PAKISTAN’S TALIBANIZATION: STRATEGIC IMPLICATIONS FOR CHINA AND OPTIONS

PAKISTAN’S TALIBANIZATION: STRATEGIC IMPLICATIONS FOR CHINA AND OPTIONS

By Dr. Subhash kapila

Introductory Observations

Pakistan’s impending take-over by the Taliban as evidenced by their recent advances to the doorstops of the capital city of Islamabad by armed occupation of Swat and Buner, has raised strategic concerns and fears in the United States and NATO countries.

The developing situation in Pakistan portending a collapse of state sovereignty in Pakistan under the Taliban onslaught and the reluctance of the Pakistan Army to commit its regular army formations to stem the Taliban tide has forced the United States to issue a blunt warning to Pakistan that it would have to militarily intervene in Swat to evict the Taliban.

The United States has legitimate fears on the enveloping Taliban menace in that even in their present configuration of wresting control of Swat, Buner and contesting in Haripur, the Taliban are sitting over- looking two strategic Pakistani military installations of the Heavy Mechanical Complex at Wah and the Pakistan Air Force Base at Minhas, Wah is the chief and central strategic site for materials ad components of Pakistan's nuclear weapons and the Pakistan Air Base at Minhas is the launch pad for Pakistan Air Force nuclear weapons armed combat aircraft.

Taliban’s impending drive to take over Islamabad has not only become a United States and regional concern, but has assumed global strategic concerns.

In such a disturbing strategic scenario that is emerging in Pakistan, what is strikingly noticeable is that China is strangely silent and has not voiced any strategic concerns, publicly at least.

Some reports suggest that China had expressed its concerns during President Zardari’s visit to China and recently to other Pakistani dignitaries too. But that was before the present looming Taliban crisis threatening Islamabad emerged.

Reports also suggest that while China has been publicly espousing the internationalizing of the Afghanistan problem, to which the present Taliban crisis is intricately interlinked, yet behind the scenes it has assured the United States that it is comfortable with United States military presence in Afghanistan, which incidentally bears heavily on Pakistan.

Admittedly, China has cultivated back-door linkages with the Taliban and other Jihadi groups for geo-political reasons but when strategically analyzed it can be said that these linkages cannot diminish or lessen the strategic implications for China of Pakistan emerging under full or partial control of the Taliban.

This Paper attempts to analyze the strategic implications for China of the above eventuality under the following heads:

China’s Strategic Stakes in Pakistan Outweigh Those of the United States.
Pakistan’s Talibanizaton: A Severe Strategic Set-Back for China.
China’s Strategic Options in Eventuality of Taliban Take-Over of Pakistan.

China’s Strategic Stakes in Pakistan Outweigh Those of the United States

This assertion is being basically made to highlight the fact that if the United States has become so strategically concerned as to threaten US military actions in Swat, then China with far more vital geo-strategic and geo-political stakes in Pakistan by virtue of geographical contiguity, should be seriously alarmed today.

At a higher strategic plane, Pakistani’s strategic utility to China by virtue of a 47-year old strategic nexus between the two nations, arises from the following: (1) Pakistani’s strategic dalliance with the United States has been promiscuous, Pakistan is ever-ready to be used by China as a counter-pressure point against the United States (2) Pakistan can geographically interrupt any American containment strategies against China (3) Pakistan has assiduously acted as the “spoiler state” on China’s behalf against India to keep India strategically confined to South Asia (4) Geo-strategically, Pakistan has given strategic access to China to the North Arabian Sea, facilitated China’s naval presence in proximity of the Gulf through the Gwadur naval base and would facilitate Chinese energy security by permitting China to use Pakistan territory as ‘energy corridors’ to China by rail, road and pipeline links in the offing.

In recognition of Pakistan’s proven strategic utility to China, Pakistan has been bestowed with a China facilitated nuclear weapons arsenal and long range nuclear armed ballistic missiles arsenal. In fact China bestowed a strategic largesse on Pakistan which has endowed Pakistan with strategic leverages far above its true strategic potential.

China has also gifted to Pakistan its so called civilian nuclear reactors for energy purposes but which essentially are the backbone of Pakistan's nuclear weapons.

Geo-politically, Pakistan has served as a political link for China to the Islamic world and more specifically to Saudi Arabia.

Militarily, the military inventories of Pakistanis Armed Forces are predominantly Chinese in origin and unlike USA, China has never imposed arms embargos on Pakistan. On the contrary, during such US embargo periods, China increased its military Supplies to Pakistan.

In terms of under-writing Pakistanis security and national integrity, China through a number of strategic cooperation agreements has committed itself to Pakistan. In fact, Pakistan has for all these years has been strategically defiant of even the United States at times, entirely on the strength of China’s assurances.

