As expected

The world and us

We huffed and puffed but they called our bluff. Pakistan is probably set to resume the Nato supply routes. It has become clearer and clearer that this is a matter of when, not if.

The foreign minister’s statement about the Nato supply routes closure for a couple of months sent a strong message was laughable really. This was not the best way to save face. It was akin to “reaching an agreement” with the local hooligan and then remarking how mutual the agreement was.

There is a fork in the road here. The west, though it begrudged us our idiosyncrasies, let us have them. Not anymore. We have to make a choice now about our position in the comity of nations. Are we to become another North Korea, a pariah state, or are we to become an effective player in the scheme of things?

Comparisons with North Korea might seem hyperbolic. But one doesn’t need a time machine to figure out what would happen if we were to adopt the hawks’ point of view consistently for a longer period of time.

The world at large is not amused by the chutzpah inherent in our public position on terror. The Nato forces are not on the same page with us. The Indians, predictably, are sworn enemies. The Iranians aren’t too amused with our choosing the other guys in the struggle for the Muslim world. The Chinese, despite the deep state having turned our friendship with them into a frenzied national hysteria, aren’t too happy with the goings on in Xinjiang.

The world’s most wanted man is taken out from a garrison town within our borders and we offer nothing but a one-step-forward-two-steps-back apology, all the while retaining a smug indignation none but our republic can pull off.

Nations that command respect in the international arena have their own house in order and, while they have a keen eye on the happenings in the world, are more introspective than anything else. The deep state strikes Faustian deals with militant networks, whose very presence in our lands costs us more than the supposed leverage we get in the region.

We need to get our act in order. The tide might turn in the future. The Americans, not known in their foreign policy for benevolence or ethics, might ask us to repeat the ‘80s. We need to have a fortitude forged by national consensus to tell them, not again, not again.

This is our war.