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The News October 25, 2010

When an ambassador is Viceroy

Zafar HilalyWhen the Cold War at its peak, states were offering themselves for sale to the highest bidder.

Pakistan was one of them. In our case the winning bid was by the United States of America. TheSoviet Union somehow did not get a chance to put in a serious bid. Ever since then, the United Stateshas developed a morbid interest in what transpires in Pakistan.American ambassadors to Pakistan are so intrusive that, if tasked, they could probably discover thestate of the digestive track of the president. Although, more often than not, they wouldnt have toask: the information would be volunteered to them anyway by the incumbent himself, so often dothey meet. Alternatively, they could tap any number of sources, considering our proclivity to blab.Pakistan leaks like a sieve. A secret hardly ever remain one, although, frankly, nothing except thedisposition of troops in battle calls for much secrecy.Some US ambassadors handled their assignments with a modicum of tact. Others preened themselvesand strutted about as if they owned the place. One US ambassador relished being called the Viceroy.A good word from him could earn one a promotion. This state of affairs has never really ceased. USambassadors continue to take liberties that no other envoy could dream of, unless it is the Indianambassador to Bhutan.

They think they have a veto on government decisions and often exercise this right, and get away withit. However, now and then, they became insufferable, and I am witness to an occasion when the wormturned, so to speak, and, threatened to his face with being declared persona non grata, the USambassador returned to his senses, with fulsome and bumbling apologies. Bullies generally tend to becowards.As US ambassadors go, Anne Patterson, who has just departed, was not obtrusive but focused andbusinesslike. She seemed to make it a point not to tread on toes. Indeed, if there was anything whichstood out about her, it was her modesty, which she seemed to have assiduously cultivated. It wasinteresting, therefore, to read that in an interview with Dr Moid Pirzada on the eve of her departure,Ambassador Patterson claimed that, among her accomplishments during her sojourn in Pakistan, wasthe restoration of democracy and the return of Benazir Bhutto and Nawaz Sharif to Pakistan.

She said the US goal was not to support the NRO. Our goal was to return to democratic governmentand get former PM Benazir Bhutto to return and then get Sharif to return. Further explaining herstance, she said: The US did not support, or did not work against, the NRO. I dont know if it was a

mistake at the time. In the context of the negotiations at the time, it was important in removingMusharraf and getting BB back.However much Ambassador Patterson may wish to skirt the issue today, the fact is that the NRO waselemental to the deal reached between Musharraf and Benazir Bhutto, brokered by the US, andPatterson knew and supported the concept.However, what she did say confirms what one had always sadly known, that who governs Pakistan isdecided as much as, though many would say more, by the US as by the electorate or theestablishment. That we should have received confirmation of this fact from the usually reticentPatterson is ironical. However, just as she has revealed what many suspected, she would beinterested to know what many of us believe, which is that, were it not for Pattersons amazinglyinsensitive handling of the situation following BBs return, BB may still have been with us today, andnot only in spirit.I was present when Ambassador Patterson called on BB a few days after the Karsaz bombing of Oct18, 2007, to congratulate her on her providential escape. Prior to the meeting there had been intense

discussions amongst BBs entourage as to what had happened and who could have been responsible.Each of us had our own theory and looked forward to learning what the US ambassador had to say.After the usual courtesies, BB, very deliberately, went through the long list of security lapsescommitted by Musharraf with regard to the protection of her procession. Some were so blatant, BBpointed out, that they could have only been deliberate. BB also recalled that her desire to haveforeigners guard her had been turned down by Musharraf. In other words, BB concluded, not only wasMusharraf in breach of his agreement to provide her with adequate security on her return but hadgone out of his way to ensure that no one else did.Ambassador Patterson, in response, muttered something about seeing what could be done, and

then, without batting an eyelid, went on to say that if such were the suspicions that BB harboured of

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Musharraf what would happen to your agreement to cooperate?It was an insensitive remark, one which suggested that, rather than address BBs feelings of beingbeen badly letdown nay, betrayed by Musharraf, all Patterson was interested in was the fate of theagreement that she had helped to cobble between them. And, furthermore, that she cared little for the150 dead, the maimed, the injured, and the suffering of their kin. It was typically American. The leastsetback to American interests seemed to be of greater concern than the destruction of the lives ofhundreds. In that one moment all of that was on naked display. And so was BBs fury, So you want

me to cooperate with a man who tried to kill me? she thundered.Even if Patterson did not get it, which she did not actually she could not, given how consumedAmericans are with their own interests those present knew that, for all practical purposes, the dealwas over. BB had decided to cut loose. Musharraf and the Americans had failed to live up to their sideof the bargain and now she was free to chart her own course. Subsequent conversations with herconfirmed this impression.A different reaction from Patterson like, for example, a promise to go immediately to Musharraf andtell him in no uncertain terms that the Americans too would hold him responsible for further securitylapses would have elicited a different reaction from BB, if not Musharraf, who obviously, if for no

other reason than to save his own hide, may well have boosted security arrangements. And that mayhave made all the difference.Clearly, along with the influence that US ambassadors wield in Pakistan comes the responsibility touse it wisely and discerningly, and for them to be sensitive to the moment as much as to theirinterlocutors thinking. On all these counts, Ambassador Patterson failed, to our everlasting regret.

Postscript.As for the NRO, it was indeed instrumental for BBs return; however, not in the way that it has beenmade out. For BB the NRO was initially irrelevant because Musharraf had earlier agreed to drop allcharges against her personally and those against her husband. He had done so because the caseswere getting nowhere and a conviction was impossible, given the quality of the evidence required. Inthe circumstances it was no big deal. However, dropping cases against BB would have left the others,like the Farooqis and Rahman Maliks who accompanied her in exile, still very much on the hook, andBB did not want to be seen as abandoning her supporters, although God knows why? She also wantedto be spared the bother of interminable court hearings all over the country. There was never anydoubt in her mind that the Pakistani cases were all contrived by her political opponents. She wanted anew beginning and the NRO seemed to promise that.The writer is a former ambassador. Email: charles123it@hotmail.com