Summer 1992

In Search of Identity and Security:

Pakistan and the Middle East, 1947-77
by
Michael B. Bishku

INTRODUCTION
Throughout its relatively brief history, Pakistan has been preoccupied
with the difficult tasks of trying to insure its political and economic security as
well asfindingthe proper means of providing a strong sense of national identity.
Needless to say, a very important factor in the formulation of Pakistan's foreign
policy has been India, which it has perceived not only as a military threat, but
also as a diplomaticrival.1Therefore, Pakistan has looked outside the region of
South Asia for political support, and military and economic assistance. Yet,
Pakistan has had its own internal problems that cannot be attributed to India (or
to Afghanistan, with whom Pakistan's relations, at times, have been far from
friendly).
When Pakistan came into existence in 1947 with the partition of India,
that state had no history of being a political or economic unit, while its
inhabitants had no common language or uniform culture. Moreover, until 1971
—when what was known as East Pakistan seceded and fully asserted its Bengali
character through its establishment as the state of Bangladesh — Pakistan
consisted of two wings separated by some 1,000 miles of Indian territory. Even
today, Pakistan is far from being unified; indeed, Shahid Javed Burki, a former
Pakistani government official, aptly describes that country as "a nation in the
making."2 Pakistan was created to serve as a territorial entity for the Muslim
population of South Asia. (However, it should be noted that today more
Muslims of the Indian subcontinent live outside its borders than within.)
Interestingly, aside from Israel, it is the only country in recent history to be
established solely on the basis of common religion. Thus, Pakistan's Islamic
character has in the past and will continue in the future to be a factor in that
country's domestic and foreign policies. With regard to Pakistani domestic
politics, ethnicity is still a very important factor despite governmental attempts
in the past to use Islam as a means to deny such distinctions within Pakistan.3
Naturally, Pakistani foreign policy also has been greatly concerned with the
preservation of national integrity. There has been a national consensus in two
regards — the perceived threat of India and that Pakistan seek to promote
friendly relations with countries in Asia and Africa, especially those with
Muslim majorities.
For the most part, it has been only in the last two decades that Pakistan
has had great success in developing mutually beneficial relationships with other
predominantly Muslim populated states, especially the Arab countries of the
Middle East. (In both domestic and foreign policy, Islam is seen as an element
of identity. However, in the domestic environment, Baluchis or Pathans may
see it as a secondary factor given their ethnic groups' dissatisfaction with

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Punjabi dominance in internal politics and the fact that they have brethren across
the borders in Iran and/or Afghanistan.)4 While Pakistan did develop close ties
with Turkey and Iran prior to the 1970s, during much of that time period these
countries were members first in the Baghdad Pact and later, with Iraq's
withdrawal from the organization in 1959, in the Central Treaty Organization
(CENTO). These Western-sponsored alliances were regarded disfavorably by
most of the Arab world, but by the mid-1960s, the newly created Regional
Cooperation for Development (RCD) organization, designed to promote joint
economic projects, had surpassed CENTO in importance.
This article will review and analyze Pakistan's relations with the so-
called "northern-tier" states of Turkey and Iran as well as the countries of the
Arab world over a thirty year period from the time of Pakistan's independence
from Great Britain through the administration of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto — the
architect of Pakistan's close ties with the Arab states of the Middle East that have
continued to thrive well after his removal from power. Pakistani-Middle Eastern
relations since 1977 are dealt with in order to assess the lasting impact of
Bhutto's policy toward the region. This is the only area of foreign policy in
which Bhutto's successor, Zia ul-Haq, maintained a similar outlook.
The purpose of this article is to show how Pakistan was finally accepted
by the Arab states, the core of the Muslim world, and to argue that these ties,
while very important, do not alone answer Pakistan's needs in terms of security
or identity. True security can only be achieved when Pakistan resolves its
outstanding problems with India, among which the issue of Kashmir is most
important.5 As for identity, only through the maintenance of democratic
government can a consensus finally be built on what it means to be Pakistani.6
Emphasis on the common faith of Pakistan's citizens is not enough to preserve
national integrity due to the culturally diverse nature of the country. Yet,
throughout the history of that states' existence, all of Pakistan's leaders have
sought close relations with the Muslim world because such a policy has been
popular domestically; in addition, they probably did so to serve as justification
for their country's existence.
The shape of Pakistan's Middle Eastern relations, in general, may be
seen in the context of Pakistan's security concerns and the need to adapt to
changing political and economic realities both in South Asia and the Middle
East. In the early years of Pakistan's existence, that country was nonaligned as
was India, but unlike its larger neighbor it did not receive much attention from
the United States government. The Pakistanis tried to forge close ties with the
Muslim world and used the United Nations to strongly support struggles for self-
determination in the region. When in the mid-1950s they had little to show for
their efforts, Pakistan joined Turkey, Iran and Iraq in the Baghdad Pact, a US-
supported "northern-tier" alliance. (This was a practical arrangement that had
nothing to do with Islamic identity on the part of Pakistan's partners as
especially both the Turkish and Iranian leadership had been, over many years,
promoting secularism in their respective countries.) During this time, the
Americans provided the Pakistanis with a great deal of military and economic
assistance. Pakistan's close ties to the US strained its relations with the Arab

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world. Over time, the Pakistanis felt that they were being "taken for granted"
by the Americans and were offended by the US's failure to provide support over
Kashmir in 1965.
As Sino-Indian and Pakistani-American relations declined—the former
over a border dispute — Sino-Pakistani relations improved greatly. The China
"card" gave Pakistan the opportunity to balance somewhat its relations with the
other two superpowers. Also, Pakistan's new approach to foreign policy — i.e.
a de- emphasis of its pro-Western posture in Middle Eastern politics — helped
that country develop closer ties with the Muslim world, especially, at first, with
Saudi Arabia who was interested in promoting Islamic unity. While the Muslim
world supported Pakistan on the Kashmir issue, Pakistan reciprocated with
succor to the Arabs in their conflict with Israel. These relations became greatly
important with the rise in oil prices following the 1973 Arab-Israeli War. The
Arabs used a part of their increased wealth to provide Pakistan with economic
assistance, which included financing for arms. In return, the Pakistanis offered
military know-how and manpower as well as civilian workers to those sparsely
populated countries.
The Soviet intervention in Afghanistan enabled Pakistan to repair its
relations with the US, which were strained under Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, and to
strengthen its ties with the Arab states of the Persian Gulf; ties with Iran were
generally cordial as Pakistan remained neutral in the Iran-Iraq War.7 During the
1991 Gulf War, the Pakistani government maintained a military presence in
Saudi Arabia but kept its distance from the US-led campaign against Iraq due to
opposition at home, and anger over the American government's suspension of
military and economic aid resulting from Pakistan's nuclear program.8

THE FOUNDATION AND OBJECTIVES

OF PAKISTANI FOREIGN POLICY
In his inaugural speech to the Constituent Assembly on 11 August 1947,
just three days before Pakistan achieved its independence, Muhammad Ali
Jinnah, who received the title of Quaid-i-Azam (The Great Leader),9 stated that
one's "religion or caste or creed" had "nothing to do with the business of the
state."10 Indeed, the Constituent Assembly chose to recognize Pakistan's non-
Muslim population — which at the time numbered about twenty percent of the
country's total — by adding a white strip to the Muslim League's green party
banner to serve as the new state's flag. ' ' Yet, there was no doubt that Pakistan's
leaders saw the new state as a means of serving the interests of the Indian
subcontinent's Muslims. In March 1949, in the midst of a massive exchange of
population between India and Pakistan — that would result, according to the
1951 census, in the latter having a ninety-five percent Muslim population —
Pakistan's first prime minister, Liaquat Ali Khan, declared the following in the
Constituent Assembly:
Pakistan was founded because the Muslims of this Sub- Conti-
nent wanted to build up their lives in accordance with the
teaching and traditions of Islam, because they wanted to demon-

