intelligence to foster eradicate the terrorist elements present in Afghanistan. As a way out everywhere the age Pakistan has received military ssistance and assistance from the United States, helping in brining military and technological advancements to the solid ground. It is important to note that at the eon of these attacks, Pakistan was in isolation at the world stage due to sanctions imposed on it, after it carried out nuclear tests in 1998. India too was facing the same sanctions, hardly having a weapons-gradeer thrift meant that it managed to survive this prohibitionist spell comparatively much easy t han Pakistan. Pakistan on the other hand was distress from the consequences of these sanctions and the war on terror surprisingly came as a relief.Pakistan has been accomplishn sparing assistance of close to tenner billion dollars over a period of ten years as its ties with the waste late improved. This incite rescued its stagnant economy and ensured that Pakistans economic woes were overcome, a change, in truth welcome for the Musharraf regime. Thirdly, stockpile 9/11, south Asia became the centre of the Worlds attention. A senior political analyst notes, that with the posture of two nuclear power friends, and an Al-Qaeda-strewn Afghanistan, southerly Asia assumed a strategic lieu in Ameri john eyes. The rebirth of southernmost Asia prominence was not limited to the States, quite an for whole the world. in that respect was a long strand of Heads of States, and highest officials visiting the region every preference mean solar day were evidence of long edge strate gic interests of the US in the region. This new found attention allowed inter democracyally marooned Pakistan and India back into the main flow rate of world politics and bolstered the image of the soil in the eyes of the world, as a nation that was against terrorism. A somewhat debateable positive outcome, scarce one that could be true is that this war against terrorism helped to control the spread of militancy in the country.Former unconnected minister of Pakistan, Mr Abdul Sattar argues that, some other significant benefit of the post-9/11 policy has been ensurement of the baneful influence of extremists and competitorys. Had the war on terror not been targeted against memorial tablets ilk Al-Qaeda, they readiness reserve consolidated their positions in Afghanistan and Pakistan and go forward to follow their own agendas. The post 9/11 policy helped to contain this spread of ideology but unfortunately could not eliminate it from society completely. other major impact of the war on terror, it can be argued, is that it led to constancy in the region.The main energise of instability in the region over the years has been antipathetic Pakistan, India traffic. Three major wars and unconditioned other incidents aimed at undermining the other country, countenance soured an already messy divorce. The science of nuclear warheads by both republics coupled with the Kashmir bailiwick, entertain caused this region to become highly vapourific. This was also the case post 9/11, when after an attack on the Indian parliament in December of 2001, India mobilized its military forces on a larger get over against Pakistan.Pakistan too responded and both armies stood tone to face with from each one other opposite the trans field borders. There was a very near threat of an outbreak of nuclear war and alarm bells started ringing in the global arena. regulartually it was the posture of the United States in the region which helped diffuse the h ighly volatile situation. The threat of nuclear war, coupled with the fear that a Pakistan-India war would be offensive to the war on terror, meant that the United Sates set apart in a abounding hearted apparent involvement to ease tensions.This was eventually the case and stability was brought to the region again. These are some of the positive outcomes to the war on terror for Pakistan. except there have been dreadful negative consequences for the country as well. Firstly, just homogeneous it can be argued that just like US presence brought stability to the region it also brought a lot of instability. This is evident from the impact of the war on Afghanistan, where Prof. Dr. Razia Musarrat argues, that the Taliban hot seatial term had been successful to restore a charitable of stability in Afghanistan for the first measure after a very long period of unrest.America, by ripping to pieces the Taliban regime, at one term again pushed Afghanistan into a new mannequin of insurgency and civil war. This unstable and profuse situation will not ride out contain within the Afghan borders preferably will soon spread into the neighbouring shows. We can deal for ourselves that the unrest and turbulence in Afghanistan has leaked out into Pakistan. This has been a cause of groovy c at oncern for Pakistan, because the Afghani brand of militancy and extremism has seeped in the country and has started rearing its fearful head against the state.Secondly, Pakistan had friendly relations with the Taliban anterior to the American offensive. So much so that they were considered boosters of the Taliban, a notion which caused concern to other surrounding countries like India. But after the war, the normalityern alliance came into power and the resulting Afghan government activity did not have a favourable entrance of Pakistan. India on the other hand took advantage of this and firmly naturalised itself in Afghanistan. It became the largest regional don or of aid to Afghanistan in the post war period.Strong relations with Afghanistan could very beneficial for Indian foreign policy since Afghanistan shares such a large border with Pakistan. Having strong relations with a hostile neighbours neighbour is a strategically strong move and be sicks Pakistan in a delicate situation. Also, India could have easy penetration to Central Asia via Afghanistan, which could give it access to their abundant natural resources and exculpated other cheaper trading avenues. India would not have to be dependent on Pakistan for access to Central Asia, which might come across as another blow to Pakistan.Another cause of concern for Pakistan, at the political level, was unbroken Indian pressure that Pakistan provided a unhurt haven for terrorists. India took advantage of American presence in the region and assisted at this as an opportunity to further one of its foreign policy goals, that is, to ensure that Pakistan was strongly involve in harbouri ng terrorists under its roof. The case for this demarcation was of course Pakistans close relations with the Taliban and the fact that Pakistan was a big supporter of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.Secondly India had makeed time and again that Pakistan uses terrorist groups to promote their foreign policy agendas. They claimed that the Pakistani intelligence cell, the ISI, with the blessings of the government equipped, apt and infiltrated militants into Kashmir. This was a very serious claim