Pakistan’s parliamentarians are a bit confused about their country’s place in the ongoing campaign against terrorism in South Asia. In a resolution that passed with unanimous support from all parties this week, they called on new President Asif Ali Zardari to undertake “an urgent review of our national security strategy” with a view to negotiating with and accommodating extremist groups and scaling back military operations. The text also demanded that Pakistan pursue “an independent foreign policy” distinct from that of the United States, which has provided Islamabad with $10-billion (U.S.) in mostly military aid since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.

This would all be a perfectly reasonable attempt to correct a failed strategy for combatting militancy if it did not rest on a caricature of Pakistani behaviour over the last seven years. Pakistan, especially under recently departed dictator Pervez Musharraf, has pursued an independent foreign policy.

There’s no other way to characterize a situation in which the country’s leaders have claimed to be doing all they can to break up terrorist groups even as the military has provided them with safe haven and, in some cases, active support.

It is similarly incorrect to characterize Islamabad’s policies up to now as confrontational. At the Red Mosque, a hard-core Islamist compound in the heart of Islamabad, and more recently in the Bajaur tribal district, the government chose to act only under considerable international pressure and after allowing militants to put down deep roots.

Elements of the Taliban and al-Qaeda continue to operate with impunity in large, lawless sections of Pakistan. Giving up on a tough approach to extremists presumes that a tough approach has been tried.

The Pakistani parliament has, in other words, directed its fire in the wrong direction. The military remains the key obstacle to making real headway against Islamic extremism. Its generals’ priority is the endless struggle for influence with India, in which the most unsavoury of Islamist groups continue to be seen as useful. The powerful ISI defence intelligence agency is preoccupied with the notion that India is vying for influence in Afghanistan, and would prefer to see the Taliban resurgent there instead.

If they are truly serious about combatting terrorism, Pakistan’s civilian leaders have no choice but to rein in the military. That is an unenviable task. Decades of corruption and sporadic dictatorship have given the armed forces unique financial and political clout, and their leaders have few qualms about interfering in politics when threatened.

But there is some reason to believe that the generals could be persuaded to change their ways. Years of quiet support for extremists have left Pakistan weak, divided, and disastrously poor. Next door, India is on the verge of superpower status thanks to a relatively strong economy and robust civil society. In the race for regional strategic supremacy, Pakistan is fast becoming an also-ran.

If nothing else can convince the military that making deals with terrorists only weakens Pakistan, perhaps that might.

globeandmail.com: Pakistan’s so-called war on terrorism