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strate to the world that Islam provides a panacea to the many

diseases which have crept into the life of humanity today.'2
However, it should be noted that the founding fathers of Pakistan were secular-
minded nationalists who based their ideas for the new state on Western political
theory and logic. They wished to build the country into a constitutional
democracy and in the process fit Islam into their design. They saw no
contradiction in having an "Islamic state" with a polity operating according to
the principles of modern democracy as "fairness, justice, compassion and
honesty are all tenets of Islam."11
Still Pakistan has had a difficult time over the years trying to maintain
a constitutional democracy — it was under military rule 1958-71 and 1977-88
—and to define a Pakistani identity. In an introductory note for the proceedings
of the First Congress of the History and Culture of Pakistan—held in Islamabad
in 1973 — the editor remarked:
The mind of [the] Pakistani intellectual has often been agitated
by a consideration of the question of our national identity ....
What are the links that bind the people of Pakistan? What is the
soul and personality of Pakistan? What is our national identity
and our peculiar oneness which makes us a nation apart from
other nations?14
Pakistan's leaders concerned themselves with the problem of national identity
in both domestic and foreign policy. However, it was the loss of what became
Bangladesh that forced a re-examination of the issue and brought about a greater
emphasis on Islam. On the domestic scene, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto's administration
granted a number of concessions to the Islamic establishment, among which was
a decision to include, for the first time in Pakistan's history, a minister for
religious affairs in the central cabinet. '5 ( At the same time, Bhutto had to use the
military to quash a Baluchi rebellion following his decision to dismiss their
elected regional government.)16 In addition, the 1973 constitution, in contrast
to the constitutions of 1956 and 1962, which did not address foreign affairs,
required that the state "shall endeavour to preserve and strengthen fraternal
relations among the Muslim countries based on Islamic unity."17 However,
despite Pakistan's changes in attitude concerning alignment with either the
Western bloc or the Muslim world, its foreign policy has remained constant in
terms of objectives.
The first and foremost objective of Pakistan's foreign policy has been to
preserve its national integrity. Indeed, it has never felt very comfortable with its
South Asian neighbors, India and Afghanistan. Since independence, Pakistan
and India have been involved in three wars — in 1948-49 and 1965 over
Kashmir, and in 1971 over Bangladesh — and the dispute over Kashmir still
lingers.18 In addition, the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan is still in
dispute with the latter calling, from time to time, for the creation of the state of
"Pukhtunistan" for the Pathans of Pakistan's North West Frontier Province and
part of Baluchistan while presently Pakistan continues to keep a wary eye on the
ongoing civil strife next door.19 However, Pakistan's integrity cannot be

33
Summer 1992

preserved solely through the realm of foreign policy. It has been bothered over
the years by ethnic strife which has the potential to bring about its disintegration,
as was the case with Bangladesh's separation. In what was prior to 1971 the
western wing of the country, the Pathans, Baluchis and Sindhis have also been
resentful of the Punjabis and me Urdu-speaking refugees from India who have
historically dominated the politics and/or economy of Pakistan.
Another important objective of Pakistan's foreign policy remains its
need to seek support for and improvement of its economy. It should be noted
that the territories that constituted Pakistan were economically the poorest of
what had been British India, and that they were dependent upon the industries
of other areas of the subcontinent for basic consumer goods. While Pakistan
possessed no known mineral resources it did have, however, two potential
assets. Prior to independence the eastern areas of Bengal had produced the bulk
of India's jute, while the western part of the Punjab, with an extensive system
of irrigation, had annual surpluses of food.20 Since 1947, Pakistan's economy
has grown considerably, yet as of 1983 its per capita income was only $390,
which according to the World Bank classifies it as a low- income country.21
These concerns of political and economic security were clearly on the minds of
Liaquat Ali Khan and Pakistan's leadership in the early years as they are today
with the current government.
A third objective of Pakistan's foreign policy is best expressed in the
words of Liaquat Ali Khan who in 1951 stated:
To us in Pakistan nothing is dearer than the prospect of the
strengthening of the world-wide Muslim brotherhood. Any
endeavour, from whatever direction it is made, to bring the
Muslims of far- flung countries together and to stimulate in them
brotherly feelings of mutual affection, understanding and co-
operation readily finds an echo in the hearts of the Muslims of
Pakistan.... [Indeed,] part of the mission which Pakistan has set
before itself [is] to do everything in its power to promote closer
fellowship and co- operation between Muslim countries.22
Aside from Pakistan's need to establish its place in the world, it has had a
genuine affinity with other Muslim populated territories seeking self-determi-
nation, given its past experience and its immediate concerns regarding Kashmir.
As Jinnah pointed out in 1948:
We are all passing through perilous times. The drama of power
politics that is being staged in Palestine, Indonesia and Kashmir
should serve as an eye opener to us [in the Muslim world]. It is
only by putting up a united front that we can make our voice felt
in the councils of the world.23
Twenty-six years later, in the keynote address to the Second Islamic Summit
Conference in Lahore, the secular-minded Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto
also called for Islamic unity:

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There is no power without economic strength. Unless we

reorientate our outlook and try to develop the potential to meet
our basic economic and security needs through cooperative
endeavour, we will continue to lack the inherent strength, the
solidity, which is necessary for achieving our social, cultural and
political purposes.
Bhutto continued:
The Muslim countries are now so placed as to be able to play a
most constructive and rewarding role for cooperation among
themselves and with other countries of the Third World. Not
only are they possessed of a common heritage and outlook but
also their economies are such as to enable them to supplement
one another's development effort. It is time that we translate the
sentiments of Islamic unity into concrete measures....24
As can be seen, sentiment and necessity have shaped Pakistan's foreign policy
objectives.

PAKISTAN'S QUEST FOR "BROTHERHOOD"

IN THE MUSLIM WORLD
Pakistan's efforts in its early years to forge close ties with the other
countries of the Muslim world were in some regards overzealous, for even
Dawn, the Muslim League newspaper felt the need to assert in 1952:
that the time has come for Pakistan's intelligentsia to realise that
Pakistan is not adding to its prestige in the international field by
running after certain other countries which are economically and
otherwise in a far less stable position than Pakistan itself....25
Indeed, the rector of Cairo's al-Azhar University "observed drily that too many
Islamic conferences had been called in Pakistan" while Egypt's King Faruq was
reported to have said in jest, "Don't you know that Islam was born on 14 August
1947?"26 Pakistan hosted the first International Islamic Economic Conference
in 1949, but the third meeting ofthat organization in 1954, also held in Karachi,
turned out to be its last. The third and fourth sessions of the World Islamic
Conference also met in, what was at the time, Pakistan's capital in 1949and 1951
— having previously gathered in Mecca and Jerusalem in 1926 and 1931,
respectively — but did not convene again until 1967.27 In addition, diere were
two failed attempts during the early 1950s to organize in Pakistan a conference
of governmental leaders from countries throughout the Muslim world.
These attempts at fostering Islamic brotherhood were bound to fail, for
other countries in the Muslim world did not share Pakistan's views regarding the
relationship between religion and nationality. Instead, they generally saw
political issues from perspectives of territorial or racial nationalism, or in terms
of opposition to Western colonialism rather than along lines of Muslim versus
non-Muslim. Therefore, India's calls for Afro- Asian solidarity had greater

