It’s Doubtful Husain Haqqani’s New Book will Help in 26/11 Probe

Vappala Balachandran comments on Husain Haqqani’s new book, saying it’s aimed at pleasing the Indian media.

Former Pakistani ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani. (Photo: Reuters)

Former Pakistani ambassador to the US, Husain Haqqani’s revelations on 26/11 in his forthcoming book are undoubtedly to please a section of the Indian media and our seminar circuit who consider him as a pro-India face after his fall from grace in 2011.

He was a star panel member during an Indian weekly’s televised debate in New York’s Pierre Hotel on 26 September 2014, coinciding with our prime minister’s first US visit.

In his forthcoming book, India Vs Pakistan: Why Can’t we Just be Friends?, Haqqani claims that former ISI chief General Shuja Pasha had told him in December 2008: “Loag hamaray thay, operation hamara nahin thha” (the people were ours but operation was not).

Haqqani is an effective campaigner whichever side he wants to represent. I had a heated exchange with him in 2007 when he attacked India during a think tank seminar in Washington DC. Surprisingly, a Pakistani lady scholar supported me. She also irritated him by highlighting his fluctuating past political loyalties – from Islami Jamiat-e-Tulaba to General Zia ul Haq, whom he later called “a most superb and patriotic liar”.

The book is currently ranked #1 in ‘International Relations and Globalization’ category of Amazon’s books on politics. (Photo: Amazon.in)

Shifting Loyalties

He then shifted to Nawaz Sharif for whom he tried to besmirch Benazir Bhutto’s reputation during the 1988 elections. Later he shifted his loyalty to Ghulam Mustafa Jatoi, Nawaz Sharif and to President Ghulam Ishaq Khan after Nawaz’s dismissal. Next, he shifted to caretaker Prime Minister Sher Mazari and finally to Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto by becoming her spokesman with a minister of state rank.

This did not prevent him from doing a Sanjay Baru on Benazir while writing Magnificent Delusions, alleging that she did not keep her 1989 promise to the US that Pakistan would not produce a nuclear bomb.

Astute Diplomat

One must, however, admit that in November 2008 he represented his country’s case very convincingly after 26/11 when he was ambassador to the US. I was in the US attending a think tank meeting during the 26/11 attack. By all accounts, the Indian embassy failed to match his public relations skill and deep connections among the US media and academic world in defending the indefensible by throwing the whole responsibility of his country’s radicalisation on the US.

I can unhesitatingly say that Indian diplomacy was conspicuous by its inability to present our case due to their invisibility on visual media despite an overwhelmingly favourable print coverage. A prominent Indian-American Obama campaigner told me that, although invited, our embassy failed to attend the very popular ‘ABC News – This Week with Stephanopoulos’, while Haqqani impressed the audience by his eloquence.

Defending the Indefensible

He successfully defended Pakistan as the “victim” of terrorism on account of heavy radicalisation injected by outside powers, including the US, during the Afghan wars. His constant rhetoric was what American policy-makers and the public wanted to hear since they feared that India might attack Pakistan:

Pakistan stands ready to support India. Pakistan is a victim of terrorism. India is a victim of terrorism. The victims need to get together. Forget about our bitter history.

Pakistani Double-Speak

However, do such views or a book change the situation on the ground? We have always found that Pakistani leaders, when out of power, harp on friendship and peace with India while they actively pursue anti-Indian policies when in power.

In 2007, I wrote a column listing Benazir’s four public apologies for her foreign policy “mistakes” while in power: In May 1999, she regretted her “hawkish” policy on Kashmir during a Wilson Centre conference. In December 2003, while speaking to a Press conclave in New Delhi, she regretted backing a low intensity conflict in Kashmir.

In April 2007, she told The Dawn that she regretted backing the Taliban. In 2009, while releasing Daughter of the East, she blamed Gen Aslam Beg for aggressive moves during the Zarb-e-Momin exercises. That provoked Gen Beg to retort that it was she, as PM, who had asked him “Can you capture Srinagar?”

Haqqani thinks that he can convince the US and India by merely blaming the Pakistan military. He feels that Pakistan will pursue peace if the army is pressurised by the US. This fiction was exposed long ago by Mubashir Hasan in his Mirage of Power (2000) in which he quoted instances of how a popularly elected Zulfikar Bhutto, with a massive majority, had actively encouraged the Pakistan army to further his anti-democratic policies even when they were defanged after the 1971 war.

In April 2007, Benazir Bhutto told The Dawn that she regretted backing the Taliban. (Photo: Reuters)

(The writer is a former Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat, and a member of the High-Level Committee which enquired into the police performance during 26/11 Mumbai)