Journalists are selling their chuna to earn big bucks and you are buying it. This is what journalists do. So what Pakistan should do? Cut ties with USA because of India?
What was the solution to Al-Qaeda Network? Imran Khan needs to understand that the world does not operate as per his wishes. Khan's patronage of extremists in Afghanistan and Pakistan is not helpful.
Negotiations with the TTP have failed in the past. There is no reason to believe they will work now.
www.aljazeera.com
PTI chairman says KP police ill-equipped to counter militants armed with modern weaponry.
www.dawn.com
Imran Khan has said that Pakistan should not consider military action against the banned Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan...
www.brecorder.com
Khan does not seem to get it.
I have seen PDF members routinely complain about Pakistan Army's inaction against TTP.
It seems like Pak Army is upping the ante :P
defence.pk
@PanzerKiel @Areesh @INDIAPOSITIVE @SQ8 @Signalian @PakFactor
defence.pk
@PanzerKiel @Areesh @Signalian @waz @SQ8 @Hakikat ve Hikmet @PakFactor @PWFI @INDIAPOSITIVE
defence.pk
https://www.brecorder.com/news/40229459
defence.pk
Well, Pakistan Army is doing it NOW under COAS Asim Munir.
Any appreciation from the thankless bunch here?
How can Pakistan Army destroy TTP when one of the most popular political figureheads of the country does not want it to be destroyed?
Tell me.
---
US provided a large number of arms to Pakistan in connection with War On Terror:
Data credit to U.S. Departments of Defense and State
This was the case even though Pakistan was supporting Afghan Taliban without taking US into confidence in this matter:
Just a normal day in Kabul Actually, if we look at the pattern (of targeted assassinations of Afghan commanders loyal to the Talibs, and low this), it seems like a coordinated campaign to sow chaos amongst the Afghan leaders and their relations with the outside world. There is either an...
defence.pk
The establishment was lacking in planning for how to negotiate its part in the War On Terror saga. Pakistani commoners were made to believe in narrative(s) like
"aalmi saazish" to keep them distracted on the other hand. US could see the obvious, made a deal with Afghan Taliban in line with its own security concerns, and bailed. Pakistan has its favorites running the show in Afghanistan since 2021, so what's the issue now?
US also provided its input to Pakistan for how to improve security of Pakistani nuclear program:
Debate is growing about whether an American classified program has done enough to help protect Pakistan’s nuclear weapons.
www.nytimes.com
This was the case even though Dr. Abdul Qadeer Khan's nuclear proliferation regime was unmasked by CIA and then COAS Pervez Musharraf did his best to cover for him.
Inna lillahi wa inna ilayhi raji'un Pervez Musharraf = the unsung HERO of Pakistan His RULE wasn't without mistakes such as supporting MQM and giving NRO to controversial Pakistani politicians, but I have compiled a list of his notable achievements for the benefit of readers in this forum. 1...
defence.pk
US is Pakistan's largest export destination:
Pakistan Exports to United States was US$5.01 Billion during 2023, according to the United Nations COMTRADE database on international trade. Pakistan Exports to United States - data, historical chart and statistics - was last updated on September of 2024.
tradingeconomics.com
The United States remained the top export destinations of Pakistani products during the first eight months of financial year (2021-22)
www.globalvillagespace.com
www.census.gov
"The United States and Pakistan have a strong economic and commercial relationship, with two-way trade reaching approximately $8.89 billion in 2021. The United States is one of Pakistan’s largest trading partners and continues to be one of the leading sources of foreign direct investment. Exports from the United States to Pakistan reached $3.61 billion in 2021, a 24 percent increase over $2.91 billion in 2020. The United States was Pakistan’s largest export market in 2021 at $5.27 billion, a 35 percent increase from the previous year. American companies have profitable operations across a range of sectors, mainly fast-moving consumer goods, agriculture, financial services, franchising, information and communication technology, renewable energy, and health care services."
Discusses key economic indicators and trade statistics, which countries are dominant in the market, and other issues that affect trade.
www.trade.gov
Pakistan has trade surplus with USA = net positive for Pakistan's economy.
Americans continue to provide entrepreneurial opportunities to a large number of Pakistani nationals. But you will not see any journalist talk about this reality, how numerous Pakistani households make their ends meet is not important.