35
Summer 1992

appeal. Nevertheless, Pakistan played an important role, during its early years,
especially in the United Nations, in its advocacy of the struggles for self-
determination in predominantly Muslim areas from North Africa to Southeast
Asia.
Few could speak so eloquently as Pakistan's Foreign Minister Zafrullah
Khan on the issue of Palestine. Just one day before the United Nations' General
Assembly adopted the proposal of the majority on the Special Committee on
Palestine calling for the partition ofthat country (28 November 1947), Zafrullah
Khan argued before the General Assembly that the Western powers were
"forcibly driving ... a Western wedge into the heart of the Middle East" and
warned them that they would have to face the consequences of their approval of
the creation of Israel: "Remember... that you may need friends tomorrow, that
you may need allies in the Middle East; I beg of you not to ruin and blast your
credit in those lands."28 Following the General Assembly vote (of 33 to 13, with
10 abstentions), in which Pakistan sided with the six Arab states, Turkey, Iran,
Afghanistan, India, Greece and Cuba, Dawn denounced the decision which it
viewed as supporting an "impolitic, immoral and illegal move to partition a
small country without reference to and against the will of the overwhelming
majority of its people." Moreover, the newspaper described the partition plan
as a "diabolical conspiracy to sow the seeds of war in the Middle East."29 Indeed,
as Zafrullah Khan pointed out to the General Assembly, in the midst of the 1948
Arab-Israeli war:
[A]t no time and under no circumstances would the East ever
assimilate or reconcile itself to a sovereign State of Israel. With
Jewry as such the East had no quarrel; it had indeed a deep
sympathy with the sufferings of the Jewish race....
As for the specific question of partition, Pakistan's Foreign Minister
asserted that his country ' s situation was quite different from that of Israel. After
all, the Indian subcontinent was divided as a result of mutual consent and
Pakistan was established in areas of South Asia where Muslims were in the
majority. In the case of Palestine, however, Zafrullah Khan pointed out that
Jews were in the minority in every sub-district except Jaffa; furthermore, (as he
was to state in 1952) the United Nations' actions with regard to Israel repre-
sented "an imposed decision to take away... [a] country from a people who had
inhabited a land for nearly 2,000 years and to hand it over to people who were
coming from... outside...."30 While the Arab-Israeli conflict continued to be an
important issue for the Pakistanis, there were a number of other territories
throughout the Muslim world in which they took an active interest.
When, in December 1948, the Netherlands attempted through military
means to reassert colonial control over Indonesia, Zafrullah Khan strongly
criticized diese actions while his government prohibited Dutch aircraft from
landing in or overflying Pakistan.31 The following year, not only were the
Netherlands and Indonesia able to reach an agreement with the help of the United
Nations concerning die latter's independence, but the General Assembly also
agreed to Libya becoming an independent state by January 1952, a cause for
which Zafrullah Khan had worked hard to garner support. The Pakistani Foreign

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 Conflict Quarterly

Minister also firmly opposed Italian trusteeship over Somaliland; the General
Assembly eventually placed Italy's former colony under the United Nations'
trusteeship, an arrangement that was to last until 1960 when that territory
received its independence. During the following decade Pakistan along with
other Asian and African states expressed support for Tunisian, Moroccan and
Algerian independence in discussions in the General Assembly.32 This was also
a time when Pakistan strengthened its ties with Turkey and Iran and moved
firmly into alliance with the Western powers. In the process, relations with much
of the Arab world deteriorated.

PAKISTAN, THE "NORTHERN-TIER"

AND ALLIANCE WITH THE WEST
By the early 1950s, Pakistan had little to show for its efforts in the
direction of attempting to achieve Islamic unity. At the same time, aside from
the Korean War boom, it faced continuing economic difficulties and had
concerns about its military security. Ever since the establishment of Pakistan,
its leaders had courted Washington for a strong commitment of military and
economic assistance, but during the late 1940s the Truman administration was
primarily concerned with developments in Europe and secondarily with those
in the Middle East and East Asia. South Asia, on the other hand, "simply did not
rank very high among American priorities during a time of heightened global
tensions and escalating demands for limited American resources."33 Moreover,
the Americans agreed with the British on the need for an evenhanded approach
with regard to Pakistan and India so as not to jeopardize prospects for a peaceful
resolution of the Kashmir dispute.
However, by 1951 with nationalistic fervor on the increase in the Middle
East in such places as Egypt and Iran over the issues of British troops based along
the Suez Canal and ownership of oil resources, respectively, the United States
began to view Pakistan as a strategic asset for the Western defense of the region.
While they took note that Pakistan possessed "the greatest military potential in
the Middle East next to Turkey," the British continued to have reservations
about arming the Pakistanis. However, the British were in no position to
dissuade the Americans when in 1953 the Eisenhower administration embraced
the idea of a "northern-tier" regional alliance to include Turkey, (post-crisis)
Iran, Iraq and Pakistan, as they favored a Middle Eastern defense pact in
principle and did not wish to alienate the Pakistanis over this issue. Moreover,
Pakistan's "clever combination" of public diplomacy, playing on the American
government's aversion to nonalignment, and leaks to both the American and
Pakistani press about plans for US-Pakistan military cooperation, designed to
agitate the Indian government, served to hasten American plans to arm Paki-
stan.34 On 19 May 1954, the United States and Pakistan signed a Mutual Defense
Assistance Agreement according to which Pakistan was to be provided with
military equipment and training for its armed forces. It should be noted that
during the preceding month the Americans had signed a similar agreement with
Iraq, and that Turkey and Pakistan had concluded a treaty of friendship and
cooperation, a move which the Eisenhower administration had hoped would

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Summer 1992

serve as the first step on the road to the development of a regional defense
organization. However, it was through a more forceful agreement calling for
cooperation in security and defense between Turkey and Iraq on 24 February
1955 that the "northern-tier" alliance, initially referred to as the Baghdad Pact,
was launched. Great Britain became a member less than two months later and
was followed by Pakistan in September and Iran in November of the same year.
Like the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO), in which Pakistan
became a founding member in September 1954, the Baghdad Pact had no joint
military command nor did it afford Pakistan protection in the event of war with
India.
Why then did Pakistan join these Western-sponsored pacts? Ayub
Khan, who was the Pakistani army's commander-in-chief from 1951-58, offers
the following explanation in his autobiography, regarding the Baghdad Pact:
The Muslim world occupied an area which was vital strategi-
cally and economically and that was the reason why the United
States and other western countries thought it worth their while to
befriend the Muslims.... There was no reason why we should not
have taken advantage of the opportunity. For us, our own needs
for development were paramount....
Moreover, Ayub Khan acknowledges that a "major benefit" of joining the
organization — which became known as CENTO with Iraq's withdrawal in
1959 — was the "association and friendship" that developed with Pakistan's
Muslim neighbors to the west, Turkey and Iran. As for SEATO, on the other
hand, whose Third World membership also included the Philippines and
Thailand — the other members were Australia, New Zealand, the US, Great
Britain and France — Ayub Khan has this to say:
I do not quite know the reasons that prompted the Government
of Pakistan to join this Organization: one must really ask
Chaudry Zafrullah Khan, who was then Foreign Minister. We
soldiers were not consulted.... I thought at the time [we learnt of
it] that Pakistan had no reason to join SEATO at all. Perhaps the
main consideration was to oblige the United States, who had
been giving us considerable economic help.35
Ayub Khan continues in his autobiography:
If anyone thought that membership of this Organization would
in any way strengthen the position of the eastern part of Pakistan,
then he was obviously overlooking die fact that the real danger
to East Pakistan was from India which surrounded it on all
sides.36
In 1971, just four years after Ayub Khan wrote those words, East
Pakistan — with the assistance of India — became Bangladesh. The loss of its
eastern wing also formally ended Pakistan's membership in SEATO. However,
in actuality, since the early 1960s — with Pakistan's growing ties with the

