The Unbreakable Bond, Why the US Cannot Abandon Pakistan Despite Decades of Betrayal
Pakistan and Iran exchanged missiles between January 16 and 18, 2024, killing 11 people. This was not the first time Pakistan acted against the interests of its Western patrons. Pakistan has repeatedly betrayed the United States since entering its security orbit in the 1950s with the Manila Pact (which became SEATO) and the Baghdad Pact (which became CENTO). Yet, despite this long and sordid history of perfidy, Pakistan remains the interlocutor of choice between Iran and the United States. The question is: why? On that “why” hangs a tale of collusive perfidy and chicanery, but also of deep strategic convergences and shared interests that the West cannot escape.
This article traces the historical arc of the US-Pakistan relationship from the dying days of the British Empire to the present, examines the institutional connections between the Pakistani military and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), explores Pakistan’s role in nuclear proliferation through the A.Q. Khan network, and explains why—despite everything—the United States cannot abandon this treacherous but indispensable ally.
Part I: The Birth of Pakistan as a Western Strategic Project
Pakistan has been a Western strategic project since before its formal inception. In early November 1940, as the Battle of Britain drew to a close, Prime Minister Winston Churchill started ideating with his War Cabinet the division of India into a western periphery. The second iteration of the Great Game had commenced in earnest in Central and West Asia, and Churchill was worried that the Soviet Union’s push into Asia would imperil British interests toward the warm waters of the Arabian Sea.
Churchill thought the Indian National Congress, which in his mind represented the interests of the demographic majority, would be an unreliable ally. This was long before Choudhry Rehmat Ali’s theory of a Muslim nation on the western extremity of India, or the Lahore Resolution of March 1940, had gained any serious traction. The USSR and Germany were on the same side in November 1940, with Operation Barbarossa (the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union) still seven months away. Given the internal ferment in India, a British cat’s-paw strategically positioned with respect to both West and Central Asia became an imperative.
Once the Cold War began, this strategic logic became a priority. It is not a coincidence that the Partition of India in the west in 1947 was carried out in the manner Churchill had proposed to his cabinet colleagues seven years earlier. It was in fact Churchill, as Leader of the Opposition in Britain, who persuaded Muhammad Ali Jinnah to accept a “moth-eaten Pakistan”—a truncated state that was nevertheless strategically positioned to serve Western interests.
Since then, the West has never abandoned this strategic piece of geography, just as it never forsook another faith-based state, Israel, created a year after Pakistan. The parallel is not accidental. Both states were created on religious identity, both have been sustained by Western military and economic aid despite their recurrent betrayals, and both serve as strategic anchors in volatile regions.
Part II: The 1953 Coup and the Birth of Iran’s Nuclear Ambition
The story of Iran’s nuclear programme and its connection to Pakistan begins with a Western betrayal. On August 19, 1953, the CIA and MI6, in a joint operation, overthrew Mohammad Mosaddegh, the democratically elected nationalist Prime Minister of Iran. The pretext was to protect and preserve Western hydrocarbon interests. The real driver was the nationalisation of Iran’s oil industry by Mosaddegh, which threatened British and American oil companies. The coup d’état paved the way for Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi to take an executive role as a reliable Western client.
In 1957, as part of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace programme, the United States approved the supply of nuclear technology to Iran under the aegis of a civil nuclear agreement. In 1967, a five-megawatt research reactor granted by the US to Iran went critical, fuelled by highly enriched uranium—at 93 per cent, weapons-grade. The Shah, however, had more ambitious objectives, and by the 1970s, plans were underway for a massive expansion of Iran’s nuclear power programme.
All of this was done with Western approval, even encouragement. Iran was a pillar of US policy in the Gulf. The Shah was America’s policeman. His nuclear ambitions were seen as a stabilising force.
Part III: The 1979 Revolution and the Lesson of Saddam Hussein
The Shah was toppled in the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The following year, Saddam Hussein, the dictator of Iraq, invaded Iran. Over the next eight years, a generation of Iranian strategic thinkers internalised a devastating doctrinal lesson. The West supplied weapons to Iraq. The Reagan administration actively supported Saddam, removing Iraq from the State Sponsors of Terrorism list, providing agricultural credits that were diverted to military purposes, and turning a blind eye to the use of chemical weapons against Iranian troops and civilians. Global organisations like the United Nations looked away.
