US-Pakistan embrace a fillip for peace

[unhappycamper]

US-Pakistan embrace a fillip for peace
By M K Bhadrakumar
Oct 26, 2010

The big news over the weekend is that the United States and Pakistan have kissed and made up. What was played up in the recent weeks as a nasty showdown between the two partners, with each side growling dangerously and scratching the other almost to bleeding, turned out to be deceptive feline foreplay.

The outcome of the three-day foreign minister-level US-Pakistan strategic dialogue that concluded on Friday once again confirms the reputation of the two sides as consummate partners: one moment snarling viciously, to the alarm of onlookers; and the next, locked in a perplexing embrace.

The balance sheet of strategic dialogue has now visibly tilted in Pakistan's favor. What the Pakistani military has offered Uncle Sam in return remains for the present a nuptial secret, but it will become known. Most certainly, it has got to do with the Afghan endgame. Considering US accommodation of some of the big-ticket items on Pakistan's wish-list, it can be surmised that Pakistan has offered meaningful accommodation of the US game plan in Afghanistan.

United States President Barack Obama's White House meeting with the visiting Pakistani delegation (which included powerful army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kiani) has come as a political bonanza for Islamabad. The White House readout on the meeting said that Obama underlined the US's readiness to advance the US-Pakistan relationship "toward a true partnership based on mutual respect and common interests".

What is even more important is that Obama agreed with the Pakistani delegation on the "need for regional stability and specifically on the importance of cooperating toward a peaceful and stable outcome in Afghanistan".