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People's Republic of China, and its disappointment over the US's failure to offer
support in its confrontation with India over Kashmir—that organization meant
nothing to the Pakistanis. As for CENTO, Pakistan remained a member until
1979, when due to the Iranian revolution, that organization ceased to exist.
While by the mid- 1960s the alliance itself was superseded in importance to its
members by its economic offshoot, the Regional Cooperation for Development
(RCD) organization, earlier, during the mid- to late 1950s, Pakistan and its
"northern-tier" allies had antagonized much of the Arab world.
When, in early 1954, Pakistan and Turkey announced that they would
make plans to cooperate in matters of defense, Egypt, which was in the process
of negotiating for the removal of British troops from its soil, criticized such a
move on Cairo radio calling it "a catastrophe for Islam ... the first stab in our
back. The next one will probably occur when Iraq joins the plot."37 Iraq's
signing of the Baghdad Pact a year later, as well as Great Britain's subsequent
accession to the alliance, disturbed not only Egypt, but most other Arab
countries as they saw it as an attempt by the West to divert their attention from
Israel and to maintain British influence in the Middle East. Therefore, when
Pakistan joined the Baghdad Pact, even Saudi Arabia, through its embassy in
Karachi, called the move "a stab in the heart of the Arab and Muslim states,"
while Radio Mecca lamented: "Is it... possible for any person to believe that an
Islamic State as that of Pakistan should accede to those who have joined hands
with Zionist Jews."38 (It should be noted that both Turkey and [alliance member
to be] Iran had recognized the state of Israel in 1950—though the latter only de
facto — and were in the process of expanding these ties.)39 A couple of months
later, during a visit to India, King Saud "publicly certified that the fate of Indian
Muslims was 'in safe hands.'"40 While Pakistani-Saudi relations had indeed
reached a low point, they were better than those between Karachi and Cairo at
the time of the Suez crisis of 1956.
Pakistan's involvement in the Suez crisis is far too complex to do it
justice in this article. However, the following interpretation of events is
presented in order to explain Pakistani- Egyptian relations in the context of
Pakistan's relations with the countries of the Middle East in general, and to
contrast it with those of India, its rival for influence in the region. In August
1956, just one month after Egypt nationalized the Anglo- French Suez Canal
Company, at the first London Conference of 22 countries called to consider the
issue, Pakistan's minister of foreign affairs and Commonwealth relations,
Hamidul Haq Choudhury, declared that "the sovereign right of Egypt in her
dealing with a commercial concern within her own territory cannot be chal-
lenged or contested." However, just like 17 other countries including the US,
Great Britain and France as well as Turkey, Iran and Ethiopia, Pakistan favored
international management of canal operations in cooperation with Egypt. India,
on the other hand, preferred a "consultative body of user interests" that would
not be able to exert any control over the canal; its proposal, which even the
Egyptians disliked, had the support of Ceylon, Indonesia and the Soviet Union.41
While Pakistan voiced its opposition to the Suez Canal User's Association
established by the Western powers—a scheme which Egypt's president Gamal

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Summer 1992

Abd al-Nasser labeled an "association for waging war" — and its foreign
minister, Firoz Khan Noon, declared: "we cannot... associate ourselves with the
use of force or any solution imposed on Egypt against her will," relations
between Cairo and Karachi remained at a low point.42
According to Muhammad Heikal, Nasser's confidant, the Egyptian
leader looked to Indian prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru for advice and support.
The two leaders who met each other initially a couple of months before the
Bandung Conference of Afro-Asian states in April 1955, came to develop a
personal friendship as well as a close working relationship in support of the
cause of nonalignment.41 On the other hand, Nasser was distrustful of the
Pakistani leadership and their almost unwavering support of the policies of the
Western powers. British Prime Minister Anthony Eden, however, "appreciated
Pakistan's role and difficulties [given the Pakistani public's pro-Egyptian
sentiment], and much preferred what was said and practised by Karachi... than
the moralizings and pro-Nasser positions adopted, as he saw it, by India...."44
When Great Britain, France and Israel went to war against Egypt in late
October-early November 1956, Pakistan's Prime Minister H.S. Suhrawardy in
"unreservedly condemning]" the action stated the following:
These developments have created a very grave situation. Not
only have these events incited and helped Israel in her aggressive
designs on Egyptian territory, but the violation by these two
Powers of Egyptian sovereignty and territory by the use of force,
in disregard of the appeals of the other members of the United
Nations, has shocked world opinion and placed the very concept
of that world organization in jeopardy.... What is happening in
Egypt today constitutes a threat to the entire Muslim world.45
Suhrawardy's statement was moderate in tone as he had to consider relations
with Great Britain both within the Baghdad Pact and the Commonwealth.
India, which also belonged to the Commonwealth, was the only member
of that body to send a formal protest to the British government, in which it
referred to the Anglo-French bombing of Egypt as "being against all considera-
tions of humanity." Nehru, himself, also remarked "we are going back to the
predatory method of the 18th and 19th centuries."46 Such words were more in
line with the tone of the Pakistani press. Dawn, in an editorial of 1 November
entitled "Hitler Reborn," declared that Great Britain and France "have suddenly
turned the clock back hundreds of years, unwritten much of what has since been
written in the book of human civilization, and decided to act as self-chartered
libertines with the gun and the bomb, killing and conquering the weak like
cowards."47 As for the Middle Eastern members of the Baghdad Pact, they
issued a joint statement in Tehran on 8 November in which they "condemned the
Israeli act of agression against Egypt," lamented the "regrettable armed inter-
vention of the British and French forces" and took credit for influencing the
British decision to accept a ceasefire on 6 November.48 As was to be expected,
following the ceasefire, Egypt turned to India for assistance at the United
Nations.

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When the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) was established

and sent to Egypt to maintain the ceasefire and to assist in the execution of UN
resolutions calling for the withdrawal of foreign forces, India sent a contingent
of peacekeepers. Egypt, however, rejected Pakistani participation in UNEF.
Suhrawardy reflecting on the Egyptian rejection stated the following to the
Pakistani National Assembly in February 1957:
When Egypt, which claims to be a champion of the Arab cause
and the anti-Israeli cause, chooses to recognize and make friends
with India and to have armies of India on its soil, the India which
recognizes Israel, and has trade relations with it, and amicable
relations with it, and refuses to allow Pakistani troops as a part
of the United Nations [Emergency] Force, am I to consider that
Israel is the pivot of Arab policy?49
This, of course, was "sour grapes"; while India did recognize Israel in 1950, it
never sent a diplomatic representative to the Jewish state, nor did Indian-Israeli
trade amount to much.50 Moreover, Suhrawardy himself in a American
television interview in July 1957 remarked that "the Arab states ought to
recognize Israel and make peace with her" and that "Pakistan might eventually
serve as a mediator."51 As a matter of fact, Zafrullah Khan had earlier served as
a "channel of Egyptian-Israeli dialogue."52 In any event, it would take some time
before Egypt and Pakistan could fully repair their strained relations.
Following the Suez Crisis of 1956, the US announced what came to be
known as the Eisenhower Doctrine. It was a program for the Middle East
designed to promote economic development and to provide military assistance,
including the employment of American armed forces, "to secure and protect the
territorial integrity and political independence of such nations, requesting such
aid, against overt armed aggression from any nation controlled by International
Communism."53 Naturally, the members of the Baghdad Pact embraced the
Eisenhower Doctrine, while Lebanon was the only Arab state (aside from Iraq)
to formally endorse the program. When in 1958, the US intervened in Lebanon
— where local Communists were not even a factor in that country's civil war,
but instead it was alleged that the United Arab Republic (UAR, a union of Egypt
and Syria) was involved — Pakistan, Turkey and Iran issued a joint statement
expressing their "appreciation and gratitude" for the "bold and appropriate
decision."54 (It should be noted that on 14 July, just a day before the US landed
troops in Lebanon, the Iraqi government was overthrown.) In contrast to the
response of Pakistan and its allies, both India and the UAR condemned the
American action.55 Yet with Iraq's subsequent withdrawal from the Baghdad
Pact, Pakistan had a chance to improve its relations with the Arab world and to
expand its ties with Turkey and Iran beyond matters of CENTO.