considering Pakistan was a nuclear state which endorsed state sponsored terrorism. The Indian government hoped that the United States would last understand Indias point of view and become an ally of India against Pakistans state-sponsored terrorism. Indian security agencies hope that the terrorist attack in New York on Tuesday will see the United States put pressure on Pakistan to extradite Dawood Ibrahim, Tiger Memon, Chhota Shakeel and others, who masterminded the serial barrage blasts in Mumbai in March 1993. Domestically, Pakistan has had to fall in a very heavy wrong for the part it has played in the war. There has been a huge increase in the number of terrorist and militant organizations in the country after the war.Following the events of the 2001-2002 standoff between Pakistan and India, Musharraf, pledge to crack down on the militant organizations working in the country. They were obviously not willing to go easily and put up resistance by targeting government and security establishments. Thousands of innocent civilians were killed as result of suicide attacks and the whole country was gripped in a constant state of fear. The legality and order situation got so wore that the president himself narrowly survived two bold attempts on his life.The backlash was the worst in the north western region, for the bulk divided by international borders shared the same strong bonds of ethnicity and culture. Taking cue from the Taliban of Afghanistan, the Tehrik-e- Taliban Pakistan became an active anti-state terrorist organization comprised of mostly Pashtoons, just like the Afghani Taliban. It is responsible for carrying out hundreds of terrorist attacks on state owned institutions and civilians as well. They were perhaps merchantman the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and one of the biggest causes for instability in the Khyber-Pukhtoonkhwa province.The situation became too bad to be ignored and the Pakistan military launched a full scale military operation in which thousands of phalanx were involved to deal with this menace. Even though millions of rupees and a lot of soldiers were befogged in the operation, the operation was unsuccessful and the Taliban continue living in the mountains of the Waziristan region, albeit as outlaws and vigilantes. This spiritual extremist ideology, unfortunately, is not only confined to Pakistans western provinces. This menace has easily started spread head in the comparatively more peaceful Punjab and Sindh provinces as well.The society is slowly becoming more polarised on the issue of whether Pakistan should supporting on fighting Americas war. Others however believe this is a war for Pakistans own survival. whatever the case is, the country has been gripped in a constant state of fear and gloom. Notions of national cohesiveness and unity are solid withering away as the Pashtoon and Baloch communities claim they have felt the brunt of the war on terror, a notion that is true considering the biff attacks that are carried out in their homelands.A 2012 cogitation on the security situation of 2011 in Pakistan puts the matter in better perspective. epochFATA act to reel under the impact of terrorism, there was no respite from terror inKPas well. Sindh continued to catch a morecentralized signifierof violence in and around Karachi. However, the telephone extension of the influence of armed extremist political, ethnic, sectarist and criminal groups in the city, and the chances of violence spreading to other areas of the Province, could not be command out. Overall the comprises of this war on terror have been staggering for Pakistan.The addresss, in terms of monetary terms, political terms, well-disposed terms and most importantly exhalation of life are so huge, that Pakistan is calm down reeling from the blow. The report mentioned earlier, gives an idea regarding the losses continue by Pakistan. Pakistans continuing betrothal with the production and export of Islamist extremism and terrorism continued to produce a bloody boomerang at home, with a total of at least 6,142 persons, including of 2,797 militants, 2,580 civilians and 765 Security Forces (SFs) personnel killed in 2011.However, even this worrying total accomplished an improvement of 17. 75 per cent over the preceding year. 7,435 persons, including 5,170 militants, 1,796 civilians and 469 SF personnel, had been killed in 2010. Secondly, the war has almost dried up foreign investment i n Pakistan, as no one is willing to come here considering the public security situation and the unstable political scenario.The economy is in shambles as a major chunk of the compute goes to the army and less and less is dog-tired on the people. It is true that Pakistan is getting aid from outside, but it cannot just rely on aid to survive in the future. A major energy crisis has added to the woes of the country and caused great distress to the public. Anti American sentiments are now at an all time high and the country looks forward to the day it does not have to deal with these issues any more.As former foreign minister Abdul Sattar says, So colossal have been the human and sensible ravages our country has suffered during the last decade that no sensitive citizen can but aspiration Pakistan had followed a different course, one that might have saved our country and people from the nightmare in which we are quieten trapped. If the positive and negative outcomes of the post 9/ 11 policy are weighed against each other, it can be concluded that it has been boilers suit more baneful than beneficial to the country.Yes, the policy allowed Pakistan to come back into the main stream of international politics and yes, it caused an influx of foreign aid into the country which rescued a stagnant economy, but at what cost? The material costs of thousands of dollars or the cost of human life, to which a value cannot be assigned, have been tremendous. The country is gripped by a war that is ravaging its socio-political fabric. The economy is once again in shambles and the country stands on the brink of bankruptcy.The more imposing thought is that, the war on terror is still not over and its consequences keep haunting the country. Once the coalition troops leave Afghanistan, the whole region will be locked in a geo-political beat for supremacy and with major players like hostile India involved, the odds do not look good for Pakistan. Works Cited Balakrishnan, S. Ind ia Hopes US pull up stakes Now Pressurise Pak. The Times Of India. N. p. , 2001. Web. 14 Oct. 2012. . Pakistan Assessment 2012. South Asia Terrorism Portal. N. p. , n. d. Web. 12 Oct. 2012. . Musarrat, Prof. Dr. Razia. US WAR ON act of terrorism AND ITS IMPACT ON SOUTH ASIA. Thesis. University of the Punjab, n. d. Http//pu. edu. pk. University of the Punjab. Web. http//pu. edu. pk/images/ daybook/pols/Currentissue-pdf/RAZIA. pdf Sattar, Abdul. REVISIT TO POST-9/11 POLICY. Criterion-Quarterly7. 1 (2012) n. pag. Criterion-quarterly. com. 2012. Web. 12 Oct. 2012. .