The lesson Iran learned was brutally simple: as long as it lacked nuclear weapons, any dictator in the neighbourhood could infringe its sovereignty. International law, treaties, and norms offered no protection. Only strategic autonomy—meaning nuclear weapons—could guarantee security.
Ukraine is learning the same lesson the hard way today, having forsaken its nuclear weapons under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum in exchange for security assurances from the United States, Russia, and the United Kingdom. Those assurances proved worthless in 2014 and 2022. Iran learned this lesson in the 1980s, and it set in motion a clandestine nuclear weapons programme.
Part IV: The Pakistan Connection – A.Q. Khan and the Mart of Nuclear Proliferation
This is where the Pakistan connection becomes critical. Dr. A.Q. Khan, who operated the “Mart of Nuclear Proliferation”—a clandestine international network supplying nuclear technology to rogue states—had reportedly visited the Iranian nuclear reactor at Bushehr in February 1986 and again in January 1987. Between 1989 and 1995, Khan is believed to have shipped over 2,000 components and sub-assemblies for centrifuges to Iran.
Khan was not a rogue actor acting alone. He had the protection and, at minimum, the tacit approval of the Pakistani military establishment. Khan famously stated, “I want to question the bloody holier-than-thou attitude of the Americans and the British. Are these bastards God-appointed guardians of the world?” when asked to justify his international network aimed at providing clandestine nuclear technology to Iran, Libya, and North Korea.
Iran approached Pakistan’s military dictator, General Zia-ul-Haq, for nuclear cooperation—a fact publicly confirmed by former Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani in 2015. The Pakistani military kept successive civilian governments in the dark about Khan’s clandestine activities. Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto stumbled upon this by sheer accident when Rafsanjani asked her to confirm the agreement between the two countries on “special defence matters” while she was on a visit to Tehran in 1989. By that time, reportedly, Iranian scientists had already been trained in Pakistan, at the Centre for Nuclear Studies in Islamabad.
This is the institutional connection between the Pakistani military and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the Praetorian Guard of Iran’s nuclear programme. The relationship is not merely transactional; it is institutionalised, personal, and enduring. Hence the comfort level with Pakistan’s military leadership—currently Field Marshal Asim Munir—as the broker of choice between Iran and the United States.
Part V: A History of Betrayal – Pakistan’s Long Record of Duplicity
Pakistan has let down its Western masters ad nauseam. The pattern is consistent and predictable.
The Afghan Jihad (1980-1989): Pakistan misappropriated weaponry, funds, and other logistics provided by the US for the anti-Soviet mujahideen. Weapons meant for the resistance were diverted, sold, or stockpiled for future use against India and Afghanistan. The infamous “Kalashnikov culture” of modern Pakistan was largely built on misappropriated Western arms.
The Taliban (1996 onwards): After the Soviet withdrawal, the US lost interest in Afghanistan. Pakistan propped up the Taliban, providing safe havens, training, and logistical support. When the Taliban captured Kabul in 1996, Pakistan was one of only three countries (along with Saudi Arabia and the UAE) to recognise the regime.
Sheltering Osama Bin Laden: During the so-called War on Terror, Pakistan sheltered Osama Bin Laden in Abbottabad, just miles from a premier military academy. It also provided safe haven to Mullah Omar and other Taliban regime figures. While accepting billions of dollars in American aid, Pakistani intelligence maintained contacts with the very terrorists the US was fighting.
Nuclear Proliferation: The A.Q. Khan network supplied nuclear technology and know-how to Iran, Libya, and North Korea. This was not merely a private enterprise; it was an instrument of Pakistani state policy, aimed at creating a “nuclear ummah” to counter Western dominance.
Double Game in Afghanistan: For two decades after 2001, Pakistan publicly supported the US-led NATO mission while privately providing sanctuary to the Haqqani network and the Taliban, enabling them to attack American and allied forces.
And yet, despite all this, the Western strategic conception remains unchanged. Pakistan is a vital piece of real estate that should not be abandoned. If it is ruled by a ruthless military dictatorship rather than the raggedness of democracies, all the better for Western purposes. A dictatorship can deliver outcomes—like access, cooperation, and deniability—that democracies cannot.
Part VI: Why the US Cannot Abandon Pakistan – The Realist Calculus
Given the history of betrayal, why does the US continue to engage with Pakistan? The answer lies in a cold, hard realist calculus.
