US - 'do more' demands

`PLEASE, stop this refrain to do more, President Asif Ali Zardari said in his speech to the UN General Assembly in a thinly veiled reference to the US and the pressure it has put on Pakistan to squeeze the sanctuaries that the Afghan Taliban, particularly the Haqqani network, have on Pakistani soil. Whether the call to end the `do more` mantra will fall on deaf ears will have much to do with the extent to which the US and Pakistan can narrow their mutual trust deficit that is very real and very acute. To be sure, Pakistan has some very legitimate complaints when it comes to US demands concerning Afghanistan. The US military in particular has been very stubborn and quick to blame Pakistan for its failures or lack of success in Afghanistan.

To clamp down on the Haqqanis to satisfy the American timeline of 2014 without regard to the existing conditions or the potential for an unmanageable blowback in Pakistan is to pit a political imperative a dignified exit from Afghanistan against what should be a crucial strategic objectivehelping Pakistan remain stable and the containment of militancy.

There is, though, an unfortunate consequence of the push and push-back vis-à-vis the `do more` platitude: the debate over what should be done against militancy in Pakistan and when it should be done has in part become linked to the Pakistan-US relationship and the post-war future of Afghanistan. As opposed to focusing on whether or not what Pakistan has done to fight militancy is acceptable and a winning strategy, whether the country is less or more secure as a result of the state`s security policy, the question of our very real and critical fight against extremism has been entangled in the messy relationship with the US.

So ordinary Pakistanis are still confused about whether the fight against militancy is for Pakistan`s own survival or for the protection of ties with an unpopular US. The unhappy truth is, Pakistan is not winning the fight against militancy.

And the state needs to do more, much, much more.

But for Pakistan`s sake, not anybody else`s