Pakistan and the United States

An Embassy after Partition

The United States recognized independent Pakistan and established an embassy in Karachi on August 15, 1947. M. A. H. Ispahani presented credentials in Washington on October 8. Refugee relief and development finance soon occupied Pakistan’s embassy. In December, the State Department answered its requests for a broad loan by recommending applications for specific projects to the Export-Import Bank. It also supported approaches for relief supplies. [1] [2] [3]

Security Interests and Competing Channels

Pakistan joined the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization in 1954 and the Baghdad Pact in 1955, seeking security support in a region dominated by rivalry with India. Washington approached those arrangements through its struggle against communism. The different priorities became evident in the 1965 India–Pakistan war, when American restrictions on arms supplies applied to both belligerents. Membership in Western security institutions did not guarantee American support in Pakistan’s regional conflicts. [10]

Security cooperation did not remove differences over India. During the 1962 border war between India and China, Ambassador Aziz Ahmed sought explanations of American military aid to India. Assistant Secretary Phillips Talbot described the equipment and the assurances obtained from New Delhi. A White House memorandum acknowledged that these explanations had not visibly reassured Ahmed. [4]

In 1971, Ambassador Agha Hilaly carried a secret American message proposing Henry Kissinger’s preliminary meeting with Chinese leaders. President Yahya Khan passed it to the Chinese ambassador in Pakistan, preserving the channel requested by Washington. At the same time, American diplomats in Dacca challenged their government’s response to the Pakistani army’s repression in East Pakistan. Their April 6 dissent telegram condemned Washington’s failure to denounce atrocities. The secret opening to China and reporting from East Pakistan exposed sharply different priorities within American diplomacy. [5] [6]

Disruption and Negotiated Limits

An attack on the American embassy in Islamabad on November 21, 1979, killed staff and burned the chancery. The next day’s situation report recorded the Secretary of State’s order to evacuate dependents and personnel deemed nonessential, while Ambassador Arthur Hummel established temporary offices in the aid mission’s building. He remained in contact with Pakistani authorities about protection. [7] [8]

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan later in 1979 changed American priorities again. Pakistan became a route for arms to Afghan resistance forces and a refuge for people escaping the war. Washington negotiated a large assistance package in 1981. Nuclear concerns remained unresolved: the Pressler Amendment required presidential certification that Pakistan lacked a nuclear explosive device, and the failure to certify in 1990 brought another aid cutoff. Assistance thus alternated with restrictions as strategic needs and nonproliferation policy collided. [11]

Pakistan’s nuclear test brought a further restriction on cooperation. President Bill Clinton ordered sanctions on 30 May 1998. [9]

Afghanistan and a Broader Agenda

After the attacks of September 11, 2001, cooperation over Afghanistan and counterterrorism brought renewed American assistance. The partnership remained vulnerable to disputes over sovereignty and trust. The 2011 American operation that killed Osama bin Laden inside Pakistan, followed by a NATO border incident that killed Pakistani soldiers, produced severe strains. Pakistan closed supply routes to Afghanistan for more than seven months. [11]

The American withdrawal from Afghanistan in 2021 narrowed the earlier security framework. A broad suspension of security assistance begun in 2018 still shaped relations when Congress reviewed them in May 2023. Other channels were reopening: a health dialogue began in 2022, and trade and energy meetings followed in 2023. American flood relief after the 2022 disaster added humanitarian recovery to that agenda. [12]

Related Reading

• United States Imposes Sanctions after Pakistan’s Nuclear Tests [9]
• U.S. Embassy in Islamabad Is Attacked [7] [8]
• Pakistan Enables Kissinger’s Secret Visit to China [5]
• United States Recognizes Pakistan [1]