Frédéric Grare is the Director of the Centre de Sciences Humaines, New Delhi. His recent publications include India and ASEAN: the Politics of India’s Look East Policy (co-edited with Amitabh Matto), India’s Energy: Essays on Sustainable Development (co-edited with P. R. Shukla and Pierre Audinet), Islamism and Security: Political Islam and Western World, and Tajikistan: The Trials of Independence (co-authored with Shirin Akiner and Mohammad-Reza Djalili).

            The book under review investigates the motives of Pakistan’s Afghan policy in the structure of the South Asian security paradigm. Heavily documented, the book is divided into five chapters, each of which asks a specific question, the most important of them being whether or not Pakistan could have signed a peace agreement a couple of years earlier than it actually did. Grare questions whether Pakistani decision-makers deliberately prolonged the war to ensure the flow of economic and military assistance the country was receiving as a “frontline state”.

            The author is of the view that Pakistan saw itself as a vulnerable state, threatened by “vexatious” neighbours on its eastern and western borders. He analyses the role played by Pakistan in the perspective of the security dilemmas imposed on it by its geo-strategic location. The author explores Pak–Afghan relations in the historical perspective, focusing on the Pushtun (Grare’s spelling) issue and Afganistan’s demand for the creation of Pushtunistan, a country which, according to the Afghans, stretched from “the Oxus to the Abasin”. He briefly reviews the historical legacy of the “Great Game” and Afghanistan’s role as buffer zone, separating the Russian and British empires. (This idea was put forward in 1942 by Nicholas Spykman; he was the proponent of the “Heartland Theory”, according to which he demarcated coastal areas or buffer zones, which he termed as the key to controlling the world.)

            While Grare places the Pushtunistan problem at the heart of Pakistan–Afghan relations, he chooses to make common animosity towards India the basis of the friendship between Pakistan and China. This is only partly correct, as other factors contributed towards Pak–Sino friendship: China’s desire to play an active role in regional and international politics, Pakistan’s policy of diversification of dependency, and common territorial and political interests.

            Grare highlights the security dilemmas of Pakistan after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Pakistan moved “from a cautious condemnation” of the invasion to an offensive strategy, especially after US involvement, which changed the dimension of the conflict from regional to international. He grudgingly admits that the revolt against the communist government in Afghanistan was not instigated by Pakistan. “It was spawned by the actions of the communist government in Kabul which strung the rope with which to hang itself.” He projects the hypothesis that communist rule destroyed the social structure of Afghanistan, mainly through their reform policies: land reform, literacy and making the state a stronger player in internal matters. He feels that the changing of the national flag from the traditionally green Islamic one to the red of the Russians was the “biggest mistake” of the Afghan communist leaders.

            With the influx of refugees into its territory (2,375,000 of them by the end of 1980), Pakistan began to receive aid from United Nations agencies and also bilaterally from the international community. This was at a time when Pakistan had few friends in the global scenario. The Afghan resistance movement became an integral part of Pakistan policies: “To start with, it evolved a strategy articulated on two areas of action. It tried to put an end to its isolation by embarking on active multilateral diplomacy, and it negotiated the acquisition of some economic and military assistance from a number of its allies.”

            The arguments given by the author to explain Pakistan’s involvement in Afghan affairs are interesting. According to Grare, Pakistan had two policy options: to support the Soviet invasion–in which case it would have Russian-allied neighbours on its eastern and western borders–or to give all-out support to the Afghan resistance. It opted, however, for a third path: Pakistan expressed “grave concern” at the Russian invasion and tried to gain support in the Non-Aligned Movement, the Organization of Islamic Conference and in the UN General Assembly. Thus, it succeeded in internationalizing the situation. US President, Jimmy Carter, said of the Soviet invasion: “It is clear that the entire subcontinent of Asia, and specifically Pakistan is threatened.” But it was during the Reagan presidency that substantial aid, both military and economic, was given to Pakistan. The arms obtained under the agreement were, according to the author, far in excess of the danger of the Afghan threat, but the success really lay in Pakistan conserving its status as a “frontline state”.

             Grare states that Ziaul Haq “legitimised” his coup, which overthrew Zulfiqar Ali Bhutto, on the basis of establishing “Nizam-i-Mustafa” (system of the Prophet [PBUH]). He took advantage of the opposition of the Islamists to the Kabul–Delhi axis, in the hope that it would also provide support to Pakistan’s stand on Kashmir. The author also holds that the ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence) in Pakistan was the sole conduit of arms to the resistance, giving that institution the ability “to keep the intensity of the conflict at the desired level.”

             As mentioned earlier, the most important question in the author’s mind is whether Pakistan had the option of signing a peace accord with USSR between 1983 and 1985. The details and critical analysis of the negotiation process, its obstacles and constraints are thought-provoking. Many previously obscured facts are disclosed, but they are yet to be authenticated through neutral and credible resources. At times, Grare appears to analyse Pakistan foreign policy from an Indian perspective, undermining the objectivity of the work. Perhaps because it has been translated from the original French, the book is not always easily comprehensible, but it does thoroughly investigate the interests of the protagonists in the conflict and the reason it was (in Grare’s view) unnecessarily prolonged.

Asma Shakir Khawaja

Assistant Research Officer, IPRI