ABSTRACT
One key focus of the new Obama Administration in 2009 was the conflict in Afghanistan, which had been relatively neglected by the previous George W. Bush Administration due to the ongoing War in Iraq (Kronstadt 2009: 52). Under Bush, the US had effectively relied on Pakistan’s army to deal with the threat of terrorism emanating from Pakistan, while America was busy elsewhere. 1 As an official American ally in the War on Terrorism, Pakistan supposedly severed links with the Afghan Taliban that it had maintained in the past (Quraishi 2002). Key figures in the Bush Administration also believed that the army in Pakistan would not rely on the Afghan Taliban and other militant groups as its regional proxies. However, unofficially, the Pakistan army continued to play a ‘double game’, despite its newly revived alliance with the US (Jones 2009: 248). In part, the links were maintained with these groups in order to garner influence in Afghan and Indian affairs, helping to prolong regional conflicts. In addition, the Pakistani Government signed peace deals with various militants in conflict with the army, creating greater scope for their more exclusive focus on attacking American forces inside Afghanistan (BBC News 2006).
