Does John Kerry represent the U.S. government in Pakistan?

Posted By Josh Rogin Monday, May 16, 2011 - 7:22 PM Share

Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) is on a mission in Islamabad to repair the fractured U.S.-Pakistan relationship and, following meetings with top Pakistani officials, issued a statement that appeared to be on behalf of the U.S. and Pakistani governments.

Kerry, as the head of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and an author of the Kerry-Lugar-Berman $7.5 billion aid package to Pakistan, is in a perfect position to convey congressional angst following the discovery that Osama bin Laden had been hiding in Abbottabad, perhaps for over five years. But he holds no position in the executive branch, which would traditionally determine the status of the U.S. relationship with Pakistan.

Kerry met with Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari, Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani, and Army Chief of Staff Gen. Ashfaq Parvez Kayani, and then issued a "joint statement" from him and those three leaders that seemed to express agreement between the U.S. and Pakistani governments on a wide range of issues.

"It was agreed that both the U.S. and Pakistan must recognize and respect each others national interests, particularly in countering terrorism and in working together for promoting reconciliation and peace in Afghanistan," read the joint statement, which was posted on the website of the U.S. embassy in Islamabad."It was agreed that all tracks of U.S-Pakistan engagement need to be revisited with a view to creating a clear understanding on the ways and means to carry forward their cooperation, in a mutually beneficial manner. It was also agreed that the two countries will work together in any future actions against high value targets in Pakistan."

"Pakistan's leadership welcomed the clear affirmation by Senator Kerry that U.S. policy has no designs against Pakistan's nuclear and strategic assets. Senator Kerry stated that he was prepared to personally affirm such a guarantee," the statement read.

Kerry also announced that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton would travel to Pakistan soon.

Kerry has traveled to both Pakistan and Afghanistan on behalf of the Obama administration before. He played a key role in smoothing relations with Afghan President Hamid Karzai last year, and traveled to Lahore in February to help negotiate the repatriation of CIA contractor Raymond Davis, following Davis's killing of two suspected Pakistani intelligence agents in broad daylight.

Meanwhile, the State Department wants to be clear that Kerry does not actually speak for the U.S. government.

"It wasn't a joint statement, it wasn't a U.S. government statement," a State Department official told The Cable.

Nevertheless, Kerry's actions are highly coordinated with the State Department. While Kerry was on the ground, Clinton had phone calls with Zardari, Gilani, and Kayani, a State Department official said, and spoke with Kerry as well.

Kerry is playing an increasingly prominent role in managing the U.S.-Pakistan relationship, relative to that of two other key interlocutors, Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm. Mike Mullen and CIA Director Leon Panetta. Panetta, who will be nominated to succeed Defense Secretary Robert Gates, reportedly got into a shouting match last week with Lt. Gen. Ahmad Shuja Pasha, the head of Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence.

Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan Marc Grossman is also getting more face time with top Pakistani officials. He was on the ground in Islamabad the day bin Laden was killed and will be traveling there again this week with CIA Deputy Director Mike Morrell.

Grossman has been trying to set up the third round of the U.S.-Pakistan Strategic Dialogue, which was scheduled for late May in Islamabad. At Monday's briefing, however, State Department spokesman Mark Toner wouldn't say if the dialogue would take place then.

"The secretary does plan to visit Pakistan in order to have an in-depth strategic discussion about our cooperation and to convey the U.S. government's views on the way forward with Pakistan," Toner said. "She'll go when she can have those discussions in the right context and with the right preparation. And we're engaged right now with the Pakistanis to lay that groundwork."

Vali Nasr, who until recently was a top Pakistan advisor for the SRAP office, told The Cable that Kerry is playing two roles -- delivering a tough message from Congress while also extending an olive branch from the Obama administration.

"His job is to stabilize the relationship. The U.S.-Pakistan relationship has suffered serious setbacks. It's important to prevent it from collapsing any further," he said.

"We don't really have any option but to continue our relationship with Pakistan. One lesson from the bin Laden discovery is that if al Qaeda senior leaders are in Pakistan, we have even more work to do there."

AFP/Getty Images

EXPLORE:SOUTH ASIA, AFGHANISTAN, DEVELOPMENT, DIPLOMACY, OBAMA ADMINISTRATION, PAKISTAN, STATE DEPARTMENT, U.S. CONGRESS, U.S. FOREIGN POLICY

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SANMAN

1:20 AM ET

May 17, 2011

Work? You Call This Work??

What is this work that Kerry is actually accomplishing?

