New Republic

As Pakistan slides towards disintegration the United States is being forced to do some fundamental rethinking of a policy dating back to the days of Dulles diplomacy which inaugurated Pak-US relations through a Mutual Security Pact in 1954. Pakistan did well out of the relationship, receiving $1.5 to-2 billion in armaments and $3 billion in economic aid up to 1969. It is less certain what the US got out of it, apart from a U-2 base in Peshawar, since Pakistan never made any bones about the fact that it needed American arms to face India.

The ostensible purpose of this investment, however, was to contain Communism in Southeast Asia and the Middle East and Pakistan was happy to subscribe to this illusion by making anticommunist noises at international forums. While the US sold its aid package to Pakistan in Congress as part of its containment strategy, the pacts were sold in Pakistan as an expedient to get arms to defend the nation against Indian designs. No one on either side sought to question these contrary assumptions until Pakistan actually became embroiled in a shooting war with India in September 1965, when a large quantity of US gifted hardware was seen in action on the plains of the Punjab.

Washington's reaction to this failure of policy was to suspend all arms shipments to both sides, but the denial was far more severely felt in Pakistan where the entire military machine had been geared to the United States. The move soured Pak-US relations which had already been strained by the US decision to send arms to India following the Sino-Indian border war in 1962. Pakistan moves to strengthen ties with China on the assumption that "my enemy's enemy is my friend" had knocked out another key assumption underlying US policy, and the Pak-Indian war merely wrote finis to that phase in the relationship .

As history has shown, US arms are far more likely to be used to suppress popular movements at home, than to resist external aggression. The rise of the military whose numbers and strength within Pakistan grew with every shipload of American weapons received gave testimony to this truth. By October 1958 the armed forces under Ayub Khan felt strong enough to take over the country and frustrate the prospects of a genuine return to democracy imminent in the general elections set for early 1959.

While the Pak-Indian war in 1965 led to a suspension of arms shipments to Pakistan, the US continued pumping in economic aid. The emphasis on aggregate growth rates concealed the fact that during the Ayub decade inequalities increased sharply both between social classes and between East and West Pakistan. Disparities in per capita income in favor of West over East Pakistan increased from 32 percent in 1959 60 to 61 percent in 1969-70. This followed from the fact that less than one- third of the development financed by aid, took place in the East, though 55 percent of the population lived there. t;2.6 billion worth of resources in the way of East Pakistan's foreign exchange plus its legitimate share of foreign aid were transferred to West Pakistan between 1948-49 and 1968 69. Such policies were possible because power in Pakistan, whether indirectly before 1958 or directly since, rested with the armed forces and bureaucracy which was overwhelmingly drawn from West Pakistan. To the extent that the US underwrote these military regimes, it perpetuated a set of power relationships which permitted the West wing based army- bureaucratic complex to dominate the more numerous East.

The war of liberation now raging in East Pakistan stems from an attempt by the Bengalis to break free of the hegemony of West Pakistan's ruling groups. They thought they could do it within the framework of Pakistan by seeking a loose federal relationship which put all decision-making and resources into the hands of the regions. But this was seen as a threat not only to the captive markets of West Pakistan's inefficient industrialists but as a threat to the westward flow of resources. And to the army it appeared as a menace to their privileged budget: East Pakistani revenues and foreign exchange were vital, particularly since arms had to be bought for cash from the French and other suppliers after the suspension of large-scale US arms shipments in 1965. The refusal of the army to come to terms with the peaceful attempt to restructure power relations within Pakistan has now compelled it to use force to suppress the Awami League which won 80 percent of the votes and 98.5 percent of the seats in the East wing on its autonomy platform. Since the entire eastern population of 75 million is united in its support for its elected representatives, the army has had to resort to genocide. Visiting foreign journalists estimate that this has led to over half a million Bengali dead within the first 6 weeks of fighting. It is hardly surprising that a political struggle by East Pakistan for autonomy within Pakistan has been transformed into a full-scale war of independence for the creation of Bangla Desh. The United States remains an uneasy but by no means uninvolved spectator. Its economic aid strategy which favored the west wing has now culminated in a drive for freedom by 55 percent of the population, and the arms Washington gave are being used by the West Pakistani army to crush this drive.

The US is further involved by the recent request from West Pakistan to rescue it from economic catastrophe. All exports from East Pakistan being suspended, Pakistan's foreign exchange earnings are cut by 50 percent and their reserves are expected to be down to zero in another two months. A business recession threatens West Pakistan due to the loss of captive markets and a price inflation of up to 100 percent is imminent because of the drop in production. This plus the loss of all revenues from the East promises that only half of the next Pakistan budget can be financed. A war now costing the impoverished economy $2 million a day will have to be financed by creating paper. In this predicament Pakistan has asked aid donors for up to $1 billion to bail her out. She needs $70 million in commodities aid from the US, plus $100 million as ready cash. A further $300-$400 million will be required by the year's end, just to stay afloat.

How Washington will respond to this request depends on how determined the Americans are to go on compounding their failures in Pakistan. Indications are that the US has bought time to make up its mind and is taking cover behind a World Bank-IMF mission being sent out early this month to look over the situation.

Meanwhile, Pakistan presses for a "political" solution to the war and speaks of the need to get relief to Bengalis faced by famine. But both these issues are tied up with a willingness by Pakistan to come to terms with reality and to negotiate disengagement with the elected leaders of Bangla Desh.

Only an inclination to resume business with old friends could persuade the Americans to buy Pakistan's proposed solution of setting up a Quisling Administration in Bangla Desh, on the pretense of returning Pakistan to civilian rule. If the US chooses under these circumstances to resume aid and agrees to put relief into the hands of the Pak army, it will neither be tranquilizing the crisis nor saving the Bengalis from famine, It will merely hand another weapon -relief-to the Pakistan army and will foster the illusion that Washington can insulate West Pakistan from the costs of this war. By doing so, the Americans will ensure that the war goes on with a mounting expenditure of Bengali lives and resources and eventual disaster for West Pakistan as the price for its refusal to negotiate a political disengagement before it is too late. An openended crisis of this dimension transcends the frontiers of Bangla Desh and threatens not just a subcontinental war but because of the interest of both China and the USSR in the area, possibly another global confrontation. The United States, today, can buy disengagement cheaply by refusing to underwrite Pakistan's military adventure in Bangla Desh. Tomorrow it may find itself in yet another quagmire not of its own making.