First, geography. Pakistan is strategically positioned at the crossroads of South Asia, Central Asia, and West Asia. It is the only country that shares a border with both Iran and China (through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, a part of the Belt and Road Initiative). It provides the shortest land route from Central Asia to the Arabian Sea. For the US, maintaining access and influence in this region requires a partner on the ground. There is no alternative. India is a rising power, but it does not share a border with Iran or Central Asia. Afghanistan is unstable. Iran is hostile. China is a competitor. Pakistan is the only game in town.
Second, nuclear weapons. Pakistan possesses approximately 170-180 nuclear warheads, a growing arsenal, and diverse delivery systems. The US cannot afford to alienate a nuclear-armed state, especially one located in the world’s most volatile region. The consequences of a complete rupture—a nuclear-armed Pakistan allied exclusively with China and Iran—would be catastrophic for US interests.
Third, access to Iran. Pakistan is the interlocutor of choice between Iran and the US. The institutional connections between the Pakistani military and the IRGC, forged through decades of nuclear cooperation and ideological affinity, give Pakistan unique access. When the US needs to send a message to Iran, test the waters for negotiations, or secure the release of prisoners, it turns to Pakistan. No other channel works as effectively.
Fourth, the Afghan endgame. Afghanistan remains a strategic concern, even after the US withdrawal. The Taliban government in Kabul has close ties to the Pakistani military. The US needs Pakistan to moderate Taliban behaviour on counterterrorism, safe havens, and human rights. Without Pakistani cooperation, the US has no leverage over the Taliban.
Fifth, the China factor. Pakistan is China’s closest ally, the linchpin of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), and a critical node in China’s Belt and Road Initiative. If the US abandons Pakistan, it will push Pakistan even more firmly into China’s embrace. The question for US strategists is not whether Pakistan is a reliable ally—it is not—but whether it is better to have Pakistan inside the Western tent, no matter how problematic, or outside it, in the Chinese tent.
Part VII: The Role of Field Marshal Asim Munir – The Favorite Field Marshal
Enter Field Marshal Asim Munir, Pakistan’s current military ruler or de facto power behind the throne. Munir embodies the paradox of US-Pakistan relations. He is the product of an institution that has betrayed the US repeatedly and systematically. Yet he is also the instrument of outreach—a “tool that can always be discarded at will if things go south,” as the article notes.
The comfort level between the Pakistani military and the IRGC—forged through decades of nuclear collaboration, shared hostility to the West, and a common vision of strategic autonomy—makes Munir the ideal intermediary. He can talk to the Iranians in ways that no American official can. He understands their doctrinal concerns, their paranoia about encirclement, and their red lines. He also has the institutional authority to deliver.
But Munir is also a liability. His loyalties are to the Pakistani military, not to the United States. He will use the US for his purposes and discard it when it no longer serves him. The US knows this. And yet, it continues to deal with him because there is no alternative.
Part VIII: The Moral and Strategic Reckoning
The US-Pakistan alliance is not based on trust, shared values, or mutual respect. It is based on compulsion, geography, and nuclear realities. The US continues to engage with a state that sheltered Osama Bin Laden, propped up the Taliban, proliferated nuclear technology, and repeatedly misappropriated American aid. This is not a partnership of equals; it is an arrangement of convenience between a superpower and a survivalist state.
For India, this is a source of persistent frustration—but also a cautionary tale. The West’s inability to abandon Pakistan, despite decades of betrayal, demonstrates that strategic interests trump moral outrage. India must therefore calibrate its own expectations of the West. The US will continue to engage with Pakistan, will continue to provide military aid (however dressed up in civilian garb), and will continue to treat Pakistani concerns as legitimate, no matter how much evidence accumulates of Pakistani duplicity.
The only way to change this calculus is to make Pakistan less strategically relevant. That means India must grow stronger, more prosperous, and more indispensable to the West. It means India must offer the US access, intelligence, and partnership that Pakistan cannot match. It means India must become, in effect, the alternative to Pakistan that the US has long sought but never found.
Conclusion: The Unbreakable Bond
Pakistan has betrayed the West repeatedly, from the 1950s to the present day. It misappropriated weapons during the Afghan Jihad. It propped up the Taliban. It sheltered Osama Bin Laden. It proliferated nuclear technology to Iran, Libya, and North Korea. It has played a double game in Afghanistan for decades. Yet the United States cannot abandon it.
The reason is not sentiment, shared history, or any illusion about Pakistani reliability. The reason is strategic necessity. Geography, nuclear weapons, access to Iran, the Afghan endgame, and the China factor all compel the US to maintain a relationship with Pakistan, no matter how dysfunctional.