"American firms have a strong presence in Pakistan. Currently, there are more than 80 wholly-owned or majority-owned U.S. subsidiary firms registered with the American Business Council (ABC) of Pakistan and the American Business Forum (ABF). The U.S.-Pakistan Business Council, an affiliate of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce based in Washington, D.C., is another forum for U.S. companies with business and investment interests in Pakistan. Leading U.S. companies doing business in Pakistan include Pepsi-Cola, Coca-Cola, General Electric International, Wabtec, Procter and Gamble, Honeywell, NCR, Teradata, Pfizer, Abbott Laboratories, DuPont, Oracle, Microsoft, Dell, 3M, IBM, McDonald’s, KFC, Pizza Hut, Domino’s Pizza, P.F. Chang’s, IHOP, D&B, Eli Lilly, Excelerate Energy, Enercon and Caterpillar among many other U.S companies."
Discusses key economic indicators and trade statistics, which countries are dominant in the market, and other issues that affect trade.
www.trade.gov
American companies also provide job opportunities to a large number of Pakistani nationals. But you will not see any journalist talk about this reality, how numerous Pakistani households make their ends meet is not important.
---
Pakistan has significant trade deficit with China = Pakistan's economic situation is strained due to this factor alone.
Pakistan’s exports to nine regional countries rose 16.97pc while imports grew by nearly 28.84pc in FY22.
www.dawn.com
Exports to China = 2.781 billion USD in FY22
Imports from China = 17.296 billion USD in FY22
But you will not see any journalist talk about this reality. No idea how to address this problem.
---
Never mind the facts though, let us continue on the path of self-delusions. Let us cut ties with USA and see how it goes for a change.
Well, that's a big reply. I will also need to layout the arguments to prove my point.
Well, first of all Pakistan should never cut ties with US. But Pakistan must understand how many times US used us as a tissue paper. We cannot have ties with US at expense of our freedom and at expense of our relations with China.
The Same US which butchered our soldiers in Salala incident. The apache gunship helicopters purposedly kept firing hell on 2 of Pakistani checkposts. The Same US which raided Abottabad (on the tip given by Pakistani agencies) but Obama in whitehouse watched Live and Obama later disclosed that his instructions to soldiers were if Pakistani military confronts them then fight, kill and make your way out. This is a country you want to trust ? Even Bush Junior secret memo's recently leaked says "India is a friend. Pakistan is not". Imagine, them saying this at the peak of our collaborations. That essentially means they always treated us as a vassal state, a country that's to be used for a certain / temporary goal.
In early days, India made alliance with USSR. Our Generals chose US as our ally. Everything was going good. Zia was installing 1000s of jihadi factories inside Pakistan in collusion with CIA. Once job was done, US left and bingooo the sanctions hit Pakistan. Our F-16s which we paid, never left US and the ones we were flying needed critical spares. On the other hand, Russia didn't betrayed her ally and kept supplying all sort of weaponary to india. So in the end india's alliance worked out well. Our didn't.
The F-16s block 52s which we are so proud of, comes with 24/7 US contractors as monitoring team. They come as a package, they are involved whenever F-16s are involved in any action, they make sure no other weapons are integrated in the F-16s other than approved ones. They want to make sure no one try to get any tech assessment. Pakistan pays millions of dollars for this monitoring. I bet they'd stay as long as Pakistan is operating these birds, otherwise no spares would be given. You also remember, they'd never had released the AMRAAMs had there be no need of us again in war on terror. At the same time, another country (China) is sending you whole squadrons of 4.5 gen jet. Same country pulled you out of this critical defense dependency by going all the way with you in joint fighter program (JF-17).
I partially agree with you on IK's stance regarding Afghanistan. However, you need to ask yourself: Was there any terrorism before IK (2018-2021). Answer is hell yes, terrorism started in early 2000s, when IK was not even in power. Country has seen hell during these 2 decades, so who is really responsible for that mess ? There was no IK who could stop military to do the hell they want regarding this. Who's responsibility was to defend the country then? Who's failure is that we lost 80,000 Pakistanis to this war on terror ? The americans kept droning us to extreme. The resentment and rage created many times bigger terror threat then it was originally. BTW, military in Pakistan do whatever it likes to do. Failures of military MUST not be painted on civil leaders. Military even interferes in politics and even makes their own foriegn policy. How is it possible that GHQ even listen to civil govt on a security policy ? Whatever Khan is / was saying, the terrorism mess can never be pointed out to IK. BTW, his era saw the least terror attacks in our recent history of 2 decades. I have listened to Khan's views multiple times, all he said always was to do dialog with people of Waziristan, FATA etc. Get all those elders on your side and then those people will themselves take out/ control the few hardcore terrorists. You just cannot bomb the whole area. All he always cared was saving the majority from slaughter which will ultimately become our enemies as a result of losing any of the family members. That was always his whole point.
