biden
Joseph Biden, the Vice President elect of the United States is  in Pakistan today for a brief visit. In recognition of Mr Biden’s support to the democratic process in Pakistan, the democratic government will present him the Hilal-e-Quaid. Just for the record though it must be mentioned that an announcement to this effect was made even before he won elections so some of our Indian hawk friends should not consider this another sign of Islamabad’s ’sycophancy’. Likewise the owner of this site has been his admirer for time immemorial now. This post then should also  not be viewed against the backdrop of the Mumbai attacks.
During the election campaign, he made an interesting comment that was misconstrued big time. He had remarked that at the very start of his term Obama’s leadership will be tested. The neocons tried to portray it as something naive. However since the elections quite a few people have tried to interpret it in terms of the momentary developments. When Mumbai attacks took place people thought he meant this. When Israel invaded Gaza we read several opeds interpreting it as Biden’s prediction. This all could be part of the bigger picture but one fact remains. The Obama Biden term has not officially started yet.  So could it be something else that he was referring to? Well the answer depends on the way you interpret his words.
When you respect someone to this extent and when he has such long experience in such matters you tend to treat his words just like those of a poet. We interpret everyone’s views according to our individual understanding. In my view his very statement shows his intellectual stature and should be viewed in light of the recent history. During last decade from Israel to India, from Pakistan to Iran and even the United States various hardliner parties rose to power. While the resulting governments strained the wafer thin global peace, they also posed serious threat to the secular prospects of each polity by inducting and promoting hardliner officials within the state apparatus, especially the defense establishment. Granted that Musharraf was not hardliner after 9/11 but he is now widely regarded as an opportunist and the inducted ambitious opportunists could be even bigger threat than a radical. In India we have repeatedly pointed out the Colonel Purohit phenomenon.  The alliance of the hardliners and the opportunist has been widely indulging in corrupt practices and is widely skeptical of popular democratic governments, led by charismatic and visionary leadership that believes in transparency. These conservative elements certainly do not want the skeletons in their cupboards to be exposed. Hence there is a great chance that they meddle in some conspiracy. In fact if you see the current posturing of India and Israel appears of the similar nature. It somehow seems that the two countries are acting on a cue. In India situation is indeed different from Israel but since the very start of the Mumbai fiasco it has shown little interest interest in solving problems through established mechanisms and has insisted on doing a Gaza in Pakistan. That of course would mean a full blown war between the nuclear armed countries. A full blown war if it is fought in accordance with the hardliner and opportunist agenda would certainly serve their cause not ours. 
The issue here is that while in democracy governments change regularly, the bureaucracy does not change that quickly, hence the new administrations should be doing their best to get rid of the bureaucratic shackles of the past. In that context at least I was happy to see the former National Security Advisor Maj Gen (r) Mahmud Durrani gone.  Just for the record I do not think that his statement accepting Ajmal Kasab’s identity as a Pakistani citizen should have caused his dismissal and the government now says that it was not the cause.  However I have consistently pointed out that his shady background is ill suited for the profile of a National Security Advisor. In my post dated July 29, 2008, I had written: “Now what was the ideal arrangement for the change in Pakistani intelligence? To create the post either of the Director of Federal Intelligence or the National Security Advisor. The latter was recently created but no use. The wrong person got the post. Lt Gen (retired) Mahmud Durrani was appointed the National Security Advisor. In my opinionated view he is the wrong choice. The right choice would have been someone who knows the army inside out but has never abused his post. Two men come into my mind. Lt Gen (retired) Asad Durrani or Lt Gen (retired) Talat Masood. These men are best suited for the post and also to oversee the leadership of the Pakistani intelligence community).” But this is not the only time I had opposed his appointment. Since his appointment as the ambassador to the US and then as the NSA I have repeatedly pointed out that not only is he blamed in the assassination of Gen Zia but was also had a reputation of hatred towards Benazir Bhutto, to an extent that it was believed that he used to practiced shooting on Benazir’s photos when he was in service. His departure brings a relief from a corrupt past.
Something deserves to be said about Leon Panetta’s appointment as the head of the CIA too for too many people seem skeptical of the appointment. Just because a man has never held an intelligence portfolio doesn’t mean he does not have sufficient intelligence to hold such a post. In fact Panetta’s  appointment brings to the fore a welcome desire to free the world’s most powerful democracy of the trappings of a neocon past. I must say here that Panetta is a consensus builder and hence can only bolster the position of a hardworking field operator. Where he promises change is at the directorial level which is lacking in transparency and also effectual counterintelligence. Today Mr Biden’s visit to Pakistan is a metaphor of a change that promises prosperity for all peoples of the world. Most welcome Mr Biden then.