artsy dot com slash usa and check out our youth to page at youtube dot com slash artsy america i'm liz wahl see you in an hour and a half. culture is the same of you i can't tell if i can enjoy the process of the models or the taliban bad guys best and be friends again pakistan u.s. relations face a breaking point the u.s. says pakistan is hedging its bets by making ties to mimic. the spanish and free couldn't take three months for charges free the maintenance free risk free stews high priests. dumb old free broadcast flooding video for your media projects and free media john darche dr tom . wealthy british scientists some.

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follow a welcoming hostile computor little destined to be front of me again pakistan u.s. relations face a breaking point the u.s. says pakistan is hedging its bets by maintaining ties to militant groups that are trying to undermine the government in neighboring afghanistan and pakistan replies that washington's rhetoric is counterproductive and would only play into the hands of militant groups how long can this get we embrace continue to live the can live their lives. to cross-talk us pakistan relations i'm joined by stephen cohen in washington he's a senior fellow at the brookings institution also in washington we have jacob foreign burgher he's founder and president of the future of freedom foundation and in islamabad we crossed i should say because she's a pakistani political commentator and author of the book military incorporated inside pakistan's military economy all right folks cross talk rules in effect that means you can jump in anytime you want you know different points of view and i want my viewers to see it but first marcia tell us about the ebb in this key strategic

relationship the relations between the u.s. and pakistan have never been smooth after the fallout from the u.s.s. nation of osama bin laden the state of the alliance has gone from bad to worse admiral mike mullen one of the most pro pakistan officials in washington has referred to the country as the epicenter of world terrorism but his most recent remarks have added fuel to the fire. and choosing to use violent extremism as an instrument of policy the government of pakistan and most especially the pakistani army and i are jeopardizes not only the prospect of our strategic partnership but pakistan's opportunity to be a respected nation with legitimate regional influence in his speech to the senate mullen accused pakistan's intelligence agency isiah of colluding with kani insurgent groups the u.s. has long been aware of the fact that pakistan may be assisting insurgents but more in statement is the first of its kind it's cost furious reactions in pakistan where

authorities have denounced the claims and pointed to the country's own bosses and the war on terror thirty thousand pakistanis it is well known that for doing that they were being and consequent. with pakistan's intelligence and security agencies that interdicted a large number of ago though are prepared for the us losing pakistan as an ally would undermine its strategic goals in the region pakistan provides key military transit routes to uganda stand in houses a base for unmanned u.s. drones but all this hasn't stopped u.s. officials from offering to support military action against qana network but if the experts believe that we need to elevate our response they will have a lot of bipartisan support on capitol hill the bomb i've been a station has repeatedly pressure pakistan to attack the haqqani network and groups the us seems a threat to its presence in afghanistan and while in statements reflect washington's uneasiness over how the two countries share political interests continue to diverge

and the smallest how the region and that's where the relationship stands today thank you very much for that much of a shift that to go to you first i'd like to quote the president of the united states transition out of afghanistan and leave a stable government behind one that is independent one that is respectful of human rights one that is democratic you think that's the primary goal of the united states in its relationship with pakistan because when we look at the relationship afghanistan is very much front and center. of course that is the game but that is not how it appears from islamabad. i mean i may not necessary necessarily share the view but the way the government and the strategic community looks at the relationship i think where this see is that despite whatever the american. fish will claim here is that the united states may want human rights may want stability but it's a stability which is the very much different from the way it's in visioned in

islamabad specially in the general headquarters armies general headquarters and there's a different perception of what do you think about are doing so stability means one thing to one government and stability means something else to another government i'm thinking of washington and islamabad well absolutely i mean the us empire is position is let's get some regimes that are going to be loyal to the empire do is they're told and doesn't matter how crooked and corrupt they are the afghan regime is about the most crooked in history possibly and now they're upset because the pakistani government and people within the pakistani nation are not willing to support this imperial occupation that's gone on for more than ten years now they're upset that the pakistani government won't kill its own people to support this crooked corrupt occupational regime that they've installed in the karzai regime ok stephen i guess i don't have to ask a question at this point how do you react to what we just heard. i think i should

