‘King’ Trump’s tactical embrace of Pakistan’s pious soldier

Donald Trump’s America is turning towards Asim Munir’s Pakistan rather than away from Narendra Modi’s India.

(Click here to read Trump Vs Modi: The ‘king’ battles a ‘world guru’, the first part of this blog.)

Three key things appear to be going on:

• Mr Trump doesn’t like India’s bolshie-ness, at least in comparison to Pakistan. Islamabad has nominated Mr Trump for a Nobel Peace Prize for his claimed mediation during the recent four-day near-war with India. Along with counter-terrorism support, Pakistan has a bunch of goodies for Mr Trump: a trade deal with no tariffs; rare earth minerals and a recently formed crypto council that’s very in tune with the Trump administration’s mood music.
• Pakistan finds it convenient to return to the sort of relationship it enjoyed with the US since independence in 1947. It was a staunch US ally during the Cold War, supported US aims for Afghanistan after the Soviet invasion and backed the post-9/11 US war on terror.
• It suits Mr Trump to indulge an old American ally. Balochistan offers strategic value due to its proximity to Iran and Afghanistan. Mr Trump would be pleased to winkle Pakistan away from the Chinese side of the equation. And it would be great to stick it to India, which was getting a tad uppity in its self-righteous boasting about size, IT skills, democratic credentials and suchlike.

It’s a major reset considering Mr Trump had accused Pakistan in 2018 of giving the US “nothing but lies and deceit” and safe havens to terrorists. The reference was to the remarkable discovery in 2011 of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, close to Pakistan’s military headquarters. At the time, questions were raised by parts of the US strategic community about Pakistan’s credibility as a security partner.

Right now, Mr Trump seems to have blocked out all the questions.