US–Pakistan Relations In The Donald Trump Administration, 2017-2020

This thesis of this analytically is to analyze and explain Trump's foreign policy towards Pakistan.In order to answer the question of why President Donald Trump changed his policy toward Pakistan,what impact does this have on Pakistan? We argue that US President Donald Trump has changed his policy towards Pakistan mainly due to internal and external factors.By domestic factors,we mean American taxpayers who have changed people's perception of Trump.Although the external factors we are talking about referring to Pakistan's role in the peace reconciliation process,it has changed Trump's view of Islamabad.We found that taxpayers have strongly influenced the Trump policies toward Pakistan.It cut-off the economic and military aid,as the taxpayers demanded to do so.Later,Trump's policy toward Pakistan has begun to change because of Pakistan's role in the process of peaceful reconciliation with the Taliban.He believed that the new government in Islamabad had an important role to play,which was later confirmed by persuading the Taliban to sign a peace agreement with the United States.This thesis aims to analytically explain the Donald Trump foreign policies toward Pakistan.In order to answer to the question that why President Donald Trump has changed his policy towards Pakistan,and what are its impacts on Pakistan? We argue that US President Donald Trump has changed his policy towards Pakistan mainly due to domestic and external factors.By domestic factor,we mean the American taxpayer that has changed the perception of Trump.While by an external factor we mean the role of Pakistan in the peace reconciliation process,which has changed the perception of Trump toward Islamabad.We found that taxpayers have strongly influenced the Trump policies toward Pakistan.It cut off the economic and military aid and,as the taxpayers demanded to do so Future,Trump's policies have begun to change toward Pakistan,because of its role in the peace reconciliation process with the Taliban.He believes that the new government in Islamabad can play an important role,for it later convinced the Taliban to sign a peace agreement with the United States,thus confirming this.The method we used in this thesis is qualitative and related to the domain of International Relations.The theoretical framework of this study is neoclassical realism.Here,we conclude that our argument produces a strong analysis that Trump's policy towards Pakistan has changed due to internal and external factors.Our conclusion here is that our argument has produced a strong result that Trump's foreign policy towards Pakistan has changed mainly two times.First due to taxpayer pressure that has eroded both state's relations,while the second time it is changed mainly due to the peace reconciliation process where Pakistan has played an important role and due to this factor both state relations are going toward normalizations.This thesis have total four chapters: Introduction,History,Trump Policy change Toward Pakistan,and US policy Impact on Pakistan.The introduction chapter deals with the overall introduction of the thesis.It explains the research question and main argument,the research objectives,methodology and literature reviews.The historical chapter introduces the overall Past ties among the US and Pakistan relation,which began with the independence of a country after 1947.Islamabad played an important role in the security environment of South Asia as it joined the alliance with the United States against counter communism.At this point,the United States was worried about the spread of communism,while Pakistan was also worried about security threats from India.As a result of these concerns and interdependence,relations between the two countries had strengthened.In 1950,Pakistan's first Prime Minister Liaquat Ali khan paid a successful visit to Washington,where he stressed the importance of bilateral relations and was greatly inspired by the strong constitutional system of the United States.Pakistan joined the US-led regional defense treaties,namely “the Southeast Asian Treaty Organization(SEATO)and the Central Treaty Organization(CENTO)” becoming the first country in South Asia to joined the two organizations at the same time.The two countries signed the SEATO treaty,which was used to defend against communism in the region.As mentioned earlier,both states were concerned with their particular security issues in the region.In April 1959,a bilateral defense agreement was signed between the US and Pakistan.For the US,this agreement was crucial for securing its national interests whereas Pakistan deemed it important for its integrity and independence.In 1980,that time,the US President Ronald Reagan established a military base in Pakistan against the Soviet Union.The Pakistani government had some concerns about Ronald's decision because it promotes the US interests in the region.The major shift in the United States policy towards Pakistan occurred after the horrific terrorist attacks of 9/11.These events once again brought both states to strengthen,their relations and fought against terrorism.The third chapter deals with the main argument.We answered the main question about why Donald Trump changed his policy toward Pakistan.As we argued,it was mainly due to domestic and external factors.By domestic factor,we mean the taxpayer which have affected Trump's policies toward Pakistan.Donald Trump promised during the election campaign that he would use the tax according to the choice of American citizens.He believes that American citizens pay a lot of taxes to the government,which are not used in the right place.After he became president,he first cut off economic and military aid to Pakistan.This action eroded the relations between the two countries.When the new prime minister took office in Pakistan,their relationship strengthened again,calling Imran Khan.Donald Trump believed Imran Khan is a good leader who can help us out of the Afghanistan dilemma.It is well known that Imran Khan has the ability to persuade the Taliban to reach a peace agreement with the United States.Trump's assumption came true,and both the Taliban and the United States signed peace agreements.These developments have strengthened relations between Islamabad and Washington.The fourth chapter discusses the impact of Trump's policies on Islamabad.Pakistan's previous government faced a financial crisis because of the trust deficit between the two countries.Islamabad decides to decide a three-year bailout package agreement with the International Monetary Fund.But at the time,the IMF imposed harsh conditions on Pakistan,such as higher interest rates and exchange rates.Islamabad believes that in imposing these conditions,it is too difficult to obtain loans from the IMF and is incompatible with the country's current economic situation.The United States plays a vital role because it has a 15% share and has the right to decide whether to provide a package of grants to any country.In short,the United States is a major stakeholder in IMF,and Donald Trump used financial institutions to impose different conditions on Islamabad in IMF.The United States has different strategies on how to use financial institutions as a means of interception.Similarly,the financial action task force is determined to check and balance financial controls and stop the terrorist organization.The Group of Seven countries entrusts the FATF to review measures and financial tendencies and take steps in line with domestic and international standards to stop illegal money laundering.When FATF put the name on Pakistan in gray list consequently Washington stopped military equipment for Pakistan is already facing an economic crisis at the domestic level,so it faces serious financing problems after the emergence of the “grey list” under the name of FATF.Recently Pakistan has greatly increased transparency cut off links with alleged terrorist networks and taken stringent measures against those involved in such activities.The United States has repeatedly put pressure on Pakistan to follow the policy of “do more” and take more action toward agreement by the difficulties related the terrorism.The U.S has a key role in the FATF decision making,due to present FATF Associate Administrator from working in the United States Department of the Funds and watched the “Terrorism Finance and Financial Crimes.” These all were a negative impact on Pakistan's choices,because its relations were not good with the US.But,when the new government came into power in Pakistan then relations have begun ameliorated and the positive impact commenced.Relations between the two countries began to normalize during the Imran Khan administration in 2018,with the United States and Pakistan each having a maximum trade volume of $6.6 billion.In 2019,the two leaders discussed the issue of trade between the two countries.Donald Trump pointed out that the establishment for strategic.In relation to both countries the U.S and Pakistan have the best choice for the two countries to reach a free trade agreement.Similarly,political relations between the two countries created to strengthen as,during both state's leaders' meeting,Trump attached greater importance to both states relations.Donald Trump agreed that Pakistan has the capability to resolve the Afghanistan issue.Imran Khan also discussed the Kashmir issue,where Donald Trump agreed to work to resolve the Kashmir issue.Trump revolutionized his behavior with Pakistan,saying “Pakistan never lies” and once again discussed providing security equipment assistants to Pakistan.The United States and Pakistan began a new political relationship,and both countries developed because Trump had a different strategy towards Pakistan when he had a different point of view a few years ago.