China would have remained an East Asian Power basically, but for its strategic nexus with Pakistan which facilitated China an intrusive presence in South Asia, Afghanistan and The Gulf Region.

Comparitively, Pakistan is only one of the strategic pieces for the United States on the global strategic chess- board, but for China it is the only “natural ally” that China has in its ascendancy to become a global power.

Pakistan’s Talibanization: A Severe Strategic Setback for China

Ordinarily, China should not experience any severe strategic setback in the event of the Taliban taking over full control of Pakistan. China has been adept in utilizing ‘rogue regimes’ like North Korea and Pakistan’s military regimes and converting them into ‘natural allies’ for its strategic advantages.

China could afford this strategy as long as it stood on the sidelines of the global power-play. Intent on carving a respectable riche for itself now in the global order, it is debatable as to how far China could go strategically in terms of supporting and subsidizing a Taliban regime in Pakistan.

Further, Pakistan’s strategic utility to China lay in the centralized authoritarian control of Pakistan by military regimes or authoritarian civilian leaders likes Zulfiqar Bhutto. China consistently and strongly supported military regimes in Pakistan.

Pakistan’s Talibanization on the other hand could spell strategic uncertainties for China’s preference for centralized control of Pakistan. In short, two disturbing scenarios form the Chinese point of view can emerge in a Talibanized Pakistan.

Pakistan’s Talibanization could lead to a civil war in Pakistan or fragmentation and disorder both due to intra-Taliban rivalries and the ethnic divide.

In both eventualities, it would be a severe strategic setback for China and the multiplicity of strategic stakes that it embedded in Pakistan over the decades.

China’s Strategic Options in Eventuality of Taliban Take- Over of Pakistan

China’s strategic options in eventuality of Taliban take- over of Pakistan basically boil down to the following (1) Support and subsidize a Taliban regime in Pakistan to safeguard its strategic interests (2) Join the United States and global mainstream to prevent a Taliban take-over of Pakistan; and (3) Use its tremendous leverages over the Pakistan Army to effectively prevent Taliban take-over of Pakistan.

The first option may be tempting for China. However, it carries a tremendous cost of global ostracizing of China for subsiding terrorist regimes. It would impair China’s attempt to cultivate an image of being a ‘respectable Permanent Member’ of the UN Security Council.

The second option is not tempting for China as inherent in such a global attempt would be a likely military intervention in Pakistan by possibly a US-led UN Coalition. China would not like to permanently foreclose its strategic options in Pakistan, and with the Pakistan Army in particular.

The third option would be a strategically “no cost, no loss” option for China. It could use its significant strategic leverages with the Pakistan Army to impel it into a ruthless liquidation of the Talibanization of Pakistan threat currently underway. The Pakistan Army may not be amenable to American strategic pressures but it can ill-afford to ignore China’s strategic preferences and pressures.

The Taliban not only endanger China’s considerable strategic stakes in Pakistan but also endanger China’s tenuous hold over its western periphery in Xinjiang. The separatist Islamic movement in Xinjiang draws sustenance from the Taliban and associated outfits. The headquarters of the Xinjiang separatist movement is reported to be functioning in the Taliban held areas of FATA in Northern Pakistan.

Concluding Observations

Pakistan’s Talibanization is not only an existential threat to Pakistan existence but an added threat to global and regional security and stability. This threat gets amplified in magnitude with the prospects of a Taliban take-over of Pakistanis nuclear weapons and missiles arsenal.

China’s geographically contiguity with Pakistan centering on China’s own restive peripheries coupled with China’s considerable strategic stakes and strategic investments in Pakistan makes Pakistan’s strategic utility to China far outweighing Pakistan’s strategic utility to the United States.

Pakistan’s Talibanization and the strategic uncertainties that could be generated in its wake would seriously endanger China’s global and regional standing.

China has taken nearly half a century to forge a strategic asset like Pakistan to serve its strategic ends. It cannot afford to take another half a century to build an alternative to Pakistan.

China seemingly will be left with no option but to use its significant leverages over the Pakistan Army to impel it to effectively prevent a Taliban take-over of Pakistan: Such an option offers multiple advantages to China in that Pakistan continues as a strategic asset for China; the global community perceives China as a “respectable stake holder” in global affairs and lastly the Taliban’s disruptive Islamic potential to destabilize China's restive western periphery is neutralized.

(The author is an International Relations and Strategic Affairs analyst. He is the Consultant, Strategic Affairs with South Asia Analysis Group. Email:drsubhashkapila.007@gmail.com)