probably created an accurate picture of how pakistanis feel clearly there's a division in pakistan between the army and some of the strategists and see want to help want to make sure there's a role for pakistan in afghanistan and they're using such groups as well as as taliban and counties and others to ensure that they have are all mostly to keep the indians out that's a primary strategic goal but the most part is that he's a little upset with this kind of extension of pakistan into afghanistan given the fact that pakistanis are feeling country along many dimensions and as for the other statement i think it's totally silly i mean there's no imperial goal there at one point in the bush administration they considered having a position in central asia including afghanistan but that was given up a long time ago this is a clear position now of the president on down as it were in afghanistan to prevent al-qaeda from rising up again and attacking us for that we need a more or less stable afghanistan covered by the goal of democratizing afghanistan

has long since been given up and it is a corrupt government there are more corrupt governments of the world fact it's a corrupt government on our side and the truth will try to overthrow the taliban or even more corrupt even more vicious and brutal so i think that i disagree with with with that's the effect if i don't go back to jacob said a little bit later in the program but i see and is limited i mean. coming out of washington right now how is that going down with the average pakistani because from what i understand anti-americanism is extremely high in pakistan because of america's war on terror. you know there are two pinions and that i mean my personal opinion is that. go and ask an american diplomat if there is been a reduction in the queues or in the visa applications of pakistanis going to the u.s. and the answer probably will be no. i mean there is that disconnect there is a lot of media hype people are reacting to the information which of which they are being fed and that information is that us is doing something which is completely

get from mental to pakistani interests and now some of that is genuine as well i mean there is that complete disconnect and i would say that it's a very direct a very typical you know kind of juncture was the end of pakistani u.s. alignment i mean the i mean the pattern has always been that there is a crises going to brings the two nations together there is a lot of music and dancing in the air and there is strategic convergence and tactical divergence and as we move on at the end of eight or nine years or at the end of a decade there is tactical you know convergence and there is strategic divergence and that is where we are at the moment ok that is a value that is now a very limited in the binion that doesn't bode very well if i go to jake up here it looks like i mean from an outsider looking in the u.s. with its drone attacks and its criticism of the pakistani government issues deal

right or do you generalize it in the eyes of its own people it's certainly not making it unstable but at the same time it gets criticized chastised for not doing more on the war on terror i mean can it have it both ways. well though there's obviously some some severe hypocrisy here i mean let's keep in mind that the head conny are being entirely consistent when when that was the soviet union the soviet empire doing the occupying of afghanistan the u.s. was funneling money into pakistan finally money and they had konnie supporting people like osama bin laden who are all trying to end the foreign occupation of this country now that it's the u.s. government that's doing the occupying the tables are turned but the economy and those people in pakistan and afghanistan that are trying to rid this country of foreign occupation are operating entirely consistently and say us empower that saying hey now that we're in the occupiers instead of the suv union we want you to start killing your own people we want you to start destabilizing things it's the

hypocrisy right here in washington what do you think about that stephen because i read the pakistani government's really put into type position here because its own people being killed by american drones as america goes over the sovereign border of pakistan on a daily basis going ahead. in the long run i am sure is correct because i think what could happen is one of several possible futures and said because american and pakistani interests are so different you know afghanistan with regard to support for these terrorist groups we could see the move of american policy from alliance with pakistan which is a nominal line so it's an alliance in which both sides lie to each other it's like a very bad marriage where both sides are unfaithful to the other two containment we could see america moving towards a containing containing pakistan but i don't think that's going to happen i think it's most pakistanis understand they need america very good relationship going to it we culturally politically and of course america needs a stable pakistan one of the reasons the congress passed the bill was to provide

a huge amount of conventional assistance economic assistance pakistan and this was the charge of imperial ambitions this fantasy i mean i haven't heard that since i was teaching undergraduates in the seventy's and university illinois there is no imperial ambition there we try to get out we try to punish the people who attack the united states we've done some most of that and there's a lot of argument for getting out very quickly certainly obama and much of the right ministry of the republicans want to get out about going to very quickly jake if you want to jump in there. stephen the government's been killing people for more than ten years how many terrorists do you have to kill before you finally say enough's enough i mean the government there been no constraints on the number of people that have been able to be killed came years of this no constraints drone attacks assassinations bombings killing of wedding parties at some point isn't it time to say anough enough look at the price you're willing to pay for this occupation now jeopardizing the relationships with a longtime ally of the united. i mean this is going to present president announce

a major troop withdrawal and congress agrees with you in the right wing americans in the republican party want to get out of afghanistan and the facts are quite different than what you're saying jacob because the accurate picture is that we do want to get out of afghanistan but we're. afraid that if we when we do get out of afghanistan this could be another nother civil war the afghans have signed a security green with the indians this is going to lead to another another potential civil war between the north and the south in afghanistan that's most afghans fear that it's worse than the american occupation most off guns welcome the american presence said they don't like it but they certainly don't want to tell anyone presence and they don't want to another civil war so i think that's the dilemma we're in all politics is tragic because bad things wind up in politics there's no good choices there's only bad and worst choice all right so somebody should say here we. are now after that short break we'll continue our discussion on pakistan state. and.