41
Summer 1992

PAKISTAN AND THE MIDDLE EAST SINCE THE 1960s

In 1960, in an article in Foreign Affairs, Pakistani President Ayub Khan
proudly declared the following:
[I]n the context of present-day world politics Pakistan has
openly and unequivocally cast its lot with the West, and unlike
several countries around us, we have shut ourselves off almost
completely from the possibility of any major assistance from the
Communist bloc. We do not believe in hunting with the hound
and running with the hare.56
Yet, during the same year, the controversy surrounding the downing of the
American U-2 spy plane over the Soviet Union — on a flight that may have
originated in Pakistan without that government's knowledge—probably forced
Pakistan to diversify its relations.57 By March 1961, it concluded an agreement
with the Soviet Union in which it received a $30 million loan and technical
assistance for oil exploration, while the following year, Pakistan began formal
negotiations that led to a border agreement being reached with the People's
Republic of China in 1963. Meanwhile, as a result of the Sino-Indian border war
of 1962, the United States and Great Britain rushed to provide India with military
aid. While the Pakistanis felt such assistance to be excessive, the United States
was quite concerned about Pakistan's growing relations with the People's
Republic of China, which also included a civil aviation agreement in 1963. At
the time of the Indo-Pakistani war of 1965, the US suspended arms deliveries to
both India and Pakistan, a move that hurt the latter far more due to its total
dependence on the US for military equipment and supplies. Naturally, the
Pakistanis felt betrayed.
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, who was foreign minister at the time, had this to say
about the American embargo:
America's reason for terminating military aid is to force both
countries into confrontation with China. Indo-Pakistani coop-
eration is a necessary step towards afixedobjective, which is the
encirclement of China. The United States being, badly bogged
down in Vietnam, would like to give military assistance only to
[Asian] countries willing to use that assistance in the Vietnam
war and prepared to use it against China.58
While relations between the US and Pakistan had reached a low point, things
improved somewhat over the next decade with the Sino-American rapproche-
ment.59 On the other hand, as for the Muslim world, most states were quite
supportive of Pakistan in its 1965 war with India.
Indeed, Pakistan's image had changed due to its growing and/or im-
proved relations with the Soviet Union and China, and its leadership's greater
appreciation of the motivations of neighboring states in the Middle East as well
as those in the Third World in general. During its confrontation with India in
1965, Pakistan not only received the strong support of Indonesia — whose
leader Sukarno, an important figure in the nonaligned movement, had offered

42
 Conflict Quarterly

military assistance — but also of Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. Iran
reportedly supplied Pakistan with jet fuel and gasoline free of cost, while Turkey
— which had earlier received Pakistani support with regard to Cyprus —
serviced aircraft and provided guns and ammunition. Saudi Arabia and, to a
much lesser degree, Jordan provided financial support. (At the same time, Egypt
professed its neutrality.)60 Two years later, during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war,
Pakistan was able to repay the favor of its Arab supporters and to show its
solidarity with Egypt, by condemning Israel's actions as "naked aggression"
and by offering "material help" to the frontline states.61 While relations with
Egypt did not improve much until after Nasser's death in 1970, ties with Saudi
Arabia strengthened during the late 1960s.
In August 1967, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia signed an agreement for
technical cooperation in thefieldof defense. This allowed for Pakistani military
officers to be sent to the desert kingdom to oversee the development of Saudi
Arabia's army and air force while Saudis were sent to Pakistan to receive
military training. It should be noted that while initial Saudi contacts about the
possibility of Pakistani help came as early as 1963, it was the American arms
embargo against Pakistan and that country's need to find alternate sources of
support as well as the "[impressive] Pakistani performance against a qualita-
tively and numerically superior Indian army" in 1965 that helped greatly to bring
the two parties together.62 Of course, both countries hoped to develop relations
beyond military ties.
As early as 1965, Saudi Arabia broached the idea of what became the
Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), currently an association of about
50 predominantly Muslim states promoting economic and cultural cooperation.
In 1966, King Faisal visited a number of countries, including Pakistan, to garner
support for his proposal of an Islamic pact, but received very little encourage-
ment. At the time, one knowledgeable observer explained the Pakistani position
in the following manner:
Pakistan has always been in favour of Muslim unity but is
nevertheless wary of entering any new pacts in the Middle East
since its unfortunate experience with the Arabs over the Bagh-
dad Pact. Now that a group of States [namely the UAR, Syria,
Iraq and Algeria] is opposing the idea of the Islamic pact,
Pakistan is all the more anxious to avoid involvement in Middle
East [Arab] disputes.63
Yet by 1969, following the burning of al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, the
short-lived Pakistani government of Yahya Khan attended the first summit
meeting of the OIC in Rabat in which 25 countries, including Turkey, Iran and
Egypt, were represented. The joint declaration concluding the conference
announced the organization's strong support of the "Palestine people for the
restitution of its usurped rights and in its struggle for national liberation."64
During the Indo- Pakistani war of 1971, with the most notable exception of
Egypt — which the Soviets used, possibly without Cairo's approval, as a base
to airlift weapons to India — countries throughout the Muslim world sided with

43
Summer 1992

Pakistan. Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Libya and Iran reportedly transferred military
equipment to Pakistan, including jets, while the last country also provided
sanctuary for Pakistani commercial aircraft.65 As a result of the war, Bangladesh
was established in what was formerly East Pakistan while Yahya Khan was
forced to resign as president and to hand over power to his deputy prime minister,
Zulfikar Ali Bhutto.
In 1972, a few months after assuming the presidency of what was left of
Pakistan, Bhutto stated the following concerning foreign policy:
The severance of our eastern wing by force has significantly
altered our geographic focus. This will naturally affect our
geopolitical perspective. The geographical distance between us
and the nations of South East Asia has grown .... [A]t the
moment, as we stand, it is within the ambit of South and Western
Asia. It is here that our primary concern must henceforth lie.
Bhutto continued:
There is a whole uninterrupted belt of Muslim nations, beginning
with Iran and Afghanistan and culminating on the shores of the
Atlantic and Morocco. With the people of all these states we
share a cultural heritage, religious beliefs and a good deal of
history. There is thus a community of interests which is further
buttressed by the similarity of our aspirations and hopes. Clearly
we have to make a major effort in building upon the fraternal ties
that already bind us to the Muslim world.66
Thus, Pakistan continued to play an active role in the OIC and to strongly support
the Arab cause against Israel. During the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, Pakistan sent
medical teams to both Egypt and Syria, while in the latter country Pakistani
pilots engaged in defensive actions.67 Furthermore, its minister for defense and
foreign affairs, Aziz Ahmed, presented the following condemnation of Israel in
the UN General Assembly:
For almost six years the Arabs and the rest of the world have
waited for a peaceful settlement in the Middle East in accordance
with Resolution 242, adopted by the Security Council in Novem-
ber 1967. Every effort made since then to resolve the conflict has
been frustrated by the intransigence of Israel.... Israel has put the
world on notice that it has no intention whatsoever to part with
the [occupied Arab] territory.... [Considering that all the
peaceful avenues of settlement have been blocked, it is small
wonder that the Arabs have taken up the challenge and decided
to meet force with force.68
Following the war, Pakistan hosted the second summit meeting of the
OIC in Lahore in February 1974, at which 37 countries and the PLO were
represented. (Syria and Iraq, which had boycotted the first summit in 1969 were
in attendance, though the latter strictly as an observer.) The three-day confer-
ence afforded Pakistan the opportunity of recognizing Bangladesh, of increas-

