The help of the Pakistani intelligence services to Britain has been vital in identifying the links of these potential terrorists to groups in Pakistan, and to preventing more attacks on the UK and elsewhere in Europe. Islamabad therefore has been only a partial ally in the “war on terror”—but still a critical and irreplaceable one [bold mine-DL]. For we need to remember that in the end, it is only legitimate Muslim governments and security services that can control terrorist plots on their soil. Western pressure may be necessary to push them in the right direction, but we need to be careful that this pressure does not become so overwhelming that it undermines or even destroys those governments by humiliating them in the eyes of their own people. ~Anatol Lieven

Whenever one is tempted to start talking about Pakistani perfidy or makes claims that Pakistan should “no longer be regarded as a U.S. ally,” I recommend that he read some of Lieven’s analysis of Pakistan’s politics. Many Americans seem to be yielding to another form of the sort of moral absolutism that took possession of the country after 9/11, but in this case there is much less excuse for it. For one thing, we have already seen where that sort of absolutism can lead when it is manipulated or exploited, and for another the “perfidy” or complicity with which everyone seems ready to indict the entire Pakistani establishment does not obviously apply to the whole. Despite the last decade’s experience with our own government’s shoddy and incomplete intelligence-gathering, many of us suddenly have enormous confidence in the competence and awareness of the Pakistani government. Let me suggest that relying on Indian news accounts for a fair treatment of the issue of Pakistan and terrorism is likely to lead one astray as often as not. Indian papers are understandably eager to exploit the situation to make popular anti-Pakistani arguments, but we shouldn’t be so quick to follow suit.

Whenever an allied government doesn’t measure up to what the U.S. expects of it, it is tempting to accuse it of perfidy or betrayal, but that avoids considering whether we are expecting something that the ally can reasonably provide. Libya hawks have taken to bashing Germany for its pacifism, which is another way of saying that allies are supposed to act like satrapies: they are not permitted to make independent judgments about policy questions, nor are they allowed to act in their own interests. Iraq hawks derided Turkey for its opposition to the invasion, and some of them built up entire narratives that portrayed France as our traditional nemesis. Considering how widely loathed our government is in Pakistan, and considering how antagonistic many of our policies are to Pakistani interests, the U.S. has no reason to expect any Pakistani cooperation. For various reasons, we have received some cooperation anyway. Inevitably, that isn’t enough for some people, who seem to expect allied governments to commit a sort of suicide to fulfill our demands.

Just two months ago, Hosni Mubarak was ousted by his military to defuse the political crisis that had started in late January. Egypt’s foreign policy alignment with the U.S. and its “cold peace” with Israel were not the main issues of that crisis, but they certainly didn’t endear him to his people. Since Mubarak stepped down, Egyptian foreign policy has begun slowly readjusting to match Egyptian public opinion. Pakistan’s government is every bit as much out of step with public opinion in its country as Mubarak was, and perhaps even more so. Instead of recognizing the political constraints that limit how much cooperation Pakistan can provide, Americans are adopting the sort of all-or-nothing, “you are with us or against us” pose that guarantees that the U.S. will indeed get nothing if it were to adopt the anti-Pakistani line that is currently being promoted.

Damning Pakistani authorities for not doing enough overlooks the problem they face, which is that their institutions are inevitably starting to reflect the views of the broader population, which are not not at all sympathetic to the U.S. As Lieven wrote three years ago:

The presence of extremist sympathisers in the security services reflects the situation in the population in general. Election results which show the Islamist parties’ share of the national vote as very low are somewhat misleading from this point of view. Pakistanis who have no desire for an Islamist revolution in Pakistan may still sympathise with Pakistanis who hit at the old enemy, India, or at America, now perceived by much of the population as a de facto enemy of Pakistan.

While Americans are appropriately satisfied with bin Laden’s death, there needs to be a serious American effort to understand how much Pakistan has been doing in support of U.S. goals and the limits of what Pakistan can do for the U.S. It is not as much as Americans would want, but it is far more than we have any right to expect.

As Lieven says later:

In the struggle against Islamist extremism and terrorism, Pakistan is a dreadfully flawed and unsatisfactory ally, but it is still an essential ally.