Magnificent Delusions (11 page)

Moreover, the NIE argued that the United States would have to arm Pakistan if it wanted Pakistan to play a role in military operations such as the one in Korea. “Even with substantial Western military aid, Pakistan could probably furnish few if any troops for early employment outside the subcontinent in the absence of a comprehensive settlement with India,” the CIA asserted. It noted that Pakistan's forces were “small even for their primary mission of defense of Pakistan's borders” but that the country could be “of potential military value to the West because of the strategically located airbases which it can provide.”
¹⁵

But Eisenhower was eager not to push India away while courting Pakistan. In a note to Dulles he pointed out that the subcontinent was “one area of the world where, even more than most cases, emotion rather than reason seems to dictate policy.” He asked his secretary of state to be watchful “to see that we do not create antagonism unnecessarily.” In his reply Dulles agreed, stating that with India and Pakistan, it was “difficult to help one without making an enemy of the other.”
¹⁶

The NIE addressed that problem by claiming that there was no likelihood of war between India and Pakistan. India-Pakistan relations were better than they had been at any time since partition, and India had “little desire to risk its present position” in Kashmir. In a major error of judgment, the NIE claimed, “Pakistan, with the weaker bargaining position, appears more willing to compromise and may eventually become reconciled to its inability to shake India's grip on Kashmir; there are already some signs that Pakistani emotionalism on the subject is beginning to subside.”

The CIA recognized that Pakistan's apparent willingness to join US military arrangements for the region were “motivated largely by a desire to strengthen Pakistan's military position vis-à-vis India.” But it assumed that Pakistan would be willing to provide troops for defending the Middle East in return for US assurances of securing its Indian borders. Pakistan's leaders would “drive as hard a bargain as possible and would almost certainly expect substantial military and economic assistance.” But, the CIA believed, they would come around in the end and align their security policies with those of the West.

This assessment failed to take into account the effect on Pakistan's posture once they felt stronger after receiving US arms. After all, the weapons the United States gave to Pakistan for a future battle with the Soviet Union could easily be used in fighting India. But according to the NIE, even though Indian and Pakistani forces were lined up against each other, hostilities were not likely to resume. “India has virtually no incentive to risk a war,” the CIA told the US government. “Despite past talk of a second round, Pakistan's leaders, particularly the military, appear to be convinced of the folly of attacking India's superior forces,” it concluded, arguing that the likelihood of sharp reaction from the Western powers would deter Pakistan against such a move. In the years to come these calculations proved terribly wrong.

P
AKISTANI LEADERS HAD
concealed from their people the negotiations for US military aid in the possible exchange for bases. Maintaining similar secrecy, however, was not possible in Washington. The State Department had to seek appropriations for aid to Pakistan, and it had to share its reasoning for it with members of Congress. There were the inevitable leaks into the US media as well.

In Pakistan those who opposed allying with the West questioned their government's “stubborn refusal to discuss the vital question of Pakistan's possible association in a US-sponsored military pact.” It was “symptomatic of their lack of respect for the Parliament and the people” wrote the
Pakistan Times
.
¹⁷
India also reacted strongly, leading to belated public comments from the Pakistan government on what it was seeking from the United States.

Governor-General Ghulam Muhammad denied that Pakistan intended to join US-led alliances or had offered to provide military bases. “Reports that my government is negotiating with the U.S. Government for military assistance in return for American bases in Pakistan are absolutely unfounded and baseless,” he declared in a statement issued from London, where he was visiting at the time. He also said, “Pakistan will never be a camp-follower of anyone,” implying that Pakistan's desired foreign policy was, like India, one of nonalignment.
¹⁸

But the official statement was a blatant lie. That it was told should have rung alarm bells in Washington. If an agreement was reached on an arms-for-bases deal later, how would Muhammad explain his earlier perfunctory denial of its discussion? Keeping secret large-scale naval or air force bases, which was what Dulles sought, would be impossible. Thus, the Pakistani government obviously had no intention of providing the bases it was dangling in front of the Americans.

An opportunity to discuss the terms of an alliance presented itself when Vice President Richard Nixon arrived in Karachi as part of a twelve-country tour of Asia. Nixon traveled thirty-eight thousand miles over sixty-eight days, partly as a public relations exercise and partly because Eisenhower was willing to concede to his vice president a somewhat enhanced role in foreign affairs.

According to media reports at the time, the policy agenda for Nixon's trip included the possible rearmament of Japan, Korean reconstruction, the war emerging in French Indo-China, and the completion of “an agreement providing Pakistan with arms and the US with bases in Pakistan.”
¹⁹
For this last item, the State Department advised in its preparatory memo for Nixon to avoid adopting “a patronizing tone” with Pakistani officials but to give “positive encouragement” to the governor-general and “especially Prime Minister” Bogra. The two leaders faced domestic challenges—Bogra had only recently gone on to become prime minister from his position as ambassador to the United States—and American support was meant to reassure them.

But Nixon's comments on Pakistan's domestic politics only accentuated the perception among Pakistan's elite that Americans pick whom to support in foreign countries and then ensure their success. Over the years the belief about Americans being veiled king makers has become only stronger.

Moreover, the State Department had advised Nixon to avoid discussing US military aid in specific terms. The vice president was to tell his Pakistani hosts that he had been away from the United States for some time and therefore was unable to address specific questions on the subject.
²⁰
But once Nixon arrived in Karachi, he realized that military aid was one of the two subjects Pakistan's leaders wished most to discuss—the other was their commitment to fighting communism, which they declared they abhorred.