44
 Conflict Quarterly

ing its stature in the Muslim world politically and of benefiting economically.69
This latter concern was extremely important given the rising price of oil
following the 1973 Arab-Israeli war and the fact that Pakistan produced
domestically only about ten percent of its petroleum needs.70
Before pursuing in more detail Pakistan's economic relations with the
Middle East, which would increase greatly during the 1970s and beyond, it must
be mentioned, that while Bhutto held true to Pakistan's long standing foreign
policy objectives, he more fully developed the policy of "bilateralism" — i.e.,
good relations bilaterally with each of the three "superpowers"—that had been
initiated by Ayub Khan. (However, it was not until 1979, after the demise of
CENTO and under the rule of Zia ul-Haq—Bhutto's successor—that Pakistan
joined the Nonaligned Movement.) At the same time, Bhutto stayed clear of
disputes in the Muslim world and carried on a somewhat similar policy in the
Middle East by maintaining close ties with Saudi Arabia, Iran and Libya:
As he paid homage to Saudi Arabia for being the center of the
Islamic world, and King Faisal as the keeper of the Faith, he
cultivated the shah of Iran as an enlightened monarch and an old
friend of Pakistan, and Libya's Colonel Qadaffi as a special
person whose unannounced arrivals were always welcomed
with a great deal of pomp and ceremony.71
These relations would bear much fruit economically. From 1973 to
1976, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Libya, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Kuwait and
Qatar provided Pakistan with loans and credits worth $993 million, totaling
almost one-third of all financial aid coming from foreign sources over the same
time period.72 In addition, Pakistani exports to the Middle East increased
dramatically. In 1970-71, before the loss of East Pakistan, exports to the region
amounted to twelve per cent of total exports while in 1974-75 it was twenty-five
per cent.73 In 1974-75, Saudi Arabia was the largest market in the Middle East
in terms of monetary value for Pakistani agricultural and industrial exports,
followed by Iran, the UAE, Iraq and Kuwait. For the same time period, Saudi
Arabia and Kuwait (in that order) were far and away Pakistan's biggest suppliers
of oil.74 In addition to trade, the exportation of civilian manpower to the Middle
East began during the Bhutto administration while, as mentioned previously, the
exportation of military personnel to the region started even earlier. Both have
become important sources of foreign exchange and workers' remittances have
provided substantial relief in covering trade imbalances caused by therisingcost
of oil.
By 1977, there were more than 300,000 Pakistanis working in the
Middle East concentrated primarily in the Arab states bordering on the Persian
Gulf and in Libya. In 1977-78, they brought in remittances totaling more than
$1.1 billion (about twice the monetary amount of Pakistan's service on its
foreign debt) and equaling seventy-nine percent of the deficit-on-trade ac-
count.75 By 1983, an International Labor Organization report estimated that
there were 1.8 to 2.4 million Pakistanis working in the Middle East with fifty-
nine percent of the workers employed in Saudi Arabia. Moreover, remittances

45
Summer 1992

sent to Pakistan amounted to roughly $2 to $2.5 billion while petroleum imports

cost the Pakistanis approximately $1.45 billion.76
By 1981, Pakistan had military contingents in 22 countries — though
primarily in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Oman, Jordan, Syria and Libya—
and was, with the exception of Cuba, the leading supplier of military personnel
in the Third World. This policy was in part necessitated by the American arms
embargoes of 1965 and 1971, and it enabled Pakistan to finance military
purchases. (It should be noted that since the 1965 embargo, Pakistan has built
up an indigenous arms industry with the help of the Chinese and the French, who
have also provided or sold the Pakistanis tanks and aircraft, respectively; and
Pakistan has the capacity to rebuild or reconstruct those tanks and aircraft.)77 In
both Libya and the UAE, Pakistanis have been contracted to maintain and fly
airplanes for these countries' respective air forces while the two Arab states and
Saudi Arabia have funded arms purchases, including French Mirage aircraft and
American Cobra helicopters. In addition, it was reported in 1983 that the Saudis
were providing Pakistan with $1 billion in economic assistance annually. In
Saudi Arabia, the Pakistani presence had been, until the 1991 Gulf War, the
largest of any foreign military in the Arab world; it includes providing services
for the Saudi army, national guard and palace guard. Estimates of Pakistani
military personnel in Saudi Arabia vary; during the 1980s, it may have been
about 20,000 while during the Gulf War the official figure was 11,000.78
Pakistan is now dependent greatly on Saudi largess, which, as with its on
again, off again American connection, comes with political strings attached.
Recently, the Pakistanis were made fully aware of this with their equivocal stand
during the Gulf War. General Mirza Aslam Beg, the Pakistani army chief of staff
at the time, split with President Ghulam Ishaq Khan and Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif and openly supported Iraq while, due to internal Pakistani opposition to
American involvement in the war, Pakistani troops in Saudi Arabia were far
from the frontlines. Even though Pakistan faced a serious economic crisis at the
time, no Arab financial assistance was forthcoming.79

CONCLUSION
This article focuses primarily on a thirty year period in which Pakistan's
foreign policy objectives have remained constant. Indeed, such is still the case
of Pakistani policy today. However, Pakistan has, during its rather brief history,
shifted in its foreign policy from nonalignment to being part of the Western
alliance, to emphasis on "bilateralism." All during this time, it has sought
Islamic unity. By 1971, Pakistan may have lost its eastern wing, but it was
finally able to gain, through the efforts of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the acceptance of
the Muslim world and to benefit in terms of identity and security from these
relations.
While Bhutto was overthrown in 1977 and executed two years later, his
cultivation of close Pakistani-Middle Eastern ties would be his legacy to
Pakistan. However, these relations, while important, have not alone provided
the answers to Pakistan's problems of trying to insure its political and economic
security as well as finding the proper means of providing a strong sense of

46
 Conflict Quarterly

national identity. The Pakistani government has to resolve its on again, off again
dispute with the United States over its nuclear program, while it must work
together with the Indians to solve once and for all the most long-standing of their
problems—the issue of Kashmir. To say the least, these are not easy tasks, but
they are necessary for Pakistan to truly feel secure from external threats.
Moreover, Pakistan has to maintain a democratic process domestically that will,
over time, bridge ethnic differences and help to establish a Pakistani national
identity that will not be based solely on its citizenry sharing a common religion.
According to Anwar Hussain Syed in his masterful work, Pakistan:
Islam, Politics, and National Solidarity, only through democracy can Pakistan
achieve national solidarity. The case of Yugoslavia has shown that unity cannot
be forced. Neither can it be based solely on ideology as the demise of the Soviet
Union has proven. Islamic institutions and relations with the Muslim world may
be important for Pakistan's well-being politically, psychologically and/or
economically, but it cannot guarantee the survival of the Pakistani state—a state
with four distinct ethnic regions.

Endnotes
1. G.W. Choudhury, Pakistan's Relations with India, 1947-1964 (New York: Praeger,
1968), pp. 223-78; Latif Ahmed Sherwani, "The Objectives of Pakistan's Foreign
Policy," in Department of International Relations, University of Karachi, ed., Foreign
Policy ofPakistan: AnAnalysis (Karachi: Allies Book Corporation, 1964), pp. 1 l-15;and
W. Howard Wriggins, "South Asia and the Gulf: Linkages, Gains, and Limitations,"
Middle East Review, XVIII, no. 2 (Winter 1985/86), p. 32.
2. Shahid Javed Burki, Pakistan: A Nation in the Making (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1986),
pp. 1-2. Burki, formerly an economic advisor to Pakistan's Ministry of Commerce, is
presently an official with the World Bank.
3. Feroz Ahmed, "Pakistan's Problems of National Integration," in Mohammad Asghar
Khan, ed., Islam, Politics and the State: The Pakistan Experience (London: Zed Books,
1985), p. 234; and Ataur Rahman, "Pakistan: Unity or Further Divisions?," in A.
Jeyaratnam Wilson and Dennis Dalton, eds., The States of South Asia: Problems of
National Integration (Honolulu: University Press of Hawaii, 1982), p. 206.
4. See Selig S. Harrison, "Ethnic Conflict in Pakistan: The Baluch, Pashtuns, and Sindhis"
in Joseph V. Montville, ed.. Conflict and Peacemaking in Multiethnic Societies (Lexington,
MA: Lexington Books, 1990), pp. 301-25.
5. Devin T. Hagerty, "Pakistan's Foreign Policy Under Z.A. Bhutto," Journal ofSouth Asian
and Middle Eastern Studies, XIV, no. 4 (Summer 1991), pp. 57,60 and 70.
6. Anwar Hussain Syed, Pakistan: Islam, Politics, and National Solidarity (New York:
Praeger, 1982), p. 1%.
7. Craig Baxter, "Pakistan and the Gulf in Thomas Naff, ed., GulfSecurity andthe Iran-Iraq
War (Washington, DC: The National Defense University Press and the Middle East
Research Institute, 1985), p. 103-28.
8. Mumtaz Ahmad, "The Politics of War Islamic Fundamentalisms in Pakistan" in James
Piscatori, ed., Islamic Fundamentalisms and the Gulf Crisis, (Chicago: The American
Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1991 ), pp. 155-85; Steve Coll, "Pakistan's War Within,"
Washington Post, Weekly Edition, 18-24 February 1991, p. 20; and John Bray, "New
directions in Pakistan's foreign policy," The World Today, 48, no. 4 (April 1992), pp. 65-
66.

