The debate turns towards Pakistan

The leader in the US presidential race drew ahead two nights ago, when Barack Obama succeeded in making John McCain look out of ideas and repetitive. The Middle East figured prominently in their discussion on foreign policy, but it was alarming that both candidates dodged the major problems of the region and focused instead on Pakistan and Iran, often taking similar positions.

Both candidates had very little to say about Palestine, so the Israeli occupying forces can breath a sigh of relief that they will not be interfered with, and the Palestinians will have to groan with despair that their split leadership has incapacitated them and so allowed them to be ignored. Neither candidate mentioned Lebanon or Syria.

Both candidates spoke of a withdrawal of US troops form Iraq, although Obama favoured a complete withdrawal sooner rather than later, whereas McCain is ready for a longer presence in Iraq, even if reduced. Either way, the Iraqi leadership will have to brace for a reduction and eventual pull-out.

Strong language on Iran

On Iran, both candidates used some of their strongest language, and refused to countenance an Iran with nuclear weapons. However, there was a sharp difference between Obama who was ready to talk to the Iranian government, and McCain who was not.

But Afghanistan was clearly at the top of their minds. In this arena, the US forces have two priorities: to support the Afghan government, which is proving more difficult as it fails to meet the challenge posed by its own internal security situation; and to continue to attack Al Qaida and its Taliban allies, and hopefully find Osama Bin Laden.

As the coalition forces have won more control of Afghanistan from the Taliban, they have started to speak of the need to find a political end to the fighting. The British ambassador in Afghanistan suffered from a leaked conversation with a French colleague (what price European unity?) when he spoke of the failings of the present Afghan government, and the British commander gave an interview in which he described the war as unwinnable and of the need to talk to the Taliban.

The current US leadership described these realists as defeatist, but in the end peace in Afghanistan will only be found if the Afghan government and the coalition attract Taliban supporters away from their die-hard leaders. But such talks require a more complete military defeat for the Taliban, which they have been able to avoid by moving out of coalition-controlled Afghanistan into the largely uncontrolled Federally Administered Tribal Areas, FATA, of Pakistan.

In the TV debate, Obama said bluntly that he would allow US forces to cross the border and attack Al Qaida and Taliban sites. He was hotly criticised by McCain for this, but it turned out that McCain was not against the idea as such, but only against talking about it in public. Such raids would clearly violate Pakistani sovereignty, and McCain would like to do it secretly.

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari and the government have spoken out strongly against such incursions in the recent past, as the US forces have frequently crossed the Pakistan border. They have used missiles to attack militant targets in FATA, and launched a major commando raid in early September which attracted severe Pakistani censure.

From their side, the Pakistani security forces have been fighting militants, in the strategically located Bajaur region; in South Waziristan, where they have managed to contain fighters loyal to Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud; and in Swat where they have had some of their fiercest fighting.

But the US administration does not think Pakistan is doing enough, and it is working with the suspicion that the Zardari government is not strong enough to force its military to go in and take full control of the FATA, in part because the military has strong and long established allies in the tribal leaders of the FATA which it does not want to disturb.

But the US is fed up with the continuing presence of Al Qaida and Taliban forces in FATA, where they act with the support of sections of the local population. Both candidates in the US presidential race share the view that the FATA safe-haven cannot continue, and either of them will put intense pressure on Zardari to take decisive action in FATA, or else put up with the US doing it for him. Zardari knows he is between a rock (his military) and a hard place (the US military), and that this pressure will not go away.

Zardari's dilemma

Therefore, Zardari has had to try to develop a political consensus in Pakistan in favour of military action. Part of this was getting Pakistan's new military spy chief, General Ahmad Shujaa Pasha, to brief a closed-door joint session of the Pakistani parliament on the internal security threat and conflict in FATA tribal territory.

Whether the Pakistani government manages to get control of FATA or not, the Americans will not allow Al Qaida to continue to operate out of FATA. Both candidates have given far too many political promises to end Al Qaida as a fighting force, that neither candidate will let internal Pakistani problems stop them. This will be humiliating for the Pakistani government, unless parliament and the military combine to agree the US is right.