Nepal & Pakistan: Lessons For The USA

Nepal and Pakistan provide good lessons in foreign policy to both Barack Obama and John McCain. The democratically-elected new Prime Minister of Nepal, Prachanda (photo above) who led a 10-year guerrilla war, now professes that his country’s era of “capitalist democracy” has begun. He was sworn in by Nepal’s first president, Ram Baran Yadav.

Lesson No. 1: The president or prime minister of any country must not be sponsored/pushed by the USA to remain friendly. Good diplomacy is making friends out of enemies.

Lesson No. 2: If the USA looks for, and sponsors, loyal and subservient leaders in the world, the public in that country would rise against their own subservient/sponsored leaders and the USA.

Lesson No. 3: It is a dangerous foreign policy to bribe foreign leaders/dictators and tempt them to follow the US policy. Only myopic policy needs to find supporters abroad with the help of bribery. Corruption would ultimately corrode the democratic functioning in the USA itself. Unaccounted billions of dollars went to the Musharraf regime from the US administration. In the end the USA has become a staunch enemy of both militants and the Pakistan public.

Lesson No. 4: To turn an enemy into a friend needs patience and sincere efforts. In other words SINCERITY and PERSEVERANCE. The BUSH and MUSHARRAF strategy of BLUFF and BLUSTER ultimately boomerangs. It also empowers/strengthens terrorism.

Lesson No. 5: NEVER take foreign policy decisions/actions unilaterally. There is the United Nations. Only dictators act unilaterally. The USA has lost much credibility with its actions in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even in Afghanistan there should be UN troops, if at all. The US will never be able to justify (or get results) by only taking NATO forces. The Musharraf tangle was solved when the US involved Britain, Saudi Arabia and other countries for parleys.

Lesson No. 6: If my neighbour has begun to treat his family violently, I can only call the police. I can’t force my way into my neighbour’s house and then tell him that I am going to stay there for years to prevent violence (as in Iraq).

Let’s come back to Nepal. After months of bickering among the political parties, a huge majority of the assembly has elected a former rebel as prime minister. The Economist notes many firsts. “(Prime Minister Prachanda) wore Western clothes (another first) but made a gesture to national custom by donning a traditional Nepali cap.

“It has been an astonishing transformation. For over a year the Maoists have been part of Nepal’s transitional government, heading ministries and becoming ambassadors. Many poor Nepalis will wonder whether, after ten years of war costing 13,000 lives, the Maoists will now sink into the comforts of power and prestige and forget them.

“The Maoists will have to prove them wrong. Their election manifesto called this the era of capitalist democracy in Nepal and stressed that the private sector is intrinsic to their plans. More immediately Prachanda must reassert the authority of the state, which has been badly eroded over the past two years as crime has spiralled and ethnic groups clamoured for their rights.”

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