WASHINGTON – Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani was singled out by a major US newspaper Saturday for resisting Obama administrationÂ’s pressures to launch a ground assault against Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda sanctuaries in Nort Waziristan, now a principal American demand.
“Recent US intelligence estimates have concluded that he (Gen. Kayani) is unlikely to change his mind anytime soon,” The Washington Post said in a dispatch, headlined: ‘Pakistan’s top general vexes US’. “Despite the entreaties, Kayani doesn’t trust US motivations and is hedging his bets in case the American strategy for Afghanistan fails,” the newspaper said, citing American officials.
Noting that Kayani is viewed as the most powerful man in Pakistan, the newspaper said the US has “yet to persuade him to undertake what its strategy review concluded is a key to success in the Afghan war – the elimination of havens inside Pakistan where the Taliban plots and stages attacks on coalition troops in Afghanistan.”
In a joint dispatch, The Washington Post staff writers, Karin Brulliard and Karen DeYoung, wrote: “Kayani, who has more direct say over the country’s security strategy than its president or prime minister, has resisted personal appeals from President (Barrack) Obama, US military commanders and senior diplomats. Recent US intelligence estimates have concluded that he is unlikely to change his mind anytime soon.”
“In many ways, Kayani is the personification of the vexing problem posed by Pakistan. Like the influential military establishment he represents, he views Afghanistan on a timeline stretching far beyond the US withdrawal, which is slated to begin this summer. While the Obama administration sees the insurgents as an enemy force to be defeated as quickly and directly as possible, Pakistan has long regarded them as useful proxies in protecting its western flank from inroads by India, its historical adversary.
“Kayani wants to talk about the end state in South Asia,” said one of several Obama administration officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity about the sensitive relationship. The US generals, the official said, “want to talk about the next drone attacks.”
“The administration has praised Kayani for operations in 2009 and 2010 against domestic militants in the Swat Valley and in South Waziristan, and has dramatically increased its military and economic assistance to Pakistan. But it has grown frustrated that the general has not launched a ground assault against Afghan Taliban and al-Qaeda sanctuaries in North Waziristan.
“Kayani has promised action when he has enough troops available, although he has given no indication of when that might be. Most of Pakistan’s half-million-man army remains facing east, toward India.
“In recent months, Kayani has sometimes become defiant. When US-Pakistani tensions spiked in September, after two Pakistani soldiers were killed by an Afghanistan-based American helicopter gunship pursuing insurgents on the wrong side of the border, he personally ordered the closure of the main frontier crossing for US military supplies into Afghanistan, according to the US and Pakistani officials.
“In October, administration officials choreographed a White House meeting for Kayani at which Obama could directly deliver his message of urgency. The army chief heard him out, then provided a 13-page document updating Pakistan’s strategic perspective and noting the gap between short-term US concerns and Pakistan’s long-term interests, according to the US officials.
“As the Obama administration struggles to assess the fruits of its investment in Pakistan, some officials said the US now accepts that pleas and military assistance will not change Kayani’s thinking. Mullen and Richard C. Holbrooke, who served as the administration’s special representative to Afghanistan and Pakistan until his death last month, thought that ‘getting Kayani to trust us enough’ to be honest constituted progress,” one official said. “But what Kayani has honestly told them, the official said, is: “I don’t trust you.”