I think when Khan lectured US back when US was facing humiliation in Afghanistan made whitehouse frustrated but real reasons were far more obvious even before that.
Khan's doing OIC and inviting one & only China in it - Khan's openly telling that he will go for Russian oil & Gas. US completely considers Russia & China as "Enemies". There's now no ambiguity. So wherever US has leverage and it can twist the arm, it does in this bigger game. The day Khan visited moscow and same day it launched Ukraine invasion was proly the final nail in the coffin. Bajwa behaved extremely unexpected few days later like someone who got scolded by his elders, he went all guns blazing against Russia in security conference when civil govt had totally different policy. For me, everything was clear by then. I knew by then PTI is being removed by US- our establishment mutual consensus. The one Cipher that we all knew was the only one that our diplomat made notice of. How many other's earlier would have come - OR its obvious what kind of communication bw US & GHQ would have been concluded on the subject already is anybody's guess.
My question to you is, do we really have to be US ally with no respect & no dignity ? Why can't we have normal relations with them ? I 100% agree that US is very important for us in business point of view, in exports, in our diaspora, in other things. But why we have to be used either as a mercenary or as a tissue paper in their big game ? Why can't we insist to have normal relations. We need to have self respected leaders & diplomats which can reason with big powers. We don't need to send Generals who are not master in such craft and give away much without any gain. I mean we sold our people for 5K usd in war on terror, we get peanuts for NATO supplies. Even if you had to become mercenary, atleast charge them decently.
The one country that is our absolute enemy is our eastern neighbor. Same has now immense influence over US. US indo economic policy, china, man-power everything is interlinked. US sees india as a country which it wants to prepare to counter china or balance it out. The kind of security agreements US did with india in 2017 - 2018 makes it much bigger ally then any ordinary NATO country. US can give any favor to india despite russian weaponary like S-400s etc but will sanction even a NATO country on it. Indians in US are getting to strong positions every year. They are in US congress, they are in politics, they are dominating the entire tech sector. US is selling them Apaches, P-8s and offering em F-15EX, F21s or whatever india puts her finger on. While we were denied even the engines for Turk helis. The point, I am trying to make is. There is ABSOLUTELY no way that establishment can win US trust. US would NEVER make alliance with us at expense of india. I am 100% convinced that India's influence today is enough that our Vipers' fleet would never get any more numbers. So my point is why on earth our GHQ proved to be that dumb that it went all the way to please US and in the process annoyed the other & only great source of weapon supplier to us. We should have been already felt blessed that we had an alternative today unlike 1990's. During 1990's russia wouldn't sell us because of her ally india and West had put sanctions on us after using us while China's tech was far behind then the west or Russia. 3 decades later China is second biggest power and completely independent in military tech & a giant in such tech.
GHQ did a strategic blunder. Its repute & respect nose dived inside the country and it shattered the trust of our natural ally that's China.
Lastly, on your China trade deficit figures: We import items from China, sizable of such items are machinery or parts or materials for our export items that we export to the word. Secondly, the kind of material we import from China is a blessing itself. If we had to import same stuff from West that would cost us 5 times more. Not to mention, much of defense products we import from China as well. That's also included. This trade deficit is purely because of our demands. There's no way we can put it as china's fault. Our biggest import bill is Oil & Gas. That Imran khan was trying to find permanent solution with Russia. Also China helped us installing power plants with coal. That would also reduce the oil & lng being used for power generation. Second biggest our import bill is autos / car parts. Japanese are destroying our economy for decades, Suzuki, toyota, honda imports billions of worth car parts every year. They never bothered to do one time major investment and install car manufacturing plants in Pak. They only installed car assembly plants. That's great for Japan but not for us. On china, If I have to write down on Pak China relations, that would need atleast 5 more pages with my limited knowledge, but long story short, whenever west / india cornered us in security council, UN etc it was always China that vetoed and bailed us out. They helped us in missile program, nuclear, all sort of weapons, all of our civil nuclear power plants, our most important coal power plants, helped us all the way in both major wars. helping build the much needed dams etc. Lastly, all that is also business for them but its also vital for us and it was us who invited them to do all that. No one can force you to take all these projects. We opened bidding for most of projects, Western companies never signed up or were much costlier. There's no way we should go in US camp at expense of china.
www.cbsnews.com
www.reuters.com