47
Summer 1992

9. J in nah was president of the Muslim League when he became governor- general; he was
also president of the Constituent Assembly.
10. Quoted in Benazir Bhutto, Daughter of Destiny (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1989),
p. 314.
11. Burki, A Nation in the Making, p. 43.
12. Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, Debates, vol. V, p. 2,7 March 1949 as quoted in Keith
Callard, Pakistan: A Political Study (London: George Allen & Unwin, 1957), p. 197.
13. Lawrence Ziring, Pakistan: The Enigma ofPolitical Development (Boulder, CO: Westview,
1980), p. 34.
14. Waheed-uz-Zaman, "Editor's Note," The Quest for Identity (Islamabad: University of
Islamabad Press, 1974), p. 1 as quoted in both Edward Mortimer, Faith and Power: The
Politic of Islam (New York: Random House, 1982), p. 215, and Shirin Tahir-Kheli, "In
Search of an Identity: Islam and Pakistan's Foreign Policy" in Adeed Dawisha, ed., Islam
in Foreign Policy (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), p. 70.
15 Syed, Islam, Politics, and National Solidarity, p. 126.
16. Harrison, "Ethnic Conflict," pp. 307-309.
17. Quoted in Burki, A Nation in the Making, p. 72.
18. See for example, Sumit Ganguly, "Avoiding War in Kashmir," Foreign Affairs, 69, no.
5 (Winter 1990/91 ), pp. 57-73, and Barbara Crossette, "India and Pakistan Seek Support
in Kashmir Rift," New York Times, 24 May 1990, p. A-6 for descriptions of recent events
and analyses of the ongoing dispute over Kashmir.
19. Some very good accounts of Pakistan's concerns regarding developments in Afghanistan
during the last decade include: W. Howard Wriggins, "Pakistan's Search for a Foreign
Policy After the Invasion of Afghanistan," Pacific Affairs, 57, no. 2 (Summer 1984), pp.
284-303 ; Hafeez Malik, "The Afghan Crisis and Its Impact on Pakistan," Journal ofSouth
Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, V, no. 3 (Spring 1982), pp. 40-52; Pervaiz Iqbal
Cheema, "The Afghan Crisis and Pakistan's Security Dilemma," Asian Survey, XXIII, no.
3 (March 1983), pp. 227- 243; and Marvin G. Weinbaum, "War and Peace in Afghanistan:
The Pakistani Role," Middle East Journal, 45, no. 1 (Winter 1991), pp. 71-85.
20. Shahid Javed Burki, "Economic Decision-making in Pakistan," in Lawrence Ziring,
Ralph Braibanti and W. Howard Wriggins, eds., Pakistan: The Long View (Durham, NC:
Duke University Press, 1977), pp. 150 and 152-53.
21. Burki, A Nation in the Making, pp. 106-07, Table 3.1.
22. Government of Pakistan Handout, E. No. 484,9 February 1951 as quoted in S.M. Burke,
Mainsprings of Indian and Pakistani Foreign Policies (Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota Press, 1974), p. 116.
23. Eid Message to the Muslim World, 27 August 1948 as quoted in Mushtaq Ahmad,
Pakistan's Foreign Policy (Karachi: Space Publishers, 1968), p. 102.
24. Speech of 22 February 1974 in Zulfikar AH Bhutto, The Third World: New Directions
(London: Quartet Books, 1977), p. 86.
25. Quoted in "Pakistan Comes Back to Earth," The Economist (London), 24 May 1952, p.
522.
26. Ibid, and Dawn, 27 September 1956 as quoted in S.M. Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy:
An Historical Analysis (London: Oxford University Press, 1973), p. 67.
27. Burke, Mainsprings, pp. 134-35.
28. UN General Assembly Official Records, Second Session, 126th Plenary Meeting as
quoted in Ahmad, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, p. 81, and K. Sarwar Hasan, Pakistan and
the United Nations (New York: Manhattan Publishing Company, 1960), p. 175.

48
 Conflict Quarterly

29. Dawn, 30 November 1947 as quoted in Hasan, Pakistan and the United Nations, p. 176.
30. UN General Assembly Official Records, Third Session, 145th Plenary Meeting, 27
September 1948 and Seventh Session, 406th Plenary Meeting, 18 December 1952 as
quoted in Hasan, Pakistan and the United Nations, p. 177, and Burke, Pakistan's Foreign
Policy, p. 138.
31. Mehrunnisa Ali, "Pakistan-Indonesia: Ties of Amity," Pakistan Horizon, XXXIV, no. 1
(1981), p. 95.
32. Hasan, Pakistan and the United Nations, pp. 186-205.
33. Robert J. McMahon, "United States Cold War Strategy in South Asia: Making a Military
Commitment to Pakistan, 1947-1954," Journal of American History, 75, no. 3 (December
1988), p. 819.
34. Ibid., pp. 832-38.
35. In 1953, the US gave Pakistan a gift of 610,000 tons of wheat and over the years that
followed, through the Public Law (PL)-480 food aid program, Pakistan paid rupees for
American wheat that went to a "counterpart fund," the resources of which paid for the local
costs of development projects. Thus, foreign exchange reserves that would have been
spent on food imports went instead to financing domestic economic development. Naved
Ahmad, "Pakistan-Turkey Relations," Pakistan Horizon, XXXIV, no. 1 (1981), p. 110,
and Burki, A Nation in the Making, p. 123.
36. Mohammad Ayub Khan, Friends Not Masters (Lahore: Oxford University Press, 1967),
pp. 154-58.
37. Dawn, 22 February 1954 as quoted in Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, p. 202.
38. The quotations are from Mujtaba Razvi, "Pak-Saudi Arabian Relations: An Example of
Entente Cordiale," Pakistan Horizon, XXXIV, no. 1 (1981), p. 83, and Hafeez-ur-
Rahman Khan, "Pakistan's Relations with the U.A.R.," Pakistan Horizon, XIII, no. 3
(1960), p. 216, respectively.
39. See Michael B. Bishku, "Turkey and its Middle Eastern Neighbors since 1945," Journal
ofSouth Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, XV, no. 3 (Spring 1992), pp. 51 -71 ; Amikam
Nachmani, Israel, Turkey and Greece: Uneasy Relations in the East Mediterranean
(London: Frank Cass, 1987); M.G. Weinbaum, "Iran and Israel: The Discreet Entente,"
Orbis, 18, no. 4 (Winter 1975), pp. 1070-87; and Sohrab Sobhani, The Pragmatic Entente:
Israeli-Iranian Relations, 1948-1988 (New York: Praeger, 1989), for accounts of those
relations.
40. Burke, Mainsprings, p. 154.
41. James Eayrs, ed., The Commonwealth and Suez: A Documentary Survey (London : Oxford
University Press, 1964), pp. 85-87, 141-46 and 151-55.
42. Eayrs, Commonwealth and Suez, pp. 91 and 155-56. Noon's statement is quoted from
Dawn, 17 September 1956.
43. Mohamed Hassanein Heikai, The Cairo Documents (New York: Doubleday, 1973), pp.
278-80 and 288.
44. Peter Lyon, "The Commonwealth and the Suez Crisis," in William Roger Louis and Roger
Owen, eds., Suez 1956: The Crisis and Its Consequences, (New York: Clarendon Press/
Oxford University Press, 1989), pp. 262-63.
45. Eayrs, Commonwealth and Suez, p. 261. Suhrawardy's statement is quoted from Dawn,
4 November 1956.
46. Eayrs, Commonwealth and Suez, pp. 194 and 251. Nehru's speech is quoted from The
Hindu, 2 November 1956.
47. Eayrs, Commonwealth and Suez, p. 197.

