Donald Trump, always the deal-maker and hardly ever presidential, has reduced diplomacy to crude real-estate transactions, depending on who needs to buy out whom at a given moment.
Right now, Trump is keen to pull the US troops out of Afghanistan ahead of the crucial 2020 presidential poll. So, overnight he has sought to embrace Pakistan, the same Pakistan which he had spurned not many months ago.
Those remarks about Modi seeking his help on Kashmir ought to be read in the above context, with Trump making them up to please the visiting Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan.
Thanks to the changed strategy in the White House, Pakistan is also being helped out of its foreign exchange woes, with the IMF likely to extend a helping hand soon.
There could also be a softening of the American stand on the proposed blacklisting of Pakistan by the Financial Action Task Force on which it now figures in the grey list.
Trump needs Khan to help him get an agreement with the Taliban so that it can ease the way for the US troops out of the god-forsaken land where America has waged its longest war in history but without much success.
Despite billions of dollars and tens of thousands of foreign troops, parts of Afghanistan remain under the control of the armed barbarics who are actively supported by Pakistan. It is this leverage over the Taliban which has led the US in the first place to invite Khan on an official visit, something he desperately wanted.
It is just as well that the Pak premier was accompanied by his controllers, Army Chief General Qamar Bajwa, and ISI Chief Lt. General Faiz Hameed, since they, and not Khan, are the real decision-makers. Besides, they control the Taliban operations in Afghanistan.
Of course, the US will try and ensure that the current civilian regime in Kabul is not completely sidelined in any deal that it may sign under the aegis of Pakistan with the Taliban, but it would be a matter of time before the Taliban take control of the entire country with ISI support.
So long as it does not happen ahead of the US presidential poll next November, it will be fine with Trump. It is because the man is so obsessed with safeguarding his own narrow interests, he can without batting an eyelid sacrifice larger US interests.
India will have reason to be concerned should Pakistan succeed in installing the Taliban in Kabul for the jihadist groups freed from waging war against the civilian rulers in their own country would be diverted towards Kashmir.
Right now, Pakistan’s jihadi operations might have been pushed on the backburner for obvious reasons. One, to bail out Pakistan out of the serious threat of bankruptcy, and, two, to enlist the US support in locating funds from multilateral institutions.
To think that Pakistan has abandoned its anti-India jihad in Kashmir will be a grave folly. It has switched off the tap temporarily, even pretending to put the Lashkar-e-Taiba chief Hafiz Saeed in a so-called jail.
Even on the Kartarpur corridor it has omitted a known Khalistani from the negotiating committee. But this does not imply that Pakistan is ready to settle Kashmir in a mutually acceptable manner.
Despite the temporary lull in the terrorist mayhem in Kashmir, India should guard against Pak perfidy. Once it succeeds in getting the Americans out of Afghanistan and, simultaneously, is able to tide over its forex crisis, it will revert to its usual anti-India operations.
By S Sadanand