The current state of affairs in US foreign policy reminds me of the Sub-Prime financial crisis. Some were bailed out to the tune of tens of billions of taxpayer dollars, because they were "too big to fail" - and yet when obligations were requested of them, they began screaming that they would never give up their handsome bonuses and expensive perks.

Likewise, Pakistan, a failing state where less than 2% of its people pay taxes, is being kept afloat largely by billions from suffering US taxpayers, yet it loudly balks at abandoning precious ties with those who are killing US soldiers.

Pakistan boasts of its contributions to the War on Terror, the way overpaid bankers boast of their contribution to the economy. In both cases, politicians rush to approve billions in aid, leaving the reluctant taxpayers on the hook, while promising that things will get better in the future.

It was these wretched excesses of the Sub-Prime scandal that triggered a voter revolt literally changed the landscape of the US Congress. But that's because those dismayed voters were also taxpayers.

In the case of the current Sub-Prime foreign policy crisis, those who have been left on the hook from the constant appeasement and coddling of Pakistan are military families who've lost irreplaceable loved ones, and even whole other nations which are having to endure Pakistani-sponsored terrorism, such as Afghanistan and India. It's possible that they may stage their own revolt of sorts, each casting their vote in their own respective ways. Military enlistment from traditional sources may suffer as part of the legacy of having been made to fight a war with one arm tied behind their backs. Leaders like Karzai have long been demanding the US get out, because they feel the US won't do anything to save them from Pakistan. India recently turned down the US bid for the largest jet fighter contract in its history, because it didn't have confidence that the US would continue supplies of parts, etc, in the event of a war with Pakistan.

It was after the sinking of the Cheonan by a similarly belligerent rogue, that the South Korean leadership finally took its gloves off and began staging live fire exercises near the border. Suddenly the North Korean shrillness was taken aback and silenced.

The US cannot allow its entire strategic freedom of action to be controlled by a single irredentist failing state bent on duplicity and pan-regional upheaval. Allowing this only undermines US credibility, and makes defense of its national security interests much harder.

Otherwise if US politicians and officials continue on the same course, handling foreign policy as they've handled the Sub-Prime financial crisis, they might well come up with an even better bailout package for Pakistan - the Terrorist Aggression Reduction in Pakistan act - which can be referred to by its acronym, TARP.

MARTY MARTEL

12:27 AM ET

May 18, 2011

John Kerry represents Pakistan in U. S. government

It is more a case of John Kerry representing Pakistan in U. S. government.

With the Pakistan-apologists like John Kerry and Hillary Clinton carrying the torch for it, Pakistan can easily get Washington to forget all about Osama being sheltered so close to the heart of Pakistani government.

There is the very real possibility that while the raid on Osama bin Laden’s hideout may have been conducted by a crack unit of the American SEALs without the participation of Pakistani forces and by keeping the effete Zardari-Gilani Government in the dark, the Pakistani military and the ISI may not have been entirely ignorant. Letting Osama bin Laden go at this point of time suits the Generals of Rawalpindi; Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani would consider it fair exchange for regaining ‘strategic depth in Afghanistan’.

Both Washington and Islamabad would insist it’s coincidental, but that the slaying of the world’s most wanted terrorist comes exactly two months before the US begins its drawdown in Afghanistan must not be seen as a mere coincidence. It is legitimate to ask if there was a trade-off somewhere along the line? Did Gen Kayani agree to let the US get the trophy it has been hunting for a decade in exchange of getting his own proxies into power in Kabul as America winds down its presence in Afghanistan?

As far the US is concerned, the war on terror is over; feeble clarifications by the State Department, that the larger war on Al Qaeda shall continue, are inconsequential. Pakistan knows that by skillfully holding out till now, it is close to getting its proxy regime in place in Kabul. If it is able to sell the idea of an Islamabad-friendly Government as being of strategic utility to Washington, there’s no reason why the Americans should object to that. Pakistani and American interests, both short-term and medium-term, converge at this point; a broke America cannot afford to look at long-term interests, not at this moment.

And thereby hangs a tale — of Pakistani and American perfidy. The US has been, and shall remain, mindful of the “paranoia of Pakistan”; Islamabad’s sensitivities, its faux victimhood, will always take precedence over Afghanistan’s concerns in Washington. Obama administration will reach an illusion of PEACE deal with Pakistan-controlled Afghan Taliban to begin its drawdown and finally exit the theatre of a war it is desperate not to be seen as having lost, not so much to the Taliban and Al Qaeda as to the wily Generals of Rawalpindi who have proved to be smarter than the Americans.