By Daniel Markey Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia Author, Securing Pakistan s Tribal Belt

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1 Council Special Report Securing Pakistan s Tribal Belt Teaching Notes By Daniel Markey Senior Fellow for India, Pakistan, and South Asia Author, Securing Pakistan s Tribal Belt This Council Special Report, Securing Pakistan s Tribal Belt, outlines the nature of the challenges in Pakistan s tribal areas, formulates strategies for addressing these challenges, and distills these strategies into realistic policy proposals. The report provides essential context on the land, people, governing institutions, and security forces of Pakistan s tribal belt, and further examines Musharraf s comprehensive approach and post-election deal-making, Pakistan-Afghanistan relations, and U.S. policy in the tribal areas. The report advocates a strategic shift to treat Pakistan s tribal areas as a top tier national security threat and argues that the best way to meet the challenges in Pakistan s tribal areas is through enhanced partnership with the political and security institutions of the Pakistani state. The report asserts that Washington needs to allocate substantial financial resources to the region and refocus the bureaucracy at home by investing in expanded institutions and specialized personnel. Moreover, it concludes that the United States should intensify its bilateral relationship with Pakistan to help Islamabad build more effective security forces and develop the capacity to govern the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Investing in a long-term partnership with Islamabad will not be cheap or easy, but the foreseeable costs associated with all of the realistic alternatives are even more daunting. The Council on Foreign Relations Academic Outreach Initiative is designed to connect educators and students at the college and graduate level with CFR s research and nonpartisan analysis. For more information, visit

2 This report is suitable for the following types of courses: Regional studies of Pakistan and/or South Asia U.S. national security and counterterrorism U.S. foreign policy and international affairs These teaching notes discuss questions and suggestions for further projects, including class debates, policy options papers, and op-eds, which may be useful for students in any of the courses above. Discussion Questions Courses on Pakistan and/or South Asia 1. Is Pakistan s inability to pacify its tribal areas due to a lack of will, lack of capacity, both, or neither? If the former plays a role, how should the United States address the problem of the Pakistani army s mixed motives in dealing with militancy? 2. What are the root causes for Pakistan s tensions with Afghanistan and India? How do these tensions affect Pakistan s perception of the constellation of threats to its national security? How would a thaw in relations with either country affect Pakistan s behavior, and is such a thaw feasible? 3. How should Pakistan structure and sequence its comprehensive approach toward the FATA? What is the most realistic acceptable mode of governance in Pakistan s tribal areas? How should the United States prioritize and disseminate development assistance to Pakistan s tribal areas? 4. How do Pakistan s weak civilian government institutions, dynastic political parties, and historically volatile civil-military relations affect the government s ability to enact policy in its tribal areas? Courses on U.S. National Security and Counterterrorism 1. Where should Pakistan fall in the hierarchy of U.S. national security concerns? 2. How should the United States balance its efforts between Afghanistan and Pakistan? 3. How should Washington weigh the costs and benefits of drone attacks as a counterterrorism tool? 4. To what extent do differing U.S. and Pakistani threat perceptions affect the two countries security relationship?

3 5. To what extent should the United States weigh the potential for Pakistan s failure in its strategic calculations? Should Washington develop a Plan B and should there be a timeline for activating that plan? Courses on U.S. Foreign Policy and International Affairs 1. What are the underlying causes of the trust deficit between the United States and Pakistan? How can the United States convince Pakistan of positive U.S. intentions in South Asia? 2. What are the pros and cons of coercion as a tool of U.S. foreign policy, both generally and in the case study of Pakistan? 3. How should the United States structure a policy of inducement in order to optimize the impact of carrots and sticks? 4. Do you agree with the author s thesis that patience and engagement remain far better tools to address Pakistan s tribal areas than unilateral or coercive measures? Why or why not? 5. Is it necessary or even possible for the United States to reverse its unpopularity in Pakistan in order to achieve its foreign policy objectives in South Asia? 6. To what extent should the United States seek to work through international organizations in order to address some of the challenges presented by Pakistan s tribal belt? Further Projects Debate Divide students into small groups and organize a debate on some of the difficult and contested policy issues raised in the report, for example: Pakistan is the primary national security threat to the United States today. Unmanned drone strikes against targets in Pakistan s tribal belt are an essential component of U.S. counterterrorism strategy. The United States needs to partner with leaders in Islamabad in order to accomplish its goals in Pakistan s tribal areas. Political and economic change cannot take place in an environment of extreme insecurity.

4 National Security Council Options Paper Assign students to write a paper modeled after a National Security Council (NSC) Options Paper. In the Options Paper format (for one example, see the author lays out the most convincing case in favor of each plausible policy direction in this case, U.S. policy toward Pakistan s tribal belt. After laying out justification for each position, the author offers his or her recommendation for U.S. policy and explains why the other alternatives are inferior. Op-eds Learning how to write concise op-ed length pieces is a useful skill to develop, and one that is not often emphasized in the academic world. While similar to the NSC Options Paper in that both products advocate a position, an op-ed must be shorter, narrowly address the point of view being presented, and written for an audience that likely has little background on the issue. Any number of the discussion questions posed above would be suitable subjects for an op-ed length treatment on the issue of Pakistan s tribal areas. Supplementary Materials Ahmed, Akbar S., Social and Economic Change in the Tribal Areas, , Oxford University Press, Edwards, David B., Heroes of the Age: Moral Fault Lines on the Afghan Frontier,University of California Press, Government of Pakistan, FATA Sustainable Development Plan , Haq, Noor ul, et al., Federally Administered Tribal Areas of Pakistan, Islamabad Policy Research Institute Paper 10, March Hussain, Zahid, Frontline Pakistan: The Struggle With Militant Islam,Columbia University Press, Johnson, Thomas H. and M. Chris Mason, No Sign Until the Burst of Fire, International Security, Vol. 32, No. 4, Spring Neumann, Ronald, Borderline Insanity, American Interest, Vol. 3, No. 2. Pakistan s Tribal Areas: Appeasing the Militants, International Crisis Group, December 11, 2006.

5 Schmidle, Nicholas, Next-Gen Taliban, New York Times Magazine, January 6, Shinwari, Naveed Ahmad, Understanding FATA: Attitudes toward Governance, Religion & Society in Pakistan s Federally Administered Tribal Areas, Community Appraisal & Motivation Programme, Tellis, Ashley J., Pakistan and the War on Terror: Conflicted Goals, Compromised Performance, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, White, Joshua T., Pakistan s Islamist Frontier: Islamic Politics and U.S. Policy in Pakistan s North-West Frontier, Religion and Security Monograph Series, No. 1, Center on Faith & International Affairs, 2008.