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48. Ibid., pp. 265-66.

49. National Assembly of Pakistan, Debates, 25 February 1957 as quoted in Burke, Pakistan 's
Foreign Policy, p. 204.
50. See Jacob Abadi, "Israeli-Indian Relations: Futile Attempts at Rapprochement," Journal
of Third World Studies, VIII, no. 2 (Fall 1991 ), pp. 161 -74, and Richard J. Kozicki, "India
and Israel: A Problem in Asian Politics," Middle Eastern Affairs, IX, no. 5 (May 1958),
pp. 162-72. Israel sent a consul to establish an office in Bombay in 1953. In January 1992,
Israel and India established full diplomatic relations.
51. Quoted in P.G., "Israel Looks Towards Africa and Asia," The World Today, 14, no. 1
(January 1958), p. 42.
52. Shimon Shamir, "The Collapse of Project Alpha," in Suez 1956, p. 78.
53. M.S. Agwami, ed., The Lebanese Crisis, 1958: A Documentary Study (Bombay: Asia
Publishing House, 1965), pp. 9- 10.
54. Ankara, Cable from Shah Muhammad Riza Pahlavi of Iran, President Iskander Mirza of
Pakistan and President Celal Bayar of Turkey to Eisenhower, 16 July 1958, Presidential
Papers, International Series, Box 44, Eisenhower Library (Abilene, KS.). For further
details on the American intervention see: Michael B. Bishku, "The 1958 American
Intervention in Lebanon: A Historical Assessment," American-Arab Affairs, no. 31
(Winter 1989-90), pp. 106-19.
55. Agwami, Lebanese Crisis, pp. 273 and 284.
56. Mohammed Ayub Khan, "Pakistan Perspective," Foreign Affairs, 38, no. 4 (July 1960),
p. 555. Though written before the U-2 incident this article was published after.
57. Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, pp. 266-67.
58. Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, The Myth ofIndependence (London: Oxford University Press, 1969),
p. 102.
59. With regard to the American arms embargo, it was partially lifted in 1967, reimposed in
1971 and lifted again in 1975. However, when Pakistan announced the following year that
it would build a nuclear processing facility, it was not until the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan that the Reagan administration initiated significant arms transfers. In 1990,
following the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan, the embargo was reimposed, once
again due to Pakistan's nuclear program.
60. Safdar Mahmood, A Political Study of Pakistan (Lahore: Muhammad Ashraf, 1972), pp.
222-24 and 226; Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, pp. 353-55; and Ahmad, "Pakistan-
Turkey Relations," pp. 117 and 119-20.
61. Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, p. 371.
62. Shirin Tahir-Kheli and William O. Staudenmaier, "The Saudi-Pakistani Military Rela-
tionship: Implications for U.S. Policy," Orbis, 26, no. 1 (Spring 1982), p. 157andNaveed
Ahmad, "Pakistan-Saudi Relations," Pakistan Horizon, XXXV, no. 4 (1982), pp. 52-53.
63. Qureshi, "Pakistan and the Middle East," p. 166.
64. Burke, Pakistan's Foreign Policy, pp. 372-74. Interestingly, just one year later, in
September 1970, Pakistani military advisers in Jordan, including future president Zia ul-
Haq, participated in suppressing the Palestinian civil war against King Hussein.
65. M.G. Weinbaum and Gautam Sen, "Pakistan Enters the Middle East," Orbis, 22, no. 3
(Fall 1978), pp. 598-99, and Major David O. Smith, "Pakistan and the Middle East
Connection," Military Review, LXJI, no. 10 (October 1982), p. 46.
66. Dawn, 16 April 1972 as quoted in Khurshid Hyder, "Pakistan under Bhutto," Current
History, 63, no. 375 (November 1972), p. 203.
67. Weinbaum and Sen, "Pakistan Enters the Middle East," p. 600.

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68. United Nations Documents, no. A/PV 2147, 10 October 1973, p. 56 as quoted in
Saeeduddin Ahmad Dar, "The Ramazan War and Pakistan," Pakistan Horizon, XXK, no.
2 (1976), p. 61.
69. See Mehrunnisa Ali, "The Second Islamic Summit Conference, 1974," Pakistan Horizon,
XXVII, no. 1 ( 1974), pp. 29-49 for a thorough account of the proceedings and impact of
the conference.
70. Wriggins, "South Asia and the Gulf," p. 30.
71. Shirin Tahir-Kheli, The United States and Pakistan: The Evolution of an Influence
Relationship (New York: Praeger, 1982), p. 64.
72. Weinbaum and Sen, "Pakistan Enters the Middle East," p. 602.
73. W. Eric Gustafson, "Economic Problems of Pakistan Under Bhutto," Asian Survey, XVI,
no. 4 (April 1976), p. 372.
74. Zubeida Mustafa, "Recent Trends in Pakistan's Foreign Policy," Pakistan Horizon,
XXVIII, no. 4 (1975), p. 17, Table D.
75. Isabelle Tsakok, "The Export of Manpower from Pakistan to the Middle East, 1975-85,"
in Shahid Javed Burki and Robert LaPorte, Jr., eds., Pakistan 's Development Priorities:
Choices for the Future (Karachi: Oxford University Press, 1984), p. 224, Table 8.1;
Weinbaum and Sen, "Pakistan Enters the Middle East," pp. 603-4; and Burki, A Nation
in the Making, p. 128, Table 3.6.
76. Anthony Hyman, "Pakistan in uncertain times," The World Today, 42, no. 7 (July 1986),
p. 120 and Wriggins, "South Asia and the Gulf," p. 31.
77. Stephen P. Cohen, The Pakistan Army (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1984),
pp. 150-51.
78. Devlet Khalid, "Pakistan's Relations with Iran and the Arab States," Journal of South
Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, V, no. 3 (Spring 1982), p. 20-21; B.A. Roberson,
"South Asia and the Gulf Complex," in Barry Buzan and Gowher Rizvi, eds., South Asian
Insecurity and the Great Powers (New York: St. Martin's, 1986), p. 172; Michael T.
Kaufman, "22 Countries Avail Themselves of Pakistani Soldiers," New York Times, 6
February 1981, p. A-2; Tahir-Kheli, The United States and Pakistan, p. 89; Craig Baxter,
"Pakistan Becomes Prominent in the International Arena" in Shahid Javed Burki and
Craig Baxter, eds., Pakistan Under the Military: Eleven Years ofTia ul-Haq (Boulder,
CO: Westview, 1991), p. 143; Mary Ann Weaver, "Military men for rent; world's no. 2
tries harder" Christian Science Monitor, 3 October 1983, p. 11 ; and Sunday World-Herald
[Omaha], 10 February 1991, p. 25-A.
79. Bray, "New directions," p. 66, and Shahid Javed Burki, "Pakistan's Cautious Democratic
Course," Current History, 91, no. 563 (March 1992), p. 122.

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