Alliance under review

Anger was still rife across Pakistan on Monday as protests against the NATO strike entered a third day with many of the demonstrators calling for an end to Islamabad's alliance with the United States.

Rallies organized by lawyers and students in Pakistan's major cities and by tribal leaders in Mohmand, the district where 24 Pakistani soldiers were killed early Saturday in the cross-border attack by NATO helicopters and fighter jets, took on a distinctly anti-US flavor with slogans and banners calling for a suspension of relations with the US and in some cases even retaliation for the strike.

In the central city of Multan, members of the blacklisted Jamat-ud-Dawa group, labeled a terror organization by the UN, burnt an effigy of US President Barack Obama and US flags while in Peshawar, the northwest city at the heart of a an al-Qaeda and Taliban-led insurgency, several hundred Islamist students chanted "Death to US" and "Quit the war on terror."

The protests will put increased pressure on the Pakistani government of Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani to reverse its pro-US stance and listen to the demands of the demonstrators who want supplies heading to NATO's 140,000 troops in Afghanistan blocked permanently, the ejection of all US military personnel from bases in Pakistan and action taken by the UN Security Council over US border incursions.

The Pakistani military - which holds a powerful position in the country - rejected NATO's version of events over the weekend, dismissing reports that it acted in self-defense after its troops were fired upon from Pakistan's side of the border.

Evidence wanted

Pakistan's military called for evidence of wounded NATO troops to support this claim, adding that its posts had been attacked by NATO forces seven or eight times during the last three years, killing a total of 72 soldiers and officers and wounding 250.

The country's Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar telephoned US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to convey a "deep sense of rage" over the attacks and to warn of the consequences the attacks may have on relations between the two nations.

Xenia Dormandy, a US foreign policy expert at Chatham House, believes that the NATO strike is just one more nail in the coffin of the US-Pakistan Strategic Partnership and that it is time for a rethink of the bilateral relationship.

"This year we've seen a series of conflicts erupt between the US and Pakistan that have laid bare the differing interests of the two nations," she told Deutsche Welle.

She added that the current incident has already led to repercussions: Pakistan closed the major NATO pipeline into Afghanistan and requested the US shut down a drone operation. In addition, further pressure will likely be put on the Pakistani Government by its public and opposition to take further action. But much of that could be mere rhetoric or short-lived, said Dormandy.

Difficult but necessary partnership

Anti-US sentiment was already high in many areas of the country before the NATO attack, due mainly to the continued use of drone attacks by the US and NATO in the restive tribal areas along the Afghanistan border from where al Qaeda and Taliban fighters are thought to launch their attacks on allied troops.

The raid by US Navy SEALs which killed Osama bin Laden in the north-western city of Abbottabad in May has also inflamed tensions with many Pakistanis incensed by the US taking unilateral action on its territory.

Dormandy believes that there are two principal actions that Pakistan could take that would be most damaging to US interests in Afghanistan.

"Firstly, it could permanently close the pipeline through which approximately 40 percent of NATO and US goods enter Afghanistan," she said. "Secondly, it could continue to hedge against US success in Afghanistan by maintaining or increasing engagement with militant groups such as the Haqanni group or the Taliban. Both would be extremely damaging to security in Afghanistan."

However, she added, Pakistan is far more strategically important to the US than Afghanistan, a point that is often forgotten by American policy-makers and the military.

"Ensuring Pakistan’s stability, security and growth should be America's number one priority in the region," said Dormandy.

A freeze in relations with Pakistan would make it increasingly difficult to access the estimated 100 al Qaeda members left in the region. Still, even more dangerous is the the threat of an unstable Pakistan with nuclear capabilities, she noted. "The US needs to implement a new policy towards the country to work with those with interests in stabilizing the nation."

"As long as the war continues in Afghanistan, as long as there is a particular emphasis on the fight against Islamic extremism, Washington won’t really have an alternative but to work with Pakistan," Jochen Hippler, a political scientist and research fellow at the Institute for Development and Peace at the University of Duisburg-Essen, told Deutsche Welle.

Afghanistan is surrounded by former Soviet republics in the north and Iran to the west - all countries that are definitely not US allies, says Hippler. "What remains is Pakistan. The US has to cooperate with the Pakistani government in the fight against the Taliban and al Qaeda in Afghanistan and Pakistan."

China and India put on alert

While the NATO attack may have repercussions for US-Pakistan relations, there are concerns that it could add to tensions between Washington and Pakistan's key ally, China.

China said that the NATO air strikes had left it "deeply shocked" and "concerned" by the attacks which it called a violation of Pakistan's independent sovereignty and territory. Beijing called for an investigation into the incident; a move which has also been proposed by both NATO and the White House.

China, Pakistan's main arms supplier and provider of nuclear technology in the form of two atomic power plants, is seen as Islamabad's strongest supporter, a counter-weight to regional rival India which has been developing closer ties to the United States.

China and Pakistan also held joint military exercises over the weekend in the latest example of their deepening military cooperation. Both also oppose US plans to keep bases in Afghanistan beyond the 2014 date for ending the coalition's combat operations there.

But regional experts don't see any reason to expect China to take any action against the US in support of Pakistan.

"China is not going to make any moves against the US or NATO as a result of this," Raffaello Pantucci, a visiting scholar at the Shanghai Academy of Social Sciences (SASS), told Deutsche Welle. "It will simply say it is going to support Pakistan and follow Pakistan's lead in what Pakistan does. Publicly this is as far as it will go, and it is unlikely to want to turn this situation into an opportunity to attack the US."

His colleague Hippler thinks that Islamabad wants to show Washington that Pakistan can survive both economically and militarily without US help even though this is not actually true. "In this particular case, there are two reasons why Pakistan gets closer to the Chinese - firstly, to show Beijing that Pakistan is a true ally of China and not a threat. Secondly, to show Washington that Islamabad is not a puppet of the US."

Indian-Pakistani tensions

Should Islamabad take steps to end its alliance with the United States and expand its partnership with China, tensions between Pakistan and India, the sub-continent's nuclear powers, could also increase. The removal of US military from bases in Pakistan and the possibility of an increased Chinese presence taking its place would make New Delhi extremely nervous.

However, Pantucci believes that China is just being used as a threat by Pakistan and that the country is better off with the US than without it - and as a result, so is the wider region.

"While it may serve Pakistan's interests to play up the alliance with China to play brinkmanship games with the US, the reality is that there is no comparison between what the US offers and does and what China offers and does," he said. "There are already some Chinese troops in Pakistan, but it is unlikely that they are able to muster the same capabilities as the American soldiers currently in country."

Author: Nick Amies
Editor: Michael Knigge