US to give Pakistan eight F-16s, India fumes

WASHINGTON: The Obama regime on Friday notified the US Congress of its intention to supply Pakistan eight nuclear-capable F-16 fighters and assorted military goods worth nearly $700 million, in the teeth of opposition from US lawmakers, regional experts and New Delhi. The move caused India to summon the US envoy to South Block to register its displeasure.
The requirement certification from Pentagon's Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA), delivered to Congress on Thursday, revealed the cache of military goods US proposes to sell to a country its own lawmakers and analysts see as a terror-sponsoring nation.
The DSCA note said Pakistan has requested the sale of eight F-16 Block 52 aircraft (two C and six D models), with the F100-PW-229 increased performance engine, and 14 joint helmet mounted cueing systems. Other items are eight AN/APG-68(V) 9 radars and eight ALQ-211(V) 9 advanced integrated defensive electronic warfare suites.
The notification said the proposed sale "contributes to US foreign policy objectives and national security goals by helping to improve the security of a strategic partner in South Asia… and (will) enhance Pakistan's ability to conduct counter-insurgency and counter-terror operations."
This premise has been widely questioned by regional experts, who say it just encourages Islamabad's bad behaviour, including sponsorship of terrorism in the region. Some lawmakers have said it encourages Pakistan to oppress its own people, citing Pakistan Air Force's repeated bombings of the Balochs and Pashtuns, while coddling terrorists in Punjab.
"The idiocy stems from some within the National Security Council who stubbornly believe a package of incentives will miraculously change Pakistan's behavior. This is the definition of insanity: pursuing a course of action even when it fails to produce the desired results," said Prof Sumit Ganguly, a South Asia scholar at Indiana University, adding, "The intelligence community disagrees (with the proposed sale) but clearly those in the White House can over rule their analysis."
So why would the Obama regime go against the advice of its own experts and lawmakers and risk being seen as a supporter of a country dubbed Terroristan? Georgetown University's Prof Christine Fair, a withering critic of Washington's Pakistan policy, reckons that given the small number of aircraft involved it may likely be "an old commitment from previous years".
"Many of the weapons Washington gives Islamabad are ill-suited to fight terror, and continued transfers will do nothing to convince the Pakistani government to end its long-standing support for terror groups. In fact, US assistance gives Pakistan an incentive to foster a sense of insecurity concerning its nuclear arsenal and expanding ranks of jihadists," Fair and Ganguly wrote in a recent co-authored commentary in Foreign Affairs headlined 'An Unworthy Ally'.
Opposition to the sale has come from not just US lawmakers but also Pakistan's own former US ambassador, Hussain Haqqani, who warned that the fighters will be used against India rather than militants Pakistan professes to fight in what has become something of a joke, given the country's open nurturing of terrorists that even former military ruler Pervez Musharraf admitted.
"The US has been giving the signal that Pakistan is too important to ignore, which reinforces all of Pakistan's wrong policies both the US and a significant section of the Pakistani intelligentsia would like changed," Haqqani said in a recent Congressional testimony.
The US appears unconcerned it might be perceived as a supporter of a terrorism-sponsoring country whose actions kill not just Indian civilians and soldiers, but also Americans. An invitation to US officials to explain the rationale for the sale elicited no response.
Reuters meanwhile quoted an unnamed state department official as saying that the US "strongly supports" the sale as it believes the jets would help Pakistan to counter terrorism and insurgency.