US AID TO PAKISTAN: INDIA’S SECURITY

CONCERN
U.S. first time established its diplomatic relations with
Pakistan in 1949 during ‘Eisenhower’ administration.
America agreed to provide economic and military
assistance to Pakistan and latter’s partnership in
‘Baghdad Pact’ during this regime. At that time, Pakistan
was so close to America that it was called ‘US’s most
allied ally’ in Asia. US began to supply arms to Pakistan in
1954 and continued till 1965.Also, the threat of N.
Khrushchev, the Soviet leader in 1960 to annihilate the
nuclear arms of Pakistan affected the US-Pak relations.
Gradually, US again restored arms sales to Pakistan in
1975 but then cut-off economic assistance under US
“Foreign Assistance Act” due to Pakistan’s nuclear
programme. The Soviet’s invasion of Afghanistan in 1979
proved to be another milestone in heavy US aid to
Pakistan being the common interest of Pakistan and US in
South Asia. In 1981, US agreed for 3.2 billion dollar
military and economic assistance to Pakistan’s armory for
conducting the worst operation which eventually
defeated the Soviet’s in 1988. US congress again added 4
million dollar for economic development and security
assistance package to Pakistan in1986, but in 1990, the
US suspended military assistance/economic aid to
Pakistan under ‘Pressler’ amendment’ which required the
President of US to certify that Pakistan doesn’t possess
nuclear explosive device. Again in 1998, the renewed US
interest into Pakistan during Clinton administration was
strengthened in view of India’s decision to conduct
nuclear test in May 1998. Pakistan’s matching response
to nuclear tests conducted by India, although called for
another sanction by US but, later the intensive dialogue
between Deputy Secretary Talbott (US) and Foreign
Secretary Shamshad Ahmed (Pakistan) waved off
sanction to an extent but in October 1999, Pakistan was
kept under another sanction by US under section 508 of
‘Foreign Appropriation Act’. However the turning point in
this scenario was 9/11 due to which Pakistan moved
decisively to ally itself with the US in its war against
Osama-bin-laden and Al-Qaeda. In bargain to provide the
US many military airports and bases for its attack on
Afghanistan and arrests of over 500 Al-Qaeda operatives,
Pakistan had been lavishly getting appreciation from US.
Although the economic and military assistance has been
flowing from US to Pakistan, the huge amount of such aid
has been misappropriated by Pakistan aimed to fight
against India. Pakistan received 9 million American dollar
after 9/11 incident, 4.2 billion dollar in 2003 to purchase
advanced American military technology and further in
May 2006, Bush announced major sale of missiles to
Pakistan costing 370 million US dollars. The recent
Taliban’s upsurge in Pakistan particularly in SWAT, FATA,
Waziristan and in close vicinity of Rawalpindi, Lahore and
Islamabad has caused some concern to US authority but
after visit of Asif Ali Zardari to America, this issue has
been cooling recently.US Ambassador to Pakistan has
again reacted about US commitment to assist Pakistan
government in the areas of development, stability and
security and has also announced 8.4 million dollar aid to
address Pakistan’s food crisis. However, the Pentagon has
confirmed one of South Asia’s worst kept secrets that,
Pakistan has used billions of dollars of US aid to buy a
mind-boggling array of conventional American Weaponry
to use against India which was meant for Pakistan to fight
the war on terror. India has repeatedly pointed out that
much of military hardware of Pakistan’s shopping list was
not suited to anti-terror operations by Pakistan. Pentagon
has also revealed that even the pouring aid to Pakistan by
Bush after 9/11 to fight Al-Qaeda was used to develop
offensive capabilities against India. This was on its peak
between 2002-2009. Even acquisition of anti-tank
missiles to F16’s by Pakistan was meant to blunt India’s
edge in conventional weaponry. Such gestures by US
authorities in favor of Pakistan has become a cause of
great concern to India particularly in view of Pakistan’s
fragile democracy, upsurge of Al-Qaeda, Pakistan’s
nuclear capability and bad experience between both the
countries during past 60 years. US may have got its
compulsion to appease Pakistan due to its war against Al-
Qaeda but it should also be equally concern about
balance of power in South Asia particularly arms race
between two nuclear power nations.