the latest insight. from the realms. you know sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then something else you hear sees some other part of it and realize everything you thought you knew you don't i'm sorry welcome to the big picture. if you. want

to. welcome back across talking about command you were talking about us pakistan relations. keep. a sure thing go to you considering the conversation we heard between jacob and stephen before we went to the break it sounds like an end all exaggerate a little bit just for discussion's sake here is that the u.s. has to actually destroy pakistan to win in afghanistan. well i don't think i mean that. superficially looks like that the guy in the know just to not only destroy it maybe even invade it one point ok because regime change seems to be a popular flavor of this year go ahead i don't think that the result that they should have my view at all i'd like to be i said i would defer exact even used a word for exaggeration exaggeration for a conversation think general you go ahead are you going to exaggeration or

misrepresented misrepresentation i should go right ahead. right i don't think that you know u.s. can despite what it wants despite the divergence i don't think that that should be on the cards that are to be in the cards or it is on the cards it would be far too risky a strategy for you know for the u.s. to you know try to come in invade or tried to do you know another may second kind of an operation until it has actionable intelligence with the maid second we have to be very clear that they had actually actionable intelligence and have the don't have the same there is definitely what is happening in pakistan is that there is a public opinion which is building up either genuinely or is being primed to go that way which does not kind of permit floor you know boots american boots on the ground and in case that happens that is going to be very destabilizing

and extremely unnerving for the pakistani state and society which then in turn is not going to be. for the peace project in of grandstand and pakistan i think of us will have to think carefully stephen ryan go to you really really i was asked even here both of you because it's really about the the future of afghanistan what kind of state it will be what kind of alliances it will have what kind of friends it will have that's what's really at stake here is not afghanistan in and of itself it's how it's going to interact with the neighborhood and it's pakistan it is very interesting if i go to stephen first time i go ahead steve. i disagree with that a number of other people in washington is argue that it's really and should be quick and should be packed pack of pakistan is far more important than four more critical country to american interest than afghanistan afghanistan is a weak fragment a tribal society which everybody contributed in destroying what the americans the

russians the off guns you know the talking the talk and studies and others that's not you know there's been a victory more than anything else but pakistan is a very dangerous to and i'd like a streak of what he would do should there be an attack on the united states that was launched from pakistan whether or not the pakistan government we had wanted to act like that in new york the times square bombing that did not go up and there been other attacks organized in pakistan against you but it's what would he do to respond to that would you simply accept the do nothing in response i think that's a danger that american like overreact to the united states launch from talking to you would lead to a great deal you because you're hedging against that yes i'm sure they would would be you know the problem the problem the problem with stephen and others of his philosophy is they don't go to the root of the problem and the root of the problem is the u.s. imperial. foreign policy that he denies even know anything about you've got it you've got an empire here with seven hundred to a thousand military bases all over the world its primary goal is regime change

we've seen that in libya a country that never attacked the united states we see it in iraq a country that never attacked the united states and goes back to iran to leave the machine to change under most of the incident airplane cuba. goes on an autopilot he also fails to recognize is the more people they kill and afghanistan and now in pakistan people get angry over that and that's why you have this perpetual war on terrorism that's why they would be attacking because of the occupation because of the killing this is what ron paul has pointed out they come over here to kill us stephen because the empire's over there killing them the best thing to do to stop this nonsense is you dismantle this imperial machine and you see you lose or you want to go right ahead. yeah see the thing is that. you know whatever designs the u.s. has right at the moment you know i think there are things which need to be put in context which is that pakistan one pakistan has to seriously look at non-state

actors even if the us leaves or does not leave. i would not agree with the notion that. part of or a large part of the non-state actors or that problem is there i mean it has been excess abated by american presence but it may not have started with the american presence there they're all interconnected there are a lot of threads of terrorism and extremism and violence which are going on in the region which would actually go back to the one nine hundred eighty s. interestingly a lot of people in pakistan as well do not question the war which we shouldn't have thought which is the war of the one nine hundred eighty s. . you know and that is where the problem has begun and ad that is going to continue the way of pakistan handles it is going to you know determine pakistan's future

