General Sharif leads the ‘Muslim NATO’ Prospects and Challenges

Rumours have been aplenty since spring 2016 that Pakistan’s former Chief of Army Staff, General Raheel Sharif, will be leading the Saudi Arabia-led Islamic Military Alliance – being dubbed as ‘Muslim NATO’ – to counter terrorism. Now, we have formal confirmation: the general has agreed to head the 41-country coalition force. The move is highly significant and is likely to cultivate significant changes.

Politics, diplomacy, policies and strategies, all revolve around personalities. And, when it comes to countering militancy and terrorism, no one stands more accomplished and eligible to serve the role than General Raheel Sharif himself. “Not only was he the head of a national army locked in a crucial battle with militants,” put a leading national newspaper of Pakistan, “he has also been credited with defining that war, discarding the often half-hearted efforts he had inherited, and launching a real offensive”.

The rise and rise of the General

June 2014 saw the start of a meteoric rise in the popularity of General Raheel Sharif. In this month, Pakistan Army, under the outstanding and dynamic leadership of the invincible commander, entered the North Waziristan Agency — a tribal area along Pakistan-Afghanistan border – to rid the soil of terrorists. The launch of Operation Zarb-e-Azb, on 15 June 2014, brought the General into the limelight of international media and its successes, subsequently, galvanized his fame.

General Raheel served so extraordinarily that he became people’s icon for bravery, courage and resoluteness. He emerged as the most magnetic COAS in the history of Pak Army – people, civilian and military men alike, were drawn toward him. His dream of Pakistan, which he expressed through his speeches, as a land of opportunities where peace prevails and prosperity flourishes, infused into people a strong liking for him. General Raheel Sharif, undoubtedly, left behind the revered legacy, any commander would ever dream of.

Saudi-Iran equation and Pakistan’s role

Religious divide along Sunni and Shiite lines is the most glaring feature of the Middle East. In fact, Saudi Arabia and Iran are considered arch-rivals as they have long been vying for influence in the Arab world and beyond. The rivalries between them stretch over land in the form of proxies across the Middle East, on organizational platforms of OIC and OPEC, and within the domain of sovereign relations with other states. Interestingly, when Saudi Arabia announced to forge the Islamic Military Alliance to Fight Terrorism, a vast majority of scholars, strategists, policymakers and politicians viewed it through the prism of this ages-old rivalry. Further augmenting the view is the reality that the alliance includes only Sunni states, and no Shiite states like Iran, Iraq and Syria, in its fold.

Because there exists a deep-seated mistrust and hatred between Saudi Arabia and Iran, restoring peace and order in the Middle East is extremely difficult. Both sides do not see the underlying security challenges in the same light; instead, they cherish different preferences for the region. Resultantly, the region is shattered and peace and security seem a long way off.

Therefore, to eliminate terrorism and increase the prospects of peace, critical reflection on ideas and strategies is nowhere more important than in the Middle East. While making critical assessments, it is, however, equally important to avoid looking through sectarian lenses as interpretations based on sectarian divides will only yield more sectarianism, serving none but terrorists.

Emphasizing the need to increase a state’s ability to defend itself against looming threats, proponents of realism propose forging alliances among states. Judging the Islamic Military Alliance on these premises, purely-held around managing security challenges rising primarily out of threats from non-state terrorist actors, the coalition seems a rational choice.

The primary objective of the alliance is to counter common security threats, ISIS and other terrorist networks. At a time when ISIS fighters and insurgents are losing their control over territories in Syria and Iraq, the outfit is desperately looking to other places, especially in Africa, Afghanistan and Central Asia, for refuge. This terrorist group has shown an immense capacity to adapt to the currently changing security environment and it has widely been reported that its fighters are even switching the label to temporarily become affiliated with other ‘moderate’ groups. It entails that ISIS will continue for a longer than anticipated time to undermine security arrangements across the region and the globe.

There was, once, a widely-held assumption that ISIS is predominantly pitted against Shiites. However, time proved its irrelevancy to the ground realities. The group showed, time and again, its utter disregard for Sunni ideology; many prominent Sunni clerics are known to be executed just because they refused to comply with the narrow and bigoted version of the ISIS’s religious outlook. Over and above their aim to establish global caliphate threatens the territorial integrity and sovereignty of all Muslim states, regardless of their being Shiite or Sunni.

Apart from the impacts of ISIS’s violent tendency, its political and religious tendencies, too, are more threatening to states that are chiefly inhabited by Sunni population as ISIS militants’ hordes are mainly of Sunni origin and envision to sway Sunni Muslims under the influence of their cult. Therefore, it is a security imperative for such states to come closer to manage their security through collective measures.

Especially related to Pakistan, some scholars opine that because of the country’s geographical contiguity with Iran, it will be an imprudent strategy for Pakistan to commit its military capabilities for the alliance. They emphasize that the country’s participation will exacerbate concerns of Iran’s strategic and security planners and will cause the country to align herself with India – the chief external threat to, and a hostile neighbour of, Pakistan.

But the assumption is flawed on many grounds primarily because the alliance of 41 Muslim states does not carry the prospects and considerations of ‘balance of power’ against any state or coalition but it is purely based on security assumptions to manage insecurities emerging from the threats of radical Islamists. Moreover, Pakistan’s decision to join the alliance is not motivated by passion to satiate any material appetite (to borrow from St. Augustine’s saying) for power or even operating on the basis of any expediency; rather it is governed by principled approach toward securing peace and security within its territorial boundaries and the region at large. Therefore, by forming alliance against the looming threat of ISIS will not perpetuate the sense of vulnerabilities and insecurities in Iran.

Moreover, Pakistan occupies a unique position in the economic, political and security features of the Muslim world. The country has long been acting as a ‘balancing force’ in Saudi-Iran equation. Exercising balance characterizes foreign and defence policies and decision-making of Pakistan.

Because of the country’s geographical proximity with Iran, and its political clout in the Muslim world, Pakistan is better placed to bring Saudi Arabia and Iran closer. On the other hand, burying head in the sand, hoping the winds of terrorism will blow off, will only hurt Pakistan’s interests both in the short and long term.

Joining the military alliance bears, along with many other incentives, the prospects of accelerating interdependence and integration among the Muslim countries. Establishing strong military, intelligence and diplomatic relations to increase ability to confront common enemy, that is, terrorism, can prove to be a strong foundation toward wider political, social and economic engagements. Moreover, active involvement of economically and militarily strong Muslim states like Turkey, Malaysia and Pakistan, will likely keep ethno-linguistic and sectarian discontents under wraps in the Middle East, thus ultimately culminating into enduring peace and prosperity in the region and beyond.