The West created Pakistan as a strategic project in the 1940s. It sustained Pakistan through the Cold War. It overlooked Pakistan’s nuclear proliferation. It continues to overlook Pakistan’s double game. And it will continue to do so, because in the grand calculus of global power, some pieces of real estate are too valuable to abandon—even when they betray you, again and again.
Who better than the “favourite field marshal” to become the instrument of outreach? A tool that can always be discarded at will if things go south. But the tool knows it is indispensable. And that is the tragedy of US-Pakistan relations.
5 Questions & Answers Based on the Article
Q1. According to the article, how was Pakistan conceived as a Western strategic project even before its independence in 1947?
A1. In November 1940, as the Battle of Britain drew to a close, Winston Churchill began ideating with his War Cabinet the division of India into a western periphery. With the Soviet Union potentially pushing toward the warm waters of the Arabian Sea and the Indian National Congress seen as an unreliable ally, a British cat’s-paw strategically positioned with respect to both West and Central Asia became an imperative. It was Churchill, as Leader of the Opposition, who later persuaded Muhammad Ali Jinnah to accept a “moth-eaten Pakistan.” The 1947 partition in the west was carried out in the manner Churchill had proposed seven years earlier. Pakistan was thus a Western strategic project from its inception.
Q2. What was the doctrinal lesson Iran learned from the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War, and how did it lead to Iran’s nuclear programme?
A2. During the Iran-Iraq War, the West supplied weapons to Saddam Hussein, and global organisations like the UN looked away when Hussein used chemical weapons on Iranian troops and civilians. Iran learned that as long as it lacked nuclear weapons, any dictator in the neighbourhood could infringe its sovereignty with impunity. International law, treaties, and norms offered no protection. This lesson—that only strategic autonomy, meaning nuclear weapons, could guarantee security—set in motion a clandestine Iranian nuclear weapons programme. The article draws a parallel to Ukraine, which learned the same lesson after forsaking its nuclear weapons under the 1994 Budapest Memorandum.
Q3. What was the role of A.Q. Khan’s network in Iran’s nuclear programme, and what was Khan’s stated justification for his actions?
A3. A.Q. Khan, who operated the “Mart of Nuclear Proliferation,” reportedly visited Iran’s Bushehr reactor in 1986 and 1987. Between 1989 and 1995, Khan shipped over 2,000 components and sub-assemblies for centrifuges to Iran. Iran had approached Pakistan’s military dictator General Zia-ul-Haq for nuclear cooperation. The Pakistani military kept civilian governments in the dark about these activities. When asked to justify his network (which also supplied Libya and North Korea), Khan famously stated: “I want to question the bloody holier-than-thou attitude of the Americans and the British. Are these bastards God-appointed guardians of the world?” He believed in breaking the monopoly of established powers on nuclear weapons.
Q4. Despite Pakistan’s long history of betraying the West, why does the article argue that the US cannot abandon Pakistan?
A4. The article identifies five strategic reasons: (1) Geography – Pakistan is strategically positioned at the crossroads of South, Central, and West Asia, and is the only country that shares a border with both Iran and China. (2) Nuclear weapons – Pakistan has 170-180 warheads; alienating a nuclear-armed state in a volatile region is too risky. (3) Access to Iran – Pakistan’s institutional connections with the IRGC make it the indispensable intermediary between the US and Iran. (4) The Afghan endgame – The US needs Pakistan to moderate Taliban behaviour on counterterrorism and safe havens. (5) The China factor – If the US abandons Pakistan, it will push Pakistan even more firmly into China’s embrace. Cold strategic necessity, not trust, compels the US to maintain the relationship.
Q5. What is the institutional connection between the Pakistani military and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), and why does this make Pakistan the “interlocutor of choice” between Iran and the US?
A5. The institutional connection was forged through decades of nuclear cooperation, starting with General Zia-ul-Haq’s agreement with Iran, the training of Iranian scientists in Pakistan, and the A.Q. Khan network’s supply of centrifuge components to Iran. This created a relationship of trust and shared strategic outlook between the Pakistani military establishment and the IRGC—the Praetorian Guard of Iran’s nuclear programme. This unique access, which no other country (including the US itself) possesses, makes Pakistan the natural interlocutor when the US needs to communicate with Iran, test the waters for negotiations, or secure diplomatic breakthroughs. The current Pakistani military leadership, including Field Marshal Asim Munir, benefits from this historical relationship.
