While Pakistan, a major non-Nato ally of the United States in its war against terrorism, pressing its mentors in Washington for stopping the counter-productive drone attacks inside its territory, a majority of defence analysts in Pentagon believe that US would suddenly invade Pakistani tribal areas in case of a fresh 9/11 like attack on its spoil.
This was revealed by Professor Anatol Lieven, a war studies expert from London's King's College, in his address during a roundtable session on "Changing Nature of War and War Studies" at Pakistan Institute of International Affairs (PIIA).
"Most of the analysts in Pentagon I have talked to are of the view that if, God forbid, another major attack carried out in US (perceivably by al Qaeda) the American response will be to invade Fata suddenly," he added.
Terming the US drone attacks in Fata as the "most dangerous" phenomenon, Lieven, who has a South Asian origin from his Bihar-born mother, said the indiscriminate assaults by foreigners were proving counter-productive and besides diminishing image of Pakistan Army's "Jawans" who could not help it.
Citing Turkey as an example, the professor rejected talks of sending the "over-mighty" armed forces back to the barracks as "stupid" and beyond the "reality", saying that there should be "some sort of institutional, stable balance" between the military and political institutions.
He said despite all disturbances on politico-religious and socio-economic fronts, Pakistan could not break up territorially until the US committed an "enormous mistake".
The war expert, who is going to write a book provisionally titled "How Pakistan Works", said the victory could not be defined in "war on terror" about which, he said, Washington was being ambitious. "Defining a complete victory is difficult and (ultimately) the US will have to abandon its ambitious thinking of a complete victory," he observed.
Lieven said most of the "words" being used by the states and media in West to define developments taking place in Pakistan "do not mean what they are supposed to mean."
He said the people's widespread perception that Pakistan was not working had motivated him to name his book on Pakistan as "How Pakistan Works." Calling the usage of word "failed state" for Pakistan as one of the most "infuriated" statements, the British war studies expert said Pakistan was a "troubled state" having "dreadful mess" like Fata etc.
"If Pakistan was a failed state we would not have been here," he argued. To him the civil institutions in Pakistan had never been following their own rules and values. To a query Lieven said at present Pakistan was in a dire need for "money" which had taken away Islamabad's bargaining leverage against Washington, as compared to 2001's Musharraf regime which was more stronger diplomatically. The session was attended by academicians, media persons, members of the PIIA and students of international relations.
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