as well as i mean little or that's a very good point. steve in this because you know if it's good stepping back to pakistan is i think stream we rational in a very pragmatic because of eventually the americans will leave afghanistan they will leave public opinion doesn't support anymore and victory is illusory ok mr karzai who knows where he's going to go after this and it's the pakistanis are waiting and it's their neighborhood pakistan isn't going anywhere so it sees that it has achieved a security challenge on its border and want to see certain outcomes when you think about that stephen. i think that's correct the pakistanis are really worried about they don't want the americans to leave they want us to stay and the indians want us to stay also because we we represent the force keeping afghanistan from breaking apart into a civil war but we're going to pull out i don't think this is ministration even the republican right one i want to stay there the ground ball as opposed to staying in

afghanistan i agree with it it's not a war we can win it's not a war was a war we should have fought better to begin with we would've won but we would have done better we would have left afghanistan with a stable government that opportunity is long since gone so there's no reason to stay in afghanistan it's a little we have another purpose of staying in afghanistan will be to make sure that ok there's no to build up a base their facility there to protect the united states it's a limited goal the real goal should be and i think it is in fact because it's not a becoming a stable country because a fragmented caucus now would be a catastrophe for india for china or for afghanistan for a whole range of for the whole region and i think with especially with one hundred plus nuclear weapons that's the strategic goal for us and so they should be thinking about that because again i'll repeat my point i mean the pakistanis are rational actors here they have to be concerned what's going on on their border and they know the americans are going to leave they have no stomach state for this go ahead you know absolutely i don't know you know i would imagine that you know jake go ahead take a. look there is an accused terrorist here in the united states luis posada kind of

the list who is accused of downing the cuban airliner over venezuelan skies the u.s. is harboring him they will not extradite him to venezuela how would we feel even as well all of a sudden start sending drones bombers assassins and started taking out americans that happen to be near by this guy i mean the pakistanis are acting totally rationally here you've got a foreign occupier that's been there for more than ten years and we don't know when it's going to leave it's killing people in afghanistan it's now killing people in pakistan and it's calling on the pakistani government to kill its own people why are they not acting rationally to meet. so you don't support you would support pakistani terrorist attack against united states because it would be were retaliation you would have supported the times where the it was you know i would support the person i would support the immediate evacuation instead of this nonsense that you're polling about some indefinite time in the future after the elections of get now don't kill one more person stephen don't don't kill one more

wedding party don't go do one more drone assassination pull the troops out home you're not doing them any favors by keeping them there all right i want to change gears are going to change on a state and have you been to pakistan. you know right now and talk to does that make a difference about this well i think you make a difference make a difference in the polls that would support that already i want to do what i want to change yours leaving here steve i want to ask shadow and islam about how much of this is a game of bluffing on both sides when you hear comments coming out of islam bad you had a moment coming out with his you know and they're both they're both going to extremes how much is each side bluffing because it's a dangerous and brace but it's an embrace nonetheless. you know there is there is you know quite of course an extent of that of bluffing as well but let me get back to in answering your question let me get back to a couple of points that were raised i mean there's a very interesting point by steve here that people in pakistan want us to stay

there now when you go out of the streets the common sentiment which has been built up over months now is that pakistani average you know common man on the street once the u.s. leaves now it's the pakistani establishment even military stablish wind which keeps telling the american military establishment we think that the problem is that you will dump us and leave dump us with this problem. now that is not translated and told to the man on the street in fact the reality is that after may second after you know there was some differing nosediving of the relations between the two establishments and then it has been a little more steady you know steadily getting better this is not told to the people there is a game and there is not just one game the games within games that are being played now the other point with what was being raised about drone attacks i think it's

again a very confusing and complex subject because right now of this you if you talk to people not people in the planes not people who are far removed from the tribal areas but if you talk to certain segments of the population there this is either the only pressure on the taliban is from drawing attacks so what reality and i suppose if you were to jump in here almost on a time here stephen i like to give you the last word on this program we received by u.s. pakistani relationship going got twenty seconds. well i think it's i think it's heading toward some kind of crisis but we've been in crisis for the past fifteen years so this could be nothing new that i think what would trigger a real break would be a serious american attack on a pakistani facility would there was an atrocity like most of those which was actually supported or pakistani wants to attack on the united states but from buying out i think we're going to bump along in a very unhappy marriage which needs to be reckoned reconciled in a major way salvation policy alliance how do not diplomacy works kicking the can

down the road many thanks to my guest today in washington and in islamabad and thanks to our viewers for watching us here at the next time remember cross talk to . well for british science. sometimes the time.

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