So much has changed, yet so much remains the same in the week since President Obama interrupted a drowsy Sunday night with his stunning announcement that American forces had found and killed Osama bin Laden. That holds especially true for the U.S. relationship with Pakistan. For the last several decades, the bilateral relationship has been one of our most intractable foreign policy dilemmas. Before Sunday it didn't seem possible for the relationship to get more complicated, but with the outing of Bin Laden's hideaway deep in Pakistan, it most certainly did.
The fall-out is still TBD. The Hill turned its attention to Pakistan's role in the whole Bin Laden affair almost immediately. But, as I wrote in a feature for this week's magazine, the reaction has been surprisingly restrained. The majority of senior lawmakers have resisted the urge to pitch Islamabad overboard immediately, despite the fact that, as I wrote, "no one seems to believe that the whole Pakistani power structure could have been ignorant of bin Laden’s whereabouts all these years."
But that's not to say lawmakers are not going to be looking to use the incident to hammer away at specific segments of our Pakistan aid program they have long disliked. There is also going to be an overwhelming impetus to try and leverage the aid dollars we do continue to deliver. Though as international development experts have warned for years, that practice is largely counterproductive, reinforcing the sense in Islamabad that the U.S. is trying to buy them off.
The folks at the Center for Global Development, in particular, have written some thoughtful analysis of late on perception vs reality when it comes to Pakistan aid.
The next few months are likely to see a continuing drip-drip-drip of news about Bin Laden's hideout in Abbottabad, and what Pakistani officials knew. Lawmakers' reaction will be an important indicator for how much our relationship with Pakistan has evolved over the last decade beyond its purely transactional roots ... or not.
The fall-out is still TBD. The Hill turned its attention to Pakistan's role in the whole Bin Laden affair almost immediately. But, as I wrote in a feature for this week's magazine, the reaction has been surprisingly restrained. The majority of senior lawmakers have resisted the urge to pitch Islamabad overboard immediately, despite the fact that, as I wrote, "no one seems to believe that the whole Pakistani power structure could have been ignorant of bin Laden’s whereabouts all these years."
But that's not to say lawmakers are not going to be looking to use the incident to hammer away at specific segments of our Pakistan aid program they have long disliked. There is also going to be an overwhelming impetus to try and leverage the aid dollars we do continue to deliver. Though as international development experts have warned for years, that practice is largely counterproductive, reinforcing the sense in Islamabad that the U.S. is trying to buy them off.
The folks at the Center for Global Development, in particular, have written some thoughtful analysis of late on perception vs reality when it comes to Pakistan aid.
The next few months are likely to see a continuing drip-drip-drip of news about Bin Laden's hideout in Abbottabad, and what Pakistani officials knew. Lawmakers' reaction will be an important indicator for how much our relationship with Pakistan has evolved over the last decade beyond its purely transactional roots ... or not.
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