Nixon liked the anticommunism he encountered in Pakistan, especially as it contrasted with his experience in India, namely, their unwillingness to even discuss the notion that communism was the gravest threat to civilization. The Indians had lectured Nixon about global poverty and injustice, both of which, they said, Western colonialism has exacerbated. Conversely, the Pakistanis seemed eager to join the American-led ideological struggle.

In his memoirs Nixon described Nehru as “the least friendly leader” that he had met in Asia.
²¹
After returning to Washington he told the National Security Council (NSC) that “Pakistan is a country I would like to do everything for. The people have fewer complexes
than the Indians.”
²²
Thus, Nixon's conclusion was that it would be “disastrous” if the United States failed to provide aid to Pakistan and “may force out the Prime Minister” who was America's friend. He had become convinced that, ideologically, Pakistan was an anticommunist bastion and would not go communist even if it received no US support.
²³
His impressions were the result of conversations during a three-day visit, during which he met only people who had carefully choreographed what to say to him.

One sign that Pakistani officials had rehearsed their message came during Nixon's separate meetings with Governor-General Muhammad and Prime Minister Bogra. Muhammad “talked mostly about the military aid question, stating it was absurd to think of Pakistan attacking India with 40 million Muslims in India,” reported US Ambassador Horace Hildreth, who was present during the meeting. If aid was provided, the governor-general said he would personally reassure Nehru “on any fears he might have of the intent of Pakistan in its use of military equipment.”

Muhammad also emphasized that the Pakistani public now expected American aid. According to him: “Were the US not to grant aid now, especially in view of all the publicity, it would be like taking a poor girl for a walk and then walking out on her, leaving her only with a bad name.” Hildreth could not help but notice that Bogra used the same analogy in his subsequent meeting with Nixon. To him this was a clear indication that “they put their heads together before seeing the Vice President and me.”
²⁴

The Pakistanis had clearly won Nixon and Dulles over, but they were not the only ones influenced by their favorable view of Pakistani leaders. Admiral Arthur Radford, the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, had also developed a personal friendship with army chief Ayub, whom he saw as someone “in a position to deliver the goods” and “willing to do so.”
²⁵

The Americans were already eyeing bases in Pakistan that had not been guaranteed. The Pakistani approach so far had been to demonstrate that they were committed to the anticommunist cause, ask for resources and materiel for their military, and hint at the prospect of US bases. The likability of Pakistani leaders in comparison with the
Indians rather than a hard-nosed assessment of policy had become the driving force in US-Pakistan relations. And the American embassy in Karachi had become indirectly involved in domestic politics by advancing the cause of pro-Western civil servants and generals against politicians who seemed to prefer alternatives, including non-alignment.

Ambassador Hildreth, a former Republican governor of Maine, argued passionately that rejecting Pakistan's request for military aid would have an adverse effect on Pakistan's government, and he considered the government's survival to be important for US interests. Hildreth thought that the advantages of Pakistan's contribution to Middle East defense outweighed the risk of adverse reaction in India. But he was unable to predict whether and to what extent Pakistan would, in fact, contribute to the American conception of Middle East defense.

But even as US officials were justifying possible military aid for Pakistan in return for naval and air bases, Foreign Minister Zafrulla Khan declared that “there have been no negotiations, nor attempts at negotiations, for an American-Pakistani military alliance.” The Pakistan government was only making “inquiries for the purchase of arms,” he told the Pakistani media, while allowing US media to publish reports about an alliance involving bases.

These denials, however, did not deter the optimists in Washington from expecting that aid would secure leverage for the United States in Pakistan. They continued to believe that Pakistan would turn around and fulfill America's expectations once military aid arrived. For these officials, the proposition was a simple equation: Pakistan will get money and weapons, the United States will get its bases, and Pakistan's problems with India and Afghanistan will diminish over time.

Ambassador Hildreth's sympathy for Pakistan was partly the result of his personal relationship with Iskander Mirza, who served as defense secretary, governor of East Pakistan, interior minister, and, eventually, governor-general and president during Hildreth's tenure (1953–1957) as ambassador. Mirza's son, Humayun, married Hildreth's daughter Josephine at a ceremony in Cumberland, Maine,
which the groom's father was unable to attend because of a political crisis in Pakistan.

Around this time Governor-General Muhammad had dismissed Pakistan's Constituent Assembly and Parliament in what was described as a constitutional coup. Then, when a new legislature was put in place without elections, the country's affairs were completely in the hands of unelected nonpoliticians. This sequence of events opened itself to conspiracy theories, including one that focused on a few coincident events: Mirza's son had married the US ambassador's daughter, the legislature was dismissed around the time of their wedding, and Mirza rose spectacularly within the power corridors immediately thereafter.

Reading through the declassified documents of the era reveals that the Americans had not orchestrated the domestic developments in Pakistan, but the appearance of an American role in Pakistan's affairs had still been created. Moreover, the marriage of Hildreth's daughter to Mirza's son had not been part of some medieval marital alliance; if anything, Pakistanis were the ones who saw political and economic advantage in it. A year earlier Bogra had been brought from ambassadorship in Washington to become the prime minister so as to help secure aid from the Americans. Now Mirza's ties to Hildreth could also